BizResearch

The @Work State of Mind Project: Engaging the Most Engaged

Source: Forbes Insights

Summary: The @Work State of Mind means that most global business decision makers are on, irrespective of time or location. Reaching them successfully requires an understanding of more than how they blur the lines between work and personal time in terms of their usage of technological devices, time slots or locations. To communicate with @Work State of Mind decision makers, it’s imperative to understand their motivations, emotional attitudes and levels of satisfaction with round-the-clock, all-device messaging. This report was designed to explore the new @Work world and start a conversation about devising the most effective messaging.

For this study, Forbes Insights, in association with gyro, the global ideas shop, surveyed 543 executives and conducted dozens of one-on-one interviews. Respondents described themselves as decision makers, with most focused on business operations and strategy. Forty-seven percent worked for companies with revenues of more than $1 billion, including the single largest grouping (19%), who worked for firms with revenues above $10 billion. The geographic breakdown included 316 respondents in the US, 105 in the U.K. and 122 in Continental Europe.

Click here to download the study (registration required)

Photo from Creative Common: Flickr: Jeni Rodger

Intelligence - new report from Demos

Source: Demos

The growth of social media poses a dilemma for security and law enforcement agencies. On the one hand, social media could provide a new form of intelligence – SOCMINT – that could contribute decisively to keeping the public safe. On the other, national security is dependent on public understanding and support for the measures being taken to keep us safe.

Social media challenges current conceptions about privacy, consent and personal data, and new forms of technology allow for more invisible and widespread intrusive surveillance than ever before. Furthermore, analysis of social media for intelligence purposes does not fit easily into the policy and legal frameworks that guarantee that such activity is proportionate, necessary and accountable.

This paper is the first effort to examine the ethical, legal and operational challenges involved in using social media for intelligence and insight purposes. It argues that social media should become a permanent part of the intelligence framework but that it must be based on a publicly argued, legal footing, with clarity and transparency over use, storage, purpose, regulation and accountability. #Intelligence lays out six ethical principles that can help government agencies approach these challenges and argues for major changes to the current regulatory and legal framework in the long-term, including a review of the current Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000.

Click here to read the full report

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The Future of Money in a Mobile Age

Authors: Aaron Smith, Janna Anderson, Lee Rainie

Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project and Elon University

Overview: Within the next decade, smart-device swiping will have gained mainstream acceptance as a method of payment and could largely replace cash and credit cards for most online and in-store purchases by smartphone and tablet owners, according to a new survey of technology experts and stakeholders.

Many of the people surveyed by Elon University’s Imagining the Internet Center and the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project said that the security, convenience and other benefits of “mobile wallet” systems will lead to widespread adoption of these technologies for everyday purchases by 2020.

Others—including some who are generally positive about the future of mobile payments—expect this process to unfold relatively slowly due to a combination of privacy fears, a desire for anonymous payments, demographic inertia, a lack of infrastructure to support widespread adoption, and resistance from those with a financial stake in the existing payment structure.

Click here for the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: By SqueakyMarmot

Adults Media Use and Attitudes Report

Source: OFCOM

Extract from Press Release

UK adults’ concerns about the internet have dropped steadily since 2005, falling from seven in ten (70 per cent) users to half (50 per cent) by 2011, with confidence online at high levels (84 per cent), according to Ofcom’s Adults Media Use and Attitudes report.

The fall in concern comes as people are spending increasing amounts of time on the internet. The average user now says they are online for over 15 hours each week, an increase of five hours since 2005. The internet is increasingly part of people’s everyday lives wherever they are, and eight in ten adults (79%) now go online on any device in any location – up by 20 percentage points compared to 2005.

Social networking is continuing to grow in popularity and three fifths of adult internet users (59 per cent) say they now have a profile on a social networking site. However, the increase has slowed, with a rise of five percentage points since 2010, compared to increases of ten percentage points in 2010 and 22 percentage points in 2009.

Adults are increasingly turning to the internet for information. Seven in ten (68 per cent) users have accessed the internet to find details about public services, compared to half (49 per cent) in 2005. And eight in ten (79 per cent) have searched online for information about leisure time activities, up from six in ten (61 per cent) in 2005. However, those aged over 65 are less likely than other age-groups to be online – with some 51 per cent saying they do not intend to get the internet at home, compared to 15 per cent of the population as a whole.

Three in ten (29 per cent) internet users said they have had a virus on their home PC in the past twelve months, with a similar number receiving unsolicited emails directing them to a website that asks them for personal information. Almost nine out of ten (87 per cent) home internet users who access through a PC, laptop or netbook said they have anti-virus software installed on their computers at home.

Click here to read the full report

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The Future of Apps and Web

Source: Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project

Overview

The Web Is Dead? No. Experts expect apps and the Web to converge in the cloud; but many worry that simplicity for users will come at a price.

Tech experts generally believe the mobile revolution, the popularity of targeted apps, the monetization of online products and services, and innovations in cloud computing will drive Web evolution. Some survey respondents say while much may be gained, perhaps even more may be lost if the “appification” of the Web comes to pass.

About the Survey

The survey results are based on a non-random, opt-in, online sample of 1,021 Internet experts and other Internet users, recruited via email invitation, Twitter or Facebook from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project and the Imagining the Internet Center at Elon University.  Since the data are based on a non-random sample, a margin of error cannot be computed, and the results are not projectable to any population other than the experts in this sample

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Daniel Y Go

The State of the News Media 2012

Source: The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism

Extract from Press Release

More than a quarter of Americans (27%) now get news on mobile devices, and for the vast majority, this is increasing news consumption, the report finds.  More than 80% of smartphone and tablet news consumers still get news on laptop or desktop computers. On mobile devices, news consumers also are more likely to go directly to a news site or use an app, rather than to rely on search — strengthening the bond with traditional news brands.

While technology may be adding to the appeal of traditional news, technology intermediaries are capturing even more of the digital revenue pie. In 2011, five technology giants generated 68% of all digital ad revenue, according to the market research firm eMarketer — and that does not include Amazon and Apple, which make their money from devices and downloads. By 2015, roughly one out of every five display ad dollars is expected to go to Facebook, according to the same source.

Social media platforms, meanwhile, grew substantially over the last year, but still play a limited role in daily news consumption. Only about a third as many news consumers follow stories via Facebook as do so by going directly to news websites or apps or by using search, according to new PEJ survey data released here. For Twitter, the proportion drops to less than a sixth as many.

These are some of the conclusions in the ninth edition of PEJ’s annual State of the News Media report.  The report is a comprehensive analysis of the major trends in news over the last year and includes detailed chapters on eight major media sectors — digital, newspapers, cable news, network TV, local TV news, audio, magazines and ethnic media. This year’s study also includes two new national surveys examining how news is consumed on different devices and the impact of social media on news, a special report on the state of community media and an examination of Native American media.

Click here to read more

Search for a New Business Model: How Newspapers are Faring Trying to Build Digital Revenue

Source: Project for Excellence in Journalism

Extract from overview

A new study, which combines detailed proprietary data from individual newspapers with in-depth interviews at more than a dozen major media companies, finds that the search for a new revenue model to revive the newspaper industry is making only halting progress but that some individual newspapers are faring much better than the industry overall and may provide signs of a path forward.

In general, the shift to replace losses in print ad revenue with new digital revenue is taking longer and proving more difficult than executives want and at the current rate most newspapers continue to contract with alarming speed, according to the study by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. Cultural inertia is a major factor. Most papers are not putting significant effort into the new digital revenue categories that, while small now, are expected to provide most the growth in the future. To different degrees, executives predict newsrooms will continue to shrink, more papers will close and many surviving papers will deliver a print edition only a few days a week.

The study involved 38 newspapers from six different companies providing highly granular data about their digital revenue and sales efforts—creating a robust series of case studies. The data sought were developed in consultation with the partnering newspaper companies after site visits and interviews with multiple executives. After collecting the data, researchers conducted follow-up interviews to confirm whether the findings reflected broader company performance. Those findings, in turn, were shared with executives from seven more companies to test how widely they could be generalized. All data was provided on the basis that it would be anonymous.

Click here to read the full report

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The Impact of Tablet Visitors on Retail Websites

Source: Adobe Systems Incorporated via iStrategy Conference

Executive Summary

Consumers who visit retail websites using tablet devices (“Tablet Visitors”) are more valuable online customers than those who visit websites using smartphones or traditional desktop/laptop computers.

Based on its analysis of 16.2 billion visits to the websites of more than 150 retailers in 2011, Adobe Digital Marketing Insights found that Tablet Visitors spend over 50% more per purchase than visitors who use smartphones (“Smartphone Visitors”) and over 20% more than visitors who use desktop/laptop computers (“Traditional Visitors”). Additionally, Adobe found that Tablet Visitors are three times more likely to make a purchase than Smartphone Visitors and nearly as likely to purchase as Traditional Visitors.

