The growing ROPO phenomenon, where customers research online using their mobiles and buy offline, makes it vital for retailers to be more than just mobile-friendly. Kevin Sparks, Commercial Director at FACT-Finder shares the mobile search essentials that every retailer needs to know.

"Customers coming into a store today are better informed than the sales staff."

So says Jörg Geilgens, Client Solution Manager at IBM.

This isn’t down to poor training by retailers, but because the vast majority of people with a smartphone (88% to be precise) use it to carry out research before even entering a physical store.

This new form of retail therapy means customers visit stores on a mission to buy, having already done their browsing online. This means they are more likely to buy, making this mobile habit – called ROPO – vital to retailers.

The downside is that if your online shop isn’t mobile friendly, these ROPO-ers won’t be heading your way. And that’s pretty much everyone with a mobile – do you know anyone in the UK and Europe without a smartphone?

If you want to become a real ROPO magnet, you need to be more than just mobile-friendly – you need to be mobile-optimised. This means making it as easy as possible to search for your products with a smartphone. So where do you start?

According to an eMarketer report, B2C ecommerce spend in the USA will stretch to $538.9billion in 2015 (an 11.4% increase on last year). As America holds on to its title as the largest international ecommerce market, it’s no surprise that European businesses are looking to pack up and expand to the states. To help you along, we’ve listed four tactics that every marketer should be adopting in the year ahead.

2015 US and UK Predictions

As mobile users tap away more than ever, and desktop use begins slowing down, we’re predicting big changes in marketing practises.

Social Ad Focus will grow

72% of all internet users are now active on social media (Bullas), and they’ve never been more targetable. With social ad algorithms now filtering demographic, geographic and social profiling, it’s quickly becoming one of the most affordable and efficient ways to reach your target audience.

We’ll see more Video Content 

2014 saw the rise of visual content marketing with infographics spreading across magazines, blogs and social media. But with the industry rapidly progressing, it could see the focus progress to video marketing as it offers a more engaging way to grasp the consumer’s attention.

Here’s a sobering thought: in the next few years, Generation Z – those born around the year 2000 – will be hitting their upper teens, entering their 20s and then embarking upon their careers. The challenge for businesses is finding a way to market to this new generation – a generation who interact with society very differently to their predecessors.

To give that some context, 81% of Generation Z use some kind of social media and have been broadly dubbed ‘Screenagers’ because they have grown up with the internet a constant presence in their lives. But the obvious routes may not necessarily be the most effective: 25% left Facebook in 2014; clearly, informed and lateral thinking is needed.

So, how can businesses reach out to individuals with an attention span of just eight seconds? The infographic below is packed with useful advice and tips…

All heroes start somewhere. – Guardians of the Galaxy

The vast majority of shopping is still done in stores – which is why location now makes mobile the most potent media for advertising for retailers.

Let’s face it: Black Friday 2014 brought the blues to retailers. Even after doling out deep discounts on merchandise, retailers struggled to entice shoppers to Black Friday sales events. Spending was down 11 percent from a year earlier according to the National Retail Federation. A tiny bit of relief came with Cyber Monday results – e-commerce sales on the Monday after Thanksgiving hit $2.04 billion, up 17 percent compared to a year ago, but e-commerce only accounts for a mere 9 percent of total retail sales. The vast majority of shopping is still done in stores – which is why location now makes mobile the most potent media for advertising for retailers.

A few retailers are leading the charge in this space with interesting results. Lorna Jane, a leading retailer in women's fitness apparel uses theMomentFeed mobile marketing platform to target custom audiences on Facebook with localized ads. The ad dynamically changes based on the location of the Facebook user, allowing for content that was relevant and personal. “The goal is to help larger retailers maintain that level of personalization in a way that scales across hundreds or even thousands of locations,” says Elle Morgan, MomentFeed’s Marketing Manager.

"We crashed and broke Twitter. We have made history." - Ellen Degeneres, March 2014

Millennials are called the “selfie-generation.” It might seem like a dis, but smart publishers know that it’s actually a good thing. It means millennials are self-aware, selective and smart. When we take a selfie, it becomes part of our personal brand online—the brand image that defines who we are, what we like and what we stand for. While members of previous generations would rather floss than see themselves in a video, we post selfies to Instagram and Vine constantly. We’re not afraid to put ourselves out there—and you shouldn’t be either. If you look a bit closer at the selfie generation, and take some cues from our quirkiness and self-deprecating wit, you might just let a few of us off the hook. 

Video has already been an important element of digital campaigns this year, but with video consumption becoming an increasingly more popular way for consumers to consume media, it’s vital for marketers that haven’t yet jumped on board the trend to engage with their customers via the channel.

Syndacast has pulled together an infographic looking at video trends from this year and what marketers can expect heading into 2015. Check it out below:

“May the odds be ever in your favour.” – The Hunger Games

Predicting the future is never easy, but it’s always interesting – regardless of whether you’re envisioning a chilling dystopia or a brave new world. 2015 is going to be a bit of both in Digital Media, the convergence of a brand’s website, social media, mobile marketing, games and apps. Smart publishers and marketers will anticipate industry changes and take advantage of new opportunities – before they become the standard.

Here are 5 trends you’ll see in Digital Media in 2015:

The phrase “Don’t leave home without it” was about a credit card, but now it applies just as much to smartphones. We love our phones. We talk to them, we depend on them to get us around, and we wouldn't dream of leaving home without them. According to Flurry Analytics, U.S. consumers spend an average of 2 hours and 38 minutes per day on smartphones and tablets. According to Nielsen, iPhone and Android usage for U.S. people over age 18 has increased 65 percent over just two years ago. In Q4 of 2013, users spent an average 30 hours and 15 minutes per month on mobile apps.

But in the midst of this mobile obsession, a new wave of simple apps, based on nothing but notifications, are clamoring to take up where Yo left off, to turn your lock screen into a carefully-curated hub where you only see the stuff you like.

“We’re now entering an age where apps function as service layers. No longer battling for a ‘homescreen’ position, new apps are emerging that are only meant to be used when they have something to explicitly tell you, rather than functioning as time-wasters you browse idly during your downtime,” writes Sara Perez in TechCrunch.