U.S. Holiday Desktop E-Commerce Sales Up 15% In 2014 Resulting In Another Big Year For Online Retailers [ComScore]

According to comScore’s latest reports, this past holiday season proved to be another gangbuster two months for online retailers. Desktop ecommerce sales increased 15 percent over 2013’s November and December sales results, reaching more than $53 billion in sales for the 2014 holiday season.

Online desktop sales occurring between November 1 and December 31 was up more than $6 billion compared to the $46.5 billion spent in 2013.

ComScore’s chairman and emeritus Gian Fulgoni noted that ecommerce sales exceeded his company’s predictions.

[pullquote]Despite a shortened holiday calendar between Thanksgiving and Christmas and erroneous reports of flogging holiday sales, the American consumer proved resilient and flexed their spending muscle online this year.[/pullquote]

“The 2014 online holiday shopping season was very strong overall as spending slightly exceeded our fairly optimistic forecast heading into the season,” said Fulgoni.

ComScore broke down the holiday ecommerce sales results by day and year to reveal Cyber Monday as the holiday season’s biggest online shopping day, generating more than $2 billion in desktop sales.

According to comScore, the three top ecommerce days for desktop sales included Cyber Monday, the first Tuesday of December (December 2), and December 8 or “Green Monday,” a term coined by eBay.

2014’s Black Friday ranked fourth as the season’s biggest online shopping day.

Analyzing combined desktop and mobile sales for the 2014 holiday season, IBM’s Digital Analytics Benchmark report showed an increase of 13.9 percent over 2013’s ecommerce sales results.

According to IBM’s numbers, the average order value (AOV) from desktop ecommerce sales occurring between November 1 and December 31 was $125.12, an increase of 19 percent over mobile’s AOV at $104.82.

“Mobile sales accounted for 22.6 percent of all online sales for the 2014 season,” reported IBM, up 27.2 percent over 2013.

IBM also evaluated online traffic during the holiday season, reporting desktop traffic accounted for 54.8 percent of all online traffic, and 77.3 percent of online sales.