Mobile payments saw continued innovation and competitive disruption throughout 2012, but consumer adoption lagged behind the industry hype. The Forrester Research Mobile Payments Forecast, 2012 To 2017 (US) shows that US consumers will adopt mobile payments at an accelerating rate over the next five years, reaching $90 billion by the end of 2017. Lower barriers to adoption, increased convenience, and early entrants striving for scale will be important drivers of growth.

Although the mobile wallet marketplace is still in its early stages today, players across the ecosystem are vying for consumer trust. Trust is often based on prior experiences: Forrester’s North American Technographics® Retail Online Benchmark Recontact Survey, Q3 2012 (US) shows that nearly half of current US PayPal users would trust PayPal as their mobile wallet provider. However, for those who don't use PayPal, the most trusted source is a bank or credit card issuer.

The recently published Forrester report “How PayPal Uses Exploratory Research To Drive A Culture Of Customer-Focused Innovation” shows how PayPal conducts exploratory research to understand the tradeoffs and emotions related to consumer payment behaviors to create better products and experiences. The insights gathered from the research helped the product development process.

Equally importantly, it helped create more appreciation for voice of the customer research: Having executives and product managers attend the sessions increased their understanding of how subtle changes in the user's context can lead to dramatically different experiences.