Mary Meeker’s 2019 Internet Trends Report- Yes, YOU Should Know What This Is!

In 1995, Mary Meeker, a former Morgan Stanley internet analyst and current venture capitalist, created an influential and in-depth report on the state of the internet popular especially among the tech world. This week, she delivered her 2019 report.

THE STATE OF THE INTERNET

Adweek’s Lisa Lacy just published eleven key takeaways from the report that would be of interest to most marketers and advertisers.  Below is an edited version of those takeaways followed up by more interesting tidbits from the report that highlight some jaw dropping statistics. Enjoy.

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE REPORT

1. Online Advertising

In 2018, the percentage of advertising spend in desktop and mobile channels drew even with the percentage of time consumers spent in those channels—18% for desktop and 33% for mobile. (And programmatic buying was up to 62% of display ad spend globally.)

2. Second Screens

The average daily time consumers spend on mobile in minutes surpassed TV in 2019: 226 minutes for mobile versus 216 minutes for TV. However, the impact of digital TV-based ads aided by in-hand mobile devices remains to be seen.

3. On-Demand

Get-it-when-you-want-it products and services increased from about 40 million in 2017 to 56 million in 2018. Online marketplaces are the most popular, followed by transportation, housing, food delivery and health/beauty.

4. Visual Communication

Instagram is up to 1 billion monthly active users, and more than 50% of tweet impressions include images, videos or other media.

5. Interactive Gaming

There were 2.4 billion interactive game players globally in 2018, which is growth of 6%, versus 5% the year prior. Online game Fortnite had 250 million users as of April 2019—and nearly one major update per week by May 2019, which Meeker said demonstrates innovation is rising across these platforms.

6. Freemium Business Models

Pure-play freemium businesses with more than 10 million paid subscribers as of March 2019 include Epic Games, Dropbox and Spotify. In fact, Spotify’s freemium model accounts for 60% of its gross added premium subscribers. These businesses also had more than $1 billion in revenue last year.

7. Data and Personalization

Context-rich data yields happier customers, but Meeker said companies are “drinking from a data firehose” because of real-time customer information capture.

In a survey of retail customers, 91% said they prefer brands that provide personalized offers and recommendations; 83% said they are willing to passively share data for personalized experiences; and 74% said they are willing to actively share data for personalized experiences.

8. Consumer Concerns

Consumers are more aware of digital overload and are taking steps to reduce screen time: 63% of U.S. adults say they are trying to limit personal smartphone usage in 2018, which is up from 47% a year prior.

9. Offensive Content

Problematic content is also top of mind for consumers, and an age-old challenge for regulators has resurfaced, which is this: How do you amplify the good and minimize the bad? That being said, consumers generally prefer negative news—and content on the internet can be less filtered. Plus, social media can amplify trending topics. And, in 2018, 43% of respondents to a Pew survey said they got their news headlines from Facebook, 21% from YouTube and 12% from Twitter.

10. Open Internet

Meeker said an open internet can benefit everyone as consumers get what they want efficiently and inexpensively, businesses sell products and services profitably and regulators protect consumers, businesses and social institutions.

11. Digital Healthcare

Consumers are driving a steady digitization of healthcare, Meeker said. Internet research increases access to data and decision-making tools, while genomic testing yields a growing base of personal genetic data and on-demand urgent care reduces time to receive treatment. Telehealth and telemedicine are improving patient-practitioner relationships, prescription delivery is increasing convenience and affordability and health-incentive tools are driving positive changes via savings and personalized rewards.

To see the entire Adweek article and full description of the takeaways click here.

MORE DATA TIDBITS

AND, here are a few more data tidbits on the 2019 Internet Trends Report from qz.com (Quartz)…

  • More than 50% of the world’s population has access to the internet, and it’s getting harder to reach new users.
  • 53% of the world’s internet users are located in the Asia-Pacific region, with China being the largest single internet market in the world, with about 0.8 billion internet users in the country.
  • Seven of the top 10 companies in the world by market capitalization are technology companies, and four of the top six are US-based.
  • E-commerce sales are up 12.4% over the prior year, which ticked up slightly over the 12.1% growth rate seen in 2017, but physical retail is also still growing, although only at about 2% in 2018 from the year prior.
  • E-commerce also accounts for about 15% of the share of US retail sales now.
  • Mobile advertising now accounts for 33% of advertisers’ ad purchases, up from 0.5% in 2010. Spending on print, TV, and radio ads have fallen as consumers spend far more time on mobile.
  • Google and Facebook still account for the majority of online ad revenue, but the growth of US advertising platforms like Amazon, Twitter, Snapchat, and Pinterest is outstripping the big players: Google’s ad revenue grew 1.4 times over the past nine quarters and Facebook’s grew 1.9 times, while the combined group of new players grew 2.6 times.
  • The average US adult spends 6.3 hours each day with digital media, over half of which is spent on their mobiles.
  • Roughly 70 million people globally listen to podcasts in the US, a figure that’s doubled in about four years.
  • 47 million people have installed Amazon Echoes, which has doubled in the last year.
  • Cloud services revenues of Google, Amazon, and Microsoft are collectively closing in on $14 billion, a jump of about 58% year-over-year.
  • More data is now stored in the cloud than on private enterprise servers or consumer devices.
  • 26% of US adults consider themselves online “almost constantly.” That number jumps to 39% for 18 to 29 year-olds surveyed.

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Resources:

https://qz.com/1640910/mary-meekers-2019-internet-trends-report-highlights/

https://www.adweek.com/digital/10-takeaways-from-mary-meekers-2019-internet-trends-report/

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