Date:06/06/2011 URL:
http://www.thehindu.com/2011/06/06/stories/2011060662701800.htm
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When social media booms, will brands take the hint?
Ramya Kannan
CHENNAI: It is probably stating the obvious, but social media use has really
boomed in India. Not only are about 30 million Indians (who are online) members
of social networking sites but they have also started spending more time on
these sites daily.
These facts came to light during a study of social media usage conducted by The
Nielsen Company in collaboration with AbsolutData. Now, for the bit you
did not expect: more time is being spent on social media than on personal
emails. While just 8 per cent spend between an hour and three hours on personal
email, 20 per cent spend the same time on social media sites.
"Social media is now ingrained in the way tech-savvy Indians live their lives.
With its ability to play multiple roles in an individual's life by enabling
shared experiences, creating linkages between communities and satisfying the
need to be networked, its role in creating a deeper engagement is a boon to
marketing," Adrian Terron, vice-president of Global Communications and
Marketing, Nielsen, says in a statement.
"One fundamental reason why Indians spend more time on social media than on
email is the nature of their communication - email is one-to-one, predominantly.
Social media is primarily a one-to-many and many-to-many communication mode.
This means social media provides a bigger audience and is limited only by
the ambition of a person to go all out and connect," says Karthik Srinivasan,
Head, Digital Strategy, Edelman India. He also advises clients with social
media strategy.
The second reason, Mr. Srinivasan adds, is the fact that Indians increasingly
are finding their voice online. "The earlier way of broadcasting your thoughts
through email is outdated - now opinions are flying fast and thick online and
as an opinion-owner, I'd obviously be interested to know what people think
of it." This means getting on to the social media bandwagon.
It is also now easier to access social sites, the mobile phone coming in handy,
literally and beyond. No wonder, the study has dared to estimate that over
the next six months 45,000 online Indians intend to join social networking
sites each day.
Now here comes the part about how what these statistics mean to money-making.
According to the study, when asked about the awareness of brands on social
media, a fourth of online Indians were able to recall brands using social
media. Of those consumers who are on social networking sites, a small, but
growing
number, claim to be following brands on these platforms.
Mr. Srinivasan has the perfect explanation for this switch: "Think of how we
used to approach purchases earlier, particularly with high-involvement products
that had multiple touch points across the purchase cycle. We used to seek
opinions from people we knew and trusted friends, family, peers to aid the
decision."
Think of the possibilities of crowd-sourcing this information - though our
trust factor has expanded, and we are not trusting complete strangers who we
believe know what they are talking about.
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