ANZ mobile media uptake grows, growing awareness of 5G advantage

Melbourne, July 11th, 2022 – Each year, Venture Insights conducts in-depth surveys looking at consumer behaviour and future intentions in Australian and New Zealand markets. The first of these survey reports covers mobile media in those two countries.

72% of Australians and 31% of New Zealanders now watch mobile video at least sometimes, and 32% of Australians and 31% of New Zealanders do so every day. This underlines the importance of mobile as a channel for content providers, who need to address mobile in distribution and marketing strategies to maintain viewer share.

David Kennedy, Managing Director of Venture Insights said, “We were expecting the pandemic and working from home to drive a decline in people watching video streaming services on phones as people working from home are more likely to use a TV set or another screen to watch videos. But our survey results for 2020 to 2022 show that the broad upward trends in mobile video viewing and games have been undisturbed by the pandemic.”

Although Australia and New Zealand started from similar positions in 2020, the survey data suggests that mobile video is growing faster in New Zealand than in Australia.

Age was by far the strongest determinant of whether respondents used video on their phones. As expected, younger mobile users where more likely to watch mobile video, with penetrations dropping off in the 55+ age groups. David Kennedy said, “Older viewers are a relatively untapped market, particularly in Australia where mobile users 55+ in age were significantly less likely to watch mobile video than their New Zealand counterparts. While we doubt participation of older viewers will ever fully match that of younger cohorts, there is scope here for both content providers and telcos to promote more engagement.”

Importantly for telcos, 25% of respondents in each country said they would pay extra for a 5G service that gave them a better video experience, with similar numbers saying they would move

mobile providers to get sport content they wanted. This is significantly higher than 2021, when 17% of Australians and 12% of New Zealanders said this. This suggests that awareness of the benefits of 5G is growing.

60% of respondents in Australia and 54% in New Zealand now use their mobile phones for games. As expected, older respondents were less like to play mobile games. The age pattern was similar in Australia and New Zealand. There is also scope to boost engagement in older cohorts, but there needs to be more effort providing puzzle and similar games that attract this demographic.

About Venture Insights

Venture Insights was founded to provide our clients with an alternative perspective on the strategic direction and outlook of the digital, media and telco sectors. We believe we have a competitive advantage over existing research providers, many of which have narrow time horizons, through our detailed market models, broad sector coverage and local ANZ focus.

For more information on this report and Venture Insights, please go to www.ventureinsights.com.au or contact us on mailto:david.kennedy@ventureinsights.com.au.