Every marketer knows millennials are really attached to their smartphones. But, a new global study shows just how much time they devote to their mobile devices.
According to TNS’s global Connected Life study, the average millennial (16 to 30) with internet access spends 3.2 hours a day on their mobile devices – the equivalent of almost a whole day every week, or 49 days a year.
In Canada, millennials spend 2.2 hours a day on their mobiles, compared to 1.4 hours for Generation X and .8 hours for baby boomers.
For millennials, watching videos and online TV accounts for 46% of device time, with 76% engaging on a daily basis compared to 59% globally. Social networking accounts for 40% of Canadian millennials’ device time and online shopping accounts for 14%.
For older consumers who are online, traditional media habits still hold strong. Those 46-65 spend 3.1 hours a day watching TV, 0.2 hours reading newspapers and magazines, and one hour listening to the radio, which adds up to 2.5 hours more than the average millennial. However, they are using online platforms regularly. For example, 46% of Canadians 46 to 55 are using Facebook every day.
“There is an increase in time spent overall on digital media, but depending on what demographic profile you are looking at, they will be using a different device at a different time of the day, doing different things,” said Stephan Sigaud, SVP of marketing and business development at TNS Canada.
“The key learning from this study is that in order to maximize the effectiveness of your marketing strategy, you really have to look deeper inside your audience and you can’t talk about the average consumer anymore.”
Canadians are also becoming media multi-taskers. According to the study, 28% of Canadians are “screen stacking,” or using multiple devices at once, when watching television.
“To reach a certain demographic, especially during evening prime time hours, you can’t just do it through television or just through mobile or digital,” said Kyle Liao, project director at TNS Canada.
“A combined approach needs to be made because people are actually sitting with a mobile phone or laptop while they’re watching TV. So the traditional touchpoints need to be re-evaluated in terms of how marketers can reach certain groups based on how they combine devices, in addition to how they use each device.”
Connected Life is based on a survey of 60,000 internet users globally, including 1,000 Canadians.