Other findings from the Adobe study include:

• Tablet Visitors respond to promotions: Conversion rates and average order values on Black Friday and Cyber Monday rose above their 2011 Holiday and Calendar 2011 averages.
• Tablet Visitors are rapidly growing in size. Although they generate a small portion of total website visits, their share of total visits increased from 1% to 4% in just 12 months.
• Tablet Visitors appear to spend more because of their demographics, the nature of the tablet user experience, and the environment in which Tablet Visitors shop online.

These findings suggest that retailers can no longer afford a “one-size-fits-all” approach to mobile optimization because Tablet Visitors and Smartphone Visitors are distinct customer segments. Retailers should evaluate the opportunity that Tablet Visitors offer and develop strategies to better attract, convert and retain them.

Click here to read the full white paper

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Marketingfacts

Digital Communication 2012

Source: Key Note

Extract from Executive Summary

The digital communications market is becoming increasingly vital to more and more people in the UK. The focus of the market is now predominantly portability and accessibility, and this is where any future growth in the industry will be attained. Traditional means such as landline phones are showing considerable long-term decline, while mobile Internet used on portable devices is becoming very popular in its infancy.

The market has quickly become a battle field between a handful of companies. Apple’s iPhone and iPad have become the market leaders in the premium category, while mobile phones and tablet computers running on the Google Android system have done very well in the mid-market, as have RIM’s BlackBerry phones and tablet computers. All of these devices have taken advantage of a good 3G network in the UK and many Wi-Fi hotspots across town and city centres.

Moving onto communications via the Internet, a large majority of residents in the UK use social networking sites as a means of communication. Consequently, this sector has recorded the largest growth in recent years. However, the only revenue generated from this sector comes from Internet advertising, and very little revenue is seen in the digital communications industry overall.

The future of the digital communications market will undoubtedly rely on more portable devices that are able to perform a greater variety of tasks. Video calls between mobiles could easily become commonplace when the new 4G Internet network is auctioned off by the Office of Communications (Ofcom) in the coming years, possibly late 2012. However, for now, consumers seem to be happy to invest in their digital communication usage despite a recent period of financial uncertainty which could continue well into the future.

This report is available to current London Business School staff, students and faculty from Key Note Online which can be found on the A-Z list of library databases via Portal.

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr:  David Reber's Hammer Photography

London's Digital Economy

Source: GLA Intelligence Unit (Greater London Authority)

This report draws together a variety of data sources to highlight London’s position in the digital arena. The report looks at uptake and use of digital technologies by businesses and households. Amongst the findings are:

• There are over 23,000 ICT and software companies in London – the highest number of any European city. London specializes in the technology industry hosting a quarter of all British jobs in computer and related activities employment and 22 per cent of British jobs in Telecommunications. London has the highest level of private equity and venture capitalists investments into technology companies of the UK regions. In 2010 they invested £453 million into 60 companies in the city.


• London adults are more likely than those in the rest of the country to access the internet by mobile phone.


• The Broadband Quality Survey 2010 shows that UK broadband services enable users to “comfortably enjoy” the latest web applications but still lag someway behind the best in the world, such as those in South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan. The Survey scores London at 30, the same as Glasgow and one point higher than Birmingham. This compares to the winning city of Seoul that has an overall score of 73. Both Virgin and BT are in the process of updating their networks to offer their customers superfast broadband and the Government recently announced that they are creating a new £100 million urban broadband fund part of which will benefit London.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: By petahopkins

Global Digital Communication: Texting, Social Networking Popular Worldwide

Source: Pew Global Attitudes Project

Extract from Press Release

Cell phones are owned by overwhelmingly large majorities of people in most major countries around the world, and they are used for much more than just phone calls. In particular, text messaging is a global phenomenon – across the 21 countries surveyed, a median of 75% of cell phone owners say they text.

Texting is widespread in both wealthy nations and the developing world. In fact, it is most common among cell phone owners in two of the poorest nations surveyed: Indonesia and Kenya.

Many also use their mobile phones to take pictures or video. A median of 50% use their cell phones in this way in the 21 countries polled. Fully 72% of Japanese cell phone owners take pictures or video, as do roughly six-in-ten in Mexico (61%), Spain (59%) and Egypt (58%). Fewer users access the internet via cell phone, although more than four-in-ten mobile phone owners use their device to go online in Israel (47%), Japan (47%) and the United States (43%).

The survey by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project, conducted March 21 to May 15, also finds that social networking is popular in many nations around the globe. This is especially true in Israel (53%) and the U.S. (50%), where half or more say they use social networking websites. More than four-in-ten use these sites in Britain (43%), Russia (43%) and Spain (42%).

Social networking is generally more common in higher income nations; however, this is largely driven by the fact that wealthier countries have higher rates of internet access. People in lower income nations who have online access use social networking at rates that are as high, or higher, than those found in affluent countries.

Click here to read full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Tray

The State of the Communications Nation

Source: Ofcom

Ofcom have just launched digital communications coverage maps, including outdoor mobile coverage and mobile broadband availability, using data supplied by communications providers. The maps are part of Ofcom’s first report on the UK’s communications infrastructure which it is now required to submit to the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport every three years. Ofcom’s report also refers to the coverage and capacity of the UK’s landline network, digital radio and TV.

Each of the 200 areas of the UK has been ranked according to a score given for coverage and colour coded with green ranking highest and red lowest.

Ofcom’s data shows considerably better household coverage compared with geographic coverage. This is because mobile providers tend to prioritise investment in network infrastructure where the maximum number of consumers and businesses can be served.

The maps show that 97% of premises and 66% of the UK landmass can receive a 2G signal outdoors from all four 2G networks. This means that approximately 900,000 UK premises do not have a choice of all four 2G mobile networks.

For 3G, 73% of premises and 13% of the UK’s landmass can receive a signal outdoors from all five 3G networks, with lower coverage in less densely populated areas. This means that approximately 7.7million UK premises do not have a choice of all five 3G mobile networks. The areas of lowest 3G geographic coverage are in the highlands of Scotland and mid-Wales which are both sparsely populated with hilly terrain.

The report also shows significant demand for broadband data from UK consumers. Residential fixed broadband customers are using on average 17 Gigabytes of data per month. This is the equivalent to downloading more than 11 films per month, streaming 12 hours of BBC iPlayer HD video or more than 12 days of streaming audio content. This compares with mobile broadband demand which is on average 0.24 Gigabytes per month per connection.

Click here to read the full report

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The 2011 Fortune 500 and Social Media Adoption

Source: Center for Marketing Research at UMass/Darmouth

From Introduction

Fortune Magazine annually compiles a list of America’s largest corporations, aptly named the “Fortune 500” given their size and wealth. Due to the hugely influential role that these companies play in the business world, studying their usage of new technological tools like social media offers important insights into the future of commerce. While these companies may not always be the first to innovate, they do provide a look at emergent trends among America’s most successful companies.

In 2008, the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth released one of the first studies of the Fortune 500 (F500) adoption and repeated that study every year since. The study has been expanded to include the usage of the fastest growing social media tools – Facebook and Twitter.

For the first time, this latest iteration includes information on the number of Facebook fans a company has as well as the number of Twitter followers.

This research also builds on the Center’s work since 2007 examining social media in a variety of organizations including the Inc. 500, US colleges and universities and the Forbes list of the 200 largest charities.

Each May the list of the top 500 companies is released in a special issue of Fortune Magazine. The Fortune 500 (F500) list includes publicly and privately held companies for which revenues are publicly available. For more information on the F500.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr:  Martin Diller

Internet Access - Households and Individuals, 2011

Source: Office for National Statistics

Summary

This release looks at how individuals access the Internet and why. It will be useful for those interested in the Internet and how its use is changing how people live, and communicate. For example, this bulletin contains information on the extent to which young people communicate via social networking.

There have been significant changes in the way people connect to the Internet in recent years. In 2011 almost half of Internet users connected to the Internet, using a mobile phone, while away from the home or office. There were 17.6 million mobile phone Internet users in 2011, representing 45 per cent of Internet users, compared to 8.5 million users (23 per cent) in 2009.

The use of wireless (wi-fi) hotspots also increased markedly with 4.9 million people using hotspots at hotels, restaurants, airports etc, compared to 0.7 million people in 2007.

The results from this bulletin are derived from the National Statistics Opinions survey. Also
released today are quarterly experimental statistics on Internet users and non-users relating to 2011 Q2, derived from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). The LFS is a much larger survey than the Opinions survey and allows more detailed socio-demographic analysis. Care should be taken when comparing results from the two releases.

Key points

• 45% of Internet users used a mobile phone to connect to the Internet
• 6 million people accessed the Internet over their mobile phone for the first time in the previous 12 months
• The use of wireless hotspots almost doubled in the last 12 months to 4.9 million users
• 215 of Internet users did not believe their skills were sufficient to protect their personal data
• 77% of households had Internet access

Click here to read the bulletin

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Orbmiser

Communications Market Report: UK

New Ofcom research reveals the extent to which the UK has become addicted to smartphones, with people confessing to using them everywhere from the dining table to the bathroom and bedroom.

