Smartphone owners of handset brands including Apple, BlackBerry and HTC are more likely to stick with the same brand when purchasing a new handset, according to new research from YouGov, but why are these devices so special?

nokia-n8Apple owners have the highest level of loyalty with 81% of users expected to buy the brand again. In contrast, LG, a traditional handset brand, comes bottom of the pile with only 10% of users saying that they would buy the brand again.

Remember back in the 90s, and even at the start of the millennium, when you swore you’d never use anything other than a Nokia because of its simplicity and easy usability? Now Nokia is being dubbed out of date.

Traditional mobile phone brands, such as Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung and LG, do not fair well when it comes to loyalty and according to YouGov, and need to update their features in order to stay in the mobile handset game.

Russell Feldman, research manager in YouGov’s Technology and Telecoms team, says that the traditional phone brands have a battle on two fronts. “Firstly, the number of smartphone owners is growing at a very fast rate and the transitional gold rush to this new technology means traditional handset brands face tough competition from new and exciting brands. Read the rest of this entry »