Standing in the grocery store the other day, I watched a harried mother of 2 young children scanning a product with her smart phone and comparing what she was seeing.  I watched as she read all the information on her phone, and then decided the product to purchase.   I couldn’t help but ask her what she was looking for as I have been working in mobile apps and nutritional data information now for quite some time, and her response sounded like so many others I have heard before.  The consumer today wants to know that the data on the package they want to buy is accurate and trust worthy!  This mother’s youngest child has a peanut allergy, one product when scanned brought up all the information including that it was peanut free, while the other package only showed the ingredients and nutritional information, sans the allergen.  Had she bought the wrong product, she could have endangered her child with the risk of a peanut allergy reaction! 

In today’s digital marketplace, the data consumers receive is often inaccurate, incomplete or missing entirely as exampled above.  The rapid rise in the use of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices will only accentuate the problem. Smartphone penetration currently ranges from 29% in Canada to 42% in Spain. And industry forecasts predict that smartphone penetration in many EU markets and the U.S. will rise above 50% by the end of this year.*

What happens if the data the consumer gets is bad:

74% of consumers say it’s important product data and information be correct*

38% of consumers would not purchase the product if they did not feel what they were seeing on their smart phones was correct and trust worthy*

35% of consumers would never use an app again if it contained bad information*

26% of consumers would never use the app again if it returned no product data at all*

It is my opinion that consumers today want to get data back that is accurate, up to date and trustworthy while using their mobile devices, which may sway them to make a choice on a product based on that information alone and make the most of their purchases. 

The answer a resounding YES, that the consumer, smart phones and data quality are VERY important today.

* “B2C Consumer Survey,” GS1, March 2011