Malaysians skip the shopping mall queues to shop online and on mobile devices this festive season
– allowing for more time to be spent with family and friends
Kuala Lumpur, 22 November 2012 – With the ease, convenience and choice of shopping online, savvy Malaysians plan to skip the long queues at shopping malls this festive season and instead click to shop at home or on-the-go. According to a new PayPal survey conducted by GfK to measure the changing ways that consumers shop and pay, Malaysians plan close to half of all their holiday shopping online this year, saving 36 hours of their precious time. This spells good news for Malaysians who are avid shoppers but find shopping a challenge when they have to spend hours stuck in traffic jams, battling the crowds, and then waiting in long queues to pay. With the time they save by shopping online or on mobile devices, 81% of Malaysians would spend more time with their family, 69% would use the extra time relaxing through exercising or taking up a hobby, and 53% intend to hang out more often with their friends.
Online and mobile shopping save precious time for Malaysians
Malaysians expect to shop online 112 times during the festive season and estimate that they would save an average of 3 hours each time they shop online instead of going to a shopping mall. The top pet peeves for shopping in malls are the trouble finding a parking lot (67%), the long queues at checkout counters (65%), and the battle with crowds (50%). In addition, 40% of the respondents are only willing to wait 5-10 minutes in line at a retail store. With the convenience of online and mobile shopping in their daily lives, time-crunched Malaysians can get 36 hours of their lives back for more important things in life such as:
• For parents: sitting down to dinner with their family every night in December or driving with the family to Port Dickson;
• For ladies: enjoying a relaxing massage or spa session every day in December;
• For guys: catching all your favourite English Premier League team’s home matches;
• For the young at heart: spending 1.5 days on a safari adventure at Bukit Kinta Rainforest.
“Instead of shopping at overcrowded retail malls and battling traffic and carpark jams, savvier and smarter Malaysian consumers are choosing to shop online and on mobile devices to simplify one of the craziest shopping seasons of the year. Besides saving money, Malaysian shoppers can use online and mobile shopping to get back 36 hours of their precious time for what the holiday season is supposed to be about - spending more time with family and friends, relaxing and celebrating the end of a great year,” said Klas Hesselman, Head of Marketing, Southeast Asia & India.
Mobile and social commerce leading the way this holiday season
2012 continues to be the year for mobile commerce as more and more Malaysians turn to their mobile devices to shop on-the-go. According to the PayPal survey, two-thirds of Malaysians shoppers expect to shop three or more times a month on their mobile devices this festive season. Smartphones and tablets emerged as the top choice to shop online with during the holiday season by almost half of respondents (47%), followed by the use of laptops (34%) and desktops (18%). The study also showed that mobile apps are still more popular than mobile websites for Malaysian online shoppers as 75% of respondents prefer to use mobile apps to access online retail stores, 54% would like to use location-based mobile shopping apps to find great deals, and 39% want to scan QR codes shown on advertisements and promotions.
In addition, the PayPal survey revealed that user-generated content on social media platforms have a strong influence on what Malaysians buy during the festive shopping season. For a start, 76% of respondents research online before they shop, and over 68% indicated that reviews – good or bad – would influence their purchase decision. Interestingly, nearly six out of ten festive shoppers (57%) actively search social networks for shopping deals and promotions, while almost half (49%) were also likely to redeem offers while browsing social media channels like Facebook and Twitter.
Black Friday and Cyber Monday effect felt in Malaysia, too
The Black Friday to Cyber Monday four-day period is one of the largest shopping long weekends in the U.S. where merchants offer massive discounts as the traditional start of the U.S. holiday shopping season. Savvy Malaysian shoppers know that such sales are no longer exclusive to U.S. consumers and that they can now shop online for the best deals along with the Americans this holiday season.
The PayPal study showed that over one-third (37%) of 1.6 million online shoppers in Malaysia plan to shop during the Black Friday-Cyber Monday shopping period, with an average spend of nearly RM113 per shopper over this period. The five most popular shopping categories for Malaysians during the Black Friday to Cyber Monday period are clothing (46%), bags and accessories (43%), electronic gadgets (38%), shoes (35%), and fragrances (29%).
Research Methodology
Commissioned by PayPal, GfK conducted the online research survey, ‘PayPal Skip the Queues Survey 2012’ to measure Malaysians’ year-end festive shopping behaviors. The fieldwork was conducted from October 15 to November 7, 2012 and the survey polled a representative sample of 1,000 Malaysian online shoppers aged 18 and above. The festive shopping season is defined to be the 3-month period from October to December.
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