Google Mobile Searches Soar as 'Thumb Shopping' Gains Steam

If recent traffic trends on the world's most popular search engine are any indication, mobile shopping, or "thumb shopping," is poised to take off this year. Google searches on mobile phones surged 130% in the third quarter of 2010. And that number is only going to swell, along with the growth of mobile commerce, said Daniel Schock, retail industry director for Google.

"Although I can't predict the future, as more and more people have access to mobile devices and grow accustomed to having a personal shopper in their pocket, we will likely continue to see growth in shopping from mobile phones," Schock told WalletPop.

Over the past two years, Google's mobile search volumes have grown more than five fold -- "at an accelerated pace," he said.

And more and more shoppers will be on the hunt for deals.According to a Google/ComScore study, mobile coupon spending is expected to reach $1 billion by 2011.

"We can tell you searches for mobile coupons have more than doubled since 2008," Schock said.

That growth not only reflects the increase in smart phone usage but also "savvy shoppers who are easily used to finding discount-relevant information," he said.

The study also revealed that 54% of consumers who researched purchases online but bought offline in brick-and-mortar stores used their mobile device to search.

Every week, more than 1 billion people surf Google for information, Schock said.

Now every week, "tens of millions of people search on Google from their mobile phone and generate hundreds of millions of searches," he said.