Mobile Messaging Platforms How Facebook’s Hedge Strategy Is Changing The Face Of Messaging

Our clients have full access to all of our reports. Clients can log in to read this report. Click here to become a client or, you can purchase this individual report.
The 20,000 Foot View
In just a few short years mobile messaging apps have become home to the largest group of digital audiences on the planet, with billion cumulative monthly active users. Following websites and social networks, messaging platforms are emerging as the third phase of how audiences congregate digitally. Facebook is particularly threatened by this potential disruption. But rather than stick its head in the sand Facebook embraced the disruption to the extent that it is now the single most important player in the mobile messaging landscape.
Key Findings
- Messaging platforms are the third phase in the evolution of digital audiences, following websites and social networks
- The cumulative global messaging platform audience is billion
- Facebook’s three messaging apps (Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram) account for of the global messaging audience
- Asian origin messenger apps account for of the global total while US origin apps account for
- The majority of messaging platform growth has occurred since 2013 with an acceleration since mid 2014
- Instagram has grown steadily since 2014 capturing the zeitgeist of consumer photography as a continual life narrative
- Facebook Messenger accelerated strongly from May 2014, adding of its total installed base but growth is slowing
- WhatsApp added million over the same period but this represented just of its total and there is no sign of a slowdown
- Korean KakaoTalk has the highest number of average messages per day per user followed by Japanese LINE with Facebook Messenger has just
Companies and services mentioned in this report: AOL, Buzz Feed, CNN, Facebook, Facebook, MSN, Messenger, Friendster, GeoCities, Instagram, Kik, KakaoTalk, LINE, MTV, MySpace, QQ, Skype, Snapchat, Tencent, Twitter, Yahoo, Vox, WeChat, WhatsApp