South Africa is continuing to grow as a mobile hungry nation as a recent study revealed that South Africans spend more time on their mobile phones than any other media channel.

As part of our research to understand youth reactions towards advertising RLabs conducted a mobile survey to 6,812 respondents which generated some interesting findings:

The age groups predominately featured are those between the ages of 18 – 35 (86% of respondents). More females responded to the survey (54%) than their make counter-parts (46%). The most popular handset manufacturer was Nokia with (41%), followed by Samsung and Blackberry. The top 3 network operators were MTN (37%), Vodacom (25%) and Cell C (24%).


The study also indicated that 77% of the respondents spend 4 hours and more on the mobile internet daily. The most popular mobile phone transactions by the respondents were Buying Airtime/Electricity (35%) and Virtual Goods (31%). Mobile Banking only made up 6% of the responses.

Our study also confirmed the study by Inmobi that South African mobile phone users are comfortable with ads via mobile phone. We asked 3 questions related to mobile advertising and the respondents gave some unexpected answers:

How is your attitude towards mobile ads?


I am happy because I learn things I did not know before (36%)
I am ok with it because sometimes it could be useful (54%)
Don’t bother me because I ignore it anyways (4%)
Irritates me because I don’t like being bothered (3%)

What is your reaction towards mobile ads?

Click if it interests me (51%)
Read if interested but don’t click (11%)
Read even if not interested (17%)
Click on as even if it does not interest me (9%)
Ignore ads or look for skip option (8%)

Which ads do you prefer to see when it is shown?

Services (Education, Health, Social, informative etc.) (66%)
Entertainment (11%)
Lifestyle (Dating, Sports etc.) (9%)
Money or Finances (6%)
Brands (3%)

The respondents for the above study with gathered over a period of 2 weeks via the RLabs mobi and Mxit portals.

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