The number of mobile social media users is set to double by the year 2016 – and you thought everyone you know was already on Twitter or Facebook.
They may be, but more and more of them will start using the social media services on their mobile devices, according to a new study from Juniper Research. The firm says a continuing increase in smartphone adoption and the rise of geosocial networking will push the number of mobile social media users from 650 million today to 1.3 billion by 2016. That would be more than the total number of social media users on all platforms now.
Juniper's report refers to "geosocial" phenomena, driven by the growing trend to integrate social, local and mobile experiences. People, the report says, want to find out not only what their friends are doing, but also their location and other available activities in the area. Geosocial networks are particularly suited to the mobile space since most smartphones now include GPS.
Love is in the air. Juniper says "geosocial" is boosting the mobile dating market because location and instant messaging are the driving forces behind a number of successful services, particularly those targeted at younger demographics who consider these to be key features. The mobile dating market is expected to be worth $2.3 billion by 2016, up from $1 billion this year.
“Location features on smartphones are opening up a new side of both dating and social networking," said report author Charlotte Miller. "Adding location features to a service makes the service local to the user. This will be a key feature for mobile dating services – why send emails to someone hundreds of miles away when you can exchange instant messages with someone only hundreds of meters away?"
The report also found that spending on advertising targeted at tablets is expected to account for almost half of total mobile social media advertising spend by 2016; and, on a regional basis, the Far East & China will continue to account for the lion’s share of mobile social media revenues, followed by North America.
