Consumer Analytics

Alibaba Holding Group Inc. profits surged as a result of a one-time benefit in the second quarter of fiscal 2016, while mobile sales boosted revenue.

A revaluation of Alibaba’s holding in its Alibaba Health Information Technology Ltd. subsidiary drove year-over-year net income growth of 657% to $3.57 billion, from $480 million.

Instacart will be opening a temporary online Halloween pop-up shop.

Customers in Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco will be able to receive same-day delivery of costumes until supplies last. Instacart successfully piloted the Halloween shop in Seattle in 2014.

Instacart will charge its normal delivery prices for the special program: $3.99 for a two-hour delivery, and $5.99 for a one hour delivery when customers spend $35 or more. First-time Instacart users can have their costume delivered for free, as can Instacart express members.

Retail marketers looking to obtain personal consumer information need to prepare for a little horse trading.

According to new research from online deals platform RetailMeNot and Kelton Global, 89% of shoppers are willing to provide retail marketers with personal information in exchange for more targeted content.

A new study from Juniper Research has found that the increased rollout of contactless payment services using fingerprint scanners will push the number of biometrically authenticated transactions to nearly 5 billion by 2019, up from less than 130 million this year.

The research observed that at present, only two services, Apple Pay and Samsung, used fingerprint scanners for authentication, with availability currently limited to the U.S. and U.K. for the former, and the U.S. and South Korea for the latter.

Moms are now much more likely than ever to complete a purchase via mobile, rather than simply using their devices to compare prices and find coupons.

According to a new infographic from pregnancy and parenting website BabyCenter, in just one year, there has been a 33% increase in moms using their smartphones for making actual purchases. Sixty-four percent of moms say they had completed a purchase via mobile in the last month, in comparison to 48% who said the same in 2014.

Purchases made via Facebook advertisements are more frequently occurring via mobile device.

According to new data released by the Facebook IQ marketing insights division, three in 10 purchase conversions from Facebook ads between January and May 2015 took place on a mobile device (24% on a phone, 6% on a tablet). During that same period, the frequency of mobile purchases increased 35%, according to Facebook IQ’s latest internal analysis.

It won’t impact retailers’ bottom line as much as the new Buy Now button, but Twitter is continuing its evolution into more of a sales-oriented digital platform.

Twitter is testing a new feature called “Promoted Moments,” which builds on its Moments offering that was launched at the beginning of October. Twitter Moments allows users to click on a special tab and view a curated list of stories considered to be the “best” on Twitter.

Moms are now much more likely than ever to complete a purchase via mobile, rather than simply using their devices to compare prices and find coupons.

According to a new infographic from pregnancy and parenting website BabyCenter, in just one year, there has been a 33% increase in moms using their smartphones for making actual purchases. Sixty-four percent of moms say they had completed a purchase via mobile in the last month, in comparison to 48% who said the same in 2014.

Purchases made via Facebook advertisements are more frequently occurring via mobile device.

According to new data released by the Facebook IQ marketing insights division, three in 10 purchase conversions from Facebook ads between January and May 2015 took place on a mobile device (24% on a phone, 6% on a tablet). During that same period, the frequency of mobile purchases increased 35%, according to Facebook IQ’s latest internal analysis.

It won’t impact retailers’ bottom line as much as the new Buy Now button, but Twitter is continuing its evolution into more of a sales-oriented digital platform.

Twitter is testing a new feature called “Promoted Moments,” which builds on its Moments offering that was launched at the beginning of October. Twitter Moments allows users to click on a special tab and view a curated list of stories considered to be the “best” on Twitter.