Tablet Visitors Spent 54% More Than Smartphone Visitors in 2011

People using tablets spent $123 on average per purchase in 2011, 54 percent more than visitors using smartphones, according to an Adobe study.
“Mobile is no longer a one-size-fits-all-strategy. It’s like saying you have an Internet strategy. You have to get more granular. Audiences are really different,” John Mellor, VP of business development for Adobe’s Digital Marketing Business, said in an interview. He recommends that retailers segment their customers to account for the different audiences and their behaviors.
The study also noted that tablets accounted for a small but fast growing segment of retail website visitors. It went from 1 percent in January 2011 to 4 percent in December 2011.
The study pointed to two reasons why tablet visitors may be more valuable than those using smartphones, laptops, desktops: tablet users are more affluent than those using other devices, plus the devices may be more conducive to shopping.
But will the dynamics change if tablets become more affordable and more widely used? It depends.
The adoption of lower priced tablets could change shopping behaviors, so that’s a trend that marketers should monitor in coming months.
But, don’t count on the demographics of Apple iPad users to change anytime soon, said Austin Bankhead, director of industry marketing for Adobe’s Digital Marketing Business. That’s because Apple is known for maintaining higher prices for their products than other vendors. And Apple attracts customers who can afford to pay more for those products. Take the Apple iPad. It currently sells for $499 for the basic 16GB model to $829 for the 64GB model, not including the 3G wireless service.
Could the novelty of tablets be another factor affecting usage patterns? Adobe executives acknowledged that is a possibility, thus making it imperative to analyze trends each month.
The study found that the average order values and conversion rates on Black Friday and Cyber Monday were higher than the averages for the 2011 calendar year and holiday season. However, the average order value during the 2011 holiday season totaled $111, which was $12 lower than the average order value during the 2011 calendar year.
The study is based on an analysis of 16 billion visits to the websites of more than 150 retailers in 2011. The average annual revenue of the sites is $260 million.

Unveils 8 New Tablets: Which Will You Choose?

The tablet market continues to expand this year, and many new versions were introduced at 2012 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this week.
Some innovations to the tablet are major. Fujitsu’s tablet can be fully submerged in water for up to 30 minutes without any damage, while Lenovo’s tablet can easily be converted into a laptop with double the battery life. Other companies are creating simple upgrades to their older models, like Toshiba’s Excite — which is a sleek .67 inches thin and coated with an anti-smudge surface.
There are also some changes so small, they might have gone completely unnoticed, with some saying an iPad 3 prototype could be hidden among all the buzz at CES.
If there’s anything to take away from all of the tablet talk at this year’s event, it’s that the market is not going anywhere but up. Many popular PC manufacturers, such as Dell, are finally joining with its own touchscreen device. And nearly three-quarters of small business owners are looking to buy tablets this year.
Here are the year’s newest tablets on the market. Let us know which device you think will be the biggest game-changer in the comments.

1. One Laptop Per Child

The XO 3.0 tablet includes the Marvell ARMADA PXA618 SOC processor, Avastar Wi-Fi SOC, standard or Pixel Qi sunlight-readable display, and supports Android and Linux operating systems. Unlike any other tablet on the market, it can be powered by solar energy, other alternative energy sources and even hand-cranks.

2. Velocity Micro

Velocity Micro's Cruz Tablet T507 will run on Android 4.0 and retail for less than $150. Its 7-inch touchscreen features full Flash support and a Cortex A81.2 GHz Processor, as well as 512MB DDR3 of RAM and 8 GB of internal storage
The Cruz Tablet T510 has a larger 9.7-inch touchscreen, and features front and rear cameras, while the T507 only has a camera in the front. The price for the larger tablet has not yet been finalized, but it’s expected to retail for less than $250

3. Lenovo IdeaTabS2-10

The IdeaTabS2-10 is a 10-inch tablet running on Android 4.0, or Ice Cream Sandwich. The tablet can be converted into a laptop with the $200 keyboard dock, which also includes a second battery that doubles its battery-life. Cameras are forward- and rear-facing, and there's an LED display and HDMI. Inside, there is 64 GB of storage and a dual-core 1.7 GHz Qualcomm CPU.

4. Lenovo YOGA

Lenovo‘s new IdeaPad YOGA is marketed as a device that's four-in-one. It can switch from a laptop to a tablet in various positions. The YOGA, which operates on Windows 8, is just .67 inches thick and weighs 3.1 pounds.

5. Toshiba

The Excite, a 10-inch Android tablet, is .3 inches thick and weighs 1.2 lbs. The screen supports a 1280 x 800 resolution and is coated with an anti-smudge surface. Inside, the tablet is running a 1.2 GHz dual-core Texas Instruments CPU and 1 GB of RAM. It's yet to be determined if the Android OS will be Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich.

6. Fujitsu

The 10.1-inch tablet, running on Android, can survive a dip in water, and full submersion for up to 30 minutes. It has not yet been released in America, but it is being sold in Japan. Fujitsu won’t bring this waterproof tech to the U.S. until it’s proven in Japan, so you'll have to put this one on the back burner for now.

7. Dell

Dell is expected to enter the tablet market in late 2012, with a Windows 8-based touchscreen device, according to a report.

8. ViewSonic Tablet Series

ViewSonic introduced a few devices ranging in price from $170 to $850, including the ViewPad 10pi and 10e, which are both 10-inch tablets that run on Android's Gingerbread. There is also the E70, a 7-inch tablet that runs Android 4.0.