Jon Russell

Jan 7

TAT Looks To Social Media Marketing

New Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) governor Surahon Svetasreni has pledged to use social media to help boost Thailand's reputation and increase visitor numbers in the country.

The new governor is far keener to use social media and e-tools to enhance the attraction of the kingdom abroad.

“We are reshaping our web tools to integrate new media such as Twitter or Facebook. We want travelers to Thailand to be more actively involved into the shaping of our web content by updating our site with their own experiences and advices,” said Mr. Svetasreni.

Social media is also a way to make TAT promotion more effective despite a limited growth in the agency budget.

“Our total budget is up by 1.9 percent to US$138 million for 2010. However, half of the money is affected to administration purposes, which requests us to be even more effective in our marketing expenses,” added TAT's new governor.

via eturbonews.com

As disclosed earlier this week recent tweets from Paula Abdul and Martha Stewart, two celebrities who celebrated the New Year in Thailand, reached a combined audience in excess off 3 million showing just a glimpse of the potential social media has for TAT and Thailand 'The Holiday Destination'.

TAT is not unfamiliar with the social media after using a combination of blogging, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube as part of Ultimate Thailand Explorer, a competition which began back in September with winners due to be announced tomorrow, Friday 8 January.

Overview of the competition below.

The Ultimate Thailand Explorer, a social-networking competition from TAT, aims to raise Thailand tourism by attracting people to join the competition and have them publicize Thailand’s top five destinations including Bangkok, Phuket, Pattaya, Chiang Mai, and Koh Samui through digital world.

The winning couple of the Ultimate Thailand Explorer, selected by a process of online voting, will win a cash reward of US$10,000, a holiday package to Thailand, a Blackberry and a Handycam video camera. Plus, the voters are also eligible to win a holiday package to Thailand worth US$1,500, a spa voucher, a Blackberry, and a handycam video camera.

Interested challengers have to apply as a pair and film a one minute video clip telling which destination you wish to explore, why you want to go there, and how will you promote the place to other visitors. Afterwards just upload your video onto Youtube.com, you must complete your team profile registration form and encourage people to vote for your team and share their Thailand experience and stories through social media tools.

via thailand-travelonline.com

Filed under // Facebook Surahon Svetasreni TAT Twitter Ultimate Thailand Explorer eturbonews social media Thailand tourism

Jan 5

Facebook & Twitter Statistics For Thailand [Via AIS]

Recently stumbled upon a number of interesting statistics from Thai operator AIS from a press release announced back in early December (2009).

The reliability of the stats is questionable as there is neither a source nor a reference. Social media user data is notorious difficult to find per country, particularly for smaller markets like Thailand.

However according to AIS

There are about 1.34 million Facebook members in Thailand with over 5 million viewers.

Regarding Twitter, there are 600,000 members with over 1.2 million followers.

There are over 6 million AIS Mobile Internet users at present.

There are about 100,000 users of Facebook on mobile phones.

There are about 30,000 users of Twitter on mobile phones.

The user statistics do not seem too drastic although it is not 100% clear what Facebook's "over 5 million viewers" refers to and the mention of "over 1.2 million followers" for Facebook in Thailand is also unclear.

Using the AIS statistics the following is true:

** 7.5% of Facebook users in Thailand actively update through their mobile phone compared to 5% of Twitter users

** Facebook membership in Thailand grew by 15% September through November [or which ever time AIS statistics date from - stats 1,160,980 in Jan 2009 to 1,340,000 - see here for more)

** More than 5% of Twitter users in Thailand took part in the recent Tweeple Talk Thai-language Twitter event (with an estimated 30,000-40,000 in attendance)

More light on this is definitely required.

Filed under // AIS Facebook Twitter mobile internet mobile social networking social media Thailand social networking

Dec 30

Technology's Winners & Losers In Thailand

Op-ed from Isriya Paireepairit, Analyst at the Siam Intelligence Unit in the Bangkok Post evaluating technology, the internet and social media in Thailand over 2009.

Few points to make following some of the analysis.

[Filed under technology winners]

Social Media Marketing Thanks to Twitter and @PM - Abhisit and his cabinet, @Thaksinlive, @Suthichai and The Nation focus on hyping up social media, everyone is now aware and social media marketing events are popping up all the time. 2009 was the year of the social media gold rush for the marketing and PR industry. The marketers have just realised the power of social media and believe it to be a magic wand that will reverse the decline in the advertising industry. Next year, reality will hit when they will realise it is not all it was hyped up to be.

