SAN DIEGO ? An American Express executive at the the CTIA Enterprise & Applications 2011 conference said that mobile and commerce are on a collision course that will affect everyone in the next few years.

During the keynote session, the executive discussed how mobile commerce is going to change everything. Additionally, the executive said that although near field communication is not here yet, it will get bigger in the coming years.

?It?s clear to me that mobile and commerce are on a collision course and in the next several years it?s going to play itself out and it?s going to affect all of us,? said Dan Schulman, group president of enterprise growth at American Express, New York. 

?We are going to have to rethink our business models, the way that we do business and who we partner with,? he said. ?It?s going to be interesting to see who comes to the forefront and what company goes instinct.

?Things change and they change very quickly and we?re seeing it right now.?

Mobile communication
According to Mr. Schulman, smartphones will eventually be the way that consumers communicate going forward.

?Basically, what a smartphone means is that you have the Internet with you at all times and that little fact is now colliding into commerce,? Mr. Schulman said. ?Mobile payments is not about tapping your device at the point-of-sale with NFC.

?That?s interesting and maybe good for consumers because they don?t have to take out their wallet,? he said. ?Basically we have the Internet in our pocket right now and as a result, there is no difference between online shopping and offline.

?When I walk into a retail store, I have the same information overlay in front of me as I have on my desktop.?

According to the executive, this is changing the way bricks-and-mortar merchants look at things going forward.

?I?ve heard that Best Buy is becoming a showroom to Amazon and that?s scary to retailers out there,? Mr. Schulman said. ?Retailers are battling back as a result of this.

?They?re desperately trying to fight back against online retail and the fact that you have information on you at all times,? he said.

Visionary
Although many marketers believe that NFC will help drive mobile commerce, Mr. Schulman sees another vision.

Instead of tapping a phone at the point-of-sale, consumers can tap their phone in the doorway. Then, consumers basically elect to expose whatever data they want.

A consumer?s device can feature information such as their shopping list, a skew of items they are interested in buying, brands they like and coupons they might have.

?This could be a fundamental shift that will allow retailers to be more efficient with their marketing,? Mr. Schulman said. ?I now know I like certain things and I can customize exactly to you.

?However, there is no way though that any one company can make that vision turn into a reality,? he said. ?There are too many  players in the ecosystem for any of us to do it alone.

?But I do believe that partnering together we can take that vision and turn it into a reality.?

Final Take