Mary Meeker’s Internet Trend Report is always one of the most highly-anticipated pieces of research to come out each year. Meeker, a partner focusing on digital investments at the venture capital firm of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, has been releasing her findings for more than two decades. The annual report is often referred to as The State of Union for Technology.
Released last week, the massive 355-slide report focuses on Internet adoption, smartphones, ads, ecommerce, entertainment, gaming, enterprise healthcare, China, India, and start-ups.
For marketers it’s crucial to understand their space as well as other factors that impact their business.
Here are some highlights from TechCrunch:
- Smartphone sales and Internet penetration growth are both slowing
- It’s not really a “shift to mobile” as much as “the addition of mobile”, since desktop usage hasn’t declined much while mobile usage has skyrocketed to over three hours per day per person in the US
- There’s still more time spent on mobile than ad spend, indicating forthcoming windfalls for mobile ad platforms
- Google and Facebook control 85% of online ad growth
- Internet ad spend will surpass TV spend within six months
- Streaming music led by Spotify surpassed physical music sales, giving recorded music its first revenue growth in 16 years
- eSports are exploding, with viewing time up 40% year over year, and an equal number of millennials strongly preferring eSports vs traditional sports
- Email spam with malicious attachments is exploding as cloud usage increases, so be careful what you click
- Tech companies drive wealth creation in China, where people pay for livestreaming, and bike sharing usage is skyrocketing
- Falling data costs are driving increasing Internet adoption in India, but smartphone prices remain too high
- 60% of the most-highly valued tech companies in America were founded by first or second generation Americans
- 50% of the top private startups were founded by first-gen immigrants
eCommerce Focus
The section of the report that focuses on ecommerce indicates that lines are blurring when it comes to what shoppers perceive as store fronts. Often consumers are shopping from emails and ads on Facebook.
There’s also an upswing in online retailers ability to capture new customers as well as retain customers. That growth of acquisition plus retentions has lead to an overall increase in consumer spending at online retail sites.
And Google Product Listing Ads (PLAs) are driving clicks to product pages.
Based on information in the report, it’s clear that the future for savvy marketers is bright. There are opportunities for growth in many verticals (like gaming and esports) provided brands are engaging consumers, delivering information how they want it, full embracing mobile, and open to shifting with behaviors.