Consumer adoption of wireless broadband is predicted to rise, offering marketers new ways to reach customers, according to analysts eMarketer’s new report Wireless Broadband: The Future Around the Corner.
eMarketer promises more bandwidth everywhere, in the home and office, on the street and on the road, creating new networking possibilities and a generally more streamlined online experience.
However, with the vast choice of technologies available on the market, eMareker argues that it is impossible to predict the success of any particular device. Most of the major players in the communications industry are developing and promoting competing platforms.
Noah Elkin, eMarketer’s senior analyst and author of the report, said: “Most consumers of technology don’t care how their products and services work, they simply expect then to function when and where and how they are supposed to.”
However, with much of this new technology yet to be rolled out, uptake rates are difficult to predict. For online marketers the opportunities that wireless broadband represents in terms of delivering messages and reaching potential customers are more important than the underlying technologies themselves.
Dr Elkin said: “Technology companies and marketers alike should remember to emphasise what the technology can be used for, not what it is.”
In the US, cable and DSL services are predicted to dominate the broadband market for the foreseeable future, although as relatively mature technologies, they will grow more slowly than some of the newer access modes, like 3G wireless, satellite and fixed wireless.
Consumer adoption of wireless broadband will depend in part on the features and uses of wireless devices.
Dr Elkin added: “There is still a bug difference between wireless operators that offer high-speed data transfer capabilities and subscribers who actually make use of the capabilities.
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