Smartphone ownership around the world

Source:  Pew Research Centre, 22nd February 2016
(So many stats in the full report!)

Instagram has more advertisers than Twitter

"2015 was a big year for Instagram’s advertising business. It rolled out new ad formats that could contain links, expanded the length of its video ads and, most importantly, made it easier for advertisers of any size — and increasingly anywhere — to buy its ads and target those ads.
Seemingly as a result of all those moves, Instagram now claims more than 200,000 active advertisers as of February 2016, the Facebook-owned photo-and-video-sharing service announced on Wednesday. That number may pale in comparison to Instagram’s parent company — Facebook claims more than 2.5 million advertisers — but it trumps Twitter, which had more than 130,000 active advertisers as of the fourth quarter of 2015.
The comparison between Instagram’s and Twitter’s advertiser numbers isn’t an entirely fair one. Twitter has built its advertising business on its own, while Instagram has been able to stand on Facebook’s shoulders. For example, advertisers can buy ads on Instagram using the same self-serve tools from Facebook that they use to buy ads on the larger social network and with the same level of targeting Facebook offers. But still, at the end of the day, more advertisers is more advertisers."

Source;  MarketingLand, 24th February 2016

Smart watch shipments 'have overtaken Swiss watch shipments'

"According to research from Strategy Analytics, global smartwatch shipments reached 8.1 million units in Q4 2015, compared with 7.9 million Swiss Watch shipments. It is the first time ever that smartwatches have outshipped Swiss watches on a global basis.
Cliff Raskind, Director at Strategy Analytics, said, “We estimate global smartwatch shipments reached 8.1 million units in Q4 2015, rising a healthy 316 perc ent from 1.9 million in Q4 2014. Smartwatches are growing rapidly in North America, Western Europe and Asia. Apple Watch captured an impressive 63 per cent share of the global smartwatch market in Q4 2015, followed by Samsung with 16 per cent. Apple and Samsung together account for a commanding 8 in 10 of all smartwatches shipped worldwide.”
Steven Waltzer, Analyst at Strategy Analytics, added, “We estimate global Swiss watch shipments reached 7.9 million units in Q4 2015, falling 5 per cent from 8.3 million in Q4 2014.  Global demand for Swiss watches is slowing down, and major players like Swatch are struggling to find growth.”"

Source;  Advanced Television, 24th February 2016

Flipkart is the first Indian app to hit 50m installs on Android

"Flipkart has become the first Indian app to cross the 50 million installs landmark on Google Android Play Store. This landmark was crossed in the first week of February 2016.
The Flipkart app, which is also among the highest rated Indian shopping app on Google Play, is the first Indian app across all genres including popular ones like communication, social, entertainment, to cross the 50 million install benchmark. Android phones are the most dominant operating system in smartphones with over 85% of the total smartphone base in India."

Source;  Next Big What, 19th February 2016

Over half of UK online sales come through tablets or mobiles

"A major digital tipping point has been reached – with the percentage of UK online retail sales made through mobile devices (smartphones and tablets) exceeding 50% for the first time in Q4 2015/16*.
Smartphones and tablets accounted for 51% of UK online retail sales in Q4, which was a substantial increase on the 45% recorded in Q3 – and up from 40% in Q4 last year.
The percentage split of total UK online sales between the types of channel for Q4 2015/16 was as follows:
Desktop / laptop – 49%
Tablets - 33%
Smartphones - 18%
Visits to retail websites via mobile devices accounted for two-thirds (66%) of traffic in Q4, up from 63% in the previous quarter. This compares with 53% in Q4 last year.
This leap in mobile penetration appears to be being driven by increased confidence in using smartphones for online shopping. Sales growth through these devices rose sharply in 2015, while growth through tablets reached a record low in December 2015."
Source;  IMRG, 24th February 2016

An average of 12,000 new companies were registered each day in China in 2015

"2015 was a big year for startups in China. Everyone knows that. VC money was coming fast and easy – so easy that VCs were literally trying to convince people with jobs at China’s top tech companies to quit and do startups. And until the cracks started showing with the summer stock market crash, China’s economy was growing like a weed, too. It was a good time to found a startup, especially a tech startup. So just how startup crazy did China go?
According to state media, an average of 12,000 new companies were registered each day in China last year. Of course, not all of those were new tech startups, but the tech and internet sectors were among the hottest in a year that saw more than 4 million new companies hit the books in China."

