As online and in-store shopping dynamics continue to evolve, consumers are figuring out their own best ways to get a deal, even if a minor one. The latest research around mobile shopping found that the majority (58%) of smartphone owners practice showrooming, shopping in a physical store and then buying online or elsewhere. However, the Parago Dynamic Pricing Study showed that it doesn't really take much to sway the mobile shopper, since a price difference of only $5 on a $50 item can determine the sale.

It all started with a broken coffee pot. My trusty old Kitchen Aid died yesterday. It was rather expected eventually, since the unit was recalled several years ago. I had two identical KitchenAid coffeemakers, one at home the other at a summer house. Although both had the same recall situation, the company replaced only one, for some reason. I'm guessing they thought I only had one, so after unsuccessfully trying to get the second one replaced, I decided to just use it until it expired, which it did yesterday. In quite a huff, actually.

There are obviously many moving parts around mobile payments. We've written quite a bit about the how to pay, using various forms of mobile payments. We've also addressed the issue of who people will pay, including credit card companies, banks and wireless carriers. At last week's MediaPost OMMA mCommerce conference, an interesting observation was made by one of the main speakers, Ken Moy, SVP, Group Head of Emerging Payments at MasterCard.

Some apps seem to be well suited to high flyers. Earlier this year I wrote about how Magellan Jets, a Boston-based private aviation company, partnered with an app provider so that the app users could input their itinerary, see prices and book a jet. The charge for the high-end app is $1,000 and had more than 150,000 members, those with a net worth of more than $1 million. It becoming clear that some big ticket purchases can and will be made from mobile devices.

Sometimes it's the simple, little things that influence commerce. A study out this week took a look at gas and convenience store purchases and found that almost half (49%) of smartphone users search using apps exclusively. No surprise, comparison apps like GasBuddy are the most commonly used among the majority of mobile searchers with price and location being the key factors, according to the study by Nielsen.

Many retailers may be totally missing some mobile shoppers. A new study shows that retailers plan to beef up their mobile investments in paid search and email, since they see some shoppers leaning that way. The research, from Forrester and Shop.org, found that more than a quarter (28%) of emails are being opened on smartphones and tablets. Of the retailers surveyed, most (87%) are on top of mobile mail optimization and they also are warm to search, with almost three quarters (71%) planning to optimize paid search for mobile devices.

Lots of insights around mobile commerce were bandied about at the MediaPost OMMA mCommerce conference in New York yesterday. By the end of the day, it was clear that there's a lot of work ahead and consumers are leading the charge. Over time, I plan to highlight some of the astute observations made by some of the presenters over the course of the day, but for now, here's a quick snapshot.

Mobile technology is evolving to do more behind the scenes work in a continuing quest to enhance the customer experience. One case in the hardware category is how the Samsung Galaxy S4 can tell when a user turns away from the phone screen, so the phone can auto-pause a video, for example. There are other efforts underway that also aim to make mobile shopping a little easier.

There's clearly some very big money at the transaction end of mobile shopping. The latest from eMarketer earlier this week pegs payment by mobile at just north of $1 billion this year climbing to $58 billion within four years. But much of the focus on mobile payments is on how a consumer will pay. Will they swipe, or tap, or scan or just be near a point-of-sale register.

There are still a lot of questions around mobile commerce. Not about whether it's happening, if it's big or any of that. The issues are more around the transformative consumer behaviors, the adoption of new mobile capabilities and taking those to scale. I'm very much looking forward to hearing discussions about some of those questions at the MediaPost OMMA mCommerce conference on Monday. It turns out there are different issue throughout what I call the Mobile Shopping Life Cycle, with related questions at each stage.