The Spotlight: Two online trends are crystal clear: connectivity has shifted from the desktop to mobile devices, and more content is consumed through video than ever before. Lesson learned for marketers everywhere: if you’re not thinking about mobile and video - ideally, video on mobile! - start now.
The percent of the world’s population that’s online hasgrown 65x in the last two decades:
0.6%1994
39%2015
Source: Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends 2015
And though the growth rate of Internet adoption has slowed in recent years, there are still 200 million people a year coming online for the first time.
In 2014, the total number of Internet users across the globe was 2.8 billion.
The composition of people online has shifted dramatically since 1995, too.
Sources: Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends 2015, Wikipedia, and World Population Clock
But relative to their total populations, the US, Europe and China are still much more connected than the rest of the world.
% of internet users vs. world population
Mobile adoption is growing even more rapidly.
% world’s population with mobile phones.
1% (80 million)1995
73% (5.2 billion)2015
And along with mobile adoption, smartphone use is increasing. There are 2.1B smartphone users globally - 29% of the world’s population.
And 370 million new users are adopting smartphones each year.
In the US, nearly two-thirds of the country’s population now have smartphones.
% US adults with smartphones
At the same time, the number of hours US adults spend online on their desktops has stayed fairly steady.
Time spent online on desktop
Yet the overall amount of time US adults spend online is increasing.
Overall time spent online
Because the amount of time US adults spend online on their mobile devices is growing significantly.
Time spent online on mobile
In 2014, US adults spent more time online via their phone than their desktops for the first time.
% world’s population online
2.4%Hrs/day online via desktop
73%Hrs/day online via mobile
In addition to the shift in where people are consuming content online, the formats they’re consuming it in are also changing. Video accounts for nearly two-thirds of consumer web traffic.
Daily Facebook Video Views
The appetite for video content is tough to exaggerate. The number of daily video views on Facebook increased 4x in 6 months.
That’s right: 4 billion videos are viewed on Facebook. Every. Single. Day.
And given the overall trends, it’s not surprising that 3 out of 4 of those videos on Facebook are watched from mobile devices.
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