The USA now has top slot for mobile web browsing
with 29% of the worldwide traffic, according to data released today by
Bango. The growth in
traffic is being matched by the growth in users paying for content on
the mobile web.
When it comes to payments though, the US is accelerating faster
than any other country and now accounts for 57% of payments worldwide.
The publicity behind the Apple iPhone
has encouraged more people to browse the mobile web in countries such
as the US and UK. But this increase in mobile browsing has taken
businesses by surprise as many don't have mobile websites.
The February Bango statistics identified mobile web browsers from a
total of 208 different countries and using 1,811 different handsets.
View a sample of the mobile traffic going through the Bango system at http://bango.com/live/. As of this writing the top carriers were 02 in the U.K. and Sprint in the U.S.
The statistics also show that while some countries such as India and
Indonesia have a good appetite for browsing on their mobiles, it
doesn't always convert into purchases. No matter how high the browsing
rate, it is only converted into a high purchase rate where people have
a good disposable income and can pay for content on their phone bills.
"Many people simply have no idea that they have visitors from mobile
devices accessing their PC website - these mobile visitors are simply
invisible to them," continued Malhotra. "Part of the problem is lack of
awareness and to help, we have created a short video at www.bango.com/mobiletracking which explains how you can get a good grasp of how much mobile traffic you have."