The Rise of Smartphones, Apps and the Mobile Web

December 15, 2011

New York, NY, USA. 2011.12.15 – In a ‘State of the Media’ report published today, market research leader Nielsen has revealed a constant growth in the use of mobile phones to view video content.

Smartphones invite users to engage in rich media activities.

The growing popularity of smartphones has led to a dramatic rise in mobile video. While 23 million mobile subscribers viewed video on their phones in 2010, 31 million use mobile video today—a 35% increase.

Digital Tsunami has been advocating video for the web since its’ inception in 1996. The company’s founder has over 30 years experience in film and video production and recognised the benefits of presenting marketing messages in evocative video from the earliest days of the World Wide Web.

Before the turn of the century video was impressively innovative, screens were small, video was short and buffering was expected. Understandable however, when a 64k modem was considered fast!

Nonetheless, 15 years ago, visionaries like Nick Negroponte of MIT Media Lab, were predicting streaming video capacity so high, that downloading a movie would take just seconds.

When software had to be loaded onto a desktop via a sequence of 3¼” floppy discs, that was a highly futuristic concept. The introduction of super-fast broadband makes it a reality.

The 2011 Mobile Media Report provides a snapshot of the current mobile media landscape and audiences in the U.S. and highlights the potential power of mobile commerce in the near future.

In a study of U.S. users, key findings were that:

• The majority of 25-34 and 18-24 year olds now own smartphones (64% and 53% respectively)
• The majority of smartphone owners (62%) have downloaded apps on their devices and games are the top application category used in the past 30 days
• The number of smartphone subscribers using the mobile Internet has grown 45 percent since 2010
• The majority of those who downloaded an app in the past 30 days (87%), used deal-of-the-day websites like Groupon or Living Social
• Younger groups text the most. In Q3, teens 13-17 sent and received the most text messages (an average of 3,417 each month)

The report draws data from a broad range of Nielsen sources, including: in-depth monthly surveys of mobile consumers (more than 300,000 consumers surveyed each year); device metering data from the iOS and Android smartphones of thousands of volunteer consumers; and detailed, monthly analysis of the cellphone bills of 65,000 U.S. volunteer panelists.

 

Source: nielsen wire