The Multi-Screen Consumer

I recently came across this incredible presentation by Google highlighting the impact technology has had on our consumer habits recently. It outlines how consumers are constantly switching between media devices and the effects it has on our behavior.

There are a lot of good figures in the report, but here are a couple that I found most interesting:

• 90% of all media interactions are screen based
• We spend 4.4 hours of our leisure time in front of screens daily
• 38% of our daily media interactions occur on the smartphone, compared to 24% on PC.
• 80% of searches on smartphones is spontaneous

Some of these findings may be shocking, but many of them will not surprise anyone who has browsed the internet on their smartphone while watching TV.  For anyone remotely familiar with technology, the idea of switching between devices regularly is not a foreign concept. What is more interesting is how we use our devices.

The fact that 80% of our smartphone searching is spontaneous, “spur of the moment” searching, is particularly telling. Most people, myself included, search on their smartphone when they need something answered immediately. Spontaneous searching has become a huge part of our consumer habits, and has started to bleed over to our donation habits as well.  Earlier this year, the Millennial Impact Report found that 42% of millennials gave to what inspires them at the moment, otherwise known as impulse donations.

If there is one main takeaway from all of this, it’s this: Your website must be optimized for the smartphone. People are already interacting with your content through their phones, and this is only going to increase with time.  I already know a few people who only browse the internet on their phones. So why risk putting off smartphone users with a cluttered, text-heavy website?

Check out the full Google report here