Over a quarter of adults (27%) and almost half of teenagers (47%) now own a smartphone, according to Ofcoms latest Communications Market Report.

Most (59%) have acquired their smartphone over the past year and users make significantly more calls and send more texts than regular mobile users (81% of smartphone users make calls every day compared with 53% of regular users).

Teenagers especially are ditching more traditional activities in favour of their smartphone, with 23% claiming to watch less TV and 15% admitting they read fewer books.  And when asked about the use of these devices, 37% of adults and 60% of teens admit they are highly addicted.

Over half (51%) of adults and two thirds (65%) of teenagers say they have used their smartphone while socialising with others, nearly a quarter (23%) of adults and a third (34%) of teenagers have used them during mealtimes and over a fifth (22%) of adult and nearly half (47%) of teenage smartphone users admitted using or answering their handset in the bathroom or toilet.

Ofcoms report also looks at the changes which have transformed the communications market during the last decade.

The majority of homes are now connected to the internet (25% in 2000, 76% in 2011) while nine out of ten people own a mobile phone (36% in 2000, 91% in 2011).

The majority of homes have adopted multi-channel TV (36% in 2000, 93% in 2010), 60% of households now own an HD-Ready TV and almost half (46%) have a digital video recorder (DVR).

The number of mobile voice minutes has grown by 250% over the past decade (from 35 billion to 125 billion per year), and the number of text messages sent has increased by 2000% (from 7 billion to 129 billion per year).

However, despite increasing use of the internet and an explosion in the range of communications devices, TV remains the nations most missed media, with viewing increasing by around 18 minutes over the last decade to just over 4 hours a day.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Thomas

Smartphone Adoption and Usage

Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project

In its first standalone measure of smartphone ownership, the Pew Internet Project finds that one third of American adults – 35% – own smartphones. The Project’s May survey found that 83% of US adults have a cell phone of some kind, and that 42% of them own a smartphone. That translates into 35% of all adults. Our definition of a smartphone owner includes anyone who falls into either of the following two categories:

• One-third of cell owners (33%) say that their phone is a smartphone.
• Two in five cell owners (39%) say that their phone operates on a smartphone platform (these include iPhones and Blackberry devices, as well as phones running the Android, Windows or Palm operating systems).

Mobile phones are a main source of internet access for one-quarter of the smartphone population

Some 87% of smartphone owners access the internet or email on their handheld, including two-thirds (68%) who do so on a typical day. When asked what device they normally use to access the internet, 25% of smartphone owners say that they mostly go online using their phone, rather than with a computer. While many of these individuals have other sources of online access at home, roughly one third of these “cell mostly” internet users lack a high-speed home broadband connection.

Android is the most common smartphone platform, followed by iPhone and Blackberry devices

Phones operating on the Android platform are currently the most prevalent type of smartphone, followed by iPhones and Blackberry devices.

Click here to read the full report

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E-reader Ownership Doubles in Six Months

Source: Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project

Highlights from report

The share of adults in the United States who own an e-book reader doubled to 12% in May, 2011 from 6% in November 2010. E-readers, such as a Kindle or Nook, are portable devices designed to allow readers to download and read books and periodicals. This is the first time since the Pew Internet Project began measuring e-reader use in April 2009 that ownership of this device has reached double digits among U.S. adults.

Tablet computers—portable devices similar to e-readers but designed for more interactive web functions—have not seen the same level of growth in recent months. In May 2011, 8% of adults report owning a tablet computer such as an iPad, Samsung Galaxy or Motorola Xoom. This is roughly the same percentage of adults who reported owning this kind of device in January 2011 (7%), and represents just a 3 percentage-point increase in ownership since November 2010. Prior to that, tablet ownership had been climbing relatively quickly.

Both e-book reader and tablet computer adoption levels among U.S. adults are still well below that of other tech devices that have been on the market longer. Cell phones are far and away the most popular digital device among U.S. adults today, followed by desktop and laptop computers, DVRs, and MP3 players.

This report is based on the findings of a survey on Americans' use of the Internet. The results in this report are based on data from telephone interviews conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International between April and May, 2011, among a sample of 2,277 adults, age 18 and older.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Richard Masoner

The New Digital Economy: How it Will Transform Business

Source: Oxford Economics

Extract from executive summary

International leaders face an era of unprecedented change. The recession and financial crisis that ended in 2009 caused a seismic shift that has reshaped the global business landscape. The world economy is now characterized by sluggish growth in the West, a shift in power to the East, and value-driven customers and rising risks everywhere. At the same time, the downturn has hastened the adoption of key technologies—mobility, cloud computing, business intelligence and social media—that are transforming businesses and sparking a new wave of wealth creation, particularly in the emerging world.

Economic growth and technology are inextricably linked. Current economic conditions are fostering investment in technology as emerging markets ramp up their demand for technology to fuel growth, and advanced markets seek new ways to cut costs and drive innovation. This becomes a virtuous circle as digital technologies drive consumer income and demand, education and training, and efficient use of capital and resources—leading to increased economic growth, particularly in emerging markets. Executives must be aware of the new challenges facing their firms as market momentum accelerates. Rising middle classes in places like China and India offer extraordinary potential for companies that understand their needs. Emerging markets are also spawning rivals that are unencumbered by legacy systems and corporate bureaucracy—with their sights set on advanced economies.

This global survey of 363 business executives was conducted in December 2010. Of the respondents, 19% hailed from the US, 20% from the UK, 15% from India, 14% from Japan, and 8% each from China, Brazil, Mexico and Australia. The survey represented a broad range of industries, including financial services (26%); manufacturing (19%); technology, information, communication and entertainment (18%); retailing and consumer products (15%); and life sciences and healthcare (11%).

Click here to read the full report

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Global Information Technology Report 2010-2011

Source: World Economic Forum

Sweden and Singapore continue to top the rankings of The Global Information Technology Report 2010-2011, Transformations 2.0, confirming the leadership of the Nordic countries and the Asian Tiger economies in adopting and implementing ICT advances for increased growth and development. Finland jumps to third place, while Switzerland and the United States are steady in fourth and fifth place respectively.

With a record coverage of 138 economies worldwide, the report remains the world’s most comprehensive and authoritative international assessment of the impact of ICT on the development process and the competitiveness of nations. The Networked Readiness Index (NRI) featured in the report examines how prepared countries are to use ICT effectively on three dimensions: the general business, regulatory and infrastructure environment for ICT; the readiness of the three key societal actors (individuals, businesses and governments) to use and benefit from ICT and their actual usage of available ICT.

Under the theme Transformations 2.0, this 10th anniversary edition explores the coming transformations powered by ICT, with a focus on the impact they will have on individuals, businesses and governments over the next few years. Since the beginning of the report, the sheer amount of information generated by today’s digital society has increased at an astounding rate. In order to measure impact of ICT and this new data revolution, a new data sharing platform is also launched on the occasion of the report’s 10th anniversary to provide users with a set of tools to explore the impact of information and data technology on a range of socio-economic areas.

Click here to read the full report

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Tech-savvy doctoral students increasingly look to open web technologies

  

"The UK's Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and the British Library have released a report, according to which young researchers are increasingly using free web technology to help with their research. However they are not active in creating content, says the report.

The British Library/ JISC generation Y, 'Researchers of Tomorrow' report shows that passive use of these open web technologies is more common than active use. Researchers are reading wikis and blogs without adding to them; they make passive use of Internet forums for research, and few blog themselves. It was found that while 29 percent made passive use of Internet discussion forums, only 13 percent were active on them.

The UK's largest survey of the information seeking behaviours of doctoral students born between 1982-1994, commonly dubbed generation Y, shows a 'modest increase' in the students' use of web technology over the past year. Compared with a sample of older students, more of the generation Y sample had used at least one kind of open web or Web 2.0 technology with only 8 percent saying they had used none at all.

The study includes a survey of doctoral students of any age to provide background to the generation Y research. The first report took place at the end of June 2009 with the assistance of over 70 universities and covering all subject disciplines. It was repeated in 2010 and will be launched for the third and final time in mid 2011."

Source: JISC - Researchers of Tomorrow

Picture: FlickR ; Creative Commons: MinimalistPhotography101 (Steve Johnson)

Measuring Mobile Broadband in the UK

Source: Ofcom

In order to understand the performance of UK mobile broadband connections using dongles and datacards, Ofcom commissioned research to identify the average actual download throughput speeds that they deliver, along with a number of other metrics which determine the consumer experience of using mobile broadband services

Key findings from the report

Average mobile broadband speeds

The research, conducted between September and December 2010 in partnership with broadband monitoring specialists Epitiro, found that the average download speed achieved by consumers in Ofcom’s consumer panel survey was 1.5Mbit/s and basic webpages took on average 8.5 seconds to download.

