One of the predictions we wrote about for 2010 (see 11 social media resolutions for 2010 post) was this finally being the year of mobile and after a few false starts it appears that the prediction is coming true.

This is inevitably being driven by the huge growth in penetration of smartphones. Last month it was announced that smartphones now account for a massive 19 percent of all the handsets shipped worldwide – a 50% growth on 2009, indeed GfK figures for June shows smartphones are steadily growing in the United Kingdom and make up 73.5 percent of the UK contract market, which is up 55 percent in Q1 2010.

In the number of "smart mobile device" sales, Symbian devices are the market leaders. Statistics published for the second quarter of 2010 showed that Symbian devices comprised a 41.2% share of smart mobile devices sold, with RIM having 18.2%, Android having 17.2%, and Apple having 15.1% (through iPhone OS) [8]

One of the biggest drivers of the success of smartphones has been applications – the stats are awesome:

- Apple to date have achieved 7 billion downloads from the 225K+ applications on their app store – up 50% in last 6 months (it took 2 years to get to 4m and 6 months to double this)

- 30% of people in Europe have downloaded an app to date with 8% downloading ten or more and nearly one in five use them on a daily basis.

Consumers are starting to view apps as essential - from finding the best routes to viewing their Facebook account and from “checking in” at various locations to playing addictive games like Angry Birds According to a Nielsen report (see image) from Aug this year games are by far the most downloaded application with weather, maps and social networking being the other most popular.

There was a time when mobile was included as an after thought in most presentations but the time has come to sart thinking about how mbile can be an integral part of the plan and think how brands can use this burgeoning opportunity to their advantage and create the ultimate advertising – as Dr Peter A. Johnson, vice president of market intelligence at the MMA recently said in an interview

“Marketers must focus on not just getting their app downloaded, but on making it a part of the consumer’s daily life by creating something that is compelling, entertaining and useful while on the go,”

This doesn't mean just integrating a flashlight, a TV remote, a battery charger or a mirror (although these are available) it means really thinking about how a brand can be relevant and useful.

Interestingly I instinctively thought that I had not let brands into my mobile life but when i looked at the branded apps on my iPhone I found at least 15 branded apps including Stella (with their AR bar finder) and John Smiths (with their Darts game) Barbie (my 5year old daughters favourite honest!) BA, RAC, Nike, Speedo, Adidas, Waitrose, Sainsburys, Orange, Sky, and BBC - 50% of which I use on a weekly basis.

However the biggest barrier that we have found as an agency is persuading brands to invest in this area - often this is less than £10k and can pay back many times over and whilst I think ROI is important sometimes it takes a leap of faith to experiment and see what huge opportunities exist for brands that can get it right.

Right..... now back to seeing how I can get to level 4 on Angry Birds !