A report from Chitika found that Apple’s iOS, the operating system that powers the iPhone and iPad, has contributed substantially to the rise of mobile search. The study found that Apple’s mobile devices had the highest percentage of all web activity related to search, with 54 percent of all iPhone or iPad mobile internet use dedicated to conducting searches.
Similarly, Apple’s desktop Mac OS had the second highest percentage of web access related to search activity, with 48 percent of Mac-based internet traffic devoted to search. Android users were third, with 43 percent of web activity dedicated to search.
With both iOS and Android processing so many queries, it’s clear that the growing smartphone population is becoming more comfortable using their devices to find information quickly. Moreover, 36 percent of iOS searches were defined as local searches, according to Chitika. Local searches from Android account for 28 percent of all web activity on handsets running Google’s operating system.
For companies considering expanding their mobile search marketing campaigns, it’s critical that they ensure users of all major mobile operating systems can access their content without issue.
Brafton recently reported that Google has added mobile operating system targeting as a Google AdWords feature. Marketers can now ensure that their paid search campaigns and PPC landing pages are optimized for the operating systems specific to users. This is good news for paid search marketers, but SEO campaigns could use some mobile considerations as well; as Brafton has reported, mobile search is set surpass desktop queries in the next three years.
