Social Machinery

Social media is already mainstream media and Singapore is at the forefront. The most wired country in the world with more broadband connections than homes is leading the way on time spent on social networks. With 4.8 broadband connections in total and highly advanced digital pattern, Singaporeans spend in average 1.300 minutes on internet every month according to Comscore.

Is also fascinating to see that Social media is chaging consumer norms and value. For instance, 51% of all Singaporeans trust more in blogs than traditional media, and Blogger is the 6^th most visited site in the country. On the 20 top most visited sites in Singapore, 80% are related to social media or user generated content.

About 71% of all Singaporeans belong to a social networking site according to brand republic and they visit social networking site in average 17 times a month .

Consumer trends - Digital lifestyle  is exploding!

Is not news that Social networking is spreading like wildfire across the Globe. Facebook already hit 300 Million subscribers, Twitter is reaching about 20 Million users and growing at a rate of 1000% year to year according to Nielsen and social networking becoming more relevant than email at least for 68% of  internet users. According to analysts, more than 500 Million people are registered to social networking sites across the globe.

The fundamental paradigm change here is the new user internet behavior. Internet has changed our way of interacting with people, brands, services and the world; we don’t want to passively absorb broadcast content, we don’t want more one way communication. People want to be in the driver seat; we want to communicate with creativity, interact in multiple channels, create our own contents and be permanently connected. “We create the tool and then the tool shape us”.

This phenomenon is already mainstream in Singapore. The combination of high broadband penetration, heavy online engagement and the overall technogically savvy Internet users make the perfect combination for the adoption of a digital lifestyle. 

According to Comscore Social networking Index, Singapore social networking activity has exhibited high level of engagement. Singapore is by far the one number country in  Asia Pacific region in terms of penetration, with more than 71% of its online population visiting a social networking site in December 2008. Social networking visitors in Singapore also ranked number one on visits per visitor to social networking sites with an average of 17 during the month. 

According to Nielsen, more than 2.5 Million Singaporean online users belong to some community. In terms of social networking sites, Friendster claims to have about 1.6 Million registered subscribers, Facebook have more than 1.5 Million visit ;being the most visited internet site. Also Singapore is the 30^th country with more Facebook users according to Facebook rankings.

Twitter situation is unclear in terms of users, but doing so quick filtering you can guess that the number should be higher than 20.000 users.

Besides, Social networking sites are the most visited online sites in Singapore. According to Comscore, users spend half of their online time in social networking sites.

 Social networking going mobile

One of the most important trends we will see by 2010 is social networking going mobile. Latest IDC report shows that Mobile devices are the preferred tools by social network site users over PCs in at least four Asian countries. Actually, more than 50%of respondents in China, India, South Korea and Thailand access social networks such as Facebook weekly via mobile phones.

In China and Thailand, 62% and 65% of the respective respondents use mobile phones to get news alerts and notifications, receive and reply to messages, upload photos, or update personal status from popular social networking sites.

Surprisingly, only 25% Singaporeans access mobile social networking versions on a weekly basis, being one of the countries with the lowest mobile social networking activity in Asia.

Actually, this is an extremely strange situation if we take in consideration that nearly 96% of all Singaporeans have a mobile device, spending more than one hour every day with their phones. Additionally, they have one of the most advanced mobile user patterns using their phones equally for make calls (40%), send SMS (45%), send MMS (2%) and browse internet (3%).

One of the factors mentioned in the study about Singaporean low usage of mobile social networks is the misperception on high rates for mobile internet browsing and the lack of good packages from local service providers