Mobile social networking has 12.3m friends in US and Western Europe

Rating: still a case of Billy No-Mates, relatively speaking

M:Metrics has released its first measurement of mobile social networking, announcing that 12.3 million consumers in the US and Western Europe accessed a social networking site by phone in June.

The American audience for mobile social networking sites was the largest, with 7.5m, or 3.5%, of mobile subscribers. Italy follows, with 1.3m or 2.8%, then the UK, with 1.1m or 2.5%, Spain, with 751,000 (2.3%), Germany (1.9%) and France (1.7%). MySpace garnered the most mobile users in the US and UK, whereas MSN was the forum of choice for mobile Web 2.0 users in the other geographies.

Mark Donovan, senior analyst, M:Metrics, comments, “Nearly every online social networking site has added the ability to connect to these communities with a mobile phone, allowing people to access profiles and share content while they’re on the go. With the mobile phone playing a central role in people’s social lives, it’s only natural that social networking sites are working to bridge the gap between the online and mobile worlds.”

MySpace and Facebook are the top two social networking sites accessed via mobile in both the US and UK. MySpace attracts 3.7m US and 440,000 UK mobile users. In America, Facebook’s mobile audience is about 2m and in Britain, about 307,000. Rounding out the top three is YouTube in the US, with 901,000 mobile visitors and Bebo in the UK, with 288,000.

The figures underline the importance of being on-deck: in June, MySpace appeared on the decks of Amp’d, AT&T, Helio and Nextel. Facebook was accessible on the Sprint, AT&T, Virgin and Amp’d (sic) decks and YouTube on the Verizon deck. In the UK in June, Facebook was accessible on T-Mobile and 3, MySpace has distribution on Vodafone and Bebo is on the 3 deck, however the second most popular, MSN Live Spaces, isn’t on any operator on-portal.

Those under 25 are the most active users of mobile social networking sites across all geographies. In France, Germany, Italy and Spain, the age demographic with the largest percentage of use is 13-17-year-olds, whereas college-aged consumers (18-24) are the most avid users in the US and the US.

All in all, mobile social networking is a drop in the bucket right now. In GoMo News’ opinion four things need to happen to accelerate take-up. Firstly flat data rates need to be commonplace. Secondly, faster pipes are needed so that people can upload and download stuff easily. Thirdly instant messaging needs to become prevalent and interoperable. Fourthly users need to be able to switch easily between different modes of communication and different applications without having to shut one down to move to the next; this is a huge inhibitor of constant, habitual use. Operators have got a great chance to differentiate themselves by making mobile social networking simple to do.

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