Smart Phone Debate

 Interviews at BrandsEye follow a very similar set of questions. Without fail the candidate will be expected to announce his allegiance to one of the three main smart phone operating systems and motivate his or her choice. Being an iPhone, Android or BlackBerry fan would speak volumes in the post interview analysis.

As the debate raged on we decided to see exactly which operating system was receiving the most conversation in the four key mobile markets in Africa, namely Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt and South Africa. We decided to answer this burning question by tracking the Twitter conversation for the last two weeks.

The results are in and South Africa is leading the pack in smart phone conversation, followed by Nigeria, Egypt and then Kenya.

Android’s cheaper pricing has seen the mobile phone manufacturer receive more praise in the four African markets. Interestingly RIM’s much publicized internal problems have negatively impacted user’s conversation, despite there being no negative impact on the phone’s performance.

Looking at sum of the credibility (level of influence) of the users driving the conversation about each phone BlackBerry leads ahead of Android with iPhone holding last place.

So our analysis of the African conversation has simply added fuel to the BrandsEye debate. The BlackBerry fans are still suggesting that the people in the know support BlackBerry. Android users still tout the offering as being the most talked about and the future of smart phones. While iPhone users suggest it’s the exclusivity that sees their phone trump the competitors.