Posts Tagged ‘Social Media’

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Statistics on Indian Social Media Landscape – Part 1

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

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.

Details of the respondents:

Total respondents – 105

Cities:

Mumbai – 40

Delhi – 40

Bangalore – 25

Gender:

Males – 60

Females – 45

Age groups

18-24 yrs group – 40

25-35 yrs group – 65

Objective of the research:

1.To understand the significance and role of Social Media in current scenario

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

3.To study the impact it has in our purchase behavior

Part 1: Significance of social media in current scenario:

Q1) If you had 30 minutes of time, which activity would you be most likely to do?

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

Surfing Internet scored as the 2nd most medium to be used in spare time overtaking reading newspapers or listening to music. Even when the users have only 30 minutes, they would rather go online than put on their MP3 players or read a newspaper, clearly indicating that Internet / Social media is highly involvement and captures the imagination.

Q2) Which medium do you use when you want to get ””””news””””?

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

Q3) Which medium do you use when you want information on new products or services?

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

Q4) Which medium would you use to find out about latest trends?

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

© Windchimes Communications Pvt Ltd

The replies to Q2, Q3 and Q4 clearly indicate the significance online medium has in our lives. Websites, Blogs, Social Networking Sites, Wikis etc clearly are becoming the places to look first – whether it is about new products or about new trends.

Companies and brands will need to have significant online presence to ensure that users find them when they are searching or researching online. Mere website presence won””””t be enough – but it will require presence in communities, discussion forums, blogs, networking sites etc.

The presence will have to be genuine, value adding and continuous. There is no end date to it. Also it has to be value adding for user to referring and recommend it to his friends. Companies will have to indulge in the social media marketing

Click here to go the second part of the study.

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Posted in Essential Series, Social Media, Social Media Research | 18 Comments »

Who is afraid of Social Media? – Part 2

Tuesday, December 30th, 2008

In the second part of the series on – ‘Who is afraid of social media?’ – we continue to focus on the concerns that stop social media from playing a key role in internal communication.

  • ‘Our culture is very different’

Yes it’s true that social media works better if the organisation has a young, tech-savvy workforce with a flat structure and a democratic and open culture. But there are enough examples across the world where conservative companies with an older workforce have met with social media success. All it needs is time, patience and consistent efforts.

It is important to recognise the company culture and customise your social media plans accordingly. You might have to tweak your plans and phase out in a manner that makes it more acceptable and easier to adopt. One needs to pay heed to the fact that even if the organisation has been traditionally conservative about communication, in the future the Digitally Advanced will form the ranks and their communication needs will be better met using social media.

  • ‘What if the employees misbehave or worse leak information’

Read behind the words. Is it just another way of saying, ‘we are not ready to lose control’? The idea that employees can say what they want is often scary to most organisations. This is the biggest obstacle in the way of social media entering an organisation. Management is often scared that employees will not have the maturity to handle social media. It is often feared that employees will say the ‘wrong’ things, use bad language, insult top bosses, complain… the list is endless. There is a bigger, and maybe real, fear of information leaks taking place.

Wake up Mr Boss! Grapevine, gossip, rumour mills… call it what you like… have been around much before Web 2.0 came on the scene. Social media, at least, allows for the so called ‘unpleasant’ things to come to management’s notice than remain something that is discussed and allowed to fester around water coolers.

You have a chance to identify issues and soothe disgruntled employees, which is better than living in a Fool’s Paradise. Just because you don’t hear negative feedback from the employees, does not mean it does not exist. If not given a platform to be aired, in the long run it will be detrimental for the company.

Instead define communication guidelines that will help employees use social media better and offset the worries regarding information leaks. IBM came up with an innovative solution in this regard and created a wiki to get its employees to create social media policies themselves.

Organisations also need to keep in mind that they have employed professionals and just because communication has moved online, professionalism and basic respect will be forgotten. Most of us are already aware that inappropriate use of email in the workplace is not acceptable and the same behavioural standards will transfer to use of other Web 2.0 tools.

  • ‘Will the organisation’s productivity come down’

Another common concern is that social media will eat into the employees’ productive time. Time needs to be invested by an employee in participating in blogs, discussion forums and wikis. Is it going to keep him away from his regular job?

