Digital in 2017: A global overview

Digital in 2017 Global Overview from We Are Social Singapore

Every year We Are Social release their collection of global facts and stats related to digital. It's fabulous.

Some highlights:

• More than half the world now uses a smartphone;
• Almost two-thirds of the world’s population now has a mobile phone;
• More than half of the world’s web traffic now comes from mobile phones;
• More than half of all mobile connections around the world are now ‘broadband’;
• More than one in five of the world’s population shopped online in the past 30 days.

Take a little looky.

Mobile is eating the world...

You just have to find the time to go through this.

Facebook won't make you any money...

That's the graph showing what happened to online voter registrations by age group on the day Facebook decided to promote voter registration to its users in advance of the UK EU referendum. More here.

Of course, as all the talking heads say, it's impossible to get anyone to engage in anything important on Facebook. It's all pictures of cats and what you had for dinner.

I mean getting young people to register to vote is so much easier than getting them to show interest in and take actions for the causes we believe in right?

All the digital stats you could ever want... (for now anyway...)

Digital, Social & Mobile in 2015 from We Are Social Singapore

The lovely people at We Are Social have been at it again. This time they have compiled all the stats related to digital you could ever need into one monster slideshow.

The headlines...

You should flick through their blog as it's a brilliant resource for all things digital.

What's going on in India and why it matters...

We Are Social do great slide deck.

This one is all about India.

Some highlights...

886.3 million active mobile subscriptions or 70% of the population.

70% of web traffic from mobile/tablet.

92 million active social media users via mobile.

Social, Digital & Mobile in India 2014 from We Are Social Singapore

You may wonder why I care..

I care because I believe that globalisation is coming for fundraising.

The rise off mobile use means that fundraising propositions can sit outside of national borders.

No credible reason why the biggest fundraising brands in the UK can't be fundraising outside of the UK.

Lots of reasons why it won't happen quickly. But it can, will and should happen.

EDIT: And as Bernard pointed out on Twitter, there is no reason why charities in other parts of the world can't generate response here.

Social, Digital & Mobile Worldwide in 2014

A great collection of stats for your viewing pleasure from the fab 'we are social'.

Social, Digital & Mobile Around The World (January 2014) from We Are Social Singapore

Predicting Riots

This is fascinating. Insight into a mathematical study conducted into the August 2011 riots in London and around the UK. What studying the data can tell us...



Specifically c.6 minutes in when the spread of information about the riots is discussed. Contagion is a really interesting concept. One that we as fundraisers need to tune into in order to use the tools of today to spread our messages.

Full info from Hannah Fry and her team here.

If you dream data we want to talk to you...

Want to come and build brilliant SMS fundraising campaigns?

Open Fundraising is looking for a Processor to join our busy mobile team.

You'll be responsible for the creation and maintenance of all our SMS services, setting up services using our SMS management systems and processing all associated data.

You'll be joining a dynamic team working with brilliant clients on some amazing projects so you'll need to be proactive, enthusiastic and passionate about SMS and mobile technology with a willingness to 'get stuck in'.

We need someone with experience working with relational databases/SQL, acute attention to detail, proficient developing technical solutions and comfortable handling large datasets.

If you have experience building journeys on SMS or telephone dialler systems that would be a bonus but we can provide training if not.

This really is a fantastic opportunity for someone who wants to be part of something exciting from the beginning. As the mobile team develops, so will you and your career.

If this sounds like it could be you, please email for a job description. For the right person we will pay up to £35K.

CLOSING DATE: 10am Monday 22 July.

MobileMagic & some non mobile things...

Some more mobile treats that I’ve picked up over the last week and a bit…

Is your online fundraising suffering from FOMO? (Fear Of Missing Out), a great post from Bryan Miller.

Boy Scouts embrace mobile POS to drive fundraising efforts, I’ve seen lots of these in the States. Portable mobile payment methods. Not heard of charities using them here yet.

Bulmers Irish Cider Increases Sales By 73 Percent With MMS messaging, if you can get past the phrase ‘Irish Cider’ this is an interesting case study. This one is organised via O2 More details here. There must be loads of uses for UK Charities. Will find out more…

ABOUT BLOODY TIME >> Twitter Vine app launches on Android after attracting 13m iPhone users. I am on Vine. Here is my lunch. I didn’t eat it all myself…

Here are a collection of Charity Vines. All collated by Kirsty.

And finally, I’ve been updating this Scoop.it for a while now. Loads of mobile & fundraising fings…

Mobile magic. This weeks collection of mobile stories & facts...

