In a new report released by Nielsen, State of the Media: The Mobile Media Report, the future of mobile commerce is beginning to get clearer to marketers. The report gathered data from a wide variety of Nielsen’s sources related to U.S. consumer audiences, including surveys, device metering from iOS and Android smartphones, cell phone bills, and volunteer panelists.
According to Nielsen’s findings from the study, approximately 2 out of 3 Americans between the ages of 25-34 own smartphones (63%), and approximately 1 out of 2 between the ages of 18-24 own smartphones (53%). In fact, the number of Americans who are smartphone subscribers and use the Internet via their mobile devices grew by 45% since 2010.
For marketers, data around the usage and downloading of mobile apps is very important, and Nielsen’s study shows that 62% of smartphone users in the United States have downloaded apps on their devices with games being the most popular type of app used within 30 days. However, 87% of people who downloaded an app in the past 30 days have used deal-of-the-day sites such as Groupon and Living Social. That’s another area of great interest to marketers.
Texting is still a popular mobile marketing tactic, so it makes sense that marketers want to hear about texting trends. According to the Nielsen study, teens between the ages of 13-17 are the heaviest users of text messaging (sending and receiving an average of nearly 3,500 text messages per month).
One more big piece of the mobile marketing puzzle is video, which is growing incredibly quickly thanks to smartphone and tablet penetration. During the third quarter of 2010, 16 million Americans had a mobile video smartphone that they used to watch video content (10% penetration). One year later during the third quarter of 2011, that number had increased to 26 million (14% penetration), and showed no sign of slowing down.
Bottom-line, mobile marketing is the future, and the future has officially arrived. If you don’t have a mobile marketing strategy in place for your brand for 2012, you need to make some changes to your marketing plan to at least begin testing mobile marketing tactics in the new year.
What do you think of the future of mobile marketing? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.
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Susan Gunelius is the author of 10 marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and technology books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, an award-wining blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more.
She has over 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Today, her clients include large and small companies around the world and household brands like Citigroup, Cox Communications, Intuit, and more. Susan is frequently interviewed about marketing and branding by television, radio, print, and online media organizations, and she speaks about these topics at events around the world. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google+.
