Nielsen has released their latest survey numbers on the smartphone market, and it seems that the pace of smartphone adoption is quickly accelerating, with 29.7% of US mobile phone owners having a small computer in their pockets. That shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. Also not a surprise: the iPhone, BlackBerry devices, and Android phones are dominating the smartphone space, snagging 27.9%, 27.4%, and 22.7%, respectively. Even Windows Mobile devices (yes, we’re talking old school Start menu Windows Mobile) stand at 14% in the survey, while Symbian accounts for 3.4%, generic “Linux” for 3.3%, and bringing up the rear is Palm (webOS and old school Palm OS) with a paltry 1.3%.

To put that into perspective, for every one Palm owner there are 21 iPhone users, 21 BlackBerry addicts, 17 Android owners, and even 11 Windows Mobile users. Heck, there are 2.5 times as many Symbian users in the US than there are Palm, and Nokia has notoriously struggled in North America.

All this begs the question: what is HP going to do to turn this around? CES is around the corner, and we’re hoping that Palm manages to pull out all the stops with the new hardware releases really needed to prop up the awesomeness that is webOS 2.0 (and maybe some wishful thinking, but we’d like to see a big splash with a feature-packed webOS 2.1 too). At this point HP and Palm are going to need a big splash, essentially rebooting the consumer mindset as it pertains to webOS and Palm. It’s becoming clear that Palm isn’t even in the conversation for most people.

Source: Nielsen; Via: Android Central, Engadget

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If the most recent ChangeWave report is any indication, HP and Palm have their work cut out for them in the market of public perception. According to their survey of prospective smartphone buys, 0% (or at least significantly less than 1%) of respondents indicated an interest in buying a webOS product. That’s in spite of the fact that more webOS users reported being “very satisfied” with their device than BlackBerry or Windows Mobile (both of which garnered more potential customers). Meanwhile, interest in Android has risen to the point that 37% of those surveyed were going to the green machine, while 38% wanted an iPhone in their pocket.

HP’s executives seem to understand what they’re up against. At the recent HP analyst event, HP Personal Systems Group Executive Vice President Todd Bradley dropped a delightfully crunchy line: the Personal Systems Group (under which Palm falms) is going to “aggressively attack” the smartphone market. On the other hand, Bradley indicated that the size of the App Catalog has doubled since July 1, though our own tracking indicates growth of 50% in that time. Don’t get us wrong; 50% growth is tremendous (that’s 1550 new apps since the start of July), but we’re not going to stretch that to a “doubled.” We’ll just chalk it up to a PalmPad-style slip-of-the-tongue.

We certainly hope that aggressively attacking includes strong carrier partnerships, serious and widespread advertising, and a quality line of diverse, powerful, and desireable webOS products. Otherwise, well, we can’t see consumer interest in Palm ticking up otherwise.

Source: Investor Place, CNET

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Video streaming site Hulu recently confirmed that it was adding a Plus tier of paid service ($9.99/month), and has created a preview site for users to request a “Preview Invite.” Clicking on that button leads you a few screens later to a survey with an intriguing set of choices for mobile platforms in use:

Come on, webOS community, let’s get clicking on that button, and tell Hulu that we’re here and we want to watch Shark Attack in the River on our Pres and Pixis!
 

(Thanks to Shawn for the tip!)

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A couple quick contest reminders as deadlines loom (LOOM I tell you!):

• The Developer Survey we mentioned here is still running but will end this weekend. Interpret is putting together an exciting set of data about mobile app development and needs your input. Take the survey here and be entered for your chance to win a Palm Pixi or Palm Pixi Plus. Heck, if those phones aren’t your style, you can also opt for up to $550 to purchase the phone of your choice.
• Since not everybody will qualify for the developer survey prize, one more reminder: the Smartphone Round Robin contest is still running, but will end on Thursday. You can enter to win the Palm Phone of your choice by posting in this thread. Everybody’s been asking so here’s the news: we are announcing the winners on Friday!

