The third quarterly Asia Pacific Digital Brand Index (DBI 10.2) shows Twitter has now established itself as the dominant online channel for news about technology brands across Asia. In October 2009, Twitter was only the number one online channel in India. Since then netizens in Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan have also made the micro-blog service their favorite venue for sharing news and views about technology brands and products. This leaves Hong Kong and China (where the service is banned), in the eight-market study, as the only Twitter hold-outs.
After nine months, tracking six million conversations, across eight Asia-Pacific markets, about 300 technology brands, across 4000 online channels – the relative consistency of our findings about the Top 10 most-discussed tech brands and online channels where these conversations were taking place is really exciting. Consistency provides a strong signal that social media could be a predictable channel planning and measurement tool – people across the region seem to be engaging each other on an ongoing basis – rather than turning up and disappearing on a whim as some people believe.
Further, three cycles of the DBI has shown a strong link between traditional marketing efforts (esp. new product introductions) and online conversations, which offers a clue as to the extent that online conversations can support/drive marketing. However, despite the success of Twitter, our experience with the data and with clients shows that brands shouldn’t rely on one particular channel (no sighs of relief just because you’ve got a Facebook page…), but rather should take a multi-channel, multi-message approach. This requires deep online insight to ensure that paid, owned, earned and social media are efficiently integrated online.
Conducted in partnership with public relations firm, Edelman, the DBI identifies the ‘buzziest’ brands, channels and topics driving online and digital trends and create insights for technology companies and marketers.
While the Asia-Pacific roll-up is interesting, the fascinating insights come at a local market level. The individual country reports are listed below.
- Australia – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10 2 (29 Apr)
- China – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10.2 (28 Apr) (Mandarin version)
- Hong Kong – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10.2 (28 Apr)
- India – Press Release – Digital Brand Index (28 Apr)
- Indonesia – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10.2 (28 Apr)
- Malaysia – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10.2 (29 April)
- Singapore – Press Release – Digital Brand Index 10.2 (28 April)
- Taiwan – Press Release – Digital Brand Index (28 Apr)