• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer, August 25, 2016

Mobile commerce is now mainstream, no longer an afterthought. According to global retail leaders, reported by Katie Evans, Internet Mobile Editor, the 2017 Mobile 500 are reaping the benefits of mobile, and are projected to grow their mobile sales 53.4% to roughly $220.4 billion this year. Top players in the Mobile 500 are experimenting with new technologies that can transform commerce.

The largest mobile commerce players in the world, those ranked in the just-released 2017 Mobile 500, will grow their sales from mobile devices 53.4% as they recognize that Mobile is just as important, or more than, desktop.

That comes after a big year in 2015, when U.S. mobile commerce sales grew 56.2% to $49.2 billion in 2015, according to web measurement firm comScore Inc. That’s nearly four times as fast as the 14.6% growth in total U.S. e-commerce sales as measured by the U.S. Department of Commerce, shows the report. What’s more, smartphone shopping searches on Google have increased by 30% in the last year, Google Inc. says. And Google said last spring that mobile searches with local intent, those that include a ZIP code or words like “near me,” have doubled in the past year.

With solid-performing mobile channels in place, the top players in the Mobile 500 are exploring new ways to reach mobile shoppers. They are investigating new design techniques to make good mobile sites great. And the most forward-thinking are experimenting with new mobile technologies that can transform commerce as we know it.

These leaders in the 2017 Mobile 500 are testing the early capabilities of bots and artificial intelligence, and sampling a fresh and growing crop of mobile tools offered by Google and Facebook. Some also are investing in creative and sophisticated mobile marketing programs that appeal to global mobile shoppers to boost international mobile sales, says the report. The new, completely updated data and analysis of the 2017, edition is available in a 59-page PDF, or the fully customizable online database version available through Top500Guide.com.

The 2017 Mobile 500 Report includes:

• All-new mobile commerce rankings and mobile commerce growth rates for each of 500 leading global mobile commerce competitors across the U.S., Europe, Latin America and Asia (both formats)
• 2014-16 mobile commerce sales figures, average mobile order values and conversion rates, and other key operational stats
• Updated app sales for each Mobile 500 merchant, plus individual breakdowns of mobile sales by smartphone and tablet
• An app user sentiment score: Exclusive data provided to Internet Retailer provides a combination Android and iOS ranking of a retailer’s m-commerce app by searching star rankings and written reviews in app stores
• Type of site: Retailers that have a dedicated separate mobile site, a Responsive Design site and also the ones that use the newest iteration of responsive design, Hybrid Responsive Design
• Mobile Performance: Average peed with which each retail site loads on 4G networks
• App SEO score: As more than 70% of app downloads come from searches in app stores, we’ve analyzed and scored each retailer’s app store SEO
• Mobile traffic: A breakdown of mobile versus desktop traffic for the world’s largest m-commerce players
• An in-depth analysis of how the leaders in mobile commerce are using new mobile technology to drive more sales from increasingly on-the-go consumers (PDF)
• Detailed data highlighting the largest and fastest-growing mobile commerce players by region, category and merchant type (both formats)
• Names and corporate contact information for 500 mobile commerce executives worldwide

The retailers in the Mobile 500 are the next generation of mobile retailers, and online retailers can learn from their pioneering examples that are fully explored in the 2017 Mobile 500, concludes the report.

For more information from Internet Retailer, please visit here.