Online Spend Surging

A jump in online sales is building up the momentum for a stronger holiday season, new comScore research has found.

“Consumers seem to be back, increasing their buying of products and not just services, such as vacations, restaurants, etc.,” said Gian Fulgoni, comScore’s executive chairman in an interview with Internet Retailer. “It looks like something might have changed in April.”

The spike is being fueled by double-digit growth of desktop eCommerce sales. In April, the segment saw a 19 percent year-over-year improvement, which helped improve eCommerce sales for retailers across the board.

“On discretionary products, (total) retail sales were up 5.3 percent in April, which is the highest level seen in years,” he said, citing U.S. Commerce Department data.

The build-up of momentum for the holiday season also underpins an improvement in sales over mobile platform. Last year, mobile contributed to a roughly 60 percent improvement in sales during the holiday season, Internet Retailer reported. The numbers are only expected to further improve this year, Fulgoni said.

“Mobile app visits were up 70 percent in Q1, and mobile site visits were up 40 percent, but there’s a user challenge because while consumers may have many apps on a phone, not many are used,” he said.