Forrester Research conducted a survey, which shows that Americans of all ages are continuing to adopt a digital lifestyle. They surveyed nearly 48,000 people, and the survey includes 1,400 data points and data on 378 US brands. Forrester says this is the largest ongoing survey in the world to explore consumer attitudes, ownership, and use of technology.
“US consumers are making an inexorable transition to an all-digital, Internet-powered world,” said Forrester Research Principal Analyst Charles S. Golvin. “The Internet pervades all aspects of Americans’ lives, from how we shop and buy, how we communicate, how we entertain ourselves, and how we seek out information to how we manage our personal relationships. While today these digital activities are constrained to the home and the office, in the next several years consumers will increasingly rely on a ubiquitous Net that is instantaneously accessible on a wide variety of devices, from mobile phones to laptops to new form factors such as eReaders.”
In Forrester’s report, they segmented consumers by “lifestage,” looking at singles and couples, young families, older families, and older singles and couples.
“This lens provides some very interesting consumer insights into how technology behavior changes when people transition between different stages of their lives,” says Forrester’s Jackie Anderson, who spent months sifting through the data. “Which devices do they own, and how many of them, what are they buying and not buying, how they are using the Internet and even how they’ve structured their digital home.”
Findings from the report include:
– Young singles and couples are the most connected (About half has send a picture from a cell phone in the past month, and a quarter has accessed the mobile Internet).
– Young families are heavy tech adopters (93% own a DVD player, 76% have some type of game console at home, and 39% have a home theater system).
– Older families are most connected (They have on average 3 mobile phones at home, and more than 2 PCs).
– Older consumers spend most money online (They’ve spend on average $560 dollar online in the past three months, and about one in five spent more than $1,000 online).
– About half of American adults are gamers
– 63% of American households have broadband Internet connections
– About 75% of American households have cellphones and PCs
– About 10 million out of 118 million American households have added an HDTV in the last year
– HD TVs were one of the fastest-growing consumer technologies in 2008
– Families are also more likely to have MP3 players, digital cameras and digital camcorders
– 33% of US homes with Internet have home networks
