Google: 44% of search traffic during Christmas 2011 is expected to come from mobile devices

Google's keyword search traffic share for the top retail brands in the U.S. in 2009 and 2010

On the afternoon of September 7, 2011, Google predicted in its latest report that based on the growth rate data of the past few years, 44% of consumers' last-minute searches for gifts and stores during this Christmas holiday will come from mobile devices.

According to Google, 44% of total searches in the US will come from smartphones by then. This has significant implications for paid search and SEO. For example, on the smaller screen of a smartphone, only the top search results will be noticed by consumers.

Google has studied the mobile shopping patterns of American consumers over the past two years and found that during the Christmas holiday, there will be two peaks in searches from mobile devices, the first on Black Friday and the second on the last weekend before Christmas.

Mobile searches showed the same trend in both 2009 and 2010. However, in 2010, searches from mobile devices increased significantly compared to 2009. This year, such searches are expected to continue to grow.

Google also said that users who search for products and stores on their phones are more likely to make purchases than other users. Based on data from a 2011 AdMob survey, Google said that 65% of respondents answered the following question in the affirmative: Have you used a smartphone to find a business and then made a purchase? Other data also reflect the same trend.

Google's survey also shows that smartphone and tablet users will start shopping before Thanksgiving this year. Therefore, merchants need to be prepared for this part of consumers, especially the increasing number of iPad users. In addition to search engine optimization and paid advertising, merchants have other ways to optimize online services, such as considering the use of HTML5 technology, applications and landing pages.

Google engineer Michael Slinger said that most of Google's advertisers have not yet optimized for mobile search results, accounting for 79% of advertisers in February this year. Google's data shows that consumers are adopting mobile technology at an increasingly rapid pace, and retailers and marketers who have not yet optimized their online services for mobile technology or have not yet developed a mobile paid search strategy will fall behind.