Source:  Tech in Asia, 26th February 2016

The New York Times has 1.4m print and 1.1m digital subscribers

"Thompson also confirmed both print and online subscriber counts at the Times: 1.38 million and nearly 1.1 million, respectively. The latter grew by 53,000 in the fourth quarter of 2015, Thompson told the Social Media Week audience. Also, during that quarter, the paper's print advertising revenue shrank by seven percent, while its digital advertising revenue grew by eight percent—but those percentage numbers may mask a greater gap between print and digital rates."
Source:  ArsTechnica, 25th February 2016

Adobe's Q4 2015 US Digital Video Benchmark Report

ADI Q4 2015 Digital Video Benchmark from Adobe

Kanye West's album The Life of Pablo was illegally downloaded 500,000 times on the first day of release

"Soon after the album was released pirated copies started to populate many torrent and direct download sites, something many people on social media were quick to point out.
TorrentFreak has been keeping a close eye on the popularity of the album on BitTorrent and after the first day an estimated 500,000 people have already grabbed a copy.
The album is currently leading The Pirate Bay’s list of most shared music torrents by a landslide. At the time of writing close to 10,000 people were sharing a copy of the most popular torrent simultaneously, something we haven’t seen with a music release before.
Aside from torrent sites, the album is also being widely distributed on various direct download services and hosting sites, increasing the overall piracy numbers even further."

Source - TorrentFreak, 16th February 2016

Telegram has 100m users; on average 350,000 new users join each day

"Two and a half years ago we launched Telegram. Then you told your friends and co-workers about it. And they told their friends and co-workers. And we started growing.
Now Telegram has more than 100,000,000 monthly active users. 350,000 new users sign up each day. We're delivering 15 billion messages daily.
Thank you for spreading the word, keep it up!"

Source:  Telegram blog, 23rd February 2016

38 million credit cards were linked to Apple Pay in China on the first day

"According to local reports, by 5 p.m., 38 million bank cards had been linked to Apple Pay. The Beijing Morning News said on its Weibo account that within an hour of the service going live at 5 a.m., 10 million people had already linked their bank cards to their accounts."

Source:  Mashable, 19th February 2016

Over $1bn of payments were made on Venmo in January 2016

"For the first time in our history, in the month of January, over $1 billion in payments were made on Venmo. That is over two-and-half times what we saw in January 2015, and more than 10x our volume in January 2014. We thought this was a pretty big milestone, so we wanted to share it with you."
~Source:  Venmo blog, 16th February 2016

BuzzFeed content generates 5bn views a month, half from video

"Across all the platforms where it now publishes content, the company generates 5 billion monthly views—half from video, a business that effectively did not exist two years ago. Traffic to the website has remained steady—80 million people in the U.S. every month, putting it ahead of The New York Times—even though as much as 75% of BuzzFeed’s content is now published somewhere else."

Source:  Fast Company, 16th February 2016

Apple Pay drives better performance in commerce apps

"That mobile apps are adopting the service at a fast rate makes sense: Getting Apple Pay into a store requires pricey new terminals, but app developers only need to insert some code.
The ease of use in an app—consumers only have to scan their fingerprint into their phone—could spur more frequent buying and larger purchases, says Ben Bajarin of Creative Strategies, a technology research firm.
For example, Domino Go, an interior design app, is running exclusive deals for purchases made with Apple Pay, and says it’s seen a 436% boost in average daily revenue after adding the option.
Staples told Quartz that checkout times are 35 seconds less than traditional methods like credit and debit cards, and Instacart, an on-demand grocery app, said customers checkout 58% faster with Apple Pay than other payment methods, saving them about a minute on average.
Apple Pay is also helping with cart abandonment—when consumers get frustrated plugging in their payment and shipping information, and just give up. JackThreads, a popular men’s fashion site, says customers who use Apple Pay are 92% more likely to finish a transaction than those who don’t."

