iPhone impacts as mobile Internet growth surges

Peter Dinham
Thursday, 16 July 2009 11:36

Your IT - Mobility

Fuelled by the impact of the iPhone, mobile websites are attracting increasingly more Australian consumers looking for on-the-go information on everything from breaking news, sport, entertainment, celebrity gossip and, even predictions for the future with their personal horoscope reports.

In a mobile traffic report just released, the Australian Interactive Media Industry Association (AIMIA) says traffic growth across Australian mobile Internet sites in the six months to March showed a 24.4 percent increase in page views, representing a compound annual growth rate (CARG) of 54.8%.

However, the AIMIA says that during the six month period from October last year to March, mobile websites did take a knock for three of those months as a result of the January-February holiday period and the economic downturn.

The fourth quarter of last year – October to December - showed very strong growth, according to the AIMIA, buoyed by seasonal purchases of new devices such as the iPhone, whereas for the first quarter this year, there was a slowdown in growth in January and February as a result of the global financial crisis and the holiday period, followed by a bounce back in traffic during March.
                   
“A number of contributors experienced a negative growth in mobile traffic during January 09 and February 09, however consumer confidence and ultimately mobile browsing grew with a comfortable increase in March 09 delivering an overall three month increase of 6%. We can only assume the global financial crisis was a key factor behind the reduction in mobile browsing for the first part of that period.”

Despite the reduction in growth in the first quarter this year, the AIMIA says that, overall, the results of its survey were extremely encouraging, “validating” the move by Australian consumers towards mobile media channels for breaking news, sport, entertainment and other digital content and services.

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