This compares with the average fixed broadband speed of 6.2Mbit/s (Nov/Dec 2010), and average web page download times on fixed broadband networks of less than 0.5 seconds.

However, in good 3G coverage areas, Ofcom found that average mobile broadband speeds were 2.1Mbit/s, falling to an average of 1.7Mbit/s during the peak evening period of 8-10pm. Basic web pages took on average 2.2 seconds to download.

Some mobile broadband providers are faster than others

The research found some differences between the performance of operators’ 3G networks. O2, Vodafone and 3 offered faster average download speeds than T-Mobile and Orange.

O2, on average, delivered web pages faster than the other four operators and had lower average latency than 3, Orange and Vodafone. Latency is a measure of the responsiveness of a connection (it is measured by the time it takes a single packet of data to travel from a user’s PC to a third-party server and back again).

The slower speed of web page downloading on mobile broadband compared to fixed broadband is largely the result of higher levels of latency. In addition to increasing the time for web page downloads, high latency may make connections less suitable for some online games and VoIP.

Differences between locations

The research also looked at how performance varied by location, by testing speeds across Birmingham, in the M62 corridor between Manchester and Liverpool, in Swansea and the surrounding area, and in the rural and semi-rural areas of Herefordshire and Shropshire.

Urban areas outperformed rural areas, primarily due to greater 3G availability. However, performance was highly variable across urban areas, with no guarantee of good performance offered in a city centre location.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Ben Smith UK

Digital Opportunity: a Review of Intellectual Property and Growth

In November 2010 the Prime Minister David Cameron announced an independent review of how the Intellectual Property framework supports growth and innovation. Chaired by Professor Ian Hargreaves and assisted by a panel of experts, the review reported to Government in May 2011.

The Review makes 10 recommendations designed to ensure that the UK has an IP framework best suited to supporting innovation and promoting economic growth in the digital age:

Key recommendations (from BIS press release)

• The UK should have a “Digital Copyright Exchange”: a digital market place where licences in copyright content can be readily bought and sold, a sort of online copyright shop.


• The Government should legislate to permit access to orphan works, where the owner cannot be traced. For example some copyrighted works remain locked away because their authors either aren’t known or can’t be traced to give permission for use. In the worst cases, where one owner cannot be located - just one out of hundreds contained in a film or TV programme - they can effectively hold the interests of others to ransom as it becomes a criminal offence to exploit that work commercially.


• Updating what it is lawful to copy. This includes copying for private purposes (such as shifting music from a laptop to an mp3 player) and copying which does not conflict with the core aims of copyright – for example, digital copying of medical and other journals for computerised analysis in research. For example an academic working on malaria cannot draw on previous research through data mining because they cannot get permission to copy the datasets they need to mine.


• The Government’s IP policy decisions need to be more closely based on economic evidence and should pay more attention to the impact on non-rights holders and consumers;


• Changes to the Intellectual Property Office’s (IPO) powers to enable it to help the IP framework adapt to future economic and technological change

Click here to read the full report

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The Mobile Entertainment Industry Outlook

Source: Business Insights

This report helps stakeholders to understand the dynamics of the mobile entertainment industry, recognize the emerging opportunities, and capitalize on these trends in the future. For each segment - music, video, gambling, and games - the report discusses market size, sub-segments, geographic segmentation, drivers, inhibitors, and major players.

Highlights

Business Insights anticipates that the global mobile entertainment industry will grow at a CAGR of 18.8% to reach $54bn by 2014 from a mere $19bn in 2008. The growth will be driven by smartphones, high speed mobile broadband networks, apps and emerging markets.

In 2009, the world’s largest market for the mobile entertainment industry was Asia Pacific, with more than half of global revenues (57%) generated in the region. It was followed by Western Europe at 21% and North America at 13%.

Features and benefits

• Access detailed analysis and revenue forecasts for the mobile entertainment industry by segment and region.
• Analyze key drivers and inhibitors to mobile entertainment industry growth.
• Identify and profile the leading players in the mobile entertainment arena.
• Analyze consumer trends and value chains that will shape the future of the mobile entertainment industry.
• Identify the business opportunities and challenges in the mobile entertainment industry.

This report is available to Current London Business School students, faculty and staff from Datamonitor 360 which can be found on the A-Z list of library databases within Portal.

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National Billmonitor Mobile Report

billmonitor is a bill analysis engine for mobile phone users. It analyses post-pay customers’ online bills to find out exactly how they use their phone, then analyses all the contract deals in the market before matching them to exactly the right contract so they pay no more than they should. billmonitor was founded by mathematicians in Oxford, who saw an opportunity to put maths to use in solving complex consumer choice problems such as choosing mobile contracts. It is an independent and impartial service that helps mobile phone users save money not only via its unique bill analysis but also through the UK’s only Ofcom-accredited mobile comparison calculator.

The results in this report are based on statistical analysis of 28,417 anonymised bills from customers with mobile contracts on O2, Orange, Vodafone and T-Mobile covering usage over the last 18 months. The analysis was carried out by the billmonitor team together with billmonitor's science advisers, Professor Chris Holmes and Dr Nicolai Meinshausen (both from Oxford University).

Selected Findings

The three main reasons why 76% of mobile subscribers are on the wrong contract wasting an average of £194.71 each per year

• 76% of UK post-pay customers are on the wrong contract, wasting on average £194.71 each per year
• 52% of those on the wrong contract are on a tariff that's too large for them, using on average just one quarter of their monthly calling allowance
• 29% of those on the wrong contract are on too small a tariff, wasting money on out of allowance calls, texts, data usage as well as other costs that could be reduced with a larger tariff

Click here to read the full report

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The State Of Mobile Investing

Authors: Bill Doyle, Peter Wannemacher

Source: Forrester

Executive Summary

Mobile is the hot channel these days. A number of investment firms have developed mobile apps, and many offer dedicated mobile Web sites. Consumer adoption is ticking up: Today, 11% of investors are mobile investors. But the road to widespread mobile investing adoption will be bumpy, thanks to low interest among nonadopters and the challenges of multiple mobile platforms. Though downloadable apps command a lot of attention today, Forrester believes that the mobile Web will remain a critical delivery method for the foreseeable future. As use of mobile investing and trading grows — driven by a continuing flood of smartphones and increasing consumer comfort — mobile channel managers at investment firms will succeed by prioritizing key functionality like access to current balances and holdings. Smart channel managers will also choose a single platform to focus on for testing and piloting downloadable apps.

Access to Forrester via the library databases area of Portal (requires email username and password).  Individual user accounts are available to current London Business School students and faculty, please use the registration form on the A-Z list of library databases.

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2011 Digital Marketing Outlook

The 2011 Digital Marketing Outlook study conducted by the Society of Digital Agencies (SoDA) and its research partner, AnswerLab, surveyed professionals at digital advertising and marketing agencies, traditional advertising agencies, service providers in the digital industry, corporate brand marketers and independent consultants.

The study reveals significant information regarding budgets, hiring strategies and what marketers value the most. For example the study discovered that 80% of marketers plan to increase the volume of digital projects in 2011 with 43% planning to decrease traditional paid media investments.

Twenty four SoDA member agencies have provided thought-provoking articles and case studies. And a 14-person panel comprised of guest contributors and notable CMO advisors have provided their insights.

Selecting Findings

• 47% of agencies spend at least half of their budget on digital


• In total, 80% of marketers plan to increase the volume of digital projects in 2011
  Marketers plan to invest in digital technologies/tools in 2011. Top areas include social networks/applications, brand experiences and digital infrastructure – blogger outreach and games are lower priorities


• Brand and product awareness, leads and web analytics – “engagement” metrics – have surpassed traditional metrics like page views and CPM for measuring performance


• Overall, 95% of respondents plan to use some form of social media in 2011


• Marketers look to mobile application and technologies that tie into mobile apps “location-based” technology and HTML5 for digital marketing in 2011-12

 

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Kristina B

Roaming in 2010

SPECIAL EUROBAROMETER 356

This study conducted by TNS Opinion & Social at the request of Directorate-General Information Society and Media looks at these developments from the consumer perspective after the implementation of the first and the second Regulation: do Europeans still change their usage pattern or switch off their phones while travelling within the EU? Do they still think that the cost of roaming is unreasonable? Are they aware of the positive changes since 2006? And has this led to a less limited use of roaming services? In other words, the results of this survey give an insight into actual consumer behaviour and how it has changed in the last 5 years, during which the Roaming Regulations have been adopted.

Selected Findings

Mobile phones are increasingly becoming not only the most important but also the only means of voice telephony for Europeans. 87% of respondents have a mobile phone compared to 80% in 2006 while 26% now use it exclusively in comparison to 20% in 2006.

