As wireless Internet traffic becomes more of a reality, more and more firms are expected to pop up interested in measuring that traffic.
Media Metrix is perhaps the most popular Internet tracking firm today, measuring surfing activity of all sorts on traditional landline Internet systems. The company recently said it is evaluating several different methods for tracking wireless Internet traffic and hopes to begin doing so sometime next year.
But other companies are not waiting. Telephia Inc., which collects marketing and network performance intelligence for clients in the wireless voice and data industries, last week announced an initiative to turn its eye to the wireless Internet.
The company has gathered several wireless Internet industry leaders to form a steering committee created to design standardized measurement metrics system to rate wireless data service quality, traffic measurement, m-commerce and advertising on Internet-enabled wireless devices. Through this committee, Telephia hopes to expand its tests and technology to an industrywide measurement metric standards.
Participants include 2Roam Inc., Agency.com, Amazon.com, AvantGo, Bonita Software, Cell-Loc Inc., DoubleClick, Engage Inc., Excite@Home, InfoSpace Inc., Inktomi Corp., Nextel Communications Corp., Nuance, OmniSky Corp., Openwave Systems Inc., PacketVideo, SignalSoft, Sprint PCS, Virgin Mobile USA and many others.
“The metrics we will jointly develop will not simply be the audience measurement data available on today’s wired Internet, but will include data sets designed to answer specific questions facing the wireless data/Internet industry,” said John Oyler, president of Telephia, in a statement.
The group’s first meeting was held Nov. 17.
The metrics are expected to focus specifically on how to improve wireless Internet offerings, how wireless networks rate in the delivery of these services, how to increase wireless data usage and how to capitalize on m-commerce and advertising opportunities.
Telephia has a partnership with Invertix Corp. to share their respective proprietary technologies in tracking wireless Internet performance, and with ComScore Networks Inc. to recruit opt-in participants interested in having their wireless and PC Internet behavior monitored and evaluated.
The company’s first wireless data quality-of-service products are expected to begin market trials early next year. Telephia said the service will provide continuous measurements of wireless Internet performance, such as connection times, site accessibility, download speed, transaction times and success rates across wireless Web sites, carrier networks, devices and areas.
Five of the country’s major national wireless carriers have signed up for the service.
WebSideStory is another traffic tracking company, but it is more interested in monitoring the types of wireless devices and browsers accessing wireless Web sites. Its HitBox technology is designed to compile the technical abilities of a given site’s visitors. This includes information about the device itself, such as make, model, browser technology, screen size, resolution and service provider. It also includes activity on the site, such as numbers of visitors per day or hour, time spent at the site and which site the visitor came from and went to next.
WebSideStory then sells its StatMarket-.com data compilation gained from all Web sites using the HitBox technology to report global averages for each type of data analyzed. The company announced the wireless version of the HitBox software in April, but has yet to release any statistics on wireless Internet traffic. A company spokesman said to expect a wireless version of StatMarket sometime next year.
Although the move toward wireless Internet traffic measurements may seem slow, the fact that there is any movement at all is telling, and here’s why.
Going back to Media Metrix, the firm reported this past September that 7.4 million U.S. households owned non-PC digital devices capable of accessing the Internet, as of July. These devices included cellular phones, personal digital assistants and pagers.
This represents a 12 percent increase, or 48 percent annualized growth, from April of the same year, when only 6.6 million households reported owning such devices, according to the company. Capping the stats, Media Metrix said 1.4 million households, or 20 percent, of this group does not own a PC at all.
“Ownership of these non-PC devices grew twice as fast among households without PCs than households with PCs,” said Bruce Ryon of Media Metrix’s New Media Group. “The largest growth in non-PC households is in wireless phones.”
