Booksellers and other retailers suffered from a 400 percent increase in “showrooming” this year according to a new report, as more customers use smartphones and other mobile devices to comparison shop.
AppNewser has all the details:
according to a new report from marketing company Pargo, comparison shopping on a smartphone while in-store is up 400% over last year. This new behavior is helping Amazon. According to Pargo’s research, “Dynamic Pricing in a Smartphone World: A Shopper Showrooming Study,” a price difference as little as $5 can make shoppers order from Amazon instead of purchasing that item in the store. It’s no wonder that Barnes & Noble has had so much trouble. Readers can easily browse new books on their big tables and then pay less to order their reading lists on Amazon, who isn’t paying for the showroom floor.
Toward the end of the report, another Pargo infographic showed how stores can fight back against showrooming by matching online discounts. The chart outlines the percentage of customers who will buy (or even buy more) if retailers match prices. We’ve embedded the complete chart above.
You can read the complete report below…