Mobile

India’s painful and ongoing struggle with the coronavirus pandemic will lead to a second consecutive difficult year for brick-and-mortar retail sales. At the same time, the public health anxieties constraining overall retail will continue pushing consumers toward digital solutions. We anticipate an extended boom for ecommerce in India, including 27.0% growth this year, for $66.76 billion in sales.

Ecommerce sales at Walmart, including Sam's Club, will reach $67.39 billion in 2021, per our forecast.

On today's episode, we discuss mobile devices' role in online grocery, how consumers' physical and digital shopping worlds are colliding, and the next major challenge for grocers. We then talk about marketers' social strategies, why Facebook is risking scrutiny to launch an Instagram for kids, and what to make of Reels getting ads. Tune in to the discussion with vice president of marketing Camilo Reina Ramirez and marketing director Lina Toledo of Grupo Éxito and eMarketer senior analysts at Insider Intelligence Matteo Ceurvels and Jasmine Enberg.

Are virtual clinical trials just as good as in-person? HumanFirst and Duke’s Clinical Research Institute are studying how clinical trials can best use remote monitoring tech—which starts to answer the big question of whether digital health tracking data is reliable enough to inform big healthcare decisions.

On today's episode, we discuss what the pandemic did to the time we spend on our smartphones, which mobile activities people do more of, and what app category has emerged as a dark horse. We then talk about how a product's first review can impact the rest, how retailers can get returns under control, and whether it's better to be more, or less, like Amazon. Tune in to the discussion with eMarketer principal analyst at Insider Intelligence Yory Wurmser.

Google's consolidating its health records and Search talent teams into its Fitbit business—this could signal its intent to pair Fitbit with personal health records, giving it enough ammo to catch up to Apple.

As the US begins to emerge from the pandemic, people are re-entering the world with new habits, including new mobile behaviors. This year, the time US adults spend on mobile devices will continue to grow, albeit at a slower rate than last year. Nearly a third of their daily time spent with media will be on mobile.

Apple is reportedly adding its most advanced sensors ever to its Series 7 Watch (temperature, glucose sensors)—here’s how its leadership in the wearables space could help prop up its healthcare play.

The pandemic accelerated mobile trends by years, and these changes should stick even as the pandemic wanes. Many people were forced to use apps for food delivery, finance, fitness, and shopping, and they’ve become accustomed to these new behaviors. Even app categories that were hurt during the pandemic, such as travel or dating apps, have been resilient. People have acclimated to new forms of mobile shopping and activities, and they’ll be more willing to try mobile interfaces for other activities going forward.

Apple placates mobile advertisers: iOS 15 will allow advertisers to get postback data directly from Apple, rather than going through an ad network—a huge help for marketers hungry for data in a post-IDFA world.

The hype around ad blocking may have died down, but plenty of internet users are still taking steps to avoid ads. Marty Krátky-Katz, co-founder and CEO at ad block revenue recovery firm Blockthrough, joins eMarketer principal analyst at Insider Intelligence Nicole Perrin to discuss why some internet users block ads, what types of ad experiences are considered the most annoying, and how publishers' approach to monetizing ad blocking users has changed over the years.