My colleague Thomas Husson wrote a report last year in which he looked at ”The Future Of Application Stores.” Overall, uptake of apps is limited: Only 15% of European smartphone owners report downloading an app on a monthly basis. By contrast, 64% of European iPhone users download apps on a monthly basis. Looking at what consumers are interested in most, Forrester's Technographics® data shows that games, music, weather, news, and social networking top the list for both iPhone and other smartphone users.

Companies that want to develop a mobile strategy should begin with a solid understanding of how mobile-advanced their brand's consumers are and will be. Mobile Technographics® places consumers into groups based on their mobile phone usage. The groups are defined by the extent to which the mobile phone user has adopted mobile data services, the frequency of use of these services, and the level of sophistication in the mobile applications he or she uses.