Archive for July, 2011

35% of American Adults Own a Smartphone

One Quarter Use Their Phone for Most of Their Online Browsing

A new Pew Research Center study, the Pew Internet & American Life Project, finds that 35% of American Adults own a smartphones. There May survey found 83% of U.S. Adults have a cell phone and that 42% of them own a smartphone or 1/3 of all adults.

Smartphone adoption is highest among the affluent and well-educated, the (relatively) young, and non-whites. Several groups have higher than average levels of smartphone adoption, including:

• The financially well-off and well-educated — 59% of adults living in a household earning income of $75,000 or more are smartphone owners; 48% of those with a college degree own smartphones.
• Those younger than age 45 — 58% of Americans between the ages of 25 and 34 now own a smartphone as do 49% of those ages 18-24 and 44% of those ages 35-44. Even among those with a household income of $30,000 or less, smartphone ownership rates for those ages 18-29 are equal to the national average.
• African-Americans and Latinos — 44% of blacks and Latinos are smartphone users.
• Urban and suburban residents are roughly twice as likely to own a smartphone as those living in rural areas, and employment status is also strongly correlated with smartphone ownership.

Mobile phones are a main source of internet access for one-quarter of the smartphone population
Some 87% of smartphone owners access the internet or email on their handheld, including two-thirds (68%) who do so on a typical day. When asked what device they normally use to access the internet, 25% of smartphone owners say that they mostly go online using their phone, rather than with a computer. While many of these individuals have other sources of online access at home, roughly one third of these “cell mostly” internet users lack a high-speed home broadband connection.

Smartphone owners under the age of 30, non-white smartphone users and smartphone owners with relatively low income and education levels are particularly likely to say that they mostly go online using their phones.

Android is the most common smartphone platform, followed by iPhone and Blackberry devices
Phones operating on the Android platform are currently the most prevalent type of smartphone, followed by iPhones and Blackberry devices.

Demographically, Android phones are especially common among young adults and African-Americans, while iPhones and Blackberry devices are most prevalent among college graduates and the financially well-off.

Read the full report for an in-depth look at the demographics of smartphone owners and how they use their devices at pewinternet.org.

Smartphone Definition:
A smartphone owner includes anyone who falls into either of the following two categories:

• One-third of cell owners (33%) say that their phone is a smartphone.
• Two-in-five cell owners (39%) say that their phone operates on a smartphone platform (these include iPhones and Blackberry devices, as well as phones running the Android, Windows or Palm operating systems).

July 11, 2011 in Blog   |   No Comments

Apple iPad accounts for more than 25 percent of U.S. Mobile Web Usage

The latest research from NetMarketShare shows just how dominate Apple is when it comes to mobile web access and consumption. Their latest research shows that more than 1 percent of all Internet browsing is now done on an iPad and in the US, over 2% of overall browsing.

Apple’s iPhone is the number one way Americans are accessing the mobile Web. Put another way, Apple owns over 60% of mobile web browsing. Considering that the iPad is just over a year old, it is shocking how quickly people have gravitated to using it for daily mobile web consumption. Apple has connected today’s mobile consumers to the web better than anyone.

The iPhone took the top ranking, accounting for 35.2 percent of the U.S mobile Web browsing market share, the iPad at 25.5% of mobile web browsing, followed by Android devices, with a 31.6% share.

 

In June, ComScore reported that the Apple iPad accounts for 97 percent of all tablet traffic in the U.S., despite the entrance of highly anticipated competitors like the Samsung Galaxy Tab, Motorola Xoom, BlackBerry PlayBook, the HP TouchPad and others.

According to comScore, Android-based tablets took up only 0.6 percent of all tablet traffic, while “other” tablets (in other words, the PlayBook), took up 0.1 percent.

Additional research from Net Applications shows that in the US, smartphones and tablets accounted for 8.2 percent of all browsing activities during June. Apple’s iOS-based iPhone and iPad, which run Safari, accounted for a combined five percent share of the U.S. browser market.

Android-based smartphones commanded 2.6 percent of the U.S. browser market, according to Net Applications. By contrast, Research In Motion’s BlackBerry platform accounted for only a 0.57 percent share.

BOTTOM LINE: Mobile web usage is growing quickly with the continued increases in smartphone and tablet sales (mainly the iPad). What’s your mobile strategy? Let QWASI help your organization discover the power of mobile.

July 10, 2011 in Blog   |   No Comments

Games are Most Downloaded and Most Purchased Mobile Apps

Nielsen recently published their findings on how consumers are using Mobile Apps. It didn’t come as a big surprise to find that games were the most downloaded and purchased mobile apps on today’s smartphones. The market research firm on Wednesday published findings from its recent Mobile Insights and Mobile Apps Playbook for the second quarter 2011 and “Games” was once again the most popular app category.

They found that 64% of app downloaders – smartphone users surveyed who had downloaded an app within the past 30 days – reported having downloaded at least one game over the past 30 days, just ahead of weather apps at 60% and social networking apps at 56%.

