Webcredible, a user experience consultancy firm, conducted a mobile Web-usage poll recently to find out what areas of the mobile Web are seeing the most traffic and user interaction these days.  Unsurprisingly, email and social network interaction are among the most visited.

The research polled more than 1,100 online users between February and April 2009 on what they used their mobile phone for most, with the exception of calls and text messages. Checking email and social networking came in as the most popular activities with 39 percent of mobile Internet users mostly using email and over 16 percent favoring social networking.  Just under 16 percent of mobile Internet users said they mostly downloaded ringtones.

The poll has been conducted in the past, and the new results show a clear indication of the evolution of the mobile Web over short periods of time.  Almost two years ago, for example, the same poll was conducted between August and October of 2007 which showed that downloading ringtones came in at the top spot with 43 percent.  During that particular poll, only 21 percent of respondents said they checked email regularly, and social network interaction didn’t even register.

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Smartphones are moving in status from high-end toy to practical device for the common man.

Regardless of income, U.S. consumers are increasingly adopting smartphones like Apple’s handset, according to ComScore. The commoditization of handsets is near now and marketers had better have campaigns to reach consumers on these devices.

ComScore reports that the strongest growth of iPhone users occurs among those earning less than the “median household income”–that is, between $25,000 and $50,000–at an increase of 48 percent. When it comes to smartphones in general, that same demographic of users grew by 5 percent, compared to the 3 percent growth of the overall smartphone market.

“One actually realizes cost savings when the device is used in lieu of multiple digital devices and services, transforming the iPhone from a luxury item to a practical communciation and entertainment tool,” said analyst Jen Wu. Added another analyst, Mark Donovan, “Lower-income mobile subscribers are increasingly turning to their mobile devices to access the Internet, email, and their music collections.”

I’ve mentioned how mobile is poised to become the de facto form of the Internet in a previous post. Specifically, I noted that the number of people using the Web via their phones instead of a PC was likely to rise. Nice to see firm figs that support this.

One odd figure: The number of people using their phones to listen to music actually dropped. Overall growth in this category was negative 0.3 percent. Seems like people don’t necessarily want an iPod blended into their phones. Instead, they want a handset that lets them use the Internet, check email, and be free from their computer.

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In an everlasting approach to overtake Google’s 61% mobile search market share, Yahoo is again stepping up it’s game and expanding it’s mobile presence by inking more search and display advertising deals with carriers in Asian markets. With these additions, Yahoo now has over 60 mobile search deals worldwide. All signed within the last 18 months.

Yahoo looks to be utilizing mobile expansion as a means to overtake it’s rivals, and in my opinion is doing a great job. We reported on OneConnect back in February, which is Yahoo’s mobile search platform that also incorporates a user’s social profiles and social footprint into an easy to read mobile application. In addition to this, Yahoo’s OnePlace aims to bring together a user’s frequently-checked information into a similar mobile application as well. All of this is an effort to be the first point-of-contact to the mobile web on behalf of Yahoo which is obviously the number one goal. Both OneConnect and OnePlace provide a beautiful user interface that, in my opinion, is easier to use and provides much more useful information than Google’s version. With some slight configuration, all the information you deem most important can be instantly available with the launch of a single mobile app.

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The other day I blogged about TeleFlip and a couple of things that I thought they needed. Donna Amato, Director of Communications at TeleFlip contacted me to let me know that they just released a feature that lets you upload your entire address book. Nice!

Truth be known, Donna emailed me Wednesday and I’ve been behind all week. I’m such a slacker! Anyone that has a 19 Month old in their house knows how hard it can be to get things done when kids are at that age. I think I logged 20 miles in August following my Daughter around the house. I love it though, my highlight of the week was when she sat down with me while I read her If You Give A Moose A Muffin.

Thanks for the status update Donna, this is something that users will certainly appreciate. Who wants to enter contacts in manually right?

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I’ve never heard of TeleFlip until about a week ago when someone sent me an email telling me to check them out. I’m going to give them a try with my Mobile Marketing Watch email.

What’s cool about TeleFlip is that it’s actually better than real email because it utilizes a trust network. So if you’re not in my trust network then you can’t spam me because I control who goes into the trusted list. Users upload their contact lists and those lists effectively become your white list. Officer trusty isn’t going to let an email get sent to the SMS gateway if it’s not in your white list otherwise he’s gonna get fired.

In the last couple of days there has been a tremendous amount of blog chatter regarding trusted networks. One A List Blogger even predicted that these types of trusted fabrics are better and that over time users will move away from applications like Google as an example and gravitate towards applications that rely on trust. I think he’s on to something even though he’s getting skewered.

Now, speaking of trust. You’ll need to trust TeleFlip because one of the first things they ask for in the sign-up process is your email account credentials. I definitely see some people bailing on this service at this point. To be perfectly honest, I hesitated too and so I’m not going to test this service with my GMail Account but I am going to try it out using one of my Mobile Marketing Watch email accounts.

Here’s something that it’s missing and I think it’s critical but I’ve been told by someone very close to the Company that they’re working on it. TeleFlip right now does not offer integration with things like LinkedIn or GMail to load contacts. I think this is going to be mandatory to get adoption. Who wants to spend time typing this stuff in repeatedly?

I’m still going to give TeleFlip a whirl though.

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