Users of smartphone-based geolcoation apps are most likely to see connecting to other people as their primary benefit, according to a new study from digital marketing agency White Horse. Results of “Lost in Geolocation” indicate 41% of smartphone owners cite connection to other people they know or could meet as the most important benefit geolocation apps provide.
Finding Places Lags behind Social Connection
Finding a place liked by people they trust came in a distant second, cited by only about half as many geolocation users (21%). The only other benefit cited by a double-digit percentage of users was insight about travel/movement patterns (17%).
4 in 10 Smartphone Operators Use Location-based Apps
Survey results indicate about four in 10 (39%) smartphone operators use one or more location-based apps, with 61% not using any. Awareness levels are higher than usage levels, as 56% of smartphone operators report knowing about location-based apps.
Facebook Places Top Geolocation App
About four in 10 (42%) smartphone users consider Facebook Places their primary geolocation app, while roughly a quarter of the sample each choose Google Latitude and Foursquare, respectively. Twitter Places, Gowalla, and Whrrl collectively account for only 6%.
White Horse analysis suggests that Facebook Places has such strong adoption numbers because of the incidental lift provided by the success of the Facebook mobile app, which White Horse says was the most downloaded app on the planet at the time the report was released. If even a quarter of that number were in the US, user experimentation alone would make Facebook the leader in terms of gross market penetration.
Privacy Leading Adoption Barrier
Among smartphone owners who are aware of location-based apps but choose not to use them, about one-third cite privacy concerns as the chief barrier to their usage. More than 25% say they have no need, interest or benefit related to location-based apps, and close to 20% say location-based apps are redundant to how they already connect to their smartphones.
ExactTarget: Smartphone Users More Tuned into Facebook
Another possible reason for the dominance of Facebook Places is the fact Facebook usage is considerably higher amongst smartphone users, according to recent data from ExactTarget which finds 23% of smartphone users check Facebook constantly throughout the day. This figure is about double the 12% of non-smartphone users who do so. Furthermore, 32% of smartphone users check Facebook at least once per day, 14% higher than the 28% of non-smartphone users who are daily Facebook checkers.
About the Data: White Horse enlisted survey respondents through an online “workforce,” Mechanical Turk (or “MTurk”) where workers earn small incentives to complete piecework. White Horse submitted the survey as an online “task” for volunteer workers to complete. The survey ran from February 16-23, 2011, and included a total of 437 people. Respondents were required to live in the US, be at least age 14 and own and use a smartphone.