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While Palm may not be putting up the same kind of sales numbers as Apple and Research in Motion, the release of the Pre has at least managed to reverse the trend of declining market share for the smartphone maker. In a survey conducted last month by ChangeWave Research, Palm posted its first non-dropping market share numbers in two years, holding steady at 7% of surveyed smartphone owners. The last survey, conducted in June, also showed Palm at 7%, though Apple logged a five percent jump to September (to 30%) and RIM’s BlackBerry line dropped one point to 40%.

In total, ChangeWave surveyed 4255 consumers, with 39% of those surveyed owning a smartphone. That’s an increase of 2% from June, even in the face of tightening purse strings and a severe economic recession. Even more impressive, that is a doubling of ownership numbers from two years ago. Not mentioned in the survey: Windows Mobile, Android, or Symbian. Given US market trends, it might be safe to assume that Windows Mobile holds the #3 slot (for now), followed by Android, webOS, and then Symbian. But hey, at least one out of every fourteen American smartphone owners has a Palm device.

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CFI Group consulting firm recently released a new report detailing customer satisfaction in the smartphone sector, ranking the iPhone at the top with Android and webOS-running Pre a close second. The survey of 1074 smartphone users and rated their satisfaction with their phones on a scale of 0 to 100. On that scale the iPhone scored an 83, while the Pre and Android tied for second with a score of 77. Research in Motion’s BlackBerry line rated with an aggregate 73, while old Palm OS Treo phones scored a solid 70, still topping Windows Mobile and Symbian satisfaction at 66. CFI says that a score above 80 is very good, while marks below 70 are considered “a cause for concern.”

What we want to look at is how CFI addressed Palm. For being the up-and-coming single-phone platform that it is (for now), webOS and the Pre scored surprisingly well. CFI said that the biggest drag on Palm’s score is the current dearth of apps in comparison to any other platform. Once Palm gets the app situation in order, the Pre will be “even more competitive,” which is would be a good thing considering the number of interesting and innovative Android devices around the corner. We have to agree with CFI; right now the biggest complaint with the Pre is the lack of apps. Hopefully that will be remedied soon, now that the App Catalog is ready to rock with paid applications.

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In a recent survey conducted by RBC Capital and ChangeWave Research, 87% of Palm Pre owners reported themselves as happy with their purchase, with 45% ranking as “very satisfied.” This seven-out-of-eight satisfaction level is the highest that any Palm device has ever scored in RBC’s surveys. The 45% very satisfied rating is also the highest Palm has scored, though it still ranks behind Research and Motion (48%) and Apple (82%). On the subject of Apple, a parallel survey was run of iPhone 3G S owners, who registered a whopping 99% satisfaction, a number that is, like most iPhone success metrics, both unbelievable and not surprising.

The same survey also explored what users liked and disliked about their respective phones. The favorite feature of both phones? The touch screen interface. There are a few interesting comparisons to be made in the results for dislikes, however. The top rated dislike of the Pre was its admittedly not-that-great battery life at 45%, and that same flaw registered at 41% disapproval on the iPhone survey, but only as the second most mentioned flaw – #1 was AT&T’s network at 55% dissatisfaction (the Pre’s tie to Sprint only registered a 11% dislike rating).

Interestingly, the Pre and iPhone scored statistically similar results for both touch screen interface satisfaction (47% vs. 45%) and ease of use (39% vs. 41%), as well as lack of support from their IT department (both at 8%). The survey also pointed out some distinct differences between the two phones: 21% of Pre users rated Synergy as one of their favorite features, while 8% of iPhone users cited the difficulty of importing their contacts into the phone. On third party apps, 24% of surveyed Pre owners were not satisfied with the App Catalog’s selection, while 31% of iPhone owners pointed to the App Store as one of their favorite features.

Most of us here at PreCentral probably fall into the very satisfied portions of the Palm Pre owner demographic, but we’ll readily acknowledge that the Pre does currently have its shortfalls. The iPhone has always had very high satisfaction ratings (new owners of the first generation iPhone rated at 92% satisfied), so it’s satisfying for the Pre to score so well in comparison so soon after release (without the Apple aura to boot).

Be sure to check out the full survey results after the break.

[via: our friends at The iPhone Blog]

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