SOASTA: 1 In 3 Americans Rely On Apps Or Websites For Halloween

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SOASTA, the leader in cloud and mobile testing, today announced the results of its Halloween Retail Readiness Index. The index was based on SOASTA’s experience of ensuring top quality performance for 10 of the top 10 online retailers who rely on SOASTA’s mobile and web technology. The Halloween Retail Readiness Index was fielded online within the U.S. by Harris Poll on behalf of SOASTA from October 9-13, 2014 among 2,026 adults, ages 18 and older.

SOASTA discovered that one third of all Americans plan on using apps or websites for Halloween. Nearly one in ten American parents (8 percent) will use an app to track their children during trick-or-treating. Five percent will use apps to find the best neighborhood to trick-or-treat. While some Americans say they will use apps and websites to buy a costume (13 percent), others (15 percent) revealed that they will use websites and apps themselves as inspiration for costumes, dressing up as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, or Plants vs. Zombies.

A majority of Americans (62 percent) say app reliability is important to them when using a website or mobile app to make purchases for the holidays, with the most important being that an app or website loads quickly (44 percent), that it doesn’t crash (43 percent), that it responds to clicks, swipes, taps, and zooms (32 percent), and that it’s instantly responsive with no lag (32 percent). Parents of children under 18 were more likely to say app reliability is important to them (80 percent vs. 55 percent). App reliability was most important to those 18-34 (87 percent vs. 60 percent of those age 35+).

An overwhelming majority of Americans (71 percent) say that if they had a bad experience shopping for Halloween on a store’s website or app it would negatively impact their likelihood to shop at the same store or mobile app when it comes to Cyber Monday. Two-in-five (40 percent) said they would avoid the store during Cyber Monday if they had a bad experience during Halloween. Nearly a third (29 percent) said bad web or app performance from a store would knock it off as their first shopping choice during Cyber Monday. Slightly over one in ten Americans (11 percent) said they would wait to see what their friends would say about the site before using it for Cyber Monday if there were problems during Halloween.

SOASTA discovered that 66 percent of Americans find themselves increasingly using websites or mobile apps to make purchases during the holidays. Christmas ranked first with 59 percent, followed by Valentine’s Day (9 percent), Halloween (7 percent), Thanksgiving (7 percent) New Year’s Eve (4 percent) and July 4th (3 percent). Parents of children under 18 are more likely to increasingly rely on websites or mobile apps for holiday shopping (82 percent to 60 percent).

Survey Methodology

This survey was conducted online within the United States by Harris Poll on behalf of SOASTA from October 9-13, 2014 among 2,026 adults ages 18 and older. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no estimate of theoretical sampling error can be calculated. For complete survey methodology, including weighting variables, please contact William McCormick at William.McCormick@grayling.com.

About SOASTA

SOASTA is the leader in cloud testing. Its web and mobile test automation and monitoring solutions, CloudTest, TouchTest and mPulse, enable developers, QA professionals and IT operations teams to test and monitor users with unprecedented speed, scale, precision and visibility. The innovative product set streamlines test creation, automates provisioning and execution, and analyzes real user behavior in real-time to deliver actionable intelligence, faster. With SOASTA, companies have confidence that their applications will perform as designed, delivering quality user experiences every time. SOASTA’s customers are many of today’s most successful brands including Avaya, American Girl, Bonobos, Backcountry.com, Chegg, Experian, Gilt Groupe, Hallmark, Intuit, Microsoft and Netflix. SOASTA is privately held and headquartered in Mountain View, Calif. For more information about SOASTA, please visit http://www.soasta.com.

SOASTA is a registered trademark of SOASTA, Inc. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners. Other product or company names mentioned may be trademarks or trade names of their respective companies.

Contacts

Grayling
Sara Black, 213-618-1501
sara.black@grayling.com