New data from Google shows that mobile is far bigger in South Africa than initially thought, having blasted past its growth projection a year sooner than expected.<\/p>\n
Speaking at the uAfrica eCommerce Conference in Midrand, Industry Head for Google South Africa, Bryan Nelson provided glimpse into the current state of search in the country.<\/p>\n
Based on desktop versus mobile search data, Nelson showed that in 2014, more mobile search terms were processed by Google than those from PC browsers.<\/p>\n
This was only expected to happen in 2015, Nelson said, and was set to grow exponentially moving forward.<\/p>\n
By 2015, mobile is expected to account for two-thirds of all search queries in South Africa.<\/p>\n
“People like to go on about ‘mobile is coming’ – but the change has happened, mobile is here,” Nelson said.<\/p>\n
“It’s safe to say that, as a business, if you don’t have a mobile strategy, you’re probably already too late.”<\/p>\n
Looking specifically at retail searches, Nelson said the same trend is showing, with mobile (tablet and smartphone) searches for retail products dominating over desktop queries.<\/p>\n
World\u2019s largest mobile networks<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n