New Skyhook Wireless Research Reveals Huge, Untapped Opportunity for Location Services in Apps
Catch 22: Majority of mobile users appreciate location-enhanced apps, but nearly 40 percent are reluctant to share their location
Catch 22: Majority of mobile users appreciate location-enhanced apps, but nearly 40 percent are reluctant to share their location
BOSTON, Nov. 5, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Eighty-three percent of app users say location is crucial to their app experiences, but nearly 40 percent are hesitant to share their location. These were key findings of an independent consumer study, commissioned by Skyhook Wireless, the leading global first party mobile location network. To view an infographic click here
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Skyhook Wireless set out to examine the extent to which people turn location services on or off for their apps and to understand why many smartphone users choose not to take advantage of the benefits of location. The study revealed an industry dichotomy: the majority of app owners say that location services improve their app experience, but many still resist sharing their location details.
The study also highlighted the significant opportunity for app owners to add value to their apps by encouraging users to turn location services on. For example, it revealed that one-third of weather app users do not activate location services. This is surprising, given that enabling locations services allows these apps to deliver the most relevant weather data to the user. Social networking, photo and video apps (other popular app categories) similarly have low adoption of location services – 38 percent, 18 percent and 16 percent respectively – revealing the potential to add value to these experiences by getting users to turn location services on, allowing for the automatic tagging of location in photos and videos, among other benefits.
"This data suggests that there's a huge and largely untapped opportunity to create value from location services that many app publishers and advertisers could be taking full advantage of," said Skyhook CEO Jim Crowley. "Ultimately, it's all about the payoff to consumers. Users need to be informed about the ways in which location services add meaningful value to their app experience, and educated about how their privacy is being managed – so that the critical benefits outweigh any attendant concerns."
Why People Don't Turn Location Services On
The study found that nearly 40 percent of app users hesitate to share location data, with 18 percent turning location services off for all apps, and 50 percent of those users named privacy concerns as the top reason; 23 percent didn't see the value of location data and 19 percent cited battery drain concerns.
Out of the nearly 20 percent of app users who turn off location services for all of their apps, 63 percent have done so because of battery drain concerns; 45 percent called out privacy concerns as the main reason; 23 percent don't see the value of giving their location data and one-fifth switch location services off in an effort to avoid advertising.
What People Want from Location Services
In exchange for disclosing their location, consumers expect real benefits from their apps. Half of all app users expect an accurate location, relevant app content and targeted offers or coupons once location data is shared – and 34 percent of smartphone users expect personalized communications.
Additionally, the study also found that:
Methodology
The study was conducted by Research Now, which, between July 9 and July 15, 2015, surveyed 1,000 mobile app users. To read about Skyhook's best practices for getting consumers to turn locations services turned on, please visit.
About Skyhook Wireless
Skyhook Wireless is a worldwide leader in location. Skyhook created and operates the most advanced global first party mobile location network that provides the fastest, most accurate and battery-friendly location results to the mobile world. Today, Skyhook regularly powers tens of billions of location requests and location-based context requests around the world for devices, apps, publishers, ad-tech, wearables, media, mobile device management, digital rights management, device recovery and more. Skyhook Wireless is a wholly owned subsidiary of TruePosition, Inc., which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Liberty Broadband Corporation. To learn more about Skyhook, please visit www.skyhook.com.
SOURCE Skyhook Wireless
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