No it is not. Social media tools allow information and knowledge to be shared more freely in the organisation, allows for virtual meetings to take place and saves time and costs, boosts overall productivity and is a useful way to cut down on time consuming internal mail traffic. Employees are only going to read or take part in what is their area of interest.

Click here to read about the rest of the concerns that plague internal communicators.

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Posted in Corporate Communications, Employee Relations | 3 Comments »

Who is afraid of Social Media? – Part 1

Monday, December 29th, 2008

I find most corporate communicators are wary of social media when it comes to Internal Communications. While they are more than happy to embrace social media otherwise; when it comes to marketing to the internal consumer, a very important constituency in any good communicator’s plan, they will not touch social media with a ten-foot barge pole.

Today, I will try to help you understand what stops most internal communicators from using social media to increase and strengthen relationships with their consumers – the employees.

In the old way of doing things, companies make use of intranets or websites as static tools. Employees can search and find, but have limited ability to participate and contribute. In the new way of doing things, things are interactive and collaborative and use social media tools such as social networking sites, blogs, collaborative research, discussion forums and wikis.

It is a pity that companies have failed to realise the potential of social media in internal communications given that it can significantly increase employee engagement, help start a dialogue with employees and build relations, increase collaboration and democratise the organisation in the true sense of the word.

It also helps to collect qualitative feedback and let you know what exactly is on the employee’s mind.

What are some of the common concerns existing in the mind of internal communicators regarding social media? How can they be addressed? You must wonder, what makes me an expert to answer these questions. Well not too long ago I used to have similar concerns. By virtue of having been there and done that, I think I might be able to provide some solutions.

So here goes…

To begin with one needs to understand that in any organisation two sets of people co-exist and I like to call them the Digitally Challenged (who think the scope of the Web is limited to emails and the occasional search) and the Digitally Advanced (who have grown up with the Internet and understand and harness the power of Web 2.0 tools in their daily lives).

The Digitally Challenged don’t perceive social media tools the way the Digitally Advanced do – as extensions of themselves. The latter understand well and harness fully the power of Web 2.0 in their daily lives. They like to be engaged and like to be involved, a fact that was strategically deduced and used to his advantage by Barack Obama. Most people joining the workforce today are Digitally Advanced and one needs to make an organisation ‘social media ready’ for them.

Is the reason behind the unpopularity of Social Media when it comes to Internal Communications, the fact that most decision makers are Digitally Challenged? Is it because they have got so used to a hierarchical and controlled form of communication that they are simply afraid of losing control?

Most decision makers fail to understand that today people prefer a environment where they can be heard, where they can participate, where they can act. Today’s workforce are great communicators and networkers themselves and want internal communications to mirror the same.

There are multiple concerns behind internal communicator’s apprehension towards social media, but a few common ones are:

  • ‘We simply don’t have the resources’

Most companies have concerns about overloading overworked communicators and also about the cost of implementing and running a full-fledged social media programme for their employees.

The only way to lay rest to this concern would be show management how social media tools are not only inexpensive but take very little time to set up. For an organisation, rather than worrying on the ROI in monetary terms, the focus should be on how much it can gain by harnessing the power of social media.

  • ‘We have other communication tools to focus and don’t have the time for social media’

An excuse if I have ever heard on. How can we ignore social media when we can see that Web 2.0 tools are already an integral part of the lives of the employees? Will it not make more sense to communicate to them in a manner that they understand and enjoy rather than a seldom-used-and-often-ignored Intranet?

There are many smart companies who have seen the sense, economic and otherwise, of incorporating social media tools in their communication plans. Your chances of convincing your management will significantly go up if you can show them how social media will support the business goals. Arm yourself with case studies of companies like IBM, Sun Microsystems and other Fortune 500 companies that are using social media successfully.

Look out for more such concerns and their solutions in the second part of Who is afraid of social media?.

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Posted in Corporate Communications, Employee Relations | 3 Comments »

Social Media Reinventing itself in 2009

Monday, December 22nd, 2008

I am sure you must have read my first five predictions on the socio-economic changes that the world will see with use of social media. The next set of five predictions that I have written are  relevant in the realm of social media medium per se.

