Consumers browsing -- but not buying -- via mobile and social media
Consumers increasingly rely on smartphones and social media to discover and research products of interest, but relatively few people go on to make mobile purchases, according to new research from Synchrony Financial. Specifically, 45 percent of respondents performed shopping-related tasks via mobile, up 4 percent since last year, but only 18 percent of browsers went on to purchase a product using a mobile device. Mobile discount offers are also popular, with 66 percent of respondents regularly using them, but that number is down from 71 percent last year, Synchrony says.