Last year, Matt Cutts warned marketers the mobile revolution was coming faster than expected, and brand content would need to be smartphone-ready sooner than later. According to data released in Nielsen’s The Digital Consumer report, we have careened past that tipping point and people now do more content browsing on mobile devices than desktop computers
Consumers spend about 27 hours and 2 minutes a month surfing the ‘net on computers, the study found. This total is eclipsed by the amount of time they are on smartphones accessing the web via mobile browsers or applications, which now averages about 34 hours and 17 minutes per person. In total, this means the average American consumer spends a little over two-and-a-half full days online every month.
Consumers spend about 34 hours and 17 minutes browsing on smartphones every month.
Over six hours of that screen time is spent checking Facebook and another six-and-a-half is dedicated to watching video content. However, there is still a sizeable timeframe left over for reading news, browsing products, researching services and checking real-time sports scores.
Marketers need to understand how this behavioral shift will impact their search engine marketing strategies and make sure they have all the local SEO clues in place. As Google’s technology becomes more advanced and looks to sophisticated ranking signals like consumers’ physical locations, it’s up to brands to ensure digital content is tailored for discovery when people are browsing on smaller screens.
