Cx3: Nielsen Iran social media stats

Nielsen has undertaken snapshot search results analysis from Google for Iran focussed key phrases (Iran; Iran protest; Iran election; Moussavi and Ahmadinejad) over a two week period. A number of insights have emerged about how the Internet and social media continue to be a transforming force for the news industry.

Findings from an Internet snapshot from June 18, 2009:
- CNN rarely shows up in the top five search results for select Iran Election terms, mirroring criticism from consumers that the global news network’s coverage of the Iran Election was lacking (#CNNFail).
- Wikipedia emerges within the top two search results for 4/5 of the leading topics.
- At least one social media source emerges within the top 10 search results for every term. In most cases, the social media sites emerge directly above a traditional, major news source, such as WSJ.com.

Findings from an Internet snapshot from June 24, 2009:
- YouTube emerges within the top 10 search results for all search terms in the second week.
- Wikipedia remains within the top three search results in the second week for four of the five search terms.
- Twitter emerges within the top 20 search results in week two, specifically the Twitter results for Moussavi and Ahmadinejad. Of course, traditional news sources such as the BBC (and CNN, in week two) bubble to the top of search results, as do general information sites such as Yahoo.com and Infoplease.com.

Nielsen say that it is "yet another watershed moment in the ongoing evolution of news and media, further blurring the lines between being, reporting, and following the story". Read full findings from Nielsen: The Iran Election and Social Media: The New News Revolution

RELATED LINKS:
Cx3 blog entry: Iran's social media voice

iPhone: Driving growth in mobile internet usage behaviour

The latest report by Nielsen Mobile, Critical Mass - The Worldwide State of the Mobile Web, provides insight into today's mobile internet usage behaviour. Coming out of the report's statistical analysis, it states that "Mobile internet reached a critical mass this year, offering a large and diverse enough base of users to support large-scale mobile marketing efforts".

Globally, 16% of the US population browse the internet via a mobile handset, closely followed by the UK (13%) and Italy (12%). Nielsen found that 82% of iPhone owners access mobile internet, "making them five times as likely to do so as the average mobile consumer".

The report says that "PC internet users visit more than 100 domains per month, on average", however, 'mobile internet' users (in the UK) visited on average only 5.5 select websites per month...oh, to be on that precious '5.5' list.

The user profile of the iPhone owner has evolved over time. The first generation iPhone aligned itself with the lifestyle and psychological profile of early adopters:

- For 'Lifestyle seekers' it was new, shiny, latest 'to-be-seen-with' phone;
- 'Apple supporters' purchased the phone for its aesthetic appeal;
- 'Techies' purchased the phone to access the web and the widgets.

However, O2 then slashed the cost of the iPhone by £100 that opened up mass availability to wider audiences bringing the product into the mainstream.

The just released second generation iPhone comes with 3G, allowing faster access to the web. This can only support the growth of mobile internet usage that opens up opportunities for web marketing trends, whose target audience's contact point is the mobile phone. As the report says "Mobile internet users are 60% more likely to be open to mobile advertising than the average mobile data user".

RELATED LINKS:
Download full report: Critical Mass - The Worldwide State of the Mobile Web (PDF 1.5MB)
Cx3 blog entry: Mobile barcodes - the future of mobile channel communication?