iPad Drives 89% of Mobile Shopping Revenue. Time for New Category

When I look at my Google Analytics reports, analyzing specifically the “mobile devices” that my visitors use to access the website I see that iPads top every other device (i) driving more traffic (55.5%) than any other device in the category, (ii) registering more “pages per visit” than any other device, and (iii) keeping people on my website for nearly twice as long as its closest “competitor”:

But is this iPad’s tremendous lead really that surprising? If you’ve ever tried browsing the Web using an iPad — having a chance to compare it to a similar experience on any mobile phone — the answer is obvious: the disparity is just as tremendous.

Earlier today MarketingCharts.com has published some interesting statistics on mobile shopping quoting RichRelevance’s recent study — where the latter have analyzed nearly 4.5 billion shopping sessions that have occurred at US retail websites between April 2011 and March 2012 and arrived at a number of interesting graphs including the below ones:

Again, the numbers in that fourth chart are hardly surprising! Whether this is because iPad users are more affluent than others, or simply because it is considerably more convenient to shop from an iPad than from a mobile phone; but it does seem like it’s high time to finally introduce a third category — one that would combine tablets (such as iPads, Eee Pads, Nooks, Kindles, etc) and netbooks, segregating them from computers (desktop and laptop ones) and definitely from mobile phones.

Happy to hear your thoughts on the subject. That’s what the “Comments” area is for, and should you have anything to add, I’m all ears.