Our new forecast for global mobile messaging app users shows that the pandemic has accelerated adoption of OTT messaging services, though not in every country nor to the same degree for every app.

The pandemic has brought an influx of new users for subscription OTT, live videos, and video games in 2020, but other activities such as social networking, mobile messaging, and digital video haven’t seen the same bump.

Of the many channels out there, SMS may not be the most exciting, but it is the most personal. And when marketers want to build on those one-on-one connections with consumers, their efforts must be exactly that.

eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver, junior analyst Blake Droesch and forecasting analyst at Insider Intelligence Peter Vahle discuss the impact, concerns and potential outcomes of the Twitter hack, which social issues matter most to consumers, Instagram's TikTok competitor, defining hate speech, text message marketing, when someone snuck something into the baseball hall of fame and more.

eMarketer is pleased to moderate a Tech-Talk Webinar featuring Acoustic’s Dave Haucke, vice president of product management, and Pinky Lees, worldwide mobile strategist. They will share multiple use cases to help marketers understand how to get started with SMS, and where this channel fits into your overall communications and marketing strategy.

The limited new uptake in mobile messaging has to do with the fact that people in the US already have well-established ways of communicating via mobile, such as traditional SMS and phone calls, that have persisted throughout the pandemic. A CivicScience survey conducted in March 2020, for example, showed that 50% of US adults stayed connected during the pandemic primarily via phone calls.

While existing mobile messaging users are increasing their engagement, few new users are signing on. People tend to have well-established ways of sending messages or video calling, such as regular SMS and Apple’s FaceTime, so there is less appeal to using a separate messaging app. Read More:. TikTok partners with Shopify as the video app moves further into social commerce​.

SMS Is Still One of the Most Effective Channels—Just Ask These Retailers. eMarketer and Business Insider Intelligence have joined forces to become the leading research company focused on digital transformation. For more insights and key statistics on the biggest trends in today's most disruptive industries, subscribe to Chart of the Day.

How does your brand’s email marketing integrate with SMS and live chat? What call center and in-person interactions integrate with and inform your email marketing program? Testing:. How often does your brand engage in ongoing email testing behavior designed to improve results? Does your testing strategy inform not just the email program, but the brand’s overall strategy as well? Internal Processes:.

eMarketer junior analyst Blake Droesch and senior analyst Jasmine Enberg discuss how COVID-19 changed social media engagement, platform advertising and influencer behavior. They then talk about TikTok's new "Transparency Center," the optimal social media posting lengths, Facebook Stories in other places and Instagram's disappearing text messages feature.

Adults in the US will spend 23 additional minutes per day on their smartphones in 2020, making a mobile strategy even more important than before.

Today marks a big milestone at Insider Intelligence: We launched our new platform, unifying our two brands (eMarketer and Business Insider Intelligence) into a single online experience and expanded our Financial Services coverage. We also just published a report that’s been long in the making--and it happens to be our very first under the new brand.