Consequently, the group of potential users of roaming services is also constantly growing, both in terms of size and heterogeneity. The differences in mobile phone penetration between countries are shrinking and even the oldest age group, which showed significantly lower levels of mobile phone usage in 2006, are quickly catching up with their younger counterparts, with 71% now having a mobile phone compared to 57% in 2006.

Significantly fewer Europeans report having travelled in the EU in this present survey than in 2006. This is undoubtedly a consequence of the economic downturn. In
2010, 48% of mobile phone users say they have travelled within last 4-5 years and 28% have travelled both prior to and since the Roaming Regulation.

An overwhelming 72% of mobile users continue to limit their mobile voice calls while abroad because they are concerned about the costs.

The perceived excessive roaming costs still appear to discourage Europeans of using roaming services, even if a majority of mobile phone users agrees that these costs have decreased. Among frequent travellers, 61% are aware of the positive price developments that have occurred over the last four years.

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Leo Reynolds

Generations and their Gadgets

This report by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project is part of a series exploring how different generations use technology. The generation labels used, with the exceptions of “Younger Boomers” and “Older Boomers,” are the names conventionalized by William Strauss and Neil Howe in their book, Generations: The History of America’s Future, 1584 to 2069 (Perennial, 1992). The Pew Internet Project’s “Generations” reports make the distinction between Younger Boomers and Older Boomers because enough research has been done to suggest that the two decades of Baby Boomers are different enough to merit being divided into distinct generational groups

Main Findings

Many devices have become popular across generations, with a majority now owning cell phones, laptops and desktop computers. Younger adults are leading the way in increased mobility, preferring laptops to desktops and using their cell phones for a variety of functions, including internet, email, music, games, and video.

Among the findings:

• Cell phones are by far the most popular device among American adults, especially for adults under the age of 65. Some 85% of adults own cell phones overall. Taking pictures (done by 76% of cell owners) and text messaging (done by 72% of cell owners) are the two non-voice functions that are widely popular among all cell phone users.
• Desktop computers are most popular with adults ages 35-65, with 69% of Gen X, 65% of Younger Boomers and 64% of Older Boomers owning these devices.
  Millennials are the only generation that is more likely to own a laptop computer or netbook than a desktop:  70% own a laptop, compared with 57% who own a desktop.
• While almost half of all adults own an mp3 player like an iPod, this device is by far the most popular with Millennials, the youngest generation—74% of adults ages 18-34 own an mp3 player, compared with 56% of the next oldest generation, Gen X (ages 35-46).
• Game consoles are significantly more popular with adults ages 18-46, with 63% owning these devices.
• 5% of all adults own an e-book reader; they are least popular with adults age 75 and older, with 2% owning this device.
• Tablet computers, such as the iPad, are most popular with American adults age 65 and younger. 4% of all adults own this device.

Additionally, about one in 11 (9%) adults do not own any of the devices we asked about, including 43% of adults age 75 and older.

Click here to read the full report

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The 2010 US Digital Year in Review

The comScore 2010 US Digital Year in Review offers an overview of the prevailing trends in digital media usage during the year and considers their implications for the year ahead. It examines the trends in US Internet usage, search activity, e-commerce, online video consumption, online advertising, and mobile, offering a prognosis for which digital strategies will be most critical for success in 2011.

Last year represented yet another exciting year in the evolution of the US digital media industry. It was a year that saw renewed optimism, continued innovation, and the increasing fragmentation of the media landscape.

The report highlights the industry’s leading stories of the year.

• How did the rebounding economy influence retail e-commerce, what group-buying and flash sales sites found success in 2010?
• Which social networks witnessed the largest gains, what new social media players came onto the scene in 2010?
• What were the key trends in the search market, which search engines saw the largest gains throughout the year?
• Who were the top players in display advertising in 2010, what are the key trends in measuring the effectiveness of digital advertising campaigns?
• How did online video viewers’ behaviors shift throughout the year, how are video ads influencing the industry landscape?
• How has smartphone adoption influenced the mobile landscape, which players accounted for the largest share of the mobile market across operating systems, device manufacturers and network operators in 2010?

The full report can be downloaded from the comScore website (pre-registration required)

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How Travelers Use Online & Social Media Channels to Make Hotel-choice Decisions

Cornell Hospitality Report, Vol. 10, No. 18, December 2010 (pre-regristration required)

by Laura McCarthy, Debra Stock, and Rohit Verma

Summary
The phenomenal rise of social media as a factor in travel plans is a Janus-like development for operators of hotels, restaurants, and other travel industry businesses. On one hand, social media have created a new distribution channel and opened a deep well for marketing research. On the other, however, social media have changed the way travelers determine where they will stay— particularly leisure travelers. Hospitality firms need to understand consumers’ attitudes toward social
media, and find ways to use the depth of information available on social media sites. For example, hotels can interact with their customers on such websites as Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, and YouTube, by sharing information, watching for service failures to correct, and to refine their brand.

The study presented here takes a snapshot of the rapidly changing field of how consumers gather information and make their decisions regarding travel purchases, based on responses of 2,830 recent travelers. With regard to gathering information for a hotel stay, the principal dividing line occurs between business travelers and leisure travelers. Business travelers often use the hotel recommended by their company, although many of them use search engines or online travel agents for their hotel search. Recommendations of friends and colleagues are less important to business travelers than they are to leisure travelers, who cited personal recommendations from friends and families as far and away the chief source of information, followed by travel related websites, search engines, and OTAs. Once the information is gathered, however, travelers of all kinds turn more to such sources as the brand website, OTAs, and TripAdvisor. Late in the decision process, the respondents tended to land on the brand websites or go to an OTA, where they can book their room.

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: OPUS Hotel

International Communications Market Report 2010

This is the fifth year that Ofcom has published comparative international data on the communications sector, benchmarking the UK against comparator countries. It aims to provide a statistically-driven international comparative context for the UK communications sector. The report compares the availability, take-up and use of services in the UK and 16 comparator countries although Ofcom focuses on a smaller sub-set of comparator countries for some of the analysis.

Selected Key points: the UK market in context

Global communications sector revenues were largely flat in the year to 2009, growing just 0.3% to £1,113bn. Global telecoms service revenues rose 1% to £878bn in 2009. Global television revenues fell 1% between 2008 and 2009 to £208bn, reflecting falls in advertising. Global radio revenues fell 9% between 2008 and 2009 to £28bn, reflecting falls in advertising revenues

Total UK telecoms, radio and television revenue was £39bn in 2009. The US, Japan and China have the largest communications sector revenues of our comparator countries, at £276bn, £100bn and £70bn respectively, but revenue per head is highest in the US (£899), Australia (£808) and Japan (£790). This compares with the UK at £630 per head.

Global advertising expenditure fell by 13% to £254bn in 2009. TV remained the largest single component, accounting for £97bn of revenues (38% of the total) – a fall of 9% from the previous year. Online was the only growth area, rising by 1% over the same period to £37bn, 15% of the global total. The internet accounted for a larger proportion of advertising spend (27%) in the UK than in any other comparator country.

Consumers appear less likely to have reduced their expenditure on communications than on other goods and services. Our online survey in six countries found that the UK was in line with several other countries, while Germany had the lowest proportion of consumers who had reduced their expenditure on a range of goods and services.

The communications service on which most survey respondents had reduced expenditure over the past 12 months was mobile, where 24% in the UK said they had lowered their expenditure. The country with the highest proportion of mobile users saying they had reduced expenditure was Italy (25%) and the lowest was the US (17%).

Spend on broadband has been generally more resilient than on other communications services. 8% of fixed broadband users in the UK and Germany said they had reduced spending on the service in the previous 12 months, and just 4% in Italy said they had reduced their spend on broadband.

Click here for the full report

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The Connected Kingdom

The UK is now home to the largest per capita e-commerce market and the second largest online advertising market globally. However, the character of the UK internet economy is not well understood. To address this gap Google UK commissioned The Boston Consulting Group to produce an independent analysis of the value of the UK’s Internet economy, the factors that are driving this, how we compare to other countries, and how this will change in the future.

Selected findings from the report

Last year the Internet contributed an estimated £100 billion or 7.2% of GDP to the UK economy. This is larger than that of the construction, transportation or utilities industry.  Around 60% of the internet economy is driven by consumption.

The internet has been particularly beneficial for small and medium enterprises. Proprietary research shows that SMEs which are more active online are more successful, growing more quickly and reaching wider markets than their peers

The UK internet economy is likely to grow by 10% per year reaching 10% of GDP by 2015

About 62% of adults or 31 million people have bought goods or services online in 2010. Collectively they spent about £50 billion in 2009 on goods and travel.  The clothing and sporting goods category is the most popular. Half of travel is booked online.

