The number of mobile phones sold every hour is 6 to 8 times more than the number of desktop computers and laptops sold combined. And among the 300,000 odd mobile phones sold in the first quarter of 2010, 50,000 were smart phones, and its sales alone are set to overtake PC sales by 2012 or maybe earlier (Gartner report). Most smart phone users use it to watch videos, read books and magazines, play games and most importantly browse the internet. To add to that the 3G and 4G networks are making things easier and exciting for the users. Yes, we are heading or may be already are in a world where the average user is hooked up to these communication devices for the better part of their lives.
This month we will cover various aspects of mobile analytics including mobile analytics framework, challenges of mobile analytics, desktop vs. mobile visitor behavior and a few case studies.
Let’s begin with why mobile analytics is gaining steam all over the world?
Smart phones are ushering users to use phones in place of desktops, laptops and net books
With smart phones, which seamlessly run on software like Android, Microsoft Mobile, Symbian, Linux, etc., things are getting much easier with richer and exciting mobile experience. To put it straight the trend is clear and loud, mobile internet users and rising and shining.
Businesses are designing compatible websites for richer user experience
Websites normally designed for PCs don’t fit in to the mobile world easily. With lower processing speeds and screen space constraints websites needs to tune up to catch up to the different mood of mobile experience. However, as the mobile internet usage is on the rise most businesses are designing mobile compatible websites to increase the user experience.
Pressing need for mobile analytics
Businesses should always latch on to opportunities which help them to better understand customer behavior and patterns, and this mandates current businesses to focus on this rising group of users, especially their business’s most likely prospects. And this is where mobile analytics pitches in. It makes the right supplement for your traditional web analytics and acts as a major source for customer analysis.
Why mobile analytics can prove valuable for your organization?
Traditional benefits of web analytics
Mobile analytics packs most benefits of traditional web analytics. It gives you details about the visitors, where they are from, their browsing patterns, flow of information preferred, keywords used to reach you and so on. This information as you know is huge and heavily useful for your positioning or repositioning. Since screen space on a mobile phone is limited, you can utilize this knowledge to tweak your content and create custom and extremely specific websites for mobile users.
Get geeky prospects
Most smart phone users are geeky and it’s assumable that they are looking for the latest stuff which suits their lifestyle. If your products or services are eyed towards these set of prospects then mobile analytics is your right marketing tool. Your mobile presence will act as a distinction for these prospects to choose you rather than your competitors.
Social networks fuel most smart phones
Most smart phone comes with one touch applications to launch social media networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. As mobile phones are absolutely personal, lot of social networking and virtual friend groups run on these devices. Mobile analytics can really help you here with useful information about their preferences, patterns and the hottest topics in town.
Rapid growth implies more visibility
As the number of smart phones sold every year is rising at an encouraging pace of around 40% to 50% more and more users are invariably locking themselves towards using internet for all their needs on these phones. This single reason itself calls for businesses like yours to seriously look at making your presence felt in the mobile world and with smarter websites and of course with good analytics you can stay on track to get your chunk of the business.
Bottom-line is that as growing businesses you should combine mobile analytics with traditional web analysis and get the best for your business now.
A good analysis about mobile phones market and the analytic need for mobile advertising and marketing. Let me add some points.
In 2015 India will have 237 million internet user and major no. of internet users in India will come from cell phones.
Right now only 1% people use the cell phone for internet. (report from the Boston Consulting Group)