The report says digital ad spending in India is expected to grow at around 47.5 per cent in 2016 in comparison with the overall ad spending, which is expected to grow at 15.5 per cent
BestMediaInfo Bureau | Mumbai | November 16, 2016
From the primitive days of chat rooms and news groups, social media has changed everything. It has successfully integrated in our daily life and has changed the way we communicate with friends, family, businesses and influencers.
Against a global population at 7.395 billion, internet users have increased to 3.419 billion today. Out of the total internet user base, there are 2.307 billion active social media users.
With the launch of Facebook in 2004, people were exposed to a new way of communication. The audience experienced a ‘global village’ kind of syndrome and got access to communities earlier restricted by geographies.
Hence across the globe, users could instantly communicate and interchange ideas, concepts, and values at a single click. Replacing its predecessors like Orkut, Facebook was able to create a social media platform binding communities across the world. Fast forward to 2016, social media channels moved from the personal to the professional and ideological spaces. From being just a pass time, it evolved into an industry with a massive user base, having the potential to be explored and utilised.
The digital age is seeing the emergence and growth of many new social platforms. But Facebook is leading the pack till now. Social media platforms like Snapchat and Instagram are also gaining ground in the virtual space.
The global social media trend has gained traction in India also. Social media in India has increased leaps and bounds, as the number of internet users today have increased to 375 million. The humongous Indian population of 1,319 million makes the country a potential market for giants like Facebook and Twitter.
Currently, in India, 28.4 per cent of the population is using internet and 10.3 per cent are active on social media. In 2011, the percentage of Facebook users was just 2.5 per cent of the population. Thanks to Facebook’s strategies for emerging economies, the number is expected to increase to 15 per cent by the end of 2016. The increased mobile web penetration is also seen as a key contributor to increased growth in active social media usage.
With the reach and the power to influence audience, celebrities and influencers are the emerging faces of social media marketing and a roadmap for brands to reach their targeted audience. Currently, with the numbers shown earlier, engagement for brands on social media has not been promising and brands have to dole out millions to get celebrities endorse their brands and products to increase their reach. But with the evolution of social media in India and across the globe, an engaging content strategy through celebrities and influencers could give a brand the much-needed boost and engagement.
However, celebrity social media endorsement is still fragmented, especially in India where brands have to jump a lot of hoops to connect with celebrities. Celebrity endorsements on social media are generally a part of large sponsorship deals and packages by big talent management companies.
To help brands easily connect with celebrities, Yral Digital has launched a platform to monetise the celebrity social media campaign where brands have access to celebrity reach on social media. This can be a game changer, since celebrity social media endorsements are not properly monetised in India and brands struggle to crack individual social media endorsement deals with celebrities.
Some of the key highlights from the report are:
Click here to view Social Media Report 2016
