Data Monday: Making the Mobile Transition

by August 12, 2012

As more companies see their audiences shift to mobile or begin as mobile-only users, they don't have a lot of time to make the transition to mobile themselves. Little wonder that mobile has become top of mind for most Internet companies. Here's how a few of them are handling the transition.

Facebook

102 million people accessed Facebook solely from mobile in June, a massive 23% increase over the 83 million mobile-only users in March. 18.7% of its 543 million monthly mobile users don’t even visit its desktop site. That means if it can’t make its mobile advertising generate a lot more money within the next year, revenue could plummet. (source)

eBay

eBay's mobile shoppers and mobile payers are 3 to 4 times more valuable than Web only. Mobile was a major contributor to eBay's Q2 growth with 600,000 new customers making their first purchase through eBay’s mobile apps. The company is now expecting eBay and PayPal mobile to each transact $10 billion in volume this year. eBay’s CEO John Donahoe, called it “a staggering surge” in mobile commerce that did not exist just a few years ago. (source)

Twitter

The majority of Twitter users are mobile and more active than their desktop counterparts. Dick Costolo, Twitter’s chief executive, says he now sees Twitter’s website as an “entry ramp” guiding users to the “core” Twitter mobile app. Mobile revenue for Twitter on some days is greater than non-mobile. (source)

Zynga

The number of people who play Zynga's games on mobile devices is growing three times faster than the number of those who play on the Web. People using their phones or other mobile devices often are what Zynga calls "casual players" who tend to spend less money. Figuring out how to make money from them is more important than ever. (source)

Yelp

10% of Yelp's monthly uniques access the service on mobile but account for a disproportionate 40% of Yelp's search query volume. On weekends, mobile searches actually outweigh desktop searches. Yelp runs ads on the mobile web, and those ads see a higher clickthrough rate than their desktop counterparts. That makes the company “very confident” that it can basically transfer its monetization to mobile. (source)

Zillow

Real estate service Zillow tipped toward mobile usage just last quarter. A user of Zillow on a mobile device is three times more likely to contact an agent than a user of Zillow on a dekstop. So Zillow actually monetizes (in terms of contacts per visitor) quite a bit better on mobile devices than on desktop. (source)