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Half of Expedia’s U.S. hotel purchases may be mobile within two years

September 14, 2012 | Hotel Marketing

Expedia, Fandango and EBay are among online retailers benefiting from surging mobile sales, as on-the-go consumers increasingly use wireless devices to book hotels and buy event tickets.

Expedia, operator of a travel bookings website, may see U.S. hotel purchases via handheld devices taking up half its total within two years, according Joe Megibow, general manager of Expedia.com. Fandango said 30 percent of movie tickets it sold this summer were through smartphones and tablets.

While mobile computing has been on the rise, on-the-go transactions account for only a sliver of e-commerce sales -- 7.6 percent last year -- according to ABI Research. Although many companies are rushing to adapt their sites for mobile users and advertising, those that focus on movie tickets or travel bookings are vaulting ahead, said Chetan Sharma, an independent wireless analyst.

“Movie tickets is an impulse-buy category -- you see an ad, a friend mentions it, you have time, you purchase it on the spot,” said Sharma, who is hosting the Mobile Future Forward conference on Sept. 10 in Seattle.

“It is also about convenience. One category in travel that is working well from an impulse point of view on smartphones is short-term flight and hotel,” Sharma said.

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