Lenova A1000
During Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Chinese computer manufacturer Lenovo announced three new tablets in its IdeaPad range.
The newcomers will be “competitively priced”, and aimed at different segments of the market: the seven-inch A1000 and A3000 will appeal to users on a budget, while the premium 10-inch S6000 was designed to offer maximum performance in a thin and light package.
All three devices will go on sale in the second quarter of 2013.
Zynga is looking for solutions for its troubles. It is the giant mobile games company. Can it surpass troubles via online Gaming?
China, being the most populated country in the world, has become a hotbed for mobile device and smartphone usage. Consumer, business, and advertiser behaviours are quickly becoming assimilated and adaptive to the mobile gadget phenomenon. Mobile is now the new “cigarette”. Here there is a video created by GroupM Interaction showing facts about Chinese smartphone usage in 2011. [3:40 mins]
Some key facts:
– Android accounted 68% of China smartphones
– 360 million Chinese used the internet on their mobile devices
– 67% of Chinese take photos before eating and post them on social network
– Smartphone users in China check their gadgets every six minutes
– 38% of smartphone users spend more than 5 hours a day on their phone
– 92% of the youth use their mobile phones in the toilet!
– More than 1000 people daily start romantic relationships using their smartphones
At the recent MRMW conference held in Amsterdam, Elias Veris from Insites Consulting showed how a mobile MROC application can boost responses and allow observational tasks to be included in community research. In this follow-up article, he discusses how people are using their smart phones and what are the core drivers for using it.
A couple of weeks ago, the MRMW conference took place in Amsterdam. A fine event, with many bright minds talking on how to use mobile as a method. I had the opportunity to present about mobile in MROC’s there too (the presentation is available here) and tremendously enjoyed the discussions I had with many of the other delegates. What struck me however, is how almost all discussions were about the method of mobile, and only very little were about mobile as ‘content’. In other words, how can we in the market research industry help our clients really understand how to use this new era of connectedness in their daily marketing practices?
To kick this discussion off, we have recently conducted a study among 800 + smartphone users in 4 countries (US, UK, The Netherlands and Belgium). Our aim? Finding out how smartphone users use their phone, and what the real drivers are of using it. And, how can brands tap into the power of mobile?
According to Socialbakers’s report, in May, the Facebook Mobile application for mobile devices had 488 million users. Four months later, Facebook demonstrates the power of mobile by hitting 543 million monthly active users out of their 955 million strong Facebook community, resulting in a 57% penetration!
North America continues to be the strongest Facebook Mobile continent with over 161 million monthly active users and South Africa, Nigeria and Japan still rule the ranking of the countries with the highest Facebook Mobile penetration.
Facebook for Android has grown the most in absolute numbers (22.5 million new users) and iPad increased its mobile Facebook base by 45%! Now that Timeline is available for iPad, it will be interesting to see how the numbers grow. Let’s check more Socialbakers’s exclusive infographics!
I am honored to share this event since I am one of the official blogger of MRMW- Market Research Mobile World Asia Pasific 2013. If you follow MMA which is the premier global non-profit trade association representing all players in the mobile marketing value chain, you may hear about Market Research Mobile World too.
Mobile has a strategic position in our lives. To take a deeper look at mobile market in Asia, lets check how MRMW explains:
Smartphone adoption and usage continues to soar in Asia. According to the recent Mobile Planet study (2012), smartphones are becoming increasingly indispensable to Asian consumers. 54% of smartphone owners from China would rather give up their TV than a smartphone. In Japan 100% of smartphone owners use their mobile device to research products or services. These mobile trends provide businesses with an exceptional opportunity to rethink how to reach the new mobile consumers, interact with them and generate insights for marketing, branding and new product development.
The Market Research in the Mobile World will be an exciting and impactful event comprising of presentations from distinguished experts around the world and wide-ranging contributions on the current state-of-the-art and the future of mobile insight generation in Asia-Pacific markets.
On February 29th, Facebook revealed big plans for the mobile platform, including that the new Timeline format for brands will also be available on the mobile platform. The game changing updates mean that for users of other social media marketing platforms, the message for 2012 will be: we need to get ready for mobile.
Let’s recap the announcements Facebook made and what they mean for your brand:
Timeline for brands will also be functional in the mobile platform (but will be made available at an unspecified date in 2012)
Implications for brands: Where brands can currently launch mobile-optimized marketing campaigns that users can access from their smart devices, soon users will be able to experience the same exact workflow on their desktop as on their smart phone. The new Timeline format for brands, once available on the mobile network, will enable page managers to curate an identical experience for all users, regardless of how they’re accessing branded content on Facebook. This means a big impact on your brand’s reach, especially as we consider that nearly half of the active Facebook user population interacts with the network from their mobile device.
Sponsored Stories now appear in the mobile feed as well
Implications for brands: To date, there has been no advertising reach to any Facebook users on mobile devices. In light of the fact that approximately 450 million Facebook users interact with the network using a mobile device, this was an enormous opportunity lost to marketers— until now. Sponsored Story ad units are the only ones being released to mobile Timelines— this means that promoting these “organic word of mouth” advertising units will become a major part of every marketers mission.
In a sense, it’s a bit silly to call 2012 the Year of Mobile because every year since the release of Apple’s ill-fated Newton has been the Year of Mobile. We have always been moving toward computing devices that are smaller, faster, and cheaper. According to research by Morgan Stanley, the number of people who access the Internet primarily from mobile devices will surpass desktop users sometime in 2013.
