Research shows UK youth embrace mobile social media more than Americans

Survey indicates 66 percent of British smartphone users from 16 to 24 years old use it daily.

The results of a new poll by tyntec, a smartphone interaction specialist firm, has determined that 66 percent of these devices users in the U.K., aged 16 through 24, use their Twitter, Facebook, and other mobile social media accounts at least daily, compared to only 37 percent of Americans within the same age group.

This study included the participation of 2,000 Millennial smartphone users in the U.S. and the U.K.

It also indicated that this demographic uses more emerging cloud-based services with their smartphones in the United Kingdom than in the United States.

A survey conducted by YouGov also showed that mobile social media users in the U.K. are the heaviest users of these services. Among smartphone users, 15 percent indicated that they accessed their profiles over 5 times every day on their devices. Comparatively, only 8 percent of Americans made this same claim. That said, all users, regardless of their country, stated that SMS was the most used feature on their devices aside from voice calls. This use was far greater than email or apps.

Another recent survey by WhatsApp showed that despite those facts, much potential remains untapped.

That research found that 40 percent of the Millennials in the United States and 27 percent of those in the United Kingdom don’t even know that over the top (OTT) messaging services exist. Moreover, it determined that a large percentage of this demographic in the U.K. (52 percent) and the U.S. (61 percent) were interested in integrating their mobile social media with SMS.

The survey from YouGov in 2012 – which tyntec sponsored – surveyed the youths from across many different regions of their countries regarding the adoption of SMS, the use of their smartphones as a whole, their behaviors with social networks over their devices, and the use of SMS alternatives and free/low cost calling.

According to CEO Michael Kowalzik, who spoke about these findings regarding mobile social media and other habits “It is interesting to note that for both UK and US users the results show that a good proportion would use SMS if integrated into social networks. This indicates a trust level and familiarity with SMS which presents huge opportunities for Internet players and operators alike.”