Mobile web is huge - says Nielson Mobile

A latest report from Nielson Mobile says that mobile internet has reached a tipping point. According to its latest survey, there are over 40 million active mobile internet users in the U.S. alone. And the number is growing steadily by the day. So, Nielson Mobile states that mobile internet, as an advertising medium, has reached a critical mass. What this means to advertisers is that they now have a very good market with a good demographic depth.

Now, this should not be surprising for anyone who’s been following the mobile web market closely. Mobile broadband usage has skyrocketed in the recent times and we’ve had report after report predicting just how big mobile web can be in the future. So, all I can say to people who doubted the potential of mobile web is – I told you so. In fact, I think there is still scope for a huge growth. As more and more people start using Apple iPhones, Blackberries, Nokia N95s, and other such phones, the number of mobile web users will increase exponentially. Already, over 80% of iPhone users surf the internet regularly from their phone. So, with more and more sophisticated devices coming into the market, we can expect further growth.

Now that we’ve heard the good news, can you predict which the most popular website among mobile internet users is? If you said Yahoo, give yourself a self-congratulatory pat on your back.

This again should not be very surprising for people following the mobile web market closely. Yahoo has made tremendous progress in the mobile web market and it’s not surprising that it enjoys great popularity among users. However, Google and Microsoft come in the second and third spots respectively and are not far away either.

Categories: Mobile Web.

1 comment.

Mobile social networking rapidly gaining popularity

Social networking is the in-thing now and it’s evident from the number of people who access MySpace and Facebook dutifully every day. In fact, people are so much into these sites that they want to be connected all the time. However, you can’t carry a laptop all the time and you can’t go to a browsing center ten times a day to update your status in your Facebook profile and to catch up with your friends. So, what do you do? Simple – you access these sites in your mobile phone.

The practice of accessing social networking sites on mobile phones, called mobile social networking, is becoming more and more popular with mobile users these days. The biggest reason is the iPhone. It literally changed the way people perceived mobile phones and now iPhone users top the chart in mobile internet usage.

According to statistics, more than 85% of iPhone users access the internet from their phones. This is an incredible number, to say the least. Smart phone users come second in this list. People, especially young ones, who have internet facility in their phone, access social networking sites regularly.

A report from Nielson says that 1.7% of all mobile users in the U.K. visited social networking sites on their cell phones regularly. It’s 1.6% in the U.S., 0.8% in Spain, 0.6% in Italy, and 0.2% in Germany. Experts predict that these numbers will more than double in about two years and mobile social networking will become popular big time.

MySpace, followed by Facebook, is the most accessed social networking site on mobile phones. In December 2007 alone, the site had close to 3 million visits from mobile users. In the U.S. and all over Europe, there are tens of thousands of regular mobile users who log into MySpace regularly. We’ve already seen how popular MySpace can be, but still these numbers are incredible.

I think these numbers will have a significant impact on mobile service prices in the coming days. Thanks to this overwhelming popularity of mobile social networking and other similar things, operators might be tempted to cut down the rates for data plans. One example for this would be Vodafone UK. In its latest monthly plans, it has added unlimited internet access as a standard feature. We might as well see other companies follow suit.

Categories: Apple iPhone, All things mobile phones, Mobile Social Networking.

0 comments.

Mobilizing sites could be the key in future

Mobile surfing, surfing the web on mobile phones, has been on the rise lately. It has been assessed that around 14% of mobile users surf the web regularly and this number will increase sharply over the next few years. Now, mobile internet is not an alien term to most of you guys and you’ve been hearing this quite often, right? But the issue I’m going to bring up is something different. It’s about the traffic generated by mobile surfing.

A recent report from Nielson says that a lot of companies have seen an increase in their website’s traffic on an average of 13% due to mobile surfing. This is an incredible number, to say the least.

The report also says that some websites had a pretty sharp increase in traffic as a lot of mobile users tend to surf those sites on the go very regularly. Can you guess what kind of websites they’re talking about? It’s a no-brainer. Weather sites and entertainment sites are the most accessed ones via mobile internet and the traffic to these sites increased by 22% due to mobile surfing.

In case of other websites, the increase in traffic has not been drastic, but noticeable nevertheless. However, the report says that this will change soon as more and more people are now accessing the net through their mobile phone.

In my opinion, this brings up the topic of mobile websites again. The question of whether or not a company should have a mobile website has been asked many a time, but there has not been any satisfactory answer. However, I’ve always claimed that mobile websites can change the way you connect with your customers and can actually help you interact with your core user base better. Now, this report reflects my thought too.

Just imagine, if you found out that more than 30% of your site’s traffic came from mobile phones, wouldn’t you be hard-pressed to mobilize your site to make it easier for them to access it through their mobile phones? Also, viewing a standard website on a mobile phone, as I’ve said many times before, can be a clumsy experience sometimes. A mobile site with a mobile-friendly interface which loads very quickly will make it easier for mobile users to access it via their mobile phone. This, in return, can result in an increase in your site’s overall traffic.

While this idea might be applicable for all websites, it’s absolutely necessary for some websites which are regularly surfed by mobile users. Entertainment, travel, weather, movies, maps, news, and banking sites are the most popular websites among mobile users and mobilizing these sites is a great idea.

The content of this report is not surprising for me at all, for there have already been instances where I could sense the immense potential of mobile sites. In case you’re new to this site, I urge you to read this, this, and this. In my opinion, this is a glimpse at the future. The question is, are you ready?

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

1 comment.