It’s also worth noting that Japan has added 500,000 users and Korea 347,000 users in the past month – Japan has the highest growth rate (8.01%) of the top 25 countries – so we also expect to see the social media landscape changing rapidly in both these markets in 2012.

Facebook Asia – January 2012 (as quoted from Socialbakers.com).

]]> http://www.asiadigitalmap.com/2012/01/india-now-worlds-second-largest-facebook-country/feed/ 1 http://www.asiadigitalmap.com/2011/11/china-please-post-responsibly-ogilvys-social-media-guidelines/ http://www.asiadigitalmap.com/2011/11/china-please-post-responsibly-ogilvys-social-media-guidelines/#comments Tue, 22 Nov 2011 09:01:31 +0000 Sarah Guldin http://www.asiadigitalmap.com/?p=4957

Social media presents both tremendous opportunities and potential risks for all types of businesses and brands, including our own. To remind staff in China about the importance of posting responsibly and how we can protect ourselves, Ogilvy and our clients from harm we created this cartoon to make policy reading a little less boring. Enjoy!

One of the most significate change in this report compared to the previous one is the Internet population in China; In December 2010, China’s netizens reached 457 million, representing an increase of 73 million since the end of 2009; Internet Penetration rate rose to 34.3%! Number of Chinese Netizens has doubled the amount of Internet users in the United States (272 million), and surpassed the population of N. America (348 million).

Click here to see the full report in Chinese

Having Google has as a client is a privilege in many ways, especially when they are kind enough to send us invitations to try the service before a broader opening. Therefore, we had the luck to be one of the first ones able trying, adding, updating, posting, sharing, watching, circling, commenting, youtube-ing, +1-ing…etc

I must say that among our very heterogeneous group of testers (boys, girls, geeks, non-geeks, social media people, and traditional media/PRpr people), reactions have been extremely positive. People loved the easy and fresh user interface, which is clear enough to instantaneously understand how things work, without having to check any manuals or How-to’s.

The “Hangout” (video conference) system really is a killer app (imagine a conference with 10 people or more directly into in your browser), the “Circle” system (where you can separate your contact into different groups such as “Family”, “Friend”, “Ogilvy”, “Web”…etc) is also well done since it allows the users to easily and clearly set privacy rules about the content they are sharing.

But one thing that has aroused my interest is that the overall user experience looked like particularly familiar, because I use Google+ the same way I use Sina Weibo! The timeline, the way we post and share links, pictures and video (they are directly implemented into the post) can be very similar to the popular China- based service. Some contacts on Twitter told me that most of mainland Chinese users of Google+ have had made the same remarks.

Of course we aren’t saying here that Google Plus (which proposes much more than a simple timeline) has copied some of Sina Weibo’s features, but I can’t help to but notice some uncanny similarities. It would be the first time that a popular western internet company is inspired by innovations from a Chinese one.

For those of view you who are not familiar with Sina Weibo, it’s one of the most popular microblogging platforms in Mainland China (also used by Taiwanese celebrities) and is often called “The Twitter of China”, with the difference distinction of being technically innovative. There is, for example, no need to use a third party clients to access Weibo, since the web interface is good enough. Indeed, Sina is one of the few internet companies in China to mainly focus on the technical/usability part before thinking about monetization.

It’s of course very difficult to say how successful the service will be (after all, to be “Social”, a network must be used by a critical mass) but at least they are starting without technical problems and usability flows that characterized its two predecessors.

China is, of course, the world’s largest mobile phone market, meaning that a gender shift this swift will likely spawn a new kinds of female-focused phones.

My colleagues in OgilvyOne are today releasing OgilvyOne Connected – a research report into how Chinese consumers use social media to interact, both with each other and with brands.

A section that I found particularly interesting categorizes Chinese social media users according to their social media habits, assigning percentages to the relative sizes of each group:

A larger-than-expected 26% of all Chinese social media users are “Initiators” — people that regularly start conversations, create content and publish their opinions online. They are also the fertile starting point for new ideas, services and products.

A further 29% of Chinese social media users are “Commenters” — people who may not initiate, but who do react and comment on other people’s views. They are also the “accelerators” of new ideas, giving them momentum and wider acceptance.

The largest group, comprising 45% of social media users, are “Gawkers” — those who quietly browse, observe and look for entertaining ideas and brands that are already popular.

OgilvyOne Connected (Original Report)

This article is republished with express permission of Media Asia, which originally published it on April 1, 2010.

Debby Cheung, group managing director of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide/China, shares her insight on the highly anticipated, six month extravaganza known as World Expo 2010 Shanghai, and gives advice on how marketers can make the most of this monumental opportunity.

1. Bring your A game.

192 countries and 50 organisations will take part in the Shanghai Expo – not to mention the brands that will jockey for position with guerilla marketing. Competition for media and consumer attention will be fierce, and the battle will play out both on the ground and online. All involved in the Expo will be scrambling to reach out to consumers to reinforce the faces and personalities of their brands. To be heard, brands will need to pull out all the stops and create bold, determined, decisive and cross-discipline strategies. There will be no room for the faint or half-hearted.