Consumers benefit from the internet by purchasing products offline which they researched online (about £40 billion per year); saving money through online shopping (about £18 billion per year); and by consuming free online content (about £5 billion per year)

Click here for the full report

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Communications Market report 2010

Ofcom have just released their seventh annual Communications Market report.  The report contains data and analysis on broadcast television and radio, broadband and fixed/mobile telephony. It also offers insights into how people are using the internet and converged devices to access audio-visual and audio content

Selected highlights from the report:

On average, nearly half of people’s waking hours are spent using media content and communications services – on average 45% of the total. People spend on average seven hours a day consuming different media, but they squeeze in 8 hours and 40 minutes’ worth using more than one medium at a time.

UK television broadcasters generated revenue of £11.1bn in 2009, a fall of £49m (-0.4%). Growing subscription revenues – up 7.5% to £4.6bn – failed to offset declining net advertising revenue (NAR), which fell by 9.6% to £3.1bn. The BBC’s estimated spending on TV services grew by 1.5% to £2.7bn (pages 98 and 123).

Total UK radio industry funding stood at £1.1bn in 2009, down by 4.0% on 2008. This came as a result of a fall in commercial radio revenues of 11.5% to £432m, while we estimate that BBC radio spend rose by 1.6% to £660m

Despite there being more radio listeners, the time each spent listening has fallen over the past five years. Listening hours were down by 5.3% in the five years to 2009, and by 0.4% on 2008. Total listening hours to all the BBC’s stations were down by 2.2% over five years and by 1.2% during 2009. By contrast, all commercial radio listener hours were stable over the year, but down 10.1% over five years

The growth in online catch-up TV services continued in 2009, as consumers increasingly watched internet-based content via their PC. Ofcom research in Q1 2010 found that 31% of adults with the internet had watched catch-up TV, up from 23% in Q1 2009, but this still constitutes a small amount of overall viewing.

Click here for the full report

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Fading Glory of the Television and Telephone

After occupying centre stage in the American household for much of the 20th century, the television set and the landline telephone are suffering from a sharp decline in public perception that they are necessities of life.  Just 42% of Americans say they consider the television set to be a necessity, according to a new nationwide survey from the Pew Research Center’s Social & Demographic Trends project. Last year, this figure was 52%. In 2006, it was 64%.

The drop-off has been less severe for the landline telephone: Some 62% of Americans say it’s a necessity of life, down from 68% last year. But there’s a related trend that’s more perilous for the landline: Fully 47% of the public say that the cell phone is a necessity of life.

In the case of the landline phone, a rising thumbs-down verdict comes not just from the survey but also from the marketplace. According to a Pew Research Center analysis of government data, just 74% of US households now have a landline phone, this is down from a peak of 97% in 2001. During the same time period, use of cell phones has skyrocketed. Fully 82% of adults now use cell phones, up from 53% in 2000.  There are now more cell phones in the US than landline phones. And—as if to add insult to injury—today’s young adults are spending less time talking on their cell phones and more time texting

Click here to read the full report

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How People Watch – A Global Nielsen Consumer Report

To get a better sense for how the world is watching video, today, Nielsen recently completed a survey of more than 27,000 online consumers in 55 countries, asking simple questions about how they watch video. Internet access still varies considerably by region, so the results of an online survey are not representative of the total global population, but show us how an important subset of the global population (the connected population) is consuming video across multiple platforms. The results from the survey, with corresponding syndicated Nielsen insights where available in a new report, “How People Watch – A Global Nielsen Consumer Report.”

Key Findings

• Online Video: approximately 70% of global online consumers watch online video; but North Americans and Europeans lag in adoption. More than half of global online consumers watch online video in the workplace.
• Mobile Video: is already used by 11% of global online consumers: penetration is highest in Asia-Pacific and among consumers in their late 20s.
• Tablet PCs: are expanding the definition of mobile video. Globally, 11% of online consumers already own or plan to purchase a tablet PC (such as an iPad) in the next year.
• Television: is a universally important platform for video consumption, with connected consumers in many markets spending 4+ hours per day watching television.
• HDTV (High-Definition TV): is improving the TV viewing experience for as many as 30% of global online consumers. Adoption is highest among older consumers and in North America, where HD content has proliferated.
• 3DTV (Three-Dimensional TV): will have a small but important audience: 12% of global online consumers own or have definite intent to purchase a 3DTV in the next year.
• “Over the Top” TV: televisions with Internet connections are gaining interest. About one in five (22%) global online consumers owns or has definite interest in buying a television with Internet connection in the next year.

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr:XiXidu

Global Online Shopping Report

The Internet has transformed many aspects of life, but perhaps none more so than how we shop for goods and services. While it’s still nice to stop by a store to touch and see products, the convenience of online shopping can’t be beat. And for some services, such as booking travel or buying concert tickets, the ability to do so online has made the process much easier and more efficient.

The Nielsen Company conducted a survey in March 2010 and polled over 27,000 Internet users in 55 markets from Asia Pacific, Europe, Middle East, North America and South America to look at how consumers shop online: what they intend to buy, how they use various sites, the impact of social media and other factors that come into play when they are trying to decide how to spend their money. 

Selected findings:

One of the great benefits of online shopping is the ability read others’ reviews of a product, be they experts or simply fellow shoppers. These opinions are most important when it comes to purchasing consumer electronics: 57 percent of online respondents consider reviews prior to buying. Reviews on cars (45%) and software (37%) rounded out the top three most important online influences when making a purchase.

Online reviews and peer recommendations also played a key role for shoppers researching future purchases of consumer electronics, cars and travel, and 40 percent of online shoppers indicate they would not even buy electronics without consulting online reviews first

Click here for the full report (registration is required)

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Social Media Marketing

In 2009, online media expenditure outstripped television advertising expenditure for the first time, growing by 4.6%, to £1,752.1m, in the first half of the year, according to the bi-annual online advertising expenditure study conducted by the Internet Advertising Bureau in partnership with the accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.

This trend towards online advertising, coupled with the trend for Internet users to interact via social networking sites, has led to increasing interest from marketers in engaging themselves in online communities. Social networking sites are playing an increasingly important role in marketers’ media arsenal, not only because marketers cannot afford to ignore them but because they allow a much closer relationship with their markets. As well as advertising on these sites, marketers use them to enhance brand awareness, reputation and other public-relations (PR) objectives, as well as to generate leads and even sales by driving traffic to their own websites.

Social networking sites have developed rapidly (and continue to evolve) since the launch of Friendster in 2002, followed by the development of MySpace and LinkedIn the following year. Facebook emerged from its Harvard University beginnings in 2004 and Twitter was launched in 2006. (Taken from report introduction)

This report from Key Note looks at the social media landscape, the way in which social media technologies are being employed at an enterprise level, the extent to which marketers are using social media and which social media they are using. It includes interviews with practitioners from a range of business sectors who are already using social media for marketing in the UK. Key Note has also compiled a list of ‘top ten tips’ for small businesses wishing to engage in this activity, which seems certain to increase in importance in the future.

The report is available to current London Business School staff, students and faculty from Key Note Online which can be found on the A-z list of library databases via Portal.

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The Information Dividend: Can IT make you ‘happier’?

A global study from the BCS (Chartered Institute for IT) shows that access to information technology has a ‘statistically significant, positive impact on life satisfaction’. The research shows that having a sense of freedom and being in control of one’s life has a crucial and particularly important effect on wellbeing. 

The study started with an analysis of data from across the globe using the World Values Survey, a recognised source of behavioural, social values, cultural and well-being measures. The analysis involved looking at individual responses to the survey; around 35,000 respondents worldwide were included. The study was particularly interested in the relationship between IT usage and other factors including well-being.

Main findings from the report:

The analysis shows that IT has a positive impact on life satisfaction even when controlling for income and other factors known to be important in determining well-being.  It suggests that IT has an enabling and empowering role leading to a greater sense of freedom and control which in turn leads to greater life satisfaction.

IT appears to empower the disempowered. In fact, much of the improvement in life satisfaction that arises from information technology flows to those who are less well-placed in society. Those on lower incomes or with fewer educational qualifications appear to benefit more from access to IT than those on higher incomes or with higher educational backgrounds.

The findings suggests that women can gain much from access to and usage of technology. One possible reason is the role played by IT in modern day communications.  This result is particularly true for women in developing nations. Why this is so is not clear. But one reason might be that in many parts of Africa, Asia, and the Middle East women have socially controlled roles which may lead to a lower sense of freedom and autonomy and hence well-being.

Click here for the full report

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Understanding the Participatory News Consumer

This report discusses two significant technological trends that have influenced Americans in their news consumption behaviour: First, the advent of social media like social networking sites and blogs which have helped the news become more of a social experience.  Second, the increase in mobile connectivity via smart phones which has turned news gathering and news awareness into an anytime, anywhere affair for a segment of avid news watchers.

