Page 4 - Jan 2014

RESEARCH, ANALYSIS & TRENDS

Forecasts and retro-

spect of digital industry

trends

Before we conclude this month’s Trend Predictions and The record numbers of smartphone units sold and sell-
what to expect from the continuing digital marketing (r) ing are in line with these results, as Asians bought
evolution in 2014, I would like to summarize my more smartphones than ever in 2013. The ongoing
thoughts on the topic, besides providing a retrospect of trend of upgrading from basic mobile phones to
Asian eMarketing’s predictions of last year. smartphones, particularly in Southeast Asia’s emerging
markets, has further deepened smartphone penetration
Every day, hundreds of new business models are com- in the region. In the first three quarters of 2013, con-
ing into existence, based on the changing technology sumers from Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia,
and culture, which to a large extent can be described as Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines have spent
“community power”, technical toys and Web 2.0 - tools. USD10.8 billion on nearly 41.5 million units of
And with around 350 million active Facebook users in smartphones, according to GfK.
Asia and a smartphone sales surge of more than 60% in
Southeast Asia alone, it is quite clear that the times are However, a change has taken place within the operat-
changing. ing systems in use: from IOS (Apple) the usage has
been moving more and more towards Android, which
Facts and figures of social media and mobile users now serves 76% of all pocket-PCs (Gartner, 2013). The
figures prove that it helps the iPhone only moderately
The fact that social media is tantamount to record num- that it is still the most popular smartphone.
bers is now well-known. But before getting into a deeper
discussion, let’s take e.g. a look at the latest record Promising channels and technologies
numbers of the still most important social network – Fa-
cebook. The social network continues to grow and cur- But where do smartphones and other technical gim-
rently has 1.15 billion active users worldwide. By now, micks lead us? And what does that mean for communi-
substantial 819 million are using mobile access, which cation channels in the future?
is 51% more than a year ago. Sales of the platform
stood at around US$ 1.8 billion – and here as well the Well, "Google Glass" is definitely an answer– the
increase is 53% compared to the same period in 2012, smartphone on the nose that is currently celebrated by
whereas around 88% are allotted to the display market. the media. The spectacle frame with the small screen
Currently, more than 1 million businesses advertise on will for sure be on many Visa billings. Through voice
the platform and more than 18 million companies oper- control the spectacle wearer can use it if necessary as
ate fan pages. In particular in Asia the use continues to photo or video camera, telephone, video conference
rise. (Numbers: Facebook Aug 2013) system, navigation system, as well as knowledge base.

The distribution of the various social networks in Asia The same applies to the new Apple creation, a watch
also brings no great surprises: Facebook with 92.3% is with a functionally similar scope. Like “Google Glass”,
followed by Twitter with 75.31% and Google+ is directly there is no meaningful display provided for entering text
in third place with 69.47 %. Having an account on messages for asynchronous communication - only
YouTube is becoming increasingly important (59.54%) voice recognition is used. And in September last year
and the fact that Pinterest (40.46%) is now even slightly Samsung launched its first smartwatch - Galaxy Gear –
ahead of Instagram (37.91%) surprises just a few. that has many of the above-mentioned features, too.
(Figures: Annual Survey Social Media Statistics, April Galaxy Gear works only with Samsung smartphones
2013) and tablets powered by the Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean)

operating system.

4 Asian eMarketing November 2013 - E-Commerce & Affiliate Marketing