Indian Social Media Landscape

Not long ago, blogging was considered as an online diary or journal where the writer documented his/her day to day activity. It was a space for people with creative bend to showcase their talent. It was personal and it was only shared with a select few. Circa 2011 and blogs have evolved into a vital communication tool that every brand is looking to incorporate in their marketing plan.

Keeping this in mind, it is important that this social media tool be well understood and its potential be highlighted. Here we look at key ways of making a corporate blogs work for your brand. To start with, a corporate blog need not be serious and perched on an ivory tower. Like any other social media tool, blogs too can help you build a friendly relationship with your consumer. Splash some creativity and humor in the content, especially, if your brand personality is such. Be vibrant, colorful and vivacious. It can go a long way in making your blog reach out to your target audience.

A colorful blog title can personify your brand image

Being a blog should not restrict you to just putting up articles. Break the monotony by posting, video blogs and/or photo blog posts. Not only will this make your blog more interesting, it will also present you with the opportunity to showcase your product features without suggesting that you are advertising your product. Also, it can help you in letting the world know about your organization, its culture and ethos of the place. It also helps in building a strong employee-employer relation.

Add photos to your blog

Another way of building employee-employer relationship is by allowing employees to post on your corporate blog. Empower them to promote the company’s products through informative tutorials, advice, and reviews that not only sell the products, but also offer some valuable tips. Not only will this help in content generation, it will also help in giving face and name to the organization.

Blogs need not always be about the products. It could well become a research platform for your company. Inviting the readers to suggest the kind of product they would want to use can help in getting valuable consumer insight at a very low cost. Adding comments and a rating system can make the blog highly interactive. The aim is to experiment with ideas, something that you can’t do with your website.

Make your blog user friendly and sharable

An important point to bear in mind is to be unique in your style. Stand out and be seen. Change your blog theme to reflect colorful seasonal themes. Add animation to bring alive your blog. The more effort you put in, the more appreciation you shall get. It is not about being different for the sake of being different, but because you truly are.

If changing your style is something you cannot suggest as a brand, then choose a very simplistic, neat and corporate look. Have a professional and simple blog design. A clutter free approach helps in easy navigation and a more pleasing experience for the reader. A decent mix of pictures and words will be enough for you to get your point across. Be simple in your language as well. Always remember, the idea is to let people know what you are talking about, not to send them on a wild hunt through online dictionary sites.

Neat and clean look for a corporate blog

Another sure shot way of getting people to your blog and keep them hooked is by inviting guest bloggers. Everyone is keen to know what a celebrity has to say or what a famous person thinks. Having such a person write an article on your post will help you achieve huge readership. Also, sharing of these posts will make your blog achieve virility like never before.

If you don’t have access to celebrities, then turn the table and give access to your readers about inside news and pre launch stories. Share all behind the scene action, through videos, photos, descriptive blog posts, and interview with people who have been part of the development process of the product.

Share exclusive details on your blog

These are just a few ideas on how a corporate blog can help you and your brand connect with your audience and potential customers. Like any other communication tool, there is no set pattern but being clear of the idea and your personality would be a perfect way of defining your blog personality.

Read more about blogging, here.

This is the second section of the research that we have carried out on social media with respect to India. Do read the first section.

Part 2 – To map out the current usage pattern of social media of Indians

Q5) How much time do you spend everyday on blogs, social networking and uploading photos and videos?

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It is really surprising to note that more than 1/3rd of the respondents spend more than 30 minutes everyday on social media sites.

Windchimes wishes its readers a very exciting and adventurous 2009

There is absolute dearth of statistics on social media with respect to India or Indians. It is important to understand the prevalence of social media in our lives. There are studies indicating that close to 40 mn Indians are online. But really nothing beyond that!!

So what are these people doing online? How important is social media to them? How do they consumer social media? How is social media impacting the purchase behavior? How can marketers leverage social media platforms to reach out to their potential consumers. We carried out research to find out answers to these questions to help us understand and give an insight from an Indian context.

The research data that we are presenting is representative of 3 Indian cities; Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. While we have received responses from people from other cities but they weren’t statistically significant. The responses have been collated as whole and not individually of 3 cities.