  1. First time use of social media through Mobile:

Majority of people world over will surf the Internet and social media for the first time in their lives using mobile phones. Mobile phone penetration is increasing rapidly in most countries and along with the its value added features like streaming. In India, close to 10 million subscribers are being added every month. These small towns will skip landlines and opt for cell phones directly. These towns will take technology leap in a manner of speaking. Simultaneously, several companies are in the process of launching social networking sites for mobile. Put these two together and you could see this prediction come true.

I predict that in 2009 itself, several small towns and rural areas will experience Internet & social media for the first time through cell phones and not through computers.

2. Online reputation management:

As our conversations move online, it will be imperative for brands and corporate to participate in them. Not only that, they will have to track those conversations to understand how their brands stand with the consumers. Are their brands in the consideration set or if they are they being spoken about in positive tone? These are very important questions for companies to get answers to as their marketing spends will be determined accordingly. There will be specialized agencies that will provide these services to the companies.

I predict that in 2009 online reputation management will be big business and most corporates will turn to it in a big way.


3. Facebook will become a paid site:

So will any social networking site that wishes to survive the next year. There have been enough and more articles written on SNS not being able to monetize on the huge subscribers that they have got for themselves. Venture capital funds can’t sustain them forever. Also purely by advertisements alone, they will not be able to break even or advance on their business plans.

I predict that in 2009, Facebook will turn a paid site. Facebook can charge $10 (Rs. 500) from every user for a year-long membership. Even if out of the 150 million users that Facebook boasts of, 2/3rd drop out, we talking of $500 mn (50m users X $10 per user) of revenue that it can generate in one year.


4. Twitter will become a verb i.e ‘To Tweet’:

Unofficially it already has. But in 2009, the importance of Twitter will grow so dramatically, that Oxford will be forced to accept it as part of our normal parlance. The role that micro blogging has played was fairly evident from the recent Mumbai terror attacks.

I predict that in 2009 twitter will become so important that at least one Indian company will use it to tweet important announcements being made in their Annual General Meeting (AGM)

5. Online videos will be most important marketing tool:

In the social media sphere, online videos will gain prominence over other marketing ploys. I had written in my earlier post that online videos will gain popularity even more in times of economic slowdown. In fact some brands like Kaya have already started using it. Other companies will soon follow and attempt to reach out to their potential consumers and collaborate with them to produce user generated content.

I predict that in 2009, social media agencies and production houses like Common Craft will have to specialize in providing online video solutions for corporates.


My friend, Gaurav Mishra who genteelly pushed me into writing these predictions has his written his seven predictions on social media.  Peter Kim has compiled his predictions along with 13 other social media gurus that really makes a good reading.

I hope my predictions have given you some food for thought to start off your own set of predictions for the next year. Do mention them and comment on this post.

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Posted in Facebook, Online Videos, Predictions, Social Media, Twitter | 28 Comments »

Social Media Predictions for 2009

Sunday, December 21st, 2008

Let’s play the word association game here. Tell me what comes to your mind when I say the word December. Of course, Christmas, shopping, holidays….Predictions!! Yup, predictions that’s the one this blog post will be all about. What will the year 2009 hold for us?

I have put down my 10 predictions. Five of these are on a more socio-economic level at large. Most of these changes that I am predicting will be huge leap jumps in their own way and will be possible only because of extensive use and acceptability of social media.

1. Thought Leadership as a Strategy:

These days, it is not uncommon to see people seek value out of everything. And by value, I am not restricting it to price equation alone. Value could be delivered in the form of information, education, better quality or even better service. One of the key principles of social media is to provide value to its consumer. For companies and in turn their brands to survive, they will have to provide value at all levels to their consumers. Social Media will prompt companies to adopt thought leadership as a value in their manifesto in their area of core competence.

I predict that in 2009 most companies will use thought leadership as a strategy in their respective categories by educating consumers to win potential consumers and retain existing ones.

2. Online activism:

World over, we are witnessing increase in online activism from citizens. People are reaching out to each other across the country or world either for peace rallies or prayers or candle light vigils or to form groups to decide on action steps. Social media is providing a platform to like-minded people to connect with each other and come forward to participate in events. It is being used to educate citizens to become more alert and aware about their surroundings.

