Why should brands in Asia care for Social Media?

There are 4 key reasons:

1. Social Media is big in Asia.

Brands cannot underestimate the size of social media in Asia. Over 450 million consumers are engaging with social media, some of whom are as dependent on it as their Western counterparts, if not more. When social media eventually goes mobile, the numbers reach over a billion, and this scale is something that brands cannot ignore.

2. Consumer opinion counts more than ever.

Consumers in Asia are talking about your brands whether you like it or not, and that opinion has a huge impact on their views of a brand and consideration to purchase. 7 of the top 10 markets that rely most on ‘recommendations from consumers’ hail from the Asia region. The internet is a platform that people listen to and learn about your brand. If you’re not participating in the discussion or feeding into it, you are likely to lose.

3. Consumers are highly connected and harder to reach then before.

The diversity of Asia needs no reminder, and this further accentuates the need to understand commonalities and differences in media repertoire as well as consumer motivations. Marketers are losing the ability to reach consumers in the way they used to as social media starts to displace aspects of traditional brand advertising. Building a corporate website and driving traffic is simply not enough, and calls for brands to re-evaluate the way they reach their audiences. Brands that understand social media by creating a web of activity that can influence and surround the target audience are most likely to be effective.

4. The Y-Generation live their lives in social media and if you’re not talking to them, someone else will.

Social media creates a huge opportunity for brand marketers where they can connect with their target audience like never before. Though the importance of this media may be in its infancy with some of the older demographic segments, there is no disputing that for the Y-Generation and future generations, social media is part and parcel of their daily lives. Brands that fail to appreciate this opportunity will risk losing an entire base of consumers in the future making social media not just a growth strategy but a defensive one too.

"Right now, the largest single group of users on the Internet today is in Asia. Half a billion Asian users. And that’s only 14% penetration. So when they get to 70% penetration which is where we are in the US and some parts of Europe, we’re talking about a couple of billion people. That’s a very, very big customer base. It’s a very diverse customer base but the internet can reach all of them once we get to that penetration level. So this is a really exciting place to be."
Vinton Cerf Vice President & Chief Internet Evangelist,
Google Inc.

"You should try to embrace as many different forms of media as possible because different audiences are in different places. But you will see an increasing amount of, especially the younger generation that’s going to hang out online and be comfortable in communities and social media. And if you don’t market to them, or if you don’t have dialogues with them (not even market to them.) ... then you’re going to lose an entire customer base."
Lee Kin Mun Founder & Blogger,
Mrbrown.com