Community features in Mobile Services are driving uptake of Mobile Content

Posted by Shailendra Pandey Wednesday, January 14th, 2009

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The last two years have seen mobile social networking and community based services and applications receiving growing attention and investment from the mobile industry.

In September 2008, Informa Telecoms & Media conducted the annual Mobile Content & Services Industry Survey. Of the 307 telecom industry professionals who participated in the survey, 71% believed that social networking & community services will have a significant impact on driving P2P uptake of mobile content.

Mobile operators and service providers are increasingly integrating social networking and community features in their value added services. For example, if we look at some of the popular mobile music services such as MusicStation, Cyloop Mobile, Shazam, Bebo Mobile, phling!, MyStrands, MOKO.mobi and Vodafone Music Reporter; they all include community features.

According to Vodafone’s ICM Survey of MusicStation users in July 2008:

·         Over 50% of all MusicStation users use the community “Buzz” section of the service to discover, recommend and share music
·         84% of MusicStation community users satisfaction was rated 7/10 or greater for being able to share their playlists with other users

At the moment however, it is difficult to determine the actual revenue contribution from social networking and community features in mobile music services. We are doing further research that may enable us to provide such analysis in the coming months. Any suggestions are most welcome…