First thing first! Earn profits no matter what medium you choose. In the time period of recession and instability every capitalists is searching for the ‘cheap and best’ mode. Web 2.0 (I am not going to deal with technical terms but one thing I can say it is a present platform of internet that has revolutionized the entire world!) was last is accepted as the most preferred way to reach the customers under limited resources. Internet penetration may be abysmal but the gaining popularity of ‘social networking sites among the youth is prompting companies to ‘log in’ and gain to support themselves.
The numbers are also very promising; India Online Report tags the Internet population in the nation between 49-50 million, with nearly 15-35 age group. This not ends here; many small and big players are also setting up online stores to accelerate their sale. At present there are about 23 million social networking sites users in India, out of which orkut stands first on victory stand with 12.8 million users, followed by facebook, bharatstudent and others.
| Sites | 2007 | 2008 |
| Orkut | 7.1mn | 12.8mn |
| Facebook | 1.6mn | 4.04mn |
| Bharatstudent | 1.7mn | 3.26mn |
| Fropper | 0.256mn | 0.248mn |
| Bigadda | 0.515mn | 0.385mn |
Source: comSource, a global leader in measuring the digital world
www.socialize.com- launching a brand
Richard Branson, owner virgin brand though decided to fling himself from a 5 star hotel of Mumbai to announce the launch of virgin mobile in India, earlier in 2008 but his CEO, Prasad Narasimhan got the pulse of the market and dedicated himself towards social networking galaxy. According to him to get a grip of tastes and preferences of young Indian consumers! Virgin’s Think Hatke tagline was an obvious result. Conversations, contests and communities on portals like orkut, facebook etc were just few among the different ways that the ionic brand is building the resonance around its brand. Virgin has 10 different communities on orkut with 3124 members at present. Twitter even has a Think Hatke ID. Now company is not only preparing to pilot its ad campaign but also deciding to jump start their sales via e-commerce .
Till now company has not got the satisfactory results but the system and the means of communication is Hatke and it will help the company in the coming days.
www.socialize.com- election campaign
In India, the forthcoming general assembly elections have seen many local politicians follow Obama's footsteps, and the Internet is poised to play a larger role in these elections--to held in five phases on Apr. 16, 23 and 30, as well as May 7 and 13.
With nearly 700 million people eligible to cast their votes, political parties are busy wooing first-time voters and the country's tech-savvy middle class. Indian politicians have turned to YouTube, Facebook, Orkut, podcasts, live chats, Twitter and other Web 2.0 tools, to reach out to the electorate.
Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) octogenarian prime ministerial candidate, L. K. Advani, is reaching out to youths through live chats and his Web site(blog.lkadvani.in). Advani is also on Facebook, Orkut and YouTube, while his colleague and Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi, uses tools such as podcasts, Twitter, Google SMS and widgets.
Supporters have also created groups on social networking sites such as Facebook and Orkut, to rally voters. Ruling party Indian National Congress' youth wing leader, Rahul Gandhi, for instance, currently has over 3,000 supporters on Facebook. Several politicians are also on Twitter, including Congress' S. M. Krishna and BJP's V K Malhotra.
The country's largest opposition party, BJP is undoubtedly the most active on cyberspace, and has banner ads--spouting "Advani for PM" messages--running on a plethora of Web sites.
The Internet, however, provides a way to appeal to the youth. Over half of India's 1.15 billion population is younger than 25 years, and 50 million new voters are estimated to have entered the electorate since 2004. Many first-time voters are likely to be connected via Internet and mobile phones.
www.socialize.com- eye on India
India is being heavily wooed by the giants of the internet, with both YouTube and MySpace having just set up dedicated Indian sites.
But both sides have the same audience firmly in their sights - young, internet-savvy Indians. Compared with the West, internet take-up in the subcontinent is not high but capitalists are taking it as a matter of investment. If we take infrastructure for instance, a huge investment was made in this field which it is paying now! YouTube has signed up a string of local media partners to put their content online - from Bollywood producers to Institutes of Technology.
In the meantime, internet users in India may have something of a golden age to look forward to.
Companies are falling over themselves to highlight what they can do for India, not what India can do for them.
All this competition will ensure that home-grown sites keep innovating - while the deep pockets of both YouTube and MySpace will mean more choice for web-surfers.
And all of it for free.
