Peggy Albright and I are road testing mobile search with the help of our sponsors and conducting briefings with mobile search companies and mobile operators – all in preparation for our upcoming quarterly series of reports, which document the end-user experience and provide insight into the key performance metrics.

In the course of our conference calls with leading search executives including Lee Ott, Director, Product Management, Mobile at Yahoo and Chris Spanos, General Manager, AOL Search Verticals, we were briefed on many topics and imminent product announcements that we cannot reveal here at this time. However, we were also treated to a few insightful stats and scoops that we now have permission to share.

With the funding announcement yesterday the timing is perfect to kick of this series of posts with some excerpts from our briefing with Adam Soroca, JumpTap Chief Product Officer.

CHANGES IN CONSUMER BEHAVIOR (January 2007 to May 2008):

· General increase in the use of mobile search:

o JumpTap divulged that one average carrier customer they have, which they declined to name, has seen a 370 percent increase in the number of unique search terms that are typed in by users on that carrier’s search box. As Adam put it: “That tells us that users are finding what they’re looking for. They’re trusting the search engine more and they’re broadening their usage of the search box.”

· Growth in number of searches per user:

o In January 2007, this operator’s customers were conducting an average of 7.3 searches per user per month. As of May 2008, “they’re doing about 11.”

· Performance:

o The percentage of times the system has an answer to the user’s query has grown from 77.4 percent in Jan. 2007 to 91.8 percent in May 2008. JumpTap attributes the improvement to a couple of things. One is that during this time period JumpTap doubled the number of unique domains that it covers in its mobile search index. Helping carriers better merchandise their content is another reason.

· General trends:

o JumpTap notices a shift away from entertainment-centric searches, such as ring tones and downloads. It reports more navigational searches: Users looking for websites (such as specific social networking sites) and utilities (such as email) on their devices.

o Local search-Interestingly, JumpTap does not see an increase in the use of search for local services. “We’re not seeing it yet in terms of a real growth in the number of searches users are doing through the main search box.” However, Adam did say when the system gives the user a prompt with a link to a local search form, the use of local search will increase by about 20 percent.

EXPANSION OF CONTENT SOURCES:

At present, and for the next few months, JumpTap is expanding the amount and types of content it covers to bring its ability to deliver a search result closer to 100 percent of the time.

At the time of our interview, Adam reported JumpTap will first focus on North American operators and achieve its objectives by bolstering the content covered for mobile search.

Specifically, it will add to its off-deck search results by enhancing its mobile search index of pure mobile sites, and blend that content with what it calls “targeted transcoded results” of high quality brands that don’t yet have a mobile presence, as well as a full Web search catalog, “which should bring the coverage rates right up to about 100 percent.”

As Adam put it: “It’s hard to imagine that, other than misspellings and really far-reaching queries, we wouldn’t have an answer between the mobile search index, the targeted transcoded drawl, and the full Web search index.”

ADVERTISING:

Over the last 6-12 months, JumpTap has worked to improve the sponsored-link marketplace across all of its properties, making sure that these links are mobile-centric and work reliably (avoiding failed links to inaccessible Web advertisements, for example).

Since mid-2007, when sponsored-link coverage rates were about 10-15 percent, JumpTap has seen the coverage rate (across all of its properties) increase to 40-45 percent. Adam attributes the improvement to the meaningful volume of sponsored links and competition among advertisers bidding on search terms. “There’s a significant amount of coverage in the sponsored links and the percentage of times we return at least one sponsored link.”

Since 3Q08, Adam noted he has seen a 40 percent increase in the average CPC. “That’s a validation that the advertisers are finding highly qualified traffic and they’re raising their bid prices to compete for that traffic.”

Please check back regularly for excerpts from our other briefings in the coming weeks as the series continues.

Disclaimer: JumpTap is an MSG supporter.