Go Mobile or Go Home

More and more, People Are Using Phones to Access the Internet

Since the beginning of the pandemic, a significant change in consumer behavior worldwide has forced organizations across all industries to re-evaluate their business models. As we all have begun to adapt to our new reality, it has become evident how important digital transformation has become. While this global lockdown brought a lot of uncertainty to many businesses, some marketers have recognized it as an opportunity to change and provide additional value to their users.

The truth of the matter is, having a mobile presence has become imperative to survival.

As mobility continues to redefine how businesses operate, traditional enterprises need to be conscious of the fact that they are no longer just in competition with each other, but with mobile-first companies that have captured the attention of an increasingly mobile society. 

If you are still targeting PC internet users, you have some catching up to do. More and more people are accessing the internet from mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. It is therefore important to provide a simple and easy mobile experience for your website users to ensure that they come back.

There are many people who only access the internet using their mobile phones. You cannot afford to ignore them if you want to reach a large audience. Here are some figures to worry about!

81 Percent of Adults Use Internet on the Go

Mobile users don’t just find their devices convenient, they are dependent on them. Given the continued increase in dependence on mobile, it’s critical to adapt business models to match key audiences’ behavior.

If a large majority of your audience is mobile-first or mobile-only, your business needs to communicate with them based on their preferences.

1. By 2021, there will be roughly 7 billion mobile users worldwide. (Source)
2. In 2020 annual mobile app downloads 218 billion downloads. That’s a seven percent increase year-over-year.
3. In 2020 app store spend reached $143 billion worldwide, an increase of 20 percent year-over-year.
4. In 2020, the average daily time spent on a mobile device reached four hours and ten minutes, an increase of 20 percent year-over-year.
5. 92 percent of time spent on mobile is spent using apps. Social networking and communication apps taking up 44 percent.
6. 25 percent of users abandon a product after only one use.
7. Generation Z (ages 6-24), Millennials (ages 25-40), and Gen X/Baby Boomers (ages 41-75) spend 16 percent, 18 percent, and 30 percent more time year-over-year, respectively, in their most-used apps. (Source)
8. 40 percent more hours streamed on mobile, peaking in Q2 of 2020.

Mobile accounts for approximately half of web traffic worldwide. In the first quarter of 2021, mobile devices (excluding tablets) generated 54.8 percent of global website traffic, numbers that have been consistently hovering around the 50 percent mark since the beginning of 2017.

It would be an understatement to say that mobile phones have become an extension of ourselves. And no doubt, our lives are tethered to mobile applications.

Most of us use more than a couple of applications every day for a variety of purposes. It could be to connect with our friends and family, for work, to make payments, or even for entertainment.

Today, the majority of internet traffic comes from mobile sources (and predominantly from smartphones). Globally, the latest statistics indicate that approximately 50.88% of all internet traffic can be attributed to mobile devices/smartphones.

As of 2020, here is the global breakdown of internet traffic:

• 50.88% mobile
• 46.39% desktop
• 2.74% tablet 

For those reading this article on a desktop computer, this information may surprise you. But looking at it from a global perspective, the numbers make sense. The biggest factor driving mobile’s dominance globally is the affordability of mobile devices and smartphones.

Of course, the type of activities that internet users engage in on mobile is notably different from typical internet activities that are performed on desktop computers. Global data on the subject is sparse, but here’s a breakdown of data in the United States:

Search Engine Activity

• Approximately 58% of all search engine activity on Google originates from mobile searches, compared to around 40% on desktop. Desktop search activity also differs from mobile searches in a number of ways.
• For instance, the volume of local search queries (such as “restaurants near me”) has declined among desktop users but continues to rise exponentially for those searching on mobile phones.

Social Media Usage

• Approximately 83% of all social media visits are from mobile devices, compared to around 15% on desktops or laptop computers.
• In fact, roughly half of social media users only use mobile devices to access their social network of choice. This can largely be attributed to the popularity of social media apps on smartphones, and increased smartphone use in general.

E-Commerce

• Approximately 28% of online e-commerce sales are made via mobile devices, compared to more than 70% on desktop. Interestingly, it appears that internet users like to browse e-commerce apps on mobile devices, but prefer to do their actual buying on desktops.
• The conversion rate (or percentage of visits that results in an actual sale) was about 4.14% on desktop, compared to just 1.53% on mobile devices.
• For eCommerce businesses, mobile traffic makes up the lion’s share of total traffic, yet accounts for a much smaller percentage of revenues. As online shopping becomes increasingly popular, eCommerce businesses will have to adapt mobile website designs to help improve conversions.

Web Browsing

• When it comes to browsing the web (outside of specific mobile apps), desktop remains dominant. While mobile visits made up 58% of US searches, they only accounted for approximately 42% of total time spent online. In other words, more individual searches are made on mobile, but more time is spent browsing the web on desktops.

The implications are increasingly clear – if you’re not able to reach your audience through mobile search or display, or you’re not providing a satisfactory mobile experience, you will miss out compared to competitors who are.

Clearly, this type of access is not only limited to younger age groups. We now have to assume that the mobile platform is the media of choice for the vast majority of users, whatever their age.

The UK has the highest rate of mobile social network users in the whole of Europe! If that’s not impressive, I don’t know what is. 7 in 10 mobile users use their phones to upload photos and videos on social media.

Unquestionably, the future is mobile – The new mantra is ‘Go Mobile or Go Home