MANILA – Facebook is the most engaging smartphone application or "app" in the Philippines, according to Nielsen, affirming the social network's popularity among Filipinos online as well as the revenue potential for the country's telecom companies.
Citing the results of the Nielsen Informate Mobile Insights, the multinational consumer research company said Facebook was tops in three of the four Southeast Asian countries included in the study. Apart from the Philippines, the study also covered Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
Indonesia and Malaysia were the two other markets that ranked Facebook as the most engaging smartphone app, while Thailand considered the social network app only second next to Line, a Japanese messaging app.
Apart from Facebook, other smartphone apps among the top 10 in the four markets were Google Play Store, YouTube and Line.
Among the four countries, the Philippines was the only place where Skype and Vibr – both Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) apps – figured among the top 10 apps. Microblogging app Twitter was among the top 10 apps in only one of the four countries – Indonesia
The ranking combined app penetration with average time spent per month. The study used a smartphone metering technology across Android, Blackberry and Symbian operating systems, but Nielsen didn't indicate the size of its sample, only to say it maintains opt-in panels in the markets covered.
On average, people from the four Southeast Asian countries spent 45 minutes a day using smartphone apps. Filipinos spent slightly less than that at 41 minutes, while Malaysians led the pack with 66 minutes a day.
“The importance and influence of apps within today’s highly-competitive mobile market has soared in recent years,” said Sagar Phadke, Nielsen director for Telecom and Technology Practice in Southeast Asia, North Asia and Pacific.
“Smartphone users in Asia are highly engaged in apps usage, and the app user base in Asia is growing rapidly, presenting huge opportunities for brand marketers to leverage apps to build lasting connections with consumers,” Phadke said.
Last year, mobile browsing revenues grew by double-digits, making it one of the drivers of an otherwise mature Philippine telecom market – a feat both Smart and Globe attributed to the increasing penetration of smartphones and aggressive rollout of promotional mobile data plans.
Smart parent firm PLDT closed the first six months of this year with a two percent in revenues to P81.1 billion from P79.7 billion last year. Globe ended the same period with a nine percent increase in revenues to P44.5 billion from P40.8 billion a year ago.
source: interaksyon.com
