India and Social Media

Social media is in its infancy stage in India and is growing at a fast pace. With over 25 million Indian users, it is obvious that Facebook is reigning the social media circuit in the country, while others are also gaining steam. Twitter, Orkut, LinkedIn are all social media sites that have Indians hooked.

The top three social media tools in India are as below. Statistics from Simon Kemp and Bartle Bogle Hegarty:

1. Facebook:

• 25 million users
• Popular in metros and now putting pressure on Orkut in tier 2 & tier 3 cities.
• People get hooked because of games and photos

2. Orkut:

• 18.7 million users
• Prevalent in tier 2 & tier 3 cities
• Is losing out the battle to Facebook
• Lack of global presence is a hindrance to its growth
• Inability to play games, tag photos/videos, limited interaction are all major limiting factors to its growth.

3. LinkedIn:

• 9 million users
• Most widely used professional networking site in the country

Events that rocked the Indian social media scene:

Cricket World Cup 2011 & IPL 4

World cup cricket final

India created a national stir when it won the cricket world cup on home soil; the ripples of which were seen on social media. Once India consolidated its place in the finals, Facebook and Twitter were abuzz with actions. People were tweeting about the game live, fans were praising the God (Sachin Tendulkar) of cricket endlessly on Facebook. YouTube became the one-stop shop to see videos of the winning hit!

While the cricket victory celebrations were still ongoing, IPL 4 added even more to the cricket excitement in the country. Since April 8, 2011 #IPL4 has been a top trending topic in the nation. Owners of teams (@iamsrk for KKR and @theshilpashetty for Rajasthan Royals) are connecting with fans through Twitter. The IPL fan page on Facebook has about 740,00 likes and the Mumbai Indians is the only team to have more than 100,000 fans. Youtube even has a dedicated channel for IPL where matches are streamed live and has more than 20,000 subscribers.