Top trends for 2012: Ericsson

BANGALORE, INDIA: From knowing what's happening around the world to paying bills to watching movies, one can do everything on a phone. Hence connectivity has become as essential as road or electricity.

According to ConsumerLab report from Ericsson, by 2016 mobile phone users living on less than one per cent of the Earth’s total land area are set to generate around 60 per cent of mobile traffic.

Also Read: Demand for video driving mobile data traffic

The report has come out with some hot consumer trends for 2012, CIOL lists them out:

Connectivity is king

Being connected is not only crucial for keeping up with friends’ activities; it increasingly means access to income. In 2010, Ericsson and Arthur D. Little concluded that for every 10 percentage point increase in broadband penetration, a country’s GDP increases by one percent. This study also revealed that around 80 new jobs are created for every 1,000 new broadband connections.

The research concludes that doubling a country’s broadband speed increases its GDP by 0.3 per cent.

Social media redefines news reporting

Social networks have become true media hubs, driving consumption of pictures, video clips and music based on the flow of conversations and posts. And now serious news reporting is being redefined.

We have heard of the importance of Twitter in social media, and in a recent Ericsson project focused on the aftermath of the Japan earthquake and tsunami disaster, we were astounded at the sharp rise of social media. During a recent field study in New York, we had the same experience — there was an earthquake and people found out about it via Facebook, not CNN.

Role of mobile phones

American speaker and writer Denis Waitley once said: “First we make our habits, and then our habits make us.” Our research confirms that habits related to commuting, shopping and household chores make up a large part of our lives.

This may be the reason why consumers show greater interest in mobile services that are directly related to nearby places and things. In a recent study, 58 per cent of smartphone users said they wanted to use their mobile phones as commuting passes, 70 per cent wanted to have their loyalty cards stored on their phones and 76 per cent wanted to use their phones as bar-code scanners for price comparisons.

{#PageBreak#}

The cloud makes things easy to use

Cloud-based offerings from telecom operators and ICT providers will continue to grow. However, consumers talk about “online services” or something similar and not that much about “the cloud.” They see the cloud as a place for sharing all kinds of information and media.

As it turns out, consumers own multiple devices that either use or produce media — and in this world of sharing, having those devices connect easily to the internet is becoming the new baseline for ease of use. For this reason, we saw that 49 per cent of US digital camera owners wanted to connect their cameras in order to directly upload photos. That is much easier than fiddling with memory cards and adapters. 

Smart women drive smartphone revolution

We all know there is dramatic growth in smartphones, but it may be comforting to know this does not mean we are all turning into geeks — just the men are.

In our 2011 survey of smartphone users in the US and the UK, more men than women use lower-penetration services such as VoIP and video telephony, and they are also more likely to download new apps. On the other hand, significantly more women use higher-penetration services such as voice calling, SMS and Facebook.

Seventy-one percent of female smartphone users check social networks on their phones, compared with only 64 percent of men — and 59 percent of women update their statuses, compared with only 51 percent of men.  By actively integrating the use of all communication channels into one device, women are driving mass-market adoption of smartphones.

Making shopping easier

When we recently asked smartphone users in Berlin, New York, Paris and Shanghai, 67 per cent said they wanted to be able to make small payments using their phones. Sixty-six per cent were interested in mobile banking. But payments should not be seen in isolation.

When meeting with smartphone users and talking to them about their shopping behavior, they quite clearly told us that going directly for their wallets is not the best approach. Mobile payments must be put in the context of everyday shopping habits. This includes everything from getting relevant product information (about allergies, origins and so on — not just prices) to advice on recipes and caring for plants.

Everything connects

Not only is urbanization continuing on a global scale, consumers are also turning into urban nomads: many activities that were previously only done at home are now done on the streets — at least those requiring an internet connection.

Fuelled by mobile broadband — where subscriptions have grown 60 per cent year-on-year — the data consumed by smartphone users is surging. Mobile data surpassed voice in Q4 2009 and was double the volume of voice traffic in Q1 2011. Total smartphone traffic will triple in 2011.