According to a recent report from Hitwise, nearly 60 percent of all Online Searches are now carried out on a mobile device, with some sectors (Food and Beverage) reaching 72 percent.
Hitwise analyzed hundreds of millions of online search queries across multiple devices, including 3.5 million smartphones and tablets between April 10 and May 7, 2016, and included searches across all search engines.
Hitwise found that 72 percent of all searches to a food and beverage website was carried out using a mobile device, while just 39 percent of banking searches came from a mobile device. Here are the full results:
| Industry | Share of online searches initiated on a mobile device |
| Food and Beverage | 72 percent |
| Health | 68 percent |
| Sports | 68 percent |
| News and Media | 64 percent |
| Lifestyle | 62 percent |
| Automotive | 62 percent |
| Retail | 56 percent |
| Travel (non-maps) | 52 percent |
| Real estate / Property | 48 percent |
| Entertainment | 42 percent |
| Banking | 39 percent |
According to the findings, mobile searches tend to serve a larger role in answering consumers’ questions earlier on the purchase journey, with navigational or brand specific searches still more likely to be conducted from a desktop.
On the other hand, location-based searches (i.e. “near me”), are almost exclusively carried out on mobile.
Other takeaways from the report include:
- Mobile searches are more likely to be structured in the form of a question, including words such as “how”, “are”, “where”, and “is”.
- Breaking news, medical symptoms and product recalls are heavily tilted toward mobile users.
- While large purchases may start off with mobile searches, there is a clear transition to desktop searches as users carry out more intense research or conduct the actual transaction.
- In what seems to fly in the face of logic, mobile searches tend to be slightly longer (character length) than desktop. For example, the average desktop search that resulted in a visit to Food & Beverage website is 2.2 words or13.8 characters in length, whereas a mobile search was 2.5 words or 15.5 characters in length.
The report further breaks down some of the main Industries, and we have highlighted the key takeaways below:
Retail
Percentage of searches initiated on mobile with the following retail search themes:
| Research Theme | Percentage | Takeaway |
| 24 hours | 82 percent | Mobile shoppers want to find out which shops are open. |
| Engagement Rings | 82 percent | Top secret purchases, such as engagement rings are more likely to be carried out on a mobile. |
| Reviews | 82 percent | Shoppers are seeking information such as reviews in-store. |
| Layaway | 89 percent | Poor consumers may only have a mobile device to connect to the internet. |
| Return Policy | 77 percent | Counteract buyer’s remorse by making information easy to find. |
| Coupon | 77 percent | Consumers can be persuaded even after entering the store. |
Banking and Finance
Percentage of searches initiated on mobile with the following retail search themes:
| Research Theme | Percentage | Takeaway |
| ATM | 84 percent | Consumers that require cash will search on their phone. |
| 30-year mortgage | 73 percent | Homebuyers will search on their phone for information |
| Payday Loan | 70 percent | Low-income consumers frequently use mobile devices. |
| Interest Rate | 65 percent | When shopping for the best interest rates or loans, mobile is commonly used. |
| Car Loan | 58 percent | Less common on mobile than mortgage searches, but still dominant. |
| Credit Report | 38 percent | The later stages of of big purchases are not so common on mobile devices. |
Travel
Percentage of searches initiated on mobile with the following retail search themes:
| Research Theme | Percentage | Takeaway |
| Wait time | 93 percent | Travelers turn to mobile to find estimated wait times of security queues etc. |
| Places to eat | 88 percent | Tourists tend to only have mobile devices available to make searches. |
| Flights from | 66 percent | Travellers looking for a destination prefer to browse on mobile. |
| Flights to | 53 percent | Once a destination has been chosen, users tend to move to the destop. |
| Best time to visit | 79 percent | Early stage travel planning is common on mobile devices. |
| Exchange rate | 34 percent | Financial topics tend to be researched more on desktops. |
Food and Beverage
Percentage of searches initiated on mobile with the following retail search themes:
| Research Theme | Percentage | Takeaway |
| Shots | 95 percent | The Bartender’s bible. |
| Is/Are…? | 88 percent | Is soy sauce vegan? Quick searches for answers are predominantly mobile. |
| How to… | 82 percent | Cooks looking for tips. |
| Ideas | 80 percent | Meal inspiration while shopping for food. |
| Recall | 80 percent | Food safety concerns can strike at any time. |
| Calories | 79 percent | Checking calories before eating. |