Mobile phone users 'wasting nearly £5bn a year' | Technology. UK mobile phone users are wasting a total of nearly £5bn a year because they are on the wrong contracts, according to a report. The overspend figure equates to almost half their spending every year on their mobile phone, or an average of £195, compared with an average spend of £439 annually. Just over three quarters (76%) of people on monthly deals are paying too much, having signed up to tariffs after wrongly estimating how many minutes and text messages they use. The study by Billmonitor, an Ofcom approved bill-analysis service, analysed millions of transactions from thousands of bills.
It discovered that in total, Britain's 33m mobile subscribers are wasting nearly £5bn a year because of the problem. But it points to the scale of the challenge for subscribers hoping to get the right contract, noting that there are more than 8.5m potential mobile tariffs available. In general it says that overspending falls into three categories: Top 10 Mobile Internet Trends (Feb 2011)
What comes after "the year of mobile" After the year of mobile, many are wondering what will come next. iMediaConnection turned to one of 2010's Mobile Women to Watch, Joy Liuzzo, for answers. A senior director at InsightExpress and a speaker at the upcoming iMedia Breakthrough Summit, Liuzzo is, quite simply, a mobile expert. Check out what she has to say about what lies ahead. iMediaConnection: What is the most surprising thing people are using their cell phones for?
iMedia: Where will consumers draw the line in terms of brands having access to them on their cell phones? Liuzzo: Consumers are more open minded to brands and advertising on their mobile when it is in a public setting, such as the mobile internet or an application. iMedia: Which demographic is growing fastest in terms of mobile use? Liuzzo: We're starting to see kids around 11-13 years old increasingly have a mobile phone.
iMedia: What mobile marketing strategy should die? Liuzzo: Carriers are very protective of their customers, and rightly so. 10 Mobile Trends for 2011. In its annual mobile technology report, Forrester Research has outlined the trends it expects to see in the coming year. Technologies like 4G and LTE, Near Field Communication (NFC), barcodes and augmented reality will see increasing amounts of hype in 2011, and the use of mobile/social/location combinations will soar, the report says. But for companies, the goal should now be on developing mobile business cases and strategies, and not jumping on the bandwagons surrounding these types of disruptions. These technologies - LTE, NFC and mobile AR - will take years to emerge, says Forrester.
Strategy needs to come before technology. 2010 Trends Continue Forrester's 2011 report began by analyzing its performance on last's year's predictions. Overall, the firm gave itself a B+ on accuracy. While those still hold true, says Forrester, new trends for 2011 are emerging. To summarize, the trends are as follows: 1) Mobile/Social/Local Combinations will Explode but will Generate Little Revenue.
2011 Mobile Trends. 10 Apps to Watch in 2011. There are more than 200,000 apps in the Android market. There are more than 325,000 apps available for iOS devices. Even the fledgling Windows Phone 7 app marketplace already has greater than 5,300 apps. Throw in the wide world of web applications and, forget about it: you'd need many lifetimes to try them all. However, there are just 10 apps you really should keep a very close watch on in 2011. 1. The Daily is the News Corp’s iPad-only newspaper that is set to launch in January with each daily edition costing $0.99 to download.
-Vadim Lavrusik, Community Manager 2. Since Drop.io was purchased and disbanded by Facebook, there’s certainly a need for free, web-based, acount-less and super simple file sharing. -Matt Silverman, Associate Features Editor 3. GetGlue is one of the few checkin apps that offers something the other major players (i.e. -Lauren Indvik, Assistant Editor 4. -Erica Swallow, Assistant Editor 5. -Ben Parr, Co-Editor 6. -Sarah Kessler, Features Writer 7. 8. 9. 10. Year in Review: 10 Trends in Mobile Technology.