CNIT-Research: It is estimated that the number of Chinese mobile online shopping users will reach 370 million in 2013

According to the latest survey conducted by CNIT-Research (China IT Research Center) on August 12, 2013, the proportion of female mobile online shopping users continues to grow, and the purchases of women's clothing and shoes, beauty and cosmetics, maternity and baby products, snacks and fruits and vegetables continue to rise in the mobile online shopping market. Although 44.5% of the respondents said that they had never used mobile networks for shopping, the number of mobile online shopping users has been growing rapidly in the past two years. CNIT-Research predicts that the scale of mobile e-commerce users in my country will reach 370 million in 2013.

In 2009, the number of mobile e-commerce users in my country reached 36 million, which climbed to 77 million in 2010 and 150 million in 2011, a year-on-year increase of 94.8%. In 2012, the number of mobile e-commerce users reached about 250 million, a year-on-year increase of 67%. CNIT-Research predicts that this number will grow to 370 million by 2013 (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: my country's mobile online shopping users will reach 370 million in 2013

The survey results show that in the second quarter of 2013, the gender structure of my country's mobile online shopping users was more balanced, with males accounting for 51% and females accounting for 49% (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Gender structure of mobile online shopping users

In the second quarter, the proportion of female users of various mobile e-commerce platforms continued to rise. In the past, the proportion of mobile online shopping users was higher in men than in women. With the surge in the number of smartphones and female users, the proportion of female users has continued to grow. This is mainly due to the quiet rise of female consumer power, especially women's clothing and shoes, beauty and cosmetics, maternal and child products, and snacks and fruits and vegetables in the mobile online shopping market.

Among mobile online shopping users, those aged between 19 and 30 account for more than half of the total, reaching 58%. The largest number of users are aged between 19 and 25, accounting for 35%, followed by those aged between 26 and 30, accounting for 23%, those aged between 31 and 35, accounting for 18%, and those aged over 36, accounting for 11% (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Age structure of mobile online shopping users

Those under the age of 18 account for as much as 13%. Compared with the age structure of online shopping users, the age of mobile online shopping users is relatively young.

However, mobile online shopping users are gradually penetrating from the early young, low-income and low-educated groups to other groups. Taobao, JD.com, Dangdang and other companies have also invested more resources in the promotion of mobile business, which has brought about the rapid growth of mobile business and expanded to older groups.

The survey results show that among mobile online shopping users, those with a college or bachelor's degree account for nearly half, reaching 48% (as shown in Figure 4).

Figure 4: Educational background of mobile online shopping users

The proportion of high school/technical secondary school graduates is as high as 28%, which is much higher than the 4% of online shopping users with "less than high school", indicating that mobile network users have lower education levels than online network users. However, as the service areas of mobile e-commerce become more and more extensive, smart phones become more popular, and the business model of smart phones becomes clearer, the overall market scale continues to expand, the education structure of mobile online shopping users will also be closer to that of online shopping users.

Figure 5: Mobile online shopping users’ usage time

It is worth noting that the results in the above chart (Figure 5) are derived from the comprehensive statistical results of the survey of online shopping users and mobile online shopping users. In the survey of online shopping users, 44.5% said that they had never used mobile networks for shopping. The survey of mobile online shopping users is reflected in the relative proportions of the other three groups of data in the figure.

The results of CNIT-Research show that most of the mobile online shopping users have joined the ranks of mobile online shopping in the past two years, among which the largest number have just joined for 1-2 years, and there are also many who have joined within the past year, indicating that the number of mobile online shopping users is growing rapidly.