I write this in a post IWITOT haze. Wasn’t it fun!

M-PESA The Economist explains: Why does Kenya lead the world in mobile money?... in simple terms for us all to understand.

The Rise of the Mobile-Only User from the Harvard Business Review.

Just 13% of people are happy to store credit card details on smartphones….

Sometimes things are just meant to bee that blog post wot I wrote about the Bees…

Get yourself a cup of tea and watch this man calmly state that traditional advertising is dead thanks to mobile. He might have a point. Let’s see shall we… Richard Eyre, IAB UK at Mobile Engage 2013.

I've been collecting mobile facts & stats again...

Last week some of you said you liked this.

A collection of things that the Open Mobile Team circulates to the rest of the agency on a weekly basis. 

Study Shows SMS Use On Smartphones Highest In The Evening. A graph – the Open Mobile team likes graphs. I keep thinking we should make and publish more of our own given how much data we analyse - Like this one that we put on the Open blog a while ago.

Smartphone Adoption Tips Past 50% in Major Markets... First time a report puts UK smartphone penetration at over 50%. I think.

5 tips to creating a better mobile landing page Mostly obvious, but good to remind ourselves. BIG BUTTONS! And Six design tips for making your website senior friendly. 

Wonder if we can convince Twitter to do this for mobile number? Twitter Advertising: Capture user interest with the Lead Generation Card.

This one is a bit sales focussed but worth ploughing through. Permission is KEY to location based mobile services… Top 10 Most Commonly Asked Location Based Mobile Marketing Questions

Report: Smartphones win as the most popular social media device in Australia.. No real surprise there then. But lots of other social media facts as well.

(photo from Elvin)

A 2013 internet trend geek fest from Mary Meeker

I've just spent far too much time looking at this.

A wonderful collection of digital/mobile/social stats pulled together by Mary Meeker. A full 117 slides of statistic fun.

KPCB Internet Trends 2013 from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

One of my my favourite stats. Mobile traffic made up 15% of all internet traffic in the whole world in May 2013. And it is obviously only going one way.

The adoption of smartphones in China is extraordinary as is the fact that mobile search surpassed desktop search in South Korea at the end of 2012.

Enjoy comrades.

Mobile facts and things that I've gathered in the last week...

I send an email to my colleagues from time to time highlighting the mobile things that catch my eye...

You might be interested. If you are I might post them here or on the Open blog more often.

SMS open rates are 99%+. That’s just silly. And most are opened within 3 minutes…

Almost Half the Guardian’s Web Traffic is Mobile. Which is a lot. We spoke to a client this week who gets 60% of all traffic via mobile. That is a lot as well.

EE Bringing 4G to Glastonbury; Which in my opinion is the moment ‘Glasto’ died. But a sign of how quickly we will all get used to, then demand 4G.

Foursquare Uses Text Messaging To Increase App Downloads - Foursquare is a funny thing. I unlocked the 'Molto Buono' badge this week. But I go to a lot of Italian restaurants.

11 ways to improve the navigation on your mobile site – my advice. MAKE THE BUTTONS BIGGER.

Any good?

Mobile 2012 review

Mobile in 2012 reviewed. Some great stats and a very American voice over.

Headline stat for me, data usage doubled in 2012 from 2011. That is incredible.

A must for all fundraising data geeks (with additional politics thrown in!)

I dare you to watch this and not want one for your fundraising database.



And there's this one as well. For plain old political/fundraising geeks.



From VisPolitics.

The social media revolution

A totally brilliant video/animation packed full of stats and insights about social media trends and usage.

Updated for 2013.



And I don't even like Fat Boy Slim that much.

How many screens do we need?

Last year the buzz word was 'dual screening'. Campaigns that were designed with the TV and laptop in mind.

Seems to me that we've moved past this already. One Saturday during the Olympics, Mrs DG and I had the telly on, two laptops and two smartphones. That's five screens. We were watching them all. Now I will concede that it was a fairly unique set of circumstances but it makes you wonder doesn't it!?

Are we still watching telly or are we being interrupted by TV? Do we now only look up from the small screen to the big screen when the medals are being given out?

I'm becoming obsessed by the subject. If you are interested (I think we all should be) then this post from Google has some great resources and stats. And this great infographic...

Need convincing of the potential for SMS?

I'm sat in cafe waiting for a friend and have just watched this.

It's worth dedicating 5 minutes to.



Still need convincing about the potential of SMS?