Is there any difference between what and how people search on mobile vs searching on desktop?

blekko recently released a search app named Izik, optimized for touch screens. It presents a lot more results than the usual "10 blue links". People can and do type shorter queries into Izik, because of the diversity of the answers. For example, [organic baby food] (https://izik.com/?q=organic+baby+food) returns results about buying, making, and the health aspects of organic baby food, divided into separate categories. By the way, there's a conflation of several issues when people talk about mobile vs. desktop. Touchscreen vs. non-touchscreen is one issue, mobile vs. stationary is another. Since Izik is currently tablet-only, we suspect most people use it from their living room. You may have been imagining a situation more like people using a phone or tablet while outside home and office.

They have found some significant differences in the way people search on mobile vs. desktop.  Startapp did a study not long ago, the key takeaways for me are: 40% of mobile searches are local, with the average response time being 1 hour (compared to 20% and 1 week for desktops) Advertisers with mobile optimised sites and targeted campaigns enjoy a 11.5% higher click through rate (compared to non mobile optimised) Here's a great infographic on the subject:

There's definitely a difference in how people search on mobile vs desktop. For example, Android devices use Google by default for global search, where iOS users may choose Safari or proprietary apps. In terms of referral traffic, aside from Facebook, none of the mobile apps (Foursquare, Yelp!, etc) seem to be producing revenue, but I'm sure they produce walk-ins. Data in the accounts I have access to show iOS users are typically buyers, where Android users may be lookie loos (Galaxy S3 users being the exception for some reason). Data also shows about 20% of all visits coming from mobile devices, but only 16% of revenue: http://screencast.com/t/R9QQ81OR8O Standard Practice for Optimizing for Mobile Create a "tap-friendly" version of your website for smartphones (view http://mobile.cashforiphones.com or https://m.chase.com or http://www.bobswatches.com on your smartphone) If mobile user elects to "View Full Site", offer up a responsive design to limit finger movement and to eliminate horizontal scrolling For desktop users display the best 17" and 21" monitor experience possible A/B test 1, 2 and 3 for tablets for at least 30-45 days - select the version that performs best A Few Tools to Test With http://www.howtogomo.com/ http://www.optimizely.com http://sixrevisions.com/tools/10-excellent-tools-for-testing-your-site-on-mobile-devices/ http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/10/8-popular-online-apps-to-test-the-mobile-version-of-your-site/ Good luck!

One more reason is that t we've become very impatient, and it takes more than 3 seconds for a website to start loading so that about 40% of us would abandon it. 64% of us expect any website to load in 4 seconds. Many searches are conducted during short breaks, so that mobile customers might not have much time, and it makes them even more hasty. Some more points http://mobidev.biz/blog/why_mobile_search_is_crucial_for_your_brand.html

> Is there any scope of using Analytics in improving search on mobile? This is a problem. Google does break out the mobile some. But, they really appear to be two different animals. It would be helpful to see the keywords for mobile separate from the keywords for desktop. It would be helpful to see the click through rates for mobile separate from desktop. In some cases it might be possible to install 2 separate analytics codes. One for the mobile site one for the desktop. As more users visit with mobile devices, this will be a bigger problem. For websites like restaurants where the traffic is almost 50% mobile, not having clear analytics data makes it difficult to create a strategy.

Some behavioral differences which I feel: 1. Most users know what they are searching when they do search on mobile and thats why they pre optimize the search string. This will reduce the number of searches and effort. On desktops, people search carelessly as there is very less cost of searching again. 2. Mobile searches are more contextual, primarily based upon location, weather , local search etc. where as Desktop is more like start searching to open a website. 3. For most of the specific purposes on mobile there are apps and hence unless some actual search need arises people avoid search. Also mobile search is mixed with searching installed applications, contacts, mails and messages so one might start searching for local phone data and end up searching on web.

This helps: http://online-behavior.com/analytics/mobile-search