Source:  Quartz, 9th February 2016

TV is no longer the dominant screen in British living rooms

"Myth 1: TV is the dominant living room screen and entertainment the dominant activity
Only 50% of UK online adults now say the TV set is the focal point of their living room, whilst 70% report they ordinarily use a connected device whilst watching TV – this rises to 87% of 16-34s. Multi device activity peaks between 6-9pm.
During TV programmes, over one third (34%) check emails, 31% Instant Message or text and 25% shop online.
The biometric data revealed that about 60% of the time a person is most highly engaged during an evening TV session is in non-TV related activity, such as using a digital device or talking to someone.
“Second screening is ingrained to such a degree that all screens are now equal, there’s no hierarchy, only fragmentation of attention – actually switch-screening is a much more accurate term,” says Tim Elkington, the IAB’s Chief Strategy Officer. “Furthermore, entertainment is only a small part of the living room media activity. It’s now a multifunctional space where people jump between individual and group activities, be it shopping, social media, emails, work or messaging.”
Myth 2: TV programmes and ad breaks determine behaviour
The study revealed the traditional assumption that people cram non-TV related behaviour into the ad breaks is no longer valid.  
For example, the incidence of checking emails is consistent during TV programmes and ad breaks (both 34%) whilst texting or Instant Messaging is only 1% higher during the ad break than the programme. The device tracking showed, overall, there was actually more online activity per minute during a programme than an ad break.
Furthermore, the declining “kettle power surge” during ad breaks in peak TV occasions over the last 25 years provides more evidence of the change in the traditional rhythm of the living room. During the biggest TV event in 1990 – England’s World Cup semi-final against West Germany – National Grid data compiled by British Gas shows a power surge equivalent to 1.12 million kettles boiling at the same time immediately after the match. In 2014’s biggest TV event – England’s World Cup match against Uruguay – the power surge was the equivalent of only 410,000 boiling kettles."

Source:  IAB UK, 11th February 2016

420m WeChat users sent over 8 billion 'Red Envelopes' at Chinese New Year 2016

"The scale of social and messaging platforms in China is at its peak on Chinese New Year, as statistics on usage of platforms such as WeChat and Weibo reveal.
According to WeChat, owned by digital media business Tencent, 420 million people sent each other lucky money via the app’s payment service on the eve of Chinese New Year. According to WeChat, it has seen a total of 8.08 billion red envelopes sent so far for Chinese New Year, eight times more than last year.
To put this into context, according to PayPal it made 4.9 billion transactions in 2015 (half of the number of transactions made on WeChat just for Chinese New Year) and only 28 per cent were made on a mobile device."
Source:  The Drum, 9th February 2016
Also
Stats on Weibo usage

HBO Now has 800,000 subscribers in the US

"Richard Pleper, Chief Executive of HBO, has revealed that HBO NOW, the broadcaster’s OTT platform, has attracted some 800,000 paying subscribers, with Jeff Bewkes, Chairman and CEO of HBO’s parent company Time Warner, suggesting the service was a significant contributor to HBO’s 2.7 million domestic subscriber additions in 2015.
The figures were highlighted during Time Warner’s Fourth Quarter 2015 Earnings Call, during which Bewkes suggested that the combination of an even stronger original programming line-up and best selection of hit Hollywood movies and ever improving digital products would drive continued subscriber growth both at HBO NOW and with its traditional distributors."

Source:  Advanced Television, 11th February 2016

40% of smartphones in use in the US are iPhones

Pource:  Parks Associates, 10th February 2016

A third of US Pizza Hut orders during the Super Bowl were made on mobile [+ other stats]

""Pizza Hut enjoyed record-breaking sales on the day of the Super Bowl, with orders coming from mobile devices representing approximately one-third of total sales, underscoring consumer demand for on-the-go food purchases during major sporting events.
The quick service restaurant chain reaped the rewards of the growing shift toward mobile ordering during Sunday’s big game, with smartphone-enabled sales accounting for one-third of total sales. Pizza Hut’s single-day digital sales record bodes well for its competitors, especially if food and beverage brands are wise enough to market to consumers during significant cultural or sporting events that typically involve plenty of get-togethers."

