Google has published an interesting study of Mobile Search trends (sent my way by Tren Griffin). In this study the authors looked at over 1M queries submitted to Google Mobile web search over the course of a one month period. They found that the average search query was 2.56 words. (This is surprisingly similar to the average desktop query at 2.6 and the average PDA query at 2.35). They predictably found a uniform relationship between query length in characters and the length of time it took to enter it. The average query took 44.8 seconds including network interactions. They estimate the overhead to be roughly 5 seconds, meaning the user is willing to spend nearly 39 seconds entering a query. This is amazingly high. It gives an idea of how valuable the query results are if users are willing to take that long to enter it. The researchers found less query diversity in the mobile world than the desktop world. The mobile click-through rate on queries was over 50%.
I also found it interesting that users are entering queries faster this year than the comparative data from 2005. The average query time fell from 66.3 seconds to 44.8 seconds (including communications overhead). The paper speculates this is a combination of improved keyboards and a population more comfortable with using devices.
The full paper is available from: http://www.maryamkamvar.com/publications/KamvarBalujaComputerMagazine.pdf.
–jrh
James Hamilton, Windows Live Platform Services
Bldg RedW-C/1279, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, Washington, 98052
W:+1(425)703-9972 | C:+1(206)910-4692 | H:+1(206)201-1859 | JamesRH@microsoft.com