Cyber Monday sales finish strong

Jayne O'Donnell and Hadley Malcolm, USA TODAY | USATODAY

Americans may have been shopping online all weekend, but they went out with a bang Monday.

Online retailers had their biggest day ever on Cyber Monday as holiday shoppers drove sales up 30% vs. the same day last year, says IBM Smarter Commerce, which tracks Web sales at 500 top online retailers.

"The reports of the death of Cyber Monday are greatly exaggerated," says Jay Henderson, IBM Smarter Commerce's strategy director. "Certainly, we saw shopping start earlier this year, but it hasn't diminished the growth in sales for Black Friday and Cyber Monday."

Online sales for department stores account for much of the boost, Henderson says, as they were up 43% over last year.

There were no early reports of crashes or major slowdowns on overloaded websites.

Websites "in general are better prepared than in prior years," says Brad Wilson of BradsDeals.com. "I think this move to virtual Web hosting in the much-discussed 'cloud' is a part of why the day (was) better overall."

The iPad drove more than 7% of online shopping, more than any other tablet or smartphone, IBM says. Mobile sales overall, which include smartphones and tablets, had a huge boost - up more than 96% from 2011. Though mobile sales and traffic were down from Black Friday as consumers returned to work and did more shopping on computers.

Still, "the implication for retailers is that the winning strategy this weekend was retailers who made it easy for consumers to buy however they want it," Henderson says.

IBM Smarter Commerce says more than 18% of consumers used a mobile device to visit a retail store, while 13% used a smartphone or tablet to make a purchase. As of Monday afternoon, PayPal had almost 200% more volume in mobile payments, compared with Cyber Monday last year.

The two most searched-for products through most of Cyber Monday were the Kindle Fire and Ugg boots, says Experian Marketing Services, a company that helps retailers with digital marketing and analyzing consumer data. The five retail websites receiving the most "Cyber Monday" searches were CyberMonday.com, Target, Amazon, Walmart and MSN.Money, in that order, the Experian data show.

Price comparison website PriceGrabber.com reported about a 17% increase in traffic over Cyber Monday last year as of about noon ET, and CEO Steve Krenzer expected about a 20% increase for the full day.

"I'm just hoping for a Black December to go with this Black week," says Krenzer.

He might get his wish. Economist Chris Christopher of IHS Global Insight said Monday that he expects online holiday retail sales to rise 17% above last year.

"Last year's holiday online retail sales amounted to a little over $67 billion, and this year's holiday online retail sales are projected to be about $79 billion," Christopher says. "This is no longer chump change by any means."

After seeing the traffic and crowds on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, Illinois forester Kevin Sorby, was looking forward to online shopping Monday. He was looking for a tablet and shopping on Amazon "with ease" Monday, he said.

"Cyber Monday is my new Black Friday from here on out, " says Sorby.