Some interesting take-aways on consumer behaviour on mobile devices from research carried out by Nielsen on a good sample of US smartphone and tablet users.
The Mobile Path-to-Purchase research looks at mobile searches and activity in the restaurant, automotive and travel sectors to reveal how consumers use devices differently based on the product or service they're researching.
The time taken before a purchase varies widely with only a third of travel searchers looking to complete the transaction within the day reflecting the research required compared to 87% in the restaurant category (with restaurants 64% want to make a decision within an hour) and 49% in automotive.
However, despite the time put into researching travel, mobile is having an effect on the consumer journey as the study reveals 46% of mobile travel searchers went on to make a purchase.
The majority of travel searchers (almost three-quarters) on both smartphones and tablets had made no decision on purchase when they first accessed the website or application.
According to the research, commissioned by mobile advertising network xAd and mobile call measurement specialist Telmetrics, smartphone owners looking for restaurants or cars turn to local directory applications while consumers researching travel head for brand websites.
For tablet users however, regardless of vertical, websites are the most popular.
Also, smartphone owners go directly to the app or website rather than being directed by a browser regardless of category while tablet users vary according to the product or service but with travel searchers again relying heavily on brand websites.
When it comes to mobile advertising, local relevance is all important when it comes to clicking on an ad followed by an ad with a promotion or coupon and then, an ad with a known brand.
The research was carried out on 1500 US smartphone and tablet users as well as learnings from Nielsen's smartphone analytics panel of 6,000 Apple and Android users.