Here are some of the key findings from the survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project and the Project for Excellence in Journalism:

The overwhelming majority of Americans (92%) use multiple platforms to get news on a typical day, including national and local TV, the internet, local & national newspapers, and radio. Some 46% of Americans say they get news from four to six media platforms on a typical day. Just 7% get their news from a single media platform on a typical day.

Most news consumers utilize multiple platforms for news, but online their range of specific outlets is limited. The majority of online news consumers (57%) say they routinely rely on just two to five websites for their news. Only 11% say they get their news from more than five websites, and 21% regularly rely on just one site.

The most popular online news subjects are the weather (followed by 81% of internet news users), national events (73%), health and medicine (66%), business and the economy (64%), international events (62%), and science and technology (60%).

Some 80% of American adults have cell phones today, and 37% of them go online from their phones. The impact of this new mobile technology on news gathering is unmistakable. One quarter (26%) of all Americans say they get some form of news via cell phone today–that amounts to 33% of cell phone owners. These wireless news consumers get the following types of news on their phones

To a great extent, people’s experience of news, especially on the internet, is becoming a shared social experience as people swap links in emails, post news stories on their social networking site feeds, highlight news stories in their Tweets, and haggle over the meaning of events in discussion threads. For instance, more than 8 in 10 online news consumers get or share links in emails.

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Daniel R Blume

Social Media and Young Adults

This report from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project is a part of a series of reports undertaken by the Pew Research Center that highlight the attitudes and behaviours of the Millennial generation (adults ages 18 to 29).  Two Pew Internet Project surveys of teens and adults reveal a decline in blogging among teens and young adults and a modest rise among adults 30 and older. Even as blogging declines among those under 30, wireless connectivity continues to rise in this age group, as does social network use. Teens ages 12-17 do not use Twitter in large numbers, though high school-aged girls show the greatest enthusiasm for the application.

Selected findings:

14% of online teens now say they blog, down from 28% of teen internet users in 2006.

By comparison, the prevalence of blogging within the overall adult internet population has remained steady in recent years. Pew Internet surveys have consistently found that roughly one in ten online adults maintain a personal online journal or blog.

Both teen and adult use of social networking sites has risen significantly, yet there are shifts and some drops in the proportion of teens using several social networking site features.

73% of American teens now use social networking websites, a significant increase from previous surveys. Just over half of online teens (55%) used social networking sites in November 2006 and 65% did so in February 2008.

47% of online adults use social networking sites, up from 37% in November 2008.

Teens are more likely to maintain a profile on MySpace (66% of young profile owners do so, compared with just 36% of those thirty and older) but less likely to have a profile on the professionally‐oriented LinkedIn (7% vs. 19%).

Click here to read the full report

Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Mathowie

State of Internet Security, Q1-Q2 2009

The latest Security Labs report from Websense has found that Web 2.0 sites are increasingly being used to carry out a wide range of attacks.  Efforts to self-police these sites have also been largely ineffective. Websense research showed that community-driven security tools (asking users to report inappropriate content) on sites like YouTube and BlogSpot are 65% to 75% ineffective in protecting Web users from objectionable content and security risks. Their research also discovered that over 200,000 phony copycat sites have been created, all including the terms Facebook, MySpace or Twitter in their URLs. These sites are created in order to take advantage of the huge number of users of social networking sites. Facebook copycat sites lead the sector with more than 150,000 known fake URLs.

Attackers also capitalized on major events during the last six months, such as the economic recession, to take advantage of job seekers looking for employment by using various exploits to infect victims’ computers.  Similarly, celebrities and politics continued to be used as lures by spammers and cybercriminals. At the end of June, the sudden death of Michael Jackson prompted spammers to send malicious email messages using news of the event as a social engineering technique to lure people to their sites.

Other highlights from the report:

• Websense Security Labs identified a 233% growth in the number of malicious Web sites in the last six months and a 671% growth during the last year. 

• 61% of the top 100 sites either hosted malicious content or contained a masked redirect to lure unsuspecting victims from legitimate sites to malicious sites.

• 95% of user-generated comments to blogs, chat rooms and message boards are spam or malicious.

• 87.7% of email messages were spam, representing a 3% increase over the last six months.

• Shopping remained the leading topic of spam (28%), followed closely by cosmetics (18.4%), medical (11.9%) and education (9.5%). Education themed spam has nearly doubled over the previous period and may be related to the recession as spammers seek to exploit people looking to gain new skills or obtain fake qualifications to help their job prospects.

Click here to read the report in full

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Online High Street Ecommerce: Usability for UK High Street Retailers in 2009

According to the Office for National Statistics, 64% of all Internet users have made a purchase online. With 63% of households on broadband connections, shopping on the Internet has never been more convenient.  This is illustrated by the amount of money being spent on Internet purchases. Online spend has been steadily rising over the years and UK consumers have spent £31 billion so far this calendar year, with the busiest trading period at Christmas yet to come. By April 2010, online spending is expected to almost double to £60 billion per year.

Historically, such phenomenal growth hasn’t been matched on the high street, and this past year, with many economies feeling the effects of the recession, the difference has only become more marked. While many big brands have disappeared from the high street, UK e-retailing has grown 15% year-on-year during 2009. So despite the economic downturn, the Internet as a channel for commerce is stronger than ever and retailers are responding by expanding and investing in their online presence.

For this survey, Webcredible investigated the usability of the websites of 20 of the UK’s leading high street shops. Last year, the top high street retailers weren’t doing enough to maximise their share of this potential revenue in preparation for Christmas. This year, Webcredible has decided to re-investigate against the same essential usability criteria to see if there’s been any change in the run-up to Christmas this year. 
 
The survey found that four of the top scoring sites have increased their position dramatically this year – 9 points in the case of John Lewis, 15 for Woolworths and M&S, and Boots has increased the most with 16 points difference. M&S had relaunched its site just before this report was written, incorporating quite a few user experience improvements. It’s interesting to note that since Woolworths has become an online-only proposition, there seems to be an improved strategy in place for user experience. Additionally, Mothercare has also improved by 10 points this year.

The dramatic changes observed in these four websites have undoubtedly contributed to the wholesale increase in the average across the sample. Whilst this is good news for these particular sites, it’s clear that the many sites scoring in the 50s and 60s can do much more to improve the usability of their online offering.

Click here to read the report

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Twitter Study

A study looking at the micro-blogging site Twitter found that a high proportion of the messages sent via this service can be classed as "Pointless Babble." The aim of the study from US-based market research firm Pear Analytics was to identify how people really use Twitter. The main assumption has been that it is predominantly used for self-promotion or to push a product or service. However, the data shows that this is not the case. Only 8.7% of all messages could be said to have "value" as they passed along news of interest. 

The study was conducted by taking random samples from the Tweet stream every 30 minutes between certain times during weekdays for a two week period. The tweets were then categorized into six main areas of usage: News; Spam; Self-promotion; Pointless Babble; Conversational; and Pass-Along Value.

So who users Twitter? Demographic data from Quantcast.com carried out in earlier this year found Twitter reaches 27 million people per month in the US. Of these 55% are female and 43% are between 18 and 34. They also found that 1% of the addicts contribute 35% of the visits. 

The results of the study showed that ‘Pointless Babble’ won with 40.55% of the total tweets captured; however, ‘Conversational’ was a very close second at 37.55%, and ‘Pass-Along Value’ was third at 8.7% of the tweets captured.

Other Results:

• 11:30am and Monday’s have the most frequent tweets with Pass-Along Value
• Spam seemed pretty consistent throughout the study, but luckily was second-to-last on frequency.
• News seemed heavier at 2:00p and on Tuesday’s
• Conversational tweets were high between 2:00 and 4:00p throughout the study, and heaviest on Tuesdays.  Pear Analytics suggest that most people are busy on Monday catching up with work, so perhaps it takes until Tuesday to get into the swing of Twittering again.

The same study will be carried out every quarter to identify new trends in usage.

Click here to read the full report

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File-Sharing and Copyright

The advent of file sharing has considerably weakened effective copyright protection. Today, more than 60% of internet traffic is made up of consumers sharing music, movies, books and games. Yet, despite its popularity, a recent working paper from the Harvard Business School argues that file-sharing technology has not undermined the incentives of artists and entertainment companies to create market and distribute new works.  While policy discussion surrounding file-sharing has largely focused on the legality of the new technology and the question of whether declining sales in music are due to file-sharing, the paper suggests that the debate has been too narrow. The working paper analyzes the landscape and identifies areas for more research.

Main findings:

• Empirical work suggests that in music, no more than 20% of the recent decline in sales is due to sharing.

• Digital technology has lowered the cost of producing movies and music and allowed artists to reach their audience in novel ways.  It’s difficult to argue that weaker copyright protection has had a negative impact on artists’ incentives to be creative.

• File-sharing has not discouraged authors and publishers. The publication of new books rose by 66% during 2002-2007. Since 2000, the annual release of new albums has more than doubled, and worldwide feature film production since 2003 is up by more than 30%.