Source:  Mobile Commerce Daily, 10th February 2016

Other Super Bowl 2016 stats:

82% of Super Bowl searches happened on mobile

Flurry looks at app usage during the game - (lowest when Beyonce performs as people put down their phones)

2nd highest overnight ratings for CBS

Big drop in number of tweets and Facebook engagements - boring game?

UK national press advertising has fallen by one third since 2010

"Spending on national newspaper advertising has fallen by one-third since 2010 to £880m. Online prospects have also darkened. Adblockers, smartphones and new social media platforms are tearing holes in digital strategies."
[...]
"Britain’s newspaper industry is arguably the most exciting and competitive in the world. Its titles sell nearly 7m print copies a day, compared with 13m 10 years ago, operate two of the world’s most popular newspaper websites and often lead the way in investigations. In 2013 the Guardian published leaks by the whistleblower Edward Snowden; a year later the Sunday Times revealed corruption at Fifa, which contributed to the ousting of its president Sepp Blatter."
[...]
"In some countries, publishers have changed course to claw back the revenue lost to online. In 2003, 93 per cent of UK property advertising went to newspapers; a decade later the proportion had halved. European newspaper groups, principally Germany’s Axel Springer and Norway’s Schibsted, responded by acquiring classified property websites.
"UK groups failed to follow suit. The Guardian turned Auto Trader, a car magazine, into a successful online portal but then sold it to boost its cash reserves. Only the Daily Mail has diversified, using cash flows from its newspapers to build up a business information and events business. Today Trinity Mirror, the UK’s largest newspaper publisher, has a market capitalisation of £430m. Rightmove, the country’s biggest property site, is eight times bigger."

Source:  Financial Times, 9th February 2016

1 in 7 Australians watch no commercial TV on a typical weekday

"Over one in seven Australians now watch no commercial television on a normal weekday – over twice as many as in 2008. The audience is fast getting older and SVoD looks set to make a bigger dent in the medium’s reach in 2016, the latest media data from Roy Morgan Research shows.
Seven years ago, only 6.9 per cent of Australians (14+) wouldn’t watch any Commercial TV on a normal weekday, and there was little difference between age groups. Nearly everyone, regardless of age, would watch at least some show (and advertising) during the day. It was simply a matter of which show reached which people.
Since then, the proportion of Australians who don’t watch any Commercial TV has more than doubled to 14.9 per cent—and the gap is widening between age groups, with 14-34 year-olds making the fastest exodus from the medium. In 2015, over one in five 25-34 year-olds (20.7 per cent) watched no Commercial TV, up nearly threefold from the 7.6 per cent who couldn’t be reached by the channel in 2008. 18.8 per cent of 14-24 year-olds now don’t watch any Commercial TV, up from 7.0 per cent in 2008.
Commercial TV also has less reach among older people, but their abandonment has been slower: 14.1 per cent of 35-49 year-olds and 11.0 per cent of Australians 50+ reported watching no Commercial TV on a normal weekday in 2015 (up from 6.5 per cent and 6.9 per cent respectively)."
Source;  Advanced Television, 1st February 2016

56% of new parents visit Facebook on their phones before 7am

"The arrival of a baby transforms a parent’s life in an instant: less “gym Tuesdays” or “happy hour Fridays” and more afternoon power napping after late-night feedings. As children turn parents’ focus close to home, parents are relying on their mobile phones to stay connected to family and friends—and even to brands. New parents, in particular, use mobile devices as an escape—especially during early mornings.1 New parents in the US are active on Facebook in the wee hours, starting their first mobile sessions as early as 4am and peaking at 7am.4 In fact, by 7am, 56% of new parents have visited Facebook on their mobile device."

