It still boggles my mind how many dealerships underestimate the activities and behaviors of mobile consumers. Repetition is the key here - you simply need to wrap your head about how people behave, what they're doing and what the opportunities are for your dealership.

Get to know these stats just like you know what's happening with the desktop activity segment in your Google Analytics. You're spending a lot of money to optimize for desktop and laptop searches, now it's time to drop the hammer and put some serious effort towards your dealership's local and mobile presence.

We've moved beyond customers just sitting down at their home computer, researching cars and driving into your store. Today's customer can search for a car on their phone, within an app and compare prices against five other dealerships - all while in your showroom.

General Mobile Usage Statistics:

• 75% of emails are opened, 60% of Facebook posts and 90% tweets are all conducted from a mobile device! @BillBoorman, ATC 2012

• 31% of mobile internet users "mostly" go online using their phones Pew 2012

• 75% of customers prefer a mobile friendly site (Google, 2012)

• 64% of mobile phone time is spent on apps (Nielsen 2012)

• 13.4% texting, 11.1% browser, 5.5% social networking apps, 5.4% dialer, 5.3% email/IM, 2.3% music/video, 1.1% camera, 55.8% other apps (Nielsen 2012)

• 61% of customers who visit a mobile unfriendly site are likely to go to a competitor's site (Karim Temsamani at IABALM 2012 via IAB)

• In 2011, smartphone adoption increased 99% among 6-person households, 98% among those making less than $25,000, and 92% among retirees (comScore 2012)

Mobile & Local Search Statistics:

• 61% of smartphone users make local searches from a device (Localeze/15miles Fifth Annual comScore Local Search Usage Study February 2012)

• Mentioning a location in an ad or search result can increase click-through rates up to 200% (ThinkNear 2012 via MediaPost)

• 70% of mobile searchers act within an hour; only 30% of PC searchers do (Mobile Marketer 2012)

Mobile Web vs. Mobile Apps:

• 127.6 million mobile users in the U.S. and 108 million users in Europe consumed mobile media through their mobile browser or application in 2011, about a 30% increase over 2010 (comScore 2012)

• 81% of users prefer mobile sites to apps for price research, 79% for product reviews, 63% for purchasing (Adobe Mobile Experience Survey & eMarketer 2011 via SearchEngineLand)

Mobile Commerce & Mobile Shopping Statistics:

• More than half of the U.S. smartphone population used their phone to perform retail research while inside a store in 2011 (comScore 2012)

• It takes over 10 sessions with an app for 44% of eventual buyers to make their first purchase. Only a third (33%) buy in 2 to 9 uses of an app. And only 22% actually accept an upsell opportunity the first time in the door (Localytics via MediaPost January 2012)

• Mobile payments are expected to quadruple to $630 billion by 2014 (Juniper Research)

• Overall, about a third of cell phone owners used their phone within the past 30 days to look up either product reviews or prices online while in the store. Of them, 35% decided to purchase the item in the store, while 19% decided to purchase the product online and 37% opted not to purchase the product at all. (Pew Research Center via MediaPost)

• 39% of store walkouts, where consumers leave without buying, were influenced by smartphones (Motorola Solutions)

• 10 times as many coupons are redeemed through mobile as through traditional channels (eMarketer 2012)

• 21% of Pinterest users purchased a product after seeing a picture on Pinterest (PriceGrabber 2012 via MediaPost)

Mobile Advertising Statistics:

• Facebook delivers 1 of every 4 online display ads (comScore 2012)

• 40% of males ages 18 to 29 like mobile ads "somewhat" or "very much" (eMarketer)

• The global mobile ad market will grow from $3.4 billion in 2010 to $22.0 billion in 2016 (Berg Insight via B2B)

Tablet Usage Statistics

• Tablet owners more likely to purchase from online ads than smartphone owners, also more likely to request coupons from merchant (Nielsen)

• 49% of mobile and tablet users conduct local business searches on apps (Localeze/15miles Fifth Annual comScore Local Search Usage Study February 2012)

• 38.4% of tablet owners have incomes over $100,000 New Media Trend Watch

• 88% of Android tablet users are satisfied with tablet shopping (Adobe Digital Index Analysis 2012)

• 71% of iPad users are satisfied with tablet shopping (Adobe Digital Index Analysis 2012)

• 75% of iPad users are satisfied with consumer product shopping on tablet (Adobe Digital Index Analysis 2012)

• 73% of Kindle users are satisfied with consumer product shopping on tablet (Adobe Digital Index Analysis 2012)

• 66% of Android users are satisfied with consumer product shopping on tablet (Adobe Digital Index Analysis 2012)

So, what should you do with any of this data? Here's three simple ways to leverage this info to benefit your dealership:

1. Share it with your dealership. Everyone needs to know this. Hopefully you're sharing website activity, share your mobile activity to help create the culture of awareness. Remember, your activity builds experience, your experience builds influence.
2. Work with your website provider. Ask them how you can get better! Continuously improve the appearance, the content and track the activity to ensure your KPI's are improving.
3. Use your site on different devices. Test the site on Android, iOS, Windows. Does it work right? Can you perform the basic functions that you would expect it to? Try it on a tablet, is it easy or does it frustrate you?

What else are you doing to improve your local mobile marketing strategy?