mInfo(R) Inc., the leading Chinese mobile search provider, is releasing some key search statistics that shed light on real user behavior and the state of the sector in the world's largest wireless phone market. China's mobile search market is set to explode in 2007 as 3G comes online and the country readies for the 2008 Olympics. From reviewing the mInfo's 2006 usage data, it's already clear that Chinese users have a strong need for mobile information services and are inclined to act on their needs.

Data published by mInfo are based on actual usage information over the last year across its SMS, WAP, kJava and IM mobile search systems. mInfo is the only provider in China offering search over all four models enabling nearly all mobile users in China to access its service. This gives it a much broader view on what users are looking for versus most other vendors that only provide WAP-based search. WAP is currently actively used by only 30-40 million of the 450 million mobile users in the country, whereas SMS has over 90% adoption. mInfo has experienced tremendous growth in 2006 adding users at an average monthly growth rate of over 70% and ending the year with 6+ million registered users.

In general, mobile searchers are looking for answers surrounding their daily lives. mInfo's data shows that searches were spread fairly evenly amongst the basic subject areas of Local Search (41%), Informational Search (31%) and Rich Content Search (28%). Local search involves finding directory information for locations such as bars, hotels and ATMs. Informational search relates to finding things such as stock quotes, sports scores, price promotions and flight schedules. Rich content search relates to finding ring tones, pictures, mp3, games, etc. mInfo offers over 30 search categories within these three areas. Mobile search traffic seems to pick up each day around noon and ramps steadily until about 10pm when traffic peaks. Fridays and Saturdays are the most heavily trafficked days for mobile search services.

  The five leading search categories in 2006 were:
   1. Dining/Recreation
   2. Jokes/Riddles
   3. Ring tones/Pictures
   4. News/Stock
   5. Weather forecast

The query model for mobile search is also quite different from web search. Mobile searchers tend to use longer query strings (5-6 words/query) vs. web searchers who average about two words per query. Mobile searchers tend to input phrases with qualifiers to improve specificity in an effort to increase relevance and get more precise answers. mInfo's natural language processing capabilities are perfectly suited to this type of user behavior pattern as its able to decipher the intent of the user's queries and provide highly relevant responses. The average web search session usually involves 5 or more iterations of keywords with countless clicks on the resulting links. Contrarily, the average mInfo search session requires just 1-2 queries for users to find their desired answers.

"With a 2-inch screen, it's just not useful to provide thousands of links the way most Web/WAP search engines do. mInfo's automated question/answer model just works better for the Chinese market where everyone is very comfortable typing messages to each other on their phones," said Alvin Wang Graylin, CEO. "There's no training needed to use our service. This is especially important in an environment where most mobile users have never used a computer or opened up a web browser."

We also find that search diversity is much higher on mobile vs. the Web. According to traffic data from a leading Chinese Internet search engine, the top 1000 keywords account for over 70% of all search traffic. However, for mobile search, the top 1000 queries account for only about 20% of the searches.

  The top 5 mobile search terms for 2006 were (terms translated):
   1. Weather
   2. Jay Chou
   3. Pretty girl
   4. Dining
   5. Joke

Not only is the usage behavior of mobile searchers different from internet searchers, they are also different in their profile. With only about 120 million Internet users in China and a significant portion accessing the web at Internet cafes or schools, Web searchers are predominantly young people age 24 or under. Although mobile searchers are still relatively young compared with the total population, about half of this population are 25 and over.