Pricegrabber’s second winter holiday study looked at how consumers plan to shop via mobile this holiday season. The study points to consumers primarily using apps to save money and time while shopping.

“We’re seeing a notable increase in consumers planning to download shopping apps to help save money this holiday season, according to our survey results,” said Rojeh Avanesian, vice president of marketing and analytics of PriceGrabber.com, Los Angeles.

“Just a couple of years ago, apps were an intriguing and new phenomenon – but now, shopping from a mobile phone is becoming a commonplace activity,” he said. “Mobile marketers will be smart to position shopping apps not only as the new norm, but also as the essential tool for getting the best deal.”

Shop on mobile
Pricegrabber surveyed 2,469 online shoppers between Sept. 14 – 17.

Pricegrabber’s study found that 31 percent of smartphone owners already have a shopping app downloaded onto their devices. Eighty-two percent of these users said that they would use their device to help save money this holiday season, showing how consumers are increasingly using their devices as price comparison tools.

Similarly, 70 percent of consumers said that they planned to download a coupon app. Comparison-shopping apps were favored by 66 percent of shoppers.

Sixty-three percent of consumers plan to download an app with bar code-scanning capabilities. Fifty-four percent of consumers surveyed said that they would download Black Friday-specific deal apps.

To help calculate discounts, 32 percent of consumers will download calculator apps. Forty-three percent of consumers plan to download apps from daily deal sites such as Groupon and LivingSocial.

Consumers will also use their mobile devices to create and manage wish lists with 30 percent planning to download a gift list app.

“The growth of mainstream consumer adoption of smartphones over the last several years has been exponential,” Mr. Avanesian said.

“It’s amazing to see how quickly and how many consumers picked-up on the benefits they could reap from their smartphones in saving money and finding bargains and we expect this trend to continue next year,” he said.

Big and small-size shopping
Mobile shoppers are not only buying small items from their devices anymore.

For example, ten percent of consumers in the study plan to buy all items on their holiday shopping lists from apps.

Forty-two percent of consumers surveyed said that they planned to buy both small and big-ticket items via their devices. Users buying small items, which constitute less than $100, made up 42 percent of the consumers surveyed. Plans to buy big-ticket items that cost more than $100 represented seven percent of consumers surveyed.

In addition to direct mcommerce sales, consumers also plan to use shopping apps while in-store. Forty-five percent of respondents said that they plan to make the same amount of trips to stores as last year and 48 percent said that they would make less trips.

“Consumers are planning to use their mobile devices for holiday shopping even more this year,” Mr. Avanesian said. “According to additional PriceGrabber holiday survey results, 16 percent of consumers are planning to shop online from a mobile device this year, compared to 13 percent in 2011.”

“Shoppers are all about convenience in 2012 and mobile apps offer consumers a quick and easy way to compare prices on products and find the best deals this holiday season,” he said.

Final Take
Lauren Johnson is associate reporter on Mobile Commerce Daily, New York