Twitter wants to start making money from its 20 million Indonesian users

Rick Mulia (pictured left) is the business head at Twitter Indonesia. On stage today at our Startup Asia Jakarta 2014 event in Jakarta, Mulia explains that he’s been with Twitter for only five weeks. The moderator is AdDiction’s Aulia Masna (pictured right).

He’s now based in Singapore but will soon move back to Indonesia to head up the upcoming Twitter Indonesia sales office which is slated to open in January.

Twitter has about 20 million active users in Indonesia from its global total of nearly a quarter of a billion. Mulia says Twitter is in Indonesia for its huge potential as the economy expands, and also for the ways it can be used positively for things like traffic, floods, and other topical applications. A recent example is the flood of activity on Twitter around the recent presidential election.

He adds that the usage of Twitter in Indonesia is “very advanced” and knowledgable. He also finds brands very keen to work with Twitter because they know how engaged people are with it.

Digital digits

“Innovation can happen in Indonesia” when it comes to Twitter, Mulia says. The recent launch of Digits and Fabric, he believes, shows that Twitter is making new things based on the needs of emerging markets. Digits allows people to login around the web using only their SMS, which was inspired by the way many people in some nations don’t have email and were put off by the email login requirement on many sites – including on Twitter itself.

Dick Costolo has promised significant investment in Indonesia, and Mulia says that’ll be seen first in the new office, which will focus on sales.

At this office, Twitter will work with local brands and celebrities to work on their Twitter content strategy, he says. Which is a nice way of saying monetization. Which is a nice way of saying ads.

Mulia’s own background is in adtech. He argues that Twitter is an affordable ad platform that works out better than other options for things like cost-per-click ad platforms. Twitter will build on that with upcoming features related to ecommerce and “direct response” services.

Green room or is that red room of #StartupAsia Jakarta. Getting ready for my "fireside chat" pic.twitter.com/xbdOqhQHsB

— Rick Mulia (@rickmulia) November 26, 2014