• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, August 21, 2012

Auto panel moderator Chuck Martin got the conversation off with an audience poll at the Mobile Insider Summit, asking how many people in the audience had used a tablet or smartphone to search about a car purchase. (An overwhelming response.) Then he asked how many people in the audience were happy about the car purchasing experience. (Crickets chirping.)

The point is that car-buying is second only to dental hygiene appointments in terms of less-than-desirable user experiences, and mobile can help change that.

It’s still a work in progress though. Edumunds.com Vice Chairman Jeremy Anwyl , for example, pointed out that Edmunds first foray into mobile was a WAP site. “Remember WAP,” he exclaimed. I’m not sure many in this audience actually did. (WAP, by the way, stands for Wireless Application Protocol, and it was kind of clunky compared to the mobile optimized Web sites of today.)

That said, Anwyl said user experiences are changing and so are mobile publishing and marketing platforms.

For example, he said about 15% of Edumunds traffic currently comes from mobile, and by the end of the year, he predicts it will be about 25%. Best of all, he said, mobile usage seems to be additive, and is giving consumers the option of accessing automotive information in places and at times when they couldn’t do it with a desktop, or laptop browsing experience.

“It seems to be additive growth,” Anwyl said, adding, “But they are doing different things.”

By different, he laid out a scenario that reminded me more of old school network TV dayparting, then mobile optimization.

Speaking of Edumunds 18 million monthly users, he said much of their desktop browsing usage occurs during weekdays – especially “heavy usage on Monday,” most likely to follow up on weekend dealer shopping experiences.

“A lot of people using desktops during the day, but in the evenings we see a lot of usage, particularly on iPads. And then smartphones on the weekends,” he explained.

Another developing phenomenon, he said, was “linking devices.” For example, he said it is customary for a desktop browser user to send their results to a portable device so that they could take the information “out into the field.”

That said, Anwyl doesn’t believe that mobile platforms – or even conventional Web sites – will ever become a material way of “consummating the sale.”

Anwyl’s comment seemed to contradict the data presented earlier by Kia’s Ryan Wein that half of all mobile searches for cars result in a purchase, but Wein didn’t actually say how many of the conversions actually consummated on a mobile device, did he?

“In terms of actually consummating the sale, I don’t think that will happen on any one of these platforms,” Anwyl said, noting that much of the final steps of buying a car, particularly filling out “government forms,” have to take place at the dealer.

“We do think we can get the actual delivery process down to one hour,” Anwyl said.