Our blog

Let’s take a look

The burgeoning field of tablet shoppers is certainly unique. While only 3% of all online revenue comes from mobile devices, and only 21% of that comes from tablets, tablet users on a whole convert at a 33-66% higher rate than shoppers using PCs (WSJ, 2011; Vertic, 2011). In addition, tablet users spend more money on their purchases than other shoppers! Some reports cite tablet users as spending 10-20% more per order (Vertic, 2011) than those on other platforms.

As with most areas of design, it’s best to focus on the most used device or platform and then work your way out from there. Recent studies have found that over 97% of tablet traffic in the US is driven by iPads (ComScore, 2011). This means it is crucial for designers to optimize their sites for iPad viewing.

However, it’s not just that more people are using iPads. More importantly, iPad shoppers are also more likely to purchase when they do shop from their device; in December 2011, conversion rates for iPad shoppers were a record 6.3 percent, versus the 3.1 percent conversion rate for all mobile devices (IBM Benchmark Report, 2011). All of this means that designing for iPads is a good place to start.

 A tablet is a tablet is a tablet…

Now that you know to design for iPads in particular, let’s look at tablet design a little more broadly. Tablets are great for sales + interaction, but it can be tricky to ensure that your emails and websites make a smooth transition between PCs and mobile.

54% of tablet owners use the devices to read email, so it’s important to make the entire user experience tablet-friendly. This means that you can’t just concern yourself with making a mobile-ready site; you also have to take into account the entire e-commerce experience, from email to purchase.