I predict that in 2009 there will be a lot more of government and citizen collaboration to fight not just terrorism but also for better governance. And the mode of collaboration and reaching out will be through social media.


3. Traditional media will rediscover itself:

There is a lot of talk on how traditional media will lose its sheen in the coming years. I believe it will continue to do so if it keeps following social media principles without reinventing itself. Take the case of citizen journalism. A couple of TV channels have started running segments where the citizens report in news to the people at large. As a subscriber I am not paying TV channels money to hear news from the common man. I am expecting a thorough analysis done by the reporters and journalists on the events before it being presented to me. I want an unbiased, complete perspective which an untrained citizen cannot provide. For citizen based reports, I always have social media platforms to go to.

I predict that in 2009 channels adopting practices like these will die. Traditional media is still very important in our lives and it has to discover and operate from its own strengths rather than borrow principles of social media.

4. Rise in Entrepreneurship:

The coming year will see a surge in employees turning entrepreneurs. Two of the key barriers for any entrepreneur are sourcing and marketing. They do not know how to reach out to their potential customers or their relevant suppliers and secondly do not have big marketing budgets to do so. With social media coming into play, both the barriers will be tackled for good. Armed with a profile in social networking sites like Facebook and Linked in, an entrepreneur can reach out to his potential customers and vendors at practically no cost. I have several of my friends who have leveraged SNS to their advantage. One is running a store called Attic and the other is promoting himself as a photographer. Several others have networked themselves on Linked In and reached out to their potential clients. This is no to say that they do not need a great idea and passion to implement the same.

I predict that in 2009, several people will turn to entrepreneurship as social media will facilitate them in their process.


5. We will turn into listeners:

Let’s admit it, most of us if giving a choice would rather speak than listen. It’s a sort of conditioning that as happened to us over the years as the media we used facilitated only one way communication. With social media increasing its presence, we will have to get used to receiving feedback. Our consumers, investors, employees will have the opportunity to talk to us directly and we will have to listen. If we want to continuously seek and retain their attention, we will have to start listening and accepting feedback.

I predict that in 2009, we as individuals and corporate will definitely change and start listening to each other more often.

Click here to read the remaining five predictions for the year 2009.

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Posted in Facebook, Predictions, Social Media, Target Audience | 26 Comments »

Media lessons in times of terror

Saturday, November 29th, 2008

Manoj ‘Night’ Shyamlan when asked how does he heightens the frightful experience in his films, replied that it was about evoking the basic human emotion – fear of unknown. It’s this fear of unknown which creates panic in terror situations like the one witnessed in Mumbai. And knowledge (information in this case) is the antidote to it. It is important that while on one hand we have National Security Guards planning a detailed and thorough rescue operation, the communications wing (don’t know if anything like this exists currently) of the government provides correct and timely information to common man.

While watching the brutal and cowardly acts of the terrorists on TV and Internet, I strongly felt that social media could have been put to better use by the official agencies. It is as much important to give out news to people as it is to evict those terrorists especially when people from all over the world have been held hostage. Mind you, by giving out news, I am not even for a second hinting at giving out NSG’s operational details!!

Social media has been blamed for spreading rumours and incorrect information. Also for sensationalizing event coverage. That’s rather unfair. Firstly there are couple of things that everyone must appreciate as a given of changing times.

Firstly, social media is here to stay. Condemning it is not the solution. Using it to your advantage is. Secondly, Internet is as important a medium as others for capturing information. The younger audience especially in Mumbai attacks was glued on to the Internet as much as their TV sets.

So what are some of the things that we could have done differently for news dissemination in times of terror?

1. Appoint a Media Manager:

The person appointed as Media Manager will be sole spokesperson for the entire crisis. For the traditional and social media he should be the one point contact for all information, queries, clarifications, requests etc. This will reduce the chaos considerably as all reporters will not run around interviewing every officer on site.

Create a separate enclosure for TV crews and if possible a section for the media manager to address the press. This will ensure that the TV cameramen don’t have to lift their tripods every time there is an update to be given. This would of course be dependent on the area and kind of terror attack. While viewing telecast of events yesterday I saw the chaos that happened when DG of NSG wanted to give a statement. All the press crew ran towards him and there was so much commotion that his address to the nation got cancelled.

