Mig33 Dreams Big in Indonesia and Beyond, Moves onto Blackberry and Android [INTERVIEW]

(Image from: IFT/STANLIE)

Mig33 is perhaps the largest mobile social network on feature-phones. The company is very ambitious as it now looks to expand its market reach not only to become the king of feature-phones, but also onto Blackberry OS and Android.

We recently chatted with Kiki Rizki (pictured right), the Indonesia country manager and head of global PR for mig33, via email. She talks about the current number of mig33 users – up from when we talked to mig33 founder Steven Goh onstage at our recent Jakarta event – and its plans and strategies to grow the user-base in Indonesia.

How many users are there in mig33 right now? And how many of there are from Indonesia?

Indonesia, being the biggest country for mig33, now has 34 million users from a total of 65 million users globally. We are spread across 200+ countries in the world and are mostly accessed via feature-phones as well as BlackBerry, Android, and also via web and WAP.

What are the favorite activities for Indonesians using mig33?

In mig33, users can engage themselves in many activities like chat, games, sending virtual gifts, miniblogging, and more. However, if you ask about the one most popular activity in Indonesia and beyond, it still remains our chat as you can easily talk with any friends in the world, find new friends, and engage them in cool games and more.

The Euro 2012 cup has just wrapped up; is that the kind of thing that your users talk about as well, not just about games?

mig33 has nearly 4 million chatrooms which users create and administer. You might not only find one or two rooms that will be talking about Euro 2012 in mig33, but do expect to find groups that talk and even guess the score of tonight’s game.

What are some strategies used by mig33 to grow its user-base in Indonesia?

We believe in good distribution and user empowerment. In Indonesia, we partner with major telcos such as Telkomsel, XL, and Indosat. We are also partnering with major handset brands such as Nokia, BlackBerry, Samsung, Sony (Ericsson), HTMobile, Lexus, and other leading local brands to expand mig33 distribution in Indonesia. And in addition to that, we believe in our users. We empower them to be our best evangelists to introduce mig33 to people around them.

Do you have any upcoming plans to share?

We are planning big for Indonesia and beyond. We have just recently launched our new platform on RIM’s BlackBerry OS and Google’s Android to answer to the growing market needs. Also, do look out for our exciting news soon on our product and marketing roadmap.