I don't see this rush for gold though Twitter and social is beginning to catch on. As it stands, there are too few business making use of Facebook, Twitter et al in Thailand - the hype is likely to occur once business start flocking to the medium next year.

[Filed under technology losers]

A year ago, Hi5 was the social network of Thailand. Then the girls learned of Facebook's quizzes and games. They switched, and the boys followed.

Whilst Hi5 has seen Facebook close the gap it is still important to stress (see here and here) that Hi5 remains Thailand's most popular social network for now.

[Filed under technology losers]

Citizen journalism It was the big thing of 2008 but ultimately it failed to live up to the hype. After a year of blogs and citizen journalism, the Thai media scene is still the same, dominated by only few big papers. I cannot see any local parallels of the Huffington Post or Perez Hilton in this country.

Has Khun Isriya not heard of Bangkok Pundit, Thai Crisis, Thailand Jumped The Shark, Absolutely Bangkok, New Mandala and others blogs which are not only widely read but raise issues in a direct manner which eludes the mainstream English-language media.

Add to that the 2009 launches of Asia Correspondent, a network of independent current affairs/political blogges across SE Asia, and CNNGo, a trans-Asian travel and lifestyle website out of the CNN umbrella, and it is clear that citizen journalism and blogging enjoyed a strong 2009 growing into an essential part of Thailand's media which many turn to ahead of the 'established' media.

Filed under // technology Facebook Siam Intelligence Unit bangkok post hi5 social media social networking thailand the internet

Dec 22

Social Media Spotlight: Adidas, The Star Wars Collection [Director Thailand]

Here's my piece for Director on an innovative social media campaign from Adidas to promote its Star Wars clothing brand.

Back in November Adidas previewed its new collection of shoes and sports wear based on Star Wars.

Mashable has details of a cutting edge campaign, the Star Wars Death Star Super Laser, to promote its new products and definite a new level of interaction for social media campaigns.

“The Adidas Originals application uses Facebook Connect to personalise the application experience, even granting you power over the Death Star control deck so you can blow up your Facebook friends’ streets with help from Google Maps.”
In combining Facebook and Google Maps, Adidas is offering a compelling application with huge potential to spread virally.

Tapping into Facebook is perhaps the key aspect to this campaign as it takes advantage of established networks of friends built into the site (an average user has 130 Facebook friends) to pass the campaign around to those who have been blown up and those who see the application being used on a contact’s news feed.

And icing on the cake? Where it is supported, Google Street View can be used to pin point the exact location the laser will hit.

Your target has no chance of surviving, on Facebook at least.

As proof, here is a shot of me taking out the Director offices...it’s ok, I’m safely working from home today.

via director-thailand.com

Filed under // Adidas Director Thailand Facebook Google Street View campaigns social media

Dec 22

Hi5 Still Ahead Of Facebook In Thailand - TechCrunch

Stats published TechCrunch (via Vincenzo Cosenza) reiterate a post from last week which shows Hi5 remains Thailand's number one social network.

Hi5 has also seen Facebook take over most of the territories where it was leading, and has only been able to stop the social network from dominance in Peru, Portugal, Romania, Thailand and Mongolia.

via techcrunch.com

Though 2010 is likely to be the year this changes.

As said before...

"Given the enormous surge of Facebook users in Thailand this year (user numbers rose 588%, to 1,160,980, between January and September) it appears to be a case of when not if Facebook topples the incumbent leader."

Filed under // Facebook TechCrunch hi5 social media social media Thailand

Dec 15

Twitter & Facebook Offline - Thai Technology Books

There are an enormous number of books dedicated to technology and the internet in Thailand.

This is down to the combination of most of the web being in English and a lack of widespread English reading across the country, although fluency levels are greater in larger cities like Bangkok.

The current trend is towards popular websites and social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter. Books may be able to explain the basics of the internet but, with their time-consuming process of production, a book is no match for the constant evolution of technology and the web.

Books on the shelf today have no reference to major updates and issues such as Twitter Lists, Twitter's new services for business, Facebook's updated privacy settings (revised 9 December 2009) or Google indexing of real-time search.

Here are a few examples including Gimp, a book which refers to the GNU Image Manipulation Program, of course.