According to a joint study by Deloitte and the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India, global e-commerce sales made through mobile devices are expected to reach over $638 billion by 2018.

At present, the availability of e-commerce applications on various mobility devices is playing a key role in driving sales and revenue for e-tailers. For example, e-tailers such as Flipkart, Amazon and Jabong now get 50 per cent of their revenues from consumers shopping on their mobile phones. The study results indicate that while shoppers want real-time, relevant, and personalised information and offers, retailers will need to provide users privacy and security to promote loyalty as mobile retailing becomes the norm. The e-tailers will further benefit if they enable all features from search-to-purchase on mobile applications, such as facilitating product research, price comparison, view ratings and reviews, and payment.

The study titled, ‘Global Powers of Retailing 2015’ also points out that the launch of wearables, such as Google Glass and Apple Watch, is opening up new opportunities for reaching out to customers and the e-marketplaces are growing significantly with the increase in the internet penetration and smartphone usage. Interestingly in developing countries such as India, cash-on-delivery has emerged as the most preferred mode of payment in India with 45 per cent of the buyers opting for the service, whereas 21 per cent and 16 per cent of shoppers prefer to make payments through debit cards and credit cards, respectively.