2. Use social media:

I don’t want to devote too much space in this blog post on how much of social media has been used. Reports indicate that there were 80 tweets happening every five seconds on this topic in the last 3 days!! Bloggers played a key role in providing missing links to information got from TV.

The Media manager in this case would have his team who will use social mediums effectively to give out information.

Official Blog:

The official government blog could have had continuous updates on the developments on each of the 3 terrorists sites where commando operations were on.

Being an official blog, even the traditional media will check on it before voicing unconfirmed reports thereby reducing rumours.

There would be sanctity to number of casualties being quoted. Because there was no official source, bloggers updated information that they presumed was correct which in its own way added to more panic.

Several international media agencies will take information from there. By subscribing to blog feeds, whenever that blog is updated, the subscribers get an automatic update informing them on the same.

Photo and Video Sharing Sites:

The blog analogy applies over here too. Distinctly there was a need for footage to be screened out to people. During the entire coverage, each news channel claimed some sort of exclusivity of sorts. That really baffled me coz all of them were lined up together outside all the 3 terror locations. Guess it’s an attempt to gain those extra TRPs. By uploading video snippets and pictures on the official site and community, you satiate that need of the people to see what is happening. The journalist at the site can do quality reporting if the pressure on that person is reduced to show exclusive shots only.

Microblogging:

Or rather plainly put tweets as it’s become insanely famous in the last 3 days. Twitter is just one of the companies providing it. There The official tweets could have been good announcement boards to keep people abreast with the developments. For example, when the rumour of CST firing started again spread, instead of banning cable everywhere these official social media tools could have helped in informing people and press that it is a false story.

Social Networking Sites:

Along with blog, the communities created on the social networking sites could be used to give out valuable information like hospitals which require blood donation, emergency helpline numbers, donation drives, information about important institutions being closed for that period etc

Some might say that there is no time to set up all these platforms. I don’t agree. For one you just have to register only once in all these platforms. And second people who are using these will agree with me that updating information is not a more time consuming process than filming, editing and screening it on channels is!!

Also this is not about social media against traditional media. The role that the reporters performed in coverage of the terror incident is exemplary. They stood there day and night without fearing for their lives and in a lot of ways built pressure on the government for quick act. My post is more about leveraging social media along with traditional media to gain maximum advantage.

Giving out information on social media will create some sort of order and hopefully stop rumours as official version will be available for people to read. Of course one is assuming that the updates will be timely and accurate from the government side. I am sure we all agree that the family members of the hostages are way too worried to be psyched out further with misleading information.

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Posted in Blogs, Social Media, Traditional Media | 12 Comments »

There is no Audience in Social Media Marketing

Monday, November 17th, 2008

This blog post has stemmed from the interesting discussion that my earlier post generated ‘Is advertising on Facebook called Social Media Marketing?” Mostly all agreed that while advertising on Facebook helped the marketer focus to the right target audience, it was still advertising.

Social Media Marketing on the other hand implicitly calls for user participation and building dialogue. Both of which remain absent with Facebook advertising form of communication. To me if there is one thing that segregates social media from others is the use of word ‘Audience’.

There is no audience in Social Media Marketing. Period.

Audience is to whom you announce any activity

Audience is to whom you talk to

Audience is to whom you have a monologue with

Audience is to whom you deliver your message to

Audience is to whom you drive your point across

It is not about semantics. It is about psychology of a marketer. Most traditional media have allowed marketer to control the message that is going out on his brand. The brand manager decides on the communication creative, the medium it will be transmitted it and in a lot of many ways anticipate how it’s audience will react to it.

In social media, he or she will only be able to manage their communication. They will have to evolve it with the consumers of that group. There will be two way communication right from the beginning allowing a sense of co-creation which will ultimately lead to higher sales and profits. There will be no messages to deliver or announce but points to discuss with users.

Social Media Marketing in a lot of ways will redefine some of the conventional marketing wisdom. The consumer insighting process will play a far more critical role in developing brand communication. Just as you need content in your blog, to generate hits to it, there will be lot of substance required to hold conversation with people and attract them towards the brand.

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Posted in Social Media, Target Audience, Traditional Media | 5 Comments »

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