2. Prolong the hype.

The Olympics comprise of 16 days of intense and enthusiastic campaigns that are more easily sustained due to the short duration of the event; but Expo is a whole different animal. This event spans six months, making sustained hype key to the success of campaigns. Without recurring, innovative and ever-changing infusions of activities, campaigns will get lost in the crowd.

3. Non-sponsors get on the bus by thinking green.

The theme, ‘Better City, Better Life’ means that anything sustainable and environmentally friendly is your ticket to an association with the Expo. Sponsors are not the only ones who can leverage this event – all brands should be thinking green to piggyback on the Expo theme. Moreover, the Shanghai government, Expo and organisations will continually look for new partnership opportunities so non-sponsors will have plenty of chances to take part. With 20,000 events in Shanghai, both on and off the Expo site, opportunities to contribute to the green theme are endless.

4. Think beyond Shanghai.

This Expo is expected to generate the largest number of visitors in the history of the event, and only 5 per cent of them will be from outside China. Domestic visitors are estimated at 70 million, with 75 per cent of them coming from second and third tier cities. As Shanghai is simply not equipped to accommodate so many visitors, the government has already secured the support of surrounding cities to help accommodate the overflow. As a result, effective marketing campaign strategies need to think beyond the borders of the already overcrowded and extraordinarily competitive Shanghai market.

5. Expo goes mobile.

3G and the connectivity of Blackberry phones and mobile devices mean visitors will be constantly on the lookout for the best and most interesting places to go and both positive and negative reports will travel at the speed of light. When mapping out Expo strategies, marketers need to capitalise on these channels and not shy away from them. The sheer size of the Expo will make targeting the right audience with traditional marketing a challenge, but mobile and online strategies will level the playing field.

Our Shanghai office is having fun promoting our internal training system, Social Media Belt.

This article was originally posted by MEDIA

Shenan Chuang (pictured), chief executive at Ogilvy & Mather Group China, shares her insights on marketing to Chinese consumers during the rapidly approaching Chinese New Year period and gives advise on how brands can capture a bit of the holiday magic.

1. Planes, trains and automobiles. In China, each year’s ChunYun, or Spring Festival travel season, sees hundreds of millions of people crisscrossing the country to reunite with their families. During this 40-day frenzy, three distinct groups of travellers can be spotted based on their choice of transportation. Migrant workers and students flood the trains; office workers, expatriates and overseas travellers form the core of the air travel segment while short-distance travellers take to the streets in automobiles. This mass migration means most consumers deviate from their normal media consumption habits and channels for up to a month or more – not an insignificant amount of time. Buses, transit zones, and outdoor media often become the primary communication channels for a country on the move.

2. Know your (often unlikely) brand ambassadors As scores of migrant workers and students temporarily trade in the bright lights of the big cities for their hometowns in the countryside, they arrive loaded with gifts, products and information from their big city lives. Viewed as successful returnees, their attitudes and opinions on brands and products are very influential on old friends and family. For brands seeking to penetrate lower tier Chinese cities and rural markets, word-of-mouth endorsements from these (often unlikely) brand ambassadors are your best – and most effective – bet.

3. The New Year’s Eve dinner. The New Year’s Eve dinner is always a highlight of the holiday celebration and family reunions. But the format has changed over the years. First it was a must to gather at home for the annual feast. That tradition eventually gave way to eating out as many families chose restaurants for their convenience and ambiance. Nowadays staying at home for the once-a-year indulgence is back in vogue – but with a twist. Rather than slaving over a hot wok or battling for a reservation at a hotel, more families are choosing to order ready-made meals that can be enjoyed at home without the hassle of fighting for a taxi only to be stuck in holiday gridlock. This shift signals big business potential for brands that can enhance those dinners at home with tableware, gift sets of holiday spirits, sweets and snacks or even jumbo family packs for the three generations reuniting over this special event.

4. CCTV New Year’s Gala – who’s watching? The CCTV New Year’s Gala (or ChunWan) is the premier mainland Chinese television event of the year, comparable to the Super Bowl in America. As the most influential and highly rated TV show in China, the Gala attracts marketers eager to buy airtime at any cost. But be forewarned: audience ratings drop as you move from the north of the country to the south. The highest ratings can be found in Northeast China where 85 per cent of residents tune in. This percentage drops to 70 per cent for Beijing and Tianjin, 60 percent for Shandong/ Shanxi/ Henan/ Shaanxi, 20 per cent for Shanghai/ Jiangsu/ Anhui/ Hubei/ Sichuan, 10 per cent for Zhejiang/ Fujian, and below 5 per cent for Guangdong/ Guangxi/ Hainan. So before you burn through your budget, think hard about your target audience… and where they live.

5. Home (and nowhere else) for the holidays. While some sightsee during the holiday, others prefer to “ZhaiNan,” which essentially means hibernating at home doing three things: eating, sleeping and surfing the web. Surfers are primarily engaged in online shopping, SNS and gaming. In 2009, online retailer Taobao.com reported a 195 per cent increase over 2008 in the number of products exchanged by consumers during the CNY period. Bestsellers were mobile phones, digital products, household appliances and gift packs with health supplements. Another trend of recent years is the younger generation’s preference for sending New Year greetings by SMS rather than paying a visit to relatives and friends.  As the internet and mobile applications make their mark on millennia-old traditions, it’s time for marketers to make inroads into the CNY “ZhaiNan” phenomenon.