Mobile app users are an attractive audience for marketers, skewing younger and more affluent than other online adults in the US, according to research from Forrester. more

Social may democratize the marketing landscape, but big businesses still have the upper hand in terms of best-practices, simply because they have more resources to devote to new media. What's a smaller marketer to do to keep pace in the social space? Here's some help. Brad Smith, in a post at ... more

Men are more likely than women to make purchases using their smartphone (45% vs. 34%), and they're even more more likely to buy certain types of products via mobile device, such as consumer electronics equipment and digital content, according to a study by uSamp. more

Smartphones and tablets are redefining sales because they offer a compelling blend of usability, utility, and innovation that's unachievable with personal computers. In short, mobile enablement can supercharge your sales. And this infographic outlines how. more

Who would've guessed a few photo filters and instant sharing capabilities would produce a social hit? Instagram, that's who! The image-based social network, available on iPhone and Android smartphones, boasts more than 100 million users. Many are brands: Starbucks, NASA, MTV, and NBC News are some of the most successful Instagrammers. Recently, the ... more

Google Sites was the top-ranked Web property in August 2012, attracting some 187 million unique visitors, followed by Microsoft Sites with 170 million and Yahoo Sites with 164 million, and making its debut to the Top 50 was Instagram, at No. 48, with 26.0 million unique visitors, according to data ... more

Some 10 million people will likely end up buying the new iPhone 5 in the 10 days after it hits stores on Sept. 21, 2012, and the iPhone 5's release will present a huge mobile app marketing opportunity for brands, according to Fiksu. more

Online video viewers living in blue states watched 26% more video content than those living in red states during the second quarter of 2012, according to Ooyala's Q2 Global Video Index Report, which also found that the proportion of time tablet viewers spent watching premium, long-form video jumped 47% over ... more

Almost nine in ten mobile users (88.1%) say they regularly or occasionally research products via their smartphone or tablet, and nearly two in three (66.5%) regularly or occasionally purchase products via the mobile channel, according to a survey from Prosper Mobile Insights. more

More than one-third of email messages across 12 key industries were opened via mobile devices in the first half of 2012, up from 20% one year earlier; moreover, for most brands, email opens via mobile are projected surpass 50% within the next 6-12 months, according to a report by Knotice. more

Among US smartphone owners, some 90% of the media they interact with (about 4.4 hours a day) is screen-based, and most of them (90%) move sequentially among multiple screens (TV, smartphone, tablet, and computer) to accomplish various tasks over time, according to a Google study. more

We've mentioned Pinterest numerous times—enough to show we're Pin-crazy. But we're not the only ones! To back us up on our Pin interest, Compete has published charts about Pinterest's growth and its impact on marketers. Some quick stats: Pinterest has grown from 700,000 to 20,000,000 unique users ... more

To find out moms' thoughts about mobile during the back-to-school season, the Interactive Advertising Bureau and Meredith's Parents Network conducted a national survey of moms. more

Google Android and Apple continued to expand their share of the US smartphone market during the three months ended July 2012: Apple captured 33.4%, up 2.0 points from the previous three-month period, while Android reached 52.2%, up 1.4 points, according to data from the comScore MobiLens service. more

Smartphone usage is up, up, up. In a global marketplace dominated by Android, traffic to websites has more than doubled in the last year. But this picture of Android's near monopoly changes when filtered through an e-commerce lens. more

Among mobile Web users in the US, mobile media (via phones and tablets) was the the most popular way to consume media content in the second quarter of 2012: Mobile media accounted for 2.97 hours of the total 9.00 hours spent consuming media via all platforms during the day, outpacing ... more

More than three-quarters (77%) of luxury advertisers are expected to increase their investments in online marketing in 2012, according to the 2012 Luxury Brand Study by Martini Media, a new study based on a poll of 400 agency marketers who serve luxury brands. more

Social media guidelines are the hallmark, and often the Achilles heel, of a solid social strategy. To be successful, your user guidelines need to be simple and facilitate right social behavior—instead of forcing visitors to wade through legalese. The worst thing a social media policy can do is make users feel ... more

Are laptops a back-to-school necessity for students? Not until high school, according to a new poll from SodaHead: A plurality (33%) of Americans say laptops should be allowed into classrooms when students reach high school, 25% say it's OK for laptops to be used in middle school, and 18% say ... more

Aside from making phone calls, consuming mobile content is the most popular smartphone activity among owners of smartphones: 93% say they regularly access mobile content and information, while 59% access the Internet and 58% use email, according to a study by the Online Publishers Association. more

The average order value (AOV) of smartphone traffic to online retailer websites reached $97.39 in the second quarter of 2012, higher than that of tablets ($96.11) and traditional devices ($91.86), according to a report by Monetate, which analyzed a random sample of more than 100 million online shopping experiences for ... more

When using Facebook apps, only 28% of people prefer to view standard banner ads, whereas 72% prefer viewing immersive and integrated ads—those that offer virtual rewards or currency, or interactive video ads that occur during natural breaks in an app or game—according to a survey conducted by Harris Interactive on ... more

So, how's that app working for you? Is it binding users to your company, building brand equity, and providing high "exit barriers" for customers? That's what the big-time successful apps are doing best, notes Robert Plant in a post at the HBR Blog Network. If your app isn't performing up to ... more

Overall, mobile users appear to be more satisfied with their tablets than their smartphones, with Apple's iPad ranking highest in tablet consumer satisfaction (scoring 8.8 on a scale of 1 to 10), just edging out Amazon's Kindle Fire (at 8.7), according to data from comScore's newly launched TabLens service. more

Does your business have a mobile site that is designed with your mobile customer in mind? Is it a branded, usable, engaging experience? If the answer is no, or if you're not sure, you are not alone. One thing is clear, though: If your site isn't mobile friendly now, it's ... more