The mobile web is now reaching its “critical mass” according to Nielsen Mobile. The report (also featured by the BBC) suggests that the UK is leading Europe in the uptake of mobile services. With US users currently most likely to use the mobile web.
Until now the mobile web has mainly been the domain of business users wanting to keep up with emails etc. on the move but now high spec. consumer devices, such as the iPhone, Nokia N95and Motorola RAZR are making leisure users aware of the web in their pocket. The wider availability and affordability of unlimited web data plans from the mobile networks is also having an impact, an improvement in connectivity is also helping.
Most mobile phones currently sold offer access to the Internet either via 2G (aka GPRS) or 3G connectivity. For businesses wishing to offer services to their customers and make the most value of their Internet investments the mobile web can be a confusing platform. However, it is possible to bring sophisticated web services on to mass market consumer devices as has been demonstrated by 3 Sheep.
Information on the go (perhaps unsurprisingly) is the biggest use of the mobile web. Services such as Email, weather and news, as well city guides and maps are amongst the most likely uses made of the mobile web. The biggest use of all are portal pages. Given that most service carriers (mobile network providers) tend to set-up their own portals and direct their customers directly to them then this uptake is not surprising and reflects trends in the early web, which the mobile web often reflects. It will be interesting to see as user confidence and knowledge grows if the portal pages remain their primary destination.
The mobile web is still an emerging platform but the Nielsen report suggests that is becoming a mainstream channel. Combined with the recent Cisco ecommerce report then it would seem that now is very much time for businesses to start including the mobile web in their decision making and strategy. 3 Sheep is ready to help business make the right design and content decisions to the most of the mobile web as it establishes itself as the fourth revenue channel.
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- July 10th, 2008 at 5:58 pm
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