New Survey Says Local Businesses Need to Focus on Mobile

A new survey has shown that consumers are unsatisfied with the quality of service from small and local businesses when it comes to their mobile platforms, which can affect the consumer’s decision to make a purchase.

A Neustar and 15miles study, which was conducted by comScore, tells us that while four out of five mobile searches leads to a sale, consumers tend to search on multiple devices and often prefer PCs and laptops for searching for content from SMBs and local businesses.

The survey studied the searching habits of 3,000 users to gain an insight into how we browse mobile content with 63 percent using mobile devices to search for local businesses.

Researchers note that PC-based searches increased slightly year-over-year in 2013, which they say was caused by a six percent decline in searches on websites other than search engines, such as social media.

The audience for mobile phones and tablets is growing too, where 79 percent of mobile phone users and 81 percent of tablet users are searching for local businesses through these devices.

This represents a huge potential market for small business owners to capitalize on mobile, say the researchers. Mobile phones has the highest conversion rate of all devices. The survey states that nearly 80 percent of mobile searches end in a purchase, with tablets at 64 percent.

“This research may be our clearest indication yet of the ongoing maturation of the mobile market,” said Brian Wool, vice president of content distribution at Neustar.

“On the one hand, consumers will continue to enjoy a wide variety of form factors, operating systems and particularly applications,” he said. “At the same time, they expect a consistent and navigable search functionality that serves up exactly the depth and quality of information they need. Vendors that can offer such services can gain a clear and competitive advantage.”

Mike Pycha, executive director at Neustar said that this is a, “tremendous opportunity” for small companies to excel. “More than half the consumers in this survey, 54 percent, stress the importance of mobile site design,” he said. “That should be a clarion call to the many vendors who still see mobile as a lower priority than their primary online offerings.”