Culture and Context Define Mobile Web Behavior, Netbiscuits Web Trends Report

• Q1 research uncovers an increasingly sophisticated global mobile web
• Overview of 242 countries unlocks the secrets of mobile personas
• US mobile users are the most consistently connected on today’s sophisticated mobile web
• Sleepy Spanish Sofa Surfers and US Night Owls demonstrate diversity of mobile web use

London, UK. May 14, 2014 – Netbiscuits today released its Global Web Trends Report for Q1 2014, providing in-depth analysis of mobile web usage based on 2.5 billion page impressions from 242 countries. For the first time, Netbiscuits processed the data on its new Mobile Analytics platform, drilling down into global consumer behavior to analyze device and user engagement trends on the web through mobile devices, which will allow marketers to identify mobile visitor segments, and understand the impact of device, context and even local culture on mobile web usage.

Netbiscuits detected 4,015 different models from almost 200 vendors, each using various versions of 26 different operating systems across at least 26 different browsers, offering over 100 possible mobile screen size combinations for marketers to contend with. The Global Web Trends report also uncovered the true scale of device fragmentation on the mobile web, with 8% more unique mobile phones and 30% more tablets compared to the last report three months ago.

Using Mobile Analytics, Netbiscuits was able to group together factors, such as screen size and speed of connectivity against the proportion of web traffic to build up a picture of how these characteristics impact user engagement globally. Device type was then mapped against the time of day to profile user behavior and segment users into personas, such as Night Owls, Morning Surfers, Lunchtime Users and Sofa Surfers. Netbiscuits research found that smaller screen mobile phones generally connected with lower bandwidth, while tablet users generally used better bandwidth connections and were used predominantly in the evening – two very contrasting use cases which demand different approaches to the mobile user experience.

As brands develop and implement mobile strategies, the Netbiscuits Global Web Trends report uncovered wide regional variations across mobile web usage which can help businesses consider their approach in specific countries; these included:

• US mobile web users were the most consistently connected nation on the mobile web, with the peak share (6%) of evening surfing coming much earlier than in Europe between 5pm and 6pm.
• iOS has its largest share of traffic in Canada, an impressive 59%. It also has the highest proportion of the latest Android KitKat users at just over 1 in 5 of Android hits.
• Android’s largest country share of traffic is in South Korea, representing 80%. The average
• In 26 countries, users surf the web on mobile phones with screens that are on average smaller than 3 inches. 25 of those countries are in Africa and the Ivory Coast and Lesotho are the smallest.
• Australia is the only country in Asia Pacific where iOS share of traffic is higher than Android. Here, iOS accounted for 54% of traffic.

Daniel Weisbeck, COO and CMO, Netbiscuits, said: “The complexity of mobile means it is no longer just enough to know that a customer is using an iPhone or a Samsung device. Brands need to understand how device parameters, such as screen size and browser version, along with contextual elements like location and bandwidth speed, influence engagement and behavior. Knowing your mobile visitors better can help identify reasons for abandonment and high conversion groups to target. We’ve identified a number of mobile personas which bring this data together, helping marketers make decisions based on the full picture rather than simply guesswork.”

Download the latest Netbiscuits Global Web Trends Report here: www.netbiscuits.com/resources/netbiscuits-reports/web-trends-report-q1-2014

To benchmark your own web trends with Free Netbiscuits Mobile Analytics click here:http://www.netbiscuits.com/mobile-analytics/

About Netbiscuits

Netbiscuits is a global leader in mobile analytics and device detection.

Netbiscuits delivers compelling analytics and device detection products to help companies achieve increased reach and performance, while improving conversion and customer engagement. Our cloud software records over one billion unique page impressions a month, serving global brands such as eBay, Coca Cola, MTV, BMW and T-Online. The award-winning Netbiscuits Device Library has been catalogued through manual testing since the year 2000, and contains detailed device feature capabilities, including over 7,300 device, 157 operating system and 343 web browser profiles, to create exceptional mobile experiences for every connected device.

For more information, please visit: www.netbiscuits.com

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