• File-sharing has been shown to increase the demand for complementary goods (such as concerts, electronics, and communications infrastructure) adding to artists' incomes.

Click on the link to read the paper in full (HBS Working Paper Number: 09-132)

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Digital Britain: Final Report

Building a digital knowledge economy in the 21st Century is fundamental to the UK’s future prosperity according to the final report from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. The UK is already digitally enabled and to a significant degree a digitally dependent economy and society.The communications sector underpins everything we do as an economy and society. Electronic systems and new technology have transformed core elements of UK industry, the media and public services. In the City, digital technologies are vital to the billions of transactions carried out each day by the stock exchange and financial institutions. In the high street, stock ordering, inventory control and the cash tills are all completely dependent on electronic communications. As consumers, some 90% of our high street purchases are transacted by plastic which depends on wired and wireless communications to work. That is in addition to the £50bn of consumer purchases and sales through e-commerce that takes place wholly online.  

The Digital Britain Report underscores the importance of understanding, appreciating and planning for a fully digital Britain by providing an analysis of the following areas:

• The levels of digital participation, skills and access needed for the digital future, with a plan for increasing participation, and more coherent public structures to deal with it.

• An analysis of our communications infrastructure capabilities, an identification of the gaps and recommendations on how to fill them.

• A statement of ambition for the future growth of our creative industries, proposals for a legal and regulatory framework for intellectual property in a digital world, proposals on skills and a recognition of the need for investment support and innovation.

• A restatement of the need for specific market intervention in the UK content market, and what that will demand of the BBC and its role in Digital Britain. What that means for the future of the C4 Corporation. An analysis of the importance of other forms of independent and suitably funded news, and what clarification and changes are needed to the existing framework.

• An analysis of the skills, research and training markets, and what supply side issues need addressing for a fully functioning digital economy.

• A framework for digital security and digital safety at international and national levels and recognition that in a world of high speed connectivity we need a digital framework not an analogue one.

• A review of what all of this means for the Government and how digital governance in the information age demands new structures, new safeguards, and new data management, access and transparency rules.

Click here to read the report in full

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UK Internet Market

The Internet is now used at home by 68% of UK adults according to the latest market review from Key Note.  The fact that 68% of those adults who use the Internet `go online' at least once a day shows how quickly the internet has become part of everyday life in the typical UK household. The last decade have brought with it significant improvements in the Internet experience for the consumer: fast broadband connections, interactive Web 2.0 technologies, and remote access using portable computerised devices (e.g. mobile phones).  E-mail is used by 87% of those with home Internet access, but communicating through websites, particularly `social networking' websites such as Facebook and MySpace has become very popular.

Highlights from the report:

Online shopping is also increasing in popularity and changing the face of retailing. Travel is the largest online market and has underpinned the rise of the budget airlines, with companies such as easyJet and Ryanair relying almost entirely on the Internet for bookings. In contrast, online grocery shopping has yet to become a mass market. Generally, any business involving detailed information is suited to e-commerce (e.g. travel, house buying, insurance, books and tickets for events).

Information is itself a large part of the Internet market, ranging across government, education, health, job seeking, family history, weather forecasts and many other areas. Wikipedia has become the world's largest online encyclopaedia. With the exception of a few operators, the funding mechanism for websites has shifted over the years from subscription fees to advertising. In 2007, the Internet accounted for 15.6% of all UK advertising expenditure (from a mere 2.9% in 2003). The market divides between advertisements on websites and `paid-for searches', where companies pay search engines such as Google to give their websites prominence.

Looking to the future, key Note predict that the current economic crisis is likely to  reduce the growth rate for Internet advertising, but the medium itself will continue to play an increasingly important role in commerce and in consumer lifestyles. Key Note identified three main future trends: convergence between the television and the computer in home entertainment and information; the fragmentation of mass markets as the Internet offers tailor-made options for entertainment; and a stimulus to live events and `socialising' generally, as the likes of networking, blogging and organising events via the Internet spread from the youth market to older consumers.

The full report is available to current London Business School staff, students & faculty via Key Note Online which can be found on the A-Z list of library databases in Portal.  The hardcopy version of this report is also available and can be found in the market reports collection on the first floor of the library

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Social Network Statistics for 2009

  Collection of Social Network Stats  2009    Jeremiah Owyang, Forrester Research

"Numbers don’t tell us much without insight and interpretation, in fact, you’re going to see conflicting numbers of usage from many of the agencies and social networks themselves. The key is to look at trend movements, don’t focus on the specific numbers but the changes to them over time. I put more weight on active unique users in the last 30 days vs overall registered, in fact, the actual active conversion rate will often range from 10-40% of actual users sticking around and using the social network, so don’t be fooled by puffed numbers. No single metric is a good indicator, you have to evaluate the usage from multiple dimensions, so you also have to factor in what are users doing, time on site, interaction, and of course, did they end up buying, recommending products, or improving their lives. "

Owyang, an analyst for Forrester, says he will be updating this information throughout the year.

Read it at the web-strategist blog.

The Forrester Service is available to current students, staff and faculty at the London Business School. Pre-registration is required. Find the Forester and the Registration link in the A-Z list of databases in Portal.

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Digital Britain - The Interim Report

The Communications sector is one of the three largest sectors in the UK economy alongside energy and financial services, accounting for around 8% of GDP. It has been one of the fastest growing successes of the past decade. Take up of first generation broadband has grown faster than that of almost all the other major economies. Britain has the highest proportion of internet advertising of any developed economy. By 2012 £1 in every £5 of all new commerce in this country will be online.  More importantly, the digital economy underpins our whole economy and builds our national competitiveness. Our readiness to adopt digital technology has driven productivity gains throughout our wider economy. Over the last ten years the UK has been consistently closing its historic productivity gap with the other leading European economies, based largely on our take-up and adoption of digital technology. However our productivity still lags well behind the USA and we face new challenges from the innovative companies of the successful Asian economies. At their best, they combine fierce competition, providing innovation and consumer services, with a regulatory framework that balances the value of investment in the next generation of technologies against the benefits for the consumer of a competitive market place.

Against this backdrop, this latest report from Department for Culture, Media and Sport assesses the UK’s readiness to fully to exploit the dramatic shift to digital technology. This revolution is still in its infancy and our demands and expectations of it will continue to rise at an accelerating pace. Are we positioned to meet those demands and expectations? 

The interim report contains more than 20 recommendations, including specific proposals on:

• next generation networks
• universal access to broadband
• the creation of a second public service provider of scale
• the modernisation of wireless radio spectrum holdings
• a digital future for radio
• a new deal for digital content rights
• enhancing the digital delivery of public services

The full report can be downloaded from the DCMS website

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The comScore 2008 Digital Year in Review

The comScore 2008 Digital Year in Review offers a birds-eye view of the overarching trends in digital marketing usage in 2008 and considers their implications for the year ahead. This report examines the trends in US internet usage, search activity, e-commerce, online video consumption, online advertising, and mobile, and what digital strategies will be critical to effectively navigating the uncertain 2009 environment

Key findings highlighted in the report include:

Nearly 137 billion searches were conducted on the five US core search engines with Google Sites accounting for nearly 90% of this growth.

Online video viewing accounted for 12.5% of Americans’ total time spent on the Internet in November 2008, up from 8.5% the previous year.

US Internet users viewed a total of 4.5 trillion display ads during the past twelve months, with the average person viewing more than 2,000 ads per month.

The fastest-growing retail category in 2008 was Video Games, Consoles & Accessories (up 29% vs. 2007), which continued to benefit from online sales of popular game consoles like the Nintendo Wii, Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation 3.

The mobile industry continued to witness the growing popularity of smartphones in 2008 with subscriptions to smartphones increasing more than 100% during the year.

The report can be downloaded form the comScore website (Registration required,free)

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Digital world, digital life

In this report TNS explore how the internet fits into people’s lives. The survey, which included respondents from sixteen countries, asked the following questions:  How digital are their lives? How do they use the internet? Is a digital life the same as a social life or does a social life today require a complementary digital life?  Perhaps the most surprising finding of the report is the question of the importance of the internet. Almost a quarter of respondents rated the internet at 10 out of 10 for importance in their personal life, and 56% of people rated it as 8 or higher in importance. In fact, the average across all people surveyed was 7.5. This goes some way to explaining why usage of the internet takes up so much of our leisure time. In countries where the proportion of leisure time spent on online is highest, the internet is also seen as being more important. Around three quarters of all internet users in China and Japan thought it was very important (scoring 8 or higher) and Korea is not far behind.

The top 10 things people have done on the internet in the last month (all countries)

81% used a search engine to find information
76% looked up the news
74% used online banking
65% looked up the weather
63% researched a product or service before buying it
61% visited a brand or product website
56% paid bills
51% watched a video clip
50% used a price comparison site
44% listened to an audio clip

Click here to read the full report

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