What’s more, a whopping 93% of app downloaders are willing to pay for the games they play. iPhone owners seem appear to be the most avid gamers too – iPhone gamers play games for about 14.7 hours on average each month which is nearly twice as long as the average mobile gamer last quarter.

Nielsen also found that consumers with iPhones, Windows Phones or Android phones were likely to have downloaded the games they play, while BlackBerry users and feature phone users typically played pre-loaded games.

FULL REPORT: Click here.

July 6, 2011 in Blog   |   No Comments

Mobile Payment transactions to reach $670 Billion by 2015

According to a new study by Juniper Research, the value of NFC purchases or “near-field communications” will reach $670 billion by 2015 for mobile-sourced money transfers, and mobile payments for digital and physical goods.

That’s represents a shift upward from the $240 billion Juniper Research has predicted for the total value of mobile payments in 2011. Juniper finds that during the next 18 months, 20 countries will begin deploying NFC payment systems and services; transactions from those services will be in the ballpark of $50 billion by 2014.

The new Mobile Payments Strategies report revealed that all segments will exhibit 2x to 3x growth over the next five years. This growth will be driven by the rapid adoption of mobile ticketing, NFC contactless payments, physical goods purchases and money transfers as people in both developed and developing countries use their devices for everyday transactions.

Recently, Google announced its Google Wallet and Google Deals services in the U.S., and the search giant has large retail partners on board, including Citi, Subway, Mastercard, Sprint, Macys, and Walgreens. The Far East and China, Western Europe, and North America are the largest mobile payment regions, and those areas “will represent 75% of the global mobile payment gross transaction value by 2015,” the report said. Read on for the full release from Juniper Research.

READ MORE: Click here.

July 5, 2011 in Blog   |   No Comments

What Drives Auto Shoppers’ Behavior – according to Google

 

While reading on of my favorite blogs from eMarketer, I came across this article about how Google’s insight into the Car Buyer’s experience is very insightful. Having a strong presence in Mobile Marketing for the Auto Industry and Car Dealers nationwide for several years, I read the article top to bottom. It was very insightful and sheds light into what Google is tracking across their properties. In addition, it should come as no surprise, that many recent enhancements made to their ad serving capabilities further extends benefits to better local search results from their advertisers – especially local car dealers.

 

According to Google’s own Automotive Industry Development Manager, Kimberly Stonehouse, they have identify some key factors influencing the way today’s consumers shop for automotive products (their next car).

3 KEY TAKEAWAYS:
1) 3 Months to buy
2) Funnel Leads from National Advertising to Local Dealer
3) Mobile & Local Combination = SUCCESS

Questions & Answers from the Google/eMarketer Q&A session.
QUESTION: How long does it take a typical consumer to research and purchase a vehicle?
On average – Three months.

Google can see “an interplay between digital and the dealer. Digital media is used often for comparison purposes to determine the consideration set and narrow it, but it is not negating the importance of the dealer.”

QUESTION: What are OEMs doing to get auto shoppers’ to their sites? 
According to Stonehouse, “Automakers aren’t trying to necessarily predict where a shopper is in their purchase funnel, but are providing choice so shoppers can determine where they want to go, where they want to find information. For example, if you search for Toyota on Google, you’ll typically see an ad for the brand, Toyota.com, you’ll see a site within the ad space for BuyaToyota.com, which is the national dealer site. And you’ll also most likely see an ad for a local Toyota dealer.

What Toyota and what a lot of our automaker partners are doing is recognizing that it’s difficult to predict from a search of Toyota, or something similar, exactly what the consumer is doing or is looking for. They can increase their efficiency and, in many cases, lower their acquisition cost or lead cost by providing that choice. It increases the likelihood that the consumer will click because they’re provided with all of the options that they could potentially be looking for, regardless of where they are in the funnel.”

QUESTION: How and when does mobile come into the picture? 
According to Stonehouse, “Mobile is one of the biggest consumer trends this year, and we’re really starting to see automakers recognize the importance of mobile in the shopping process. Within automotive specifically, it varies among brands, but up to 20% of search traffic to OEMs comes through a mobile device. So that’s a tipping point for automakers to realize that mobile is a substantial portion of search traffic, and those consumers are ones they need to reach.

We’ve seen that mobile traffic doesn’t replace desktop by any means. It’s additive, and it’s complementary. Through our search data, we see more desktop search traffic in the middle of the day, but mobile will spike in the evenings. Although mobile usage is strong in the evening timeframes, it also has proliferated past what the typical uses and time periods you might expect.”

QUESTION: What advantage does the mobile platform offer to local dealerships? 
“One in three mobile searches are local. When a mobile device can recognize a consumer’s location, it becomes a much more powerful tool. Dealers can provide an offer to a consumer who is driving around looking for a vehicle on a Saturday. This enables the advertiser to send a targeted message—and for the consumer to receive something useful and relevant. “

For the complete interview, visit eMarketer (eMarketer Total Access clients only)

July 2, 2011 in Blog   |   No Comments