In a recent article, Matt Bishop at E-commerce Times provides some great tips on how consumers can take steps to protect their personal and financial information when making purchases using mobile devices. E-tailers participating in mobile commerce, or m-commerce, should also take this advice into consideration and use it to create m-commerce experiences that instil consumer confidence.
Tip: Create a transactional site for mobile phones
Websites can be difficult to navigate on a small screen and as a result it's not always clear if it's the right site. Further it can be difficult for consumers to see products clearly.
Keep in consideration that images can slow down loading times and that Flash is not supported on most phone browsers.
One of the risks of shopping with a mobile device is that site URLs are often truncated making it difficult for consumers to know they've landed on the right site. Creating a mobile-ready site that mobile users can opt to use when navigating to your main site can alleviate this concern while also improving user experience.
Create a mobile-ready site with fewer images and simplified navigation to help your mobile customers quickly and confidently access the information they seek.
Tip: Provide secure, trusted payment methods
Mobile devices are just that. Mobile. Which means there is a greater risk of loss or theft than with a desktop computer. As a result, consumers may hesitate to make a mobile purchase from your site unless they know they can do so securely.
While consumers can take steps such as encryption of passwords and credit card information, e-tailers should ensure that the information you are collecting from m-commerce transactions is securely stored to mitigate the risk of data being stolen.
Mobile payment services are available. E-tailers and mobile users can opt into these services making it easy and secure to conduct mobile transactions. See this article by Practical Commerce for more information on the different options with mobile payment services.
It's important to remember that mobile users have a different web experience than laptop or desktop users. If you optimize your site for mobile traffic, you can instil consumer confidence by creating a better mobile shopping experience.