Defining, researching Mobile Internet

Framework

• Tier 1: The WAP Internet (access to WAP gateways, which includes mobile versions of brand sites, mobile versions of traditional and new media publisher sites, downloads of ringtones, games and other content, which may only involve a single link from the phone; the typical user of the WAP Internet is not always aware of using the Internet).
• Tier 2: The Mobile Application Internet (usage of "stand-alone" applications on the phone that rely on data feeds, such as MXit, Gmail, and Maps; the typical user is aware of using data, but not of fully accessing the Internet)
• Tier 3: Mobile Web Browsing (usage of a web browser to access the World Wide Web from the phone - understood by most users to represent full Internet access)

Playing down the hype

"It resolves the dilemma that some appear to hype up the mobile Internet while others appear to underplay it, when in fact everyone is talking about different elements of the mobile Internet," says Goldstuck.

Research released

The Mobile Internet in SA 2010 study, backed by First National Bank, was conducted face to face among urban cellphone users aged 16 and older, representing 16-million South Africans. The report, released 26 May 2010, directly measures mobile web browsing and accounts for 3.36-million users at the end of 2009. The Mobile Application Internet is measured across several applications, including instant messaging, downloadable applications, Internet applications and e-mail. The Mobile Application Internet user base is estimated at about 9-million.

Market reach

"This does not mean marketers can target 9-million Internet users via their cellphones," warns Goldstuck. "They would have to target the individual applications that make up that total, which means that the Mobile Application Internet is not a readily addressable market."

"The media opportunity represented by the three tiers of the mobile web is quite fragmented and not easy to exploit, but that barrier in itself has presented a fantastic opportunity for early adopter brands who have embraced the medium," says Joubert. "It has also offered opportunities for aggregators of the medium, such as application stores and advertising networks like AdMob and Buzz City, and for the very large publishers like Mxit, all of whom are able to offer marketers very significant reach."

Results

The study was conducted face to face among urban cellphone users aged 16 and older, representing 16-million South Africans.

• Less than half of urban cellphone users who have Internet-capable phones use the Internet
• Usage of specific applications like MXit and Facebook Mobile far outpace browsing on the phone, even though both are available on almost two thirds of the phones used by South Africa's urban cellular users
• While 28% of the urban cellular market is using mobile instant messaging (IM), as many as 65% have the capacity on their phones, meaning that only 4.5-million out of 10.5-million potential mobile IM users actually use it. In many cases, an application has been installed on the phone, and the owner may even have registered to use the service, but is not in fact a user.
• 60% of users in this market have phones that can browse the Internet; only 21% report that they use this form of mobile Internet access.
• More than half of urban cellular users - 8.5-million - are capable of accessing e-mail on their phones, and as many as 60% - 9.5-million - are able to browse on their phones.

The implications of these numbers are significant: in one fell swoop, they would turn the SA Internet user base from the 5.3-million reported by World Wide Worx at the end of 2009 to 9.6-million. Add Instant Messaging to the mix and the total becomes 10.56-million - exactly double that of the Internet user base at the end of last year.

"The truth is, many people with these applications on their phones do no use them and do not even know how to use them," says Goldstuck. "It is clear that the cellphone has the potential to take South Africans across the digital divide, but the phones themselves need to become more user-friendly and a vast amount of consumer education is needed."

Cellphone banking

Ravesh Ramlakan, CEO of FNB Cellphone Banking Solutions, says that, while the overall cellphone banking service has grown more rapidly than online banking, the adoption of FNB's mobile banking WAP site has been relatively slow.

"Customers either do not know how to access it via their cellphone, or their phone needs to be configured first in order to access. However, with technology lifecycles, the adoption to internet banking via the cellphone will feature more prominently in future," he says. Cellphone banking provides two million of its registered customers with access via menu based banking.