Midday on Mondays is the peak time for American consumers to shop online, according to May data compiled by Buy.com, Rakuten’s flagship online retail destination in the U.S. The new report shows that Monday lunch breaks across the country are the most popular time for consumers to shop online.
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Mondays have the highest volume of traffic on the site, according to the report, along with the highest number of orders placed on that day. After Mondays, shopping and browsing habits for U.S. consumers trend lower, according to the report. Data shows that the online purchase volume on Mondays implies that consumers browse the Internet to compare prices and buy merchandise they saw in retail stores over the weekend.
Online and mobile purchases peak at the same times during the week and on the weekend. During weekdays, the report says the typical peak time for orders being placed starts mid-morning, around 10:00 a.m. and extends to midday. On Sundays, orders peak in the evening around 7.
“During the morning hours, consumers are just as likely to shop on their mobile device as they are on their desktops, indicating that mobile shopping is providing consumers easy and convenient ways to shop anytime, anywhere,” Bernard Luthi, chief marketing officer for Rakuten’s Buy.com, said in the report.
The report reveals that during their online and mobile shopping experiences, consumers are spending more time browsing categories that tend to have a higher price tag — specifically computers, electronics, clothing and bags, where an average of 4.4 to 4.7 minutes are spent viewing before purchasing. Less viewing time occurs in categories with lower price tags, including books, office supplies and video games, where an average of 2.8 to 3.2 minutes are spent between browsing and the point of purchase.
For more news related to ecommerce trends, take a look at our MCM Outlook 2012-13 Report.
Jim Tierney ([email protected]) is a senior writer for Multichannel Merchant. You can connect with him on Twitter (TierneyMCM) and LinkedIn, or call him at 203-358-4265.