Source:  Facebook, 28th January 2016

More drones than aircraft are registered with the American government

"Civil aviation has passed an important milestone.
More drones are now registered with the federal government than piloted aircraft, marking a major milestone in aviation history.
Over 325,000 people have registered their flying robots with the Federal Aviation Administration’s new drone registration system, FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said at a drone-related conference in Washington, D.C. on Monday. That number tops the 320,000 piloted aircraft registrations the FAA has on file, he said, according to a USA Today report.
In early January, just weeks after the FAA’s drone registration system opened on Dec. 21, the FAA had just 181,000 drone registrations.
This rise in the number of registrations shows that many people are racing to meet a Feb. 19 deadline to do so. Failure to register could result in civil penalties up to $27,500 and criminal penalties of up to three years in prison."

Source:  Fortune, 8th February 2016

Twitter has 130,000 active advertisers

"In Q4, we reached 130,000 active advertisers, up almost 90% year over year, driven by our small and medium-sized businesses (SMB) initiatives. We expect that SMB growth will continue as we improve our product, making it faster and easier to run campaigns and improve our direct response tools. "
Source:  Twitter's Q4 2015 Results statement, 10th February 2016

Twitter's US Monthly Active Users fell in Q4 2015

Source:  Twitter's Q4 2015 earning slides, 10th February 2016
MAUs

The FT has 780,000 paying readers

FT hit another readership record today: 780,000 paying readers is highest in our 128 year history.

— Andrew Betts (@triblondon) February 2, 2016

WhatsApp has one billion users

"As of today, one billion people are using WhatsApp.
That's nearly one in seven people on Earth who use WhatsApp each month to stay in touch with their loved ones, their friends and their family.
We are proud of this milestone, and we're humbled by the extraordinary ways all of you have used WhatsApp. Whether it's sharing vital information during natural disasters or health emergencies, finding a date, growing a small business, buying an engagement ring, or seeking a better life – we're honored to be a small part of what people are doing to make their lives and the lives of those around them better.
And yet, through all the progress we've made together over the last seven years, our mission has never changed. WhatsApp began as a simple idea: ensuring that anyone could stay in touch with family and friends anywhere on the planet, without costs or gimmicks standing in the way.
So even as we celebrate this achievement, our focus remains the same. Every day, our team continues to work to improve WhatsApp's speed, reliability, security and simplicity. We're excited to see how far we've come. But now, it's back to work – because we still have another 6 billion people to get on WhatsApp, and a long way left to go."

Source:  Blog post by WhatsApp, 1st February 2016

MAUs
Update - more stats here

Messaging is more popular than search among Chinese internet users

Source:  Data from CNNIC, reported by DigiTimes, 25th January 2016

Over 5m Google Cardboard devices have been shipped

"A year and a half ago we introduced Google Cardboard, a simple cardboard viewer that anyone can use to experience mobile virtual reality (VR). With just Cardboard and the smartphone in your pocket, you can travel to faraway places and visit imagined worlds. Since then everyone from droid lovers and Sunday edition subscribers, to big kids and grandmas have been able to enjoy VR—often for the very first time. Here's a look at where we are, 19 months in:
1. 5 million Cardboard fans have joined the fold.
2. In just the past two months (October-December), you launched into 10 million more immersive app experiences:
3. Out of 1,000+ Cardboard apps on Google Play, one of your favorites got you screaming “aaaaaaahwsome,” while another “gave you goosebumps.”
4. You teleported to places far and wide, right from the comfort of YouTube.
5. Since we launched Cardboard Camera in December, you’ve captured more than 750,000 VR photos, letting you relive your favorite moments anytime, from anywhere."
Source:  Google Blog, 27th January 2016

Conan O'Brien's Team Coco YouTube Channel's videos have had 2bn views

"Conan O’Brien and his Team Coco YouTube channel have reached 2 billion video views and 3.5 million subscribers. It took five years to reach but, really, that’s a lot of post-late night viewing.
He still draws the youngest audience of any other late night show and is also drawing in traditional TV ratings along with his YouTube views. The show saw an 8 percent increase among adults 18-49 in December, versus November and a 5 percent  lift in January, versus December."

Source:  AdWeek, 26th January 2016