Opportunities for integrated mobile and out of home campaigns grow as consumers continue to embrace smartphone technology
The number of Britons putting smartphone technologies into practice has risen significantly during the first months of 2012. The latest Kinetic Panel also finds three quarters of 18-45 year olds now own a smartphone and over a fifth (22%) of 25-34 year olds are tablet owners, with many more planning to upgrade in the near future.
Twitter continues to be the social media channel used most on the move, while LinkedIn use continues to grow. Facebook dominates amongst those aged 18-24, with virtually all users (96%) engaging via mobiles on the move.
Kinetic is also working on a number of projects to investigate how consumers use technologies to interact with their surroundings, with findings due later this month. Ahead of those results, the Kinetic Panel has found two thirds of smartphone users in the UK are aware of QR codes or location-based services, Google Goggles, NFC, augmented reality apps or Blippar. The highest usage rate reported is for QR codes, with 59% of those aware having scanned them to be directed to content.
Most of those acquainted with NFC are so as a means of instant payment, while half know it can be used to exchange information with other smartphone users and as a travel card. A fifth know they can use NFC to interact with posters, reinforcing the opportunity for both education and greater penetration within smartphones.
Interest in m-commerce is rapidly growing, with people starting to feel more comfortable with the technologies available. Over half of those aware of the instant payment capability of NFC have used it for that purpose. The Panel confirms that there is opportunity to influence m-commerce at the point of purchase, with the most popular purchases made via smartphone for the categories of music, games and movies (half have done this) and fashion (40%). A quarter of people reported that they were comfortable with using the tap-to-pay mechanism through NFC, up from just 13% in August last year, while there is still some work to do to educate people in what is being done to make the technology as secure as possible.
Mobile banking is taking off in a similar way; half of us think mobile banking will be a quicker way to manage their finances on the move, rising to 67% in 18-24 year olds, and a quarter said they were likely to adopt mobile banking this year. However, a majority did state that they would need more information about mobile banking to be entirely comfortable with it.
The latest Kinetic Panel found people in the UK are very comfortable in sharing their own content through smartphones, with 68% having posted images or video content outside of the home. We’ve seen a trend of innovative Out of Home campaigns being posted on the internet, with two thirds of smartphone users having used a mobile to upload a photo to a website and 18% have done the same with video. In the past experiential campaigns have served to engage people on the move and gain press coverage. The opportunity is now certainly there for brands to execute campaigns that are hugely amplified through sharing across the internet.
For more information please contact:
Nick Mawditt, Kinetic Worldwide
Naomi Roberts, Kinetic Worldwide
