The number of people clicking on ads when using their mobile phones to browse the web and shop online has risen to account for half of the market in the UK, according to a new report published this week by Marin Software.

Fifty per cent of all clicks were made from portable devices, showing that the importance of smartphones and tablets as a portal for advertising and e-commerce could soon exceed that of desktop PCs.

Forty three per cent of all people who clicked on ads and were then converted to paying customers also came from the mobile arena, meaning that people are not just using their handsets to browse for information on products, but actually go through with transactions as well.

Desktop computers may be capable of netting higher conversions than mobiles, but the problem with this is that they also cost retailers more when it comes to advertising, perhaps because the mobile market is undervalued in spite of its growth.

The annual increase in the number of sales made from smartphones and tablets is seen as a sign by many that using desktop PCs and laptops to carry out safe shopping online will eventually slip from being the dominant consumer habit, to being something that only the minority of people do.

Interestingly, the UK is the only place in Europe where smartphone ads are less effective than desktop ones at getting people to part with their cash. This could be to do with increased consumer savvy in the UK, or indeed that the e-commerce market is better developed here. People seem happy to look up items on their smartphones, then do the actual buying when they are sitting at a desktop machine.

Whichever way you spin it, m-commerce is not only here to stay but could soon hold sway over the entire online shopping industry.