Today we announced our study with Harris Interactive on Americans and location-based shopping. The survey, which was conducted online from July 20 to July 22, 2009 among 2,029 adults ages 18 and older, measured consumer sentiment towards using mobile devices as it relates to shopping, sales promotions and impulse purchases.

Some of our key findings included:

Consumers are interested in receiving alerts on their mobile phones from brands that they care about, provided they can opt-in and the messages are relevant. The responses indicate that 42% of 18 to 34 year olds and 33% of 35 to 44 year olds expressed some interest in receiving opt-in alerts on their cell phones from their favorite establishments.

9-in-10 U.S. adults have made an impulse purchase when they were out shopping in a store based on a sale or special going on around where they were. There is an opportunity to influence impulse purchases using a mobile phone: nearly a quarter of adults owning cell phones (22%) make this type of impulse purchase at least once per week or more often. Among women with cell phones ages 18 to 44, 27% report making at least one impulse purchase a week; among men 18 – 34, this number rises to 31%.

About 2-in-5 of these adults would like to receive alerts about sales for:

  • Movie/event tickets (43%)
  • Weather information (39%)
  • Clearance or liquidation sales (37%)

About another 3-in-10 of these adults would want to be alerted about:

  • Pizza (31%)
  • Clothes (30%)
  • Fast food (27%)

About one quarter would want to be notified about:

  • Electronics (25%)
  • Music (24%)
  • Happy hour specials or bar and night club offers (21%)

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