As I pointed in my IWOM Summit post late last year, the current phase of IWOM/social media development is seeing how organizations are adapting around social media. I am attending Dachis’ Social Business Summit in a couple of weeks which addresses this topic on a larger scale and I can’t wait. BTW, Hyku blog is a must read for anyone who wants to have a practical understanding of social media from someone who is right in the middle of the “last mile” of “installing” strategic social media within organizations. 

• Centralized Control of Social vs. Spreading Social Throughout the Organization (Social Media Today)
• Social Media is the ‘Last Mile’ - Part 1, Part 2 The Internal War, Part 3 Scaling (Hyku Blog)
• Listening to the Future (Visible Technologies)

The Internet Does Not Rise Above Nations and Cultures

Google’s threatened pull out in China has inspired reflection on the larger role of the Internet’s place within Society.

• The Internet Does Not Rise Above Nations and Cultures (David Wolf/Ad Age)
• Another look at China’s Internet (The Statesman)
• The Digital Dictatorship (Wall Street Journal) 

Behind the Scenes of Chinese Social Media Operations

These surprisingly candid articles demonstrate again that you need a nuanced understanding of the Chinese web.

• Publish and be deleted (Global Times)
• Invisible footprints of online commentators (Global Times)

Social Media for Categories

Just as there are specialized communications and research agencies for certain categories like healthcare, so will there be specialized social media agencies.

• Social Media Monitoring Goes Niche (Our Social Times)
• Understanding Luxury Brands and Social Media (Mashable)

Below are some snippet translations of this past week’s IWOM mark.

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version

[1]Advertisement in the CCTV New Year’s Gala
According to netizens’ counting, over 10 brands was found having implanted ads in 2010 CCTV New Year’s Gala, including Yanghe, Tudou.com, Sohu.com, Guojiao 1573 wine, Sanya tourism, Hui Yuan beverage, Lu Hua, Ping An Insurance, Canon and Sharp. Netizens was joking that it was a “Gala inserted in advertisements”.

[2] Two hot issues happened after the CCTV New Year’s Gala (see here and here)

[3] ExpoSay, White Paper about Shanghai Expo is launched
CIC collaborates with Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide to release “ExpoSay“, a monthly report on Chinese-language IWOM – or Social Media buzz – related to World Expo 2010 Shanghai. (click here to read more details in my blog or read the full report here)

[4] Employees of the supplier of Apple China is reported poisoned (see here)

[5] Cockroach appears in Su Fu Chi
One netizen posted an article I find a cockroach in Su Fu Chi with a real photo. Although being questioned of its authenticity by some repliers, it generated huge negative  buzz and spreaded out to other sites. By now, Su Fu Chi did not respond to this crisis.

[6] “Nobody” becomes a “fixed” show for company annual dinner  
Do a search and view now:
Sample 1: http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/s-83nXZWrVQ/
Sample 2：http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/BqAsavQQtg8/
Sample 3：http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/g5fG5CGP6zI/

China readers without a VPN will miss the video that accompanies the story, and it is a real gem. See below:

If you have been following this blog over the years, you will know that I really love this phenomenon as it is a clear example of how the Chinese Internet Community is reshaping the relationship between brands and consumers. The Internet Community not only influences purchase decisions, but also the way the purchases are actually made. It is social commerce in action.

I first wrote about the phenomena in 2006 (Online tuangou “group purchase” giving offline retailers a run for their money), showing how Gome, the sort of ‘Best Buy’ of China, had “declared war” on tuan gou. Below is a pic of a sign from inside the store at that time.

Translation: “We are not tuangou. We are better than tuangou. Changning Guomei declares war on Tuangou.”

Two years later, we wrote how Gome completely reversed the war (Retailers reverse the “Group Purchase” trend), and actually invited consumers to tuan gou, in partnership with the Shanghai BBS community KDS.

In fact, we do see that the tuan gou phenomena is increasing in popularity. According to our analysis of over 100 million automobile BBS comments, we found that the number of mentions of tuan gou doubled in 1 year’s time.

For a ‘first hand’ account of how the tuan gou phenomena works, check out the experience of my colleague Ellen here. CNN later based an article on Ellen’s story here.

In short, it took Ellen just 2 weeks to find 54 other people from Xcar BBS to organize a tuan gou purchase with a Toyota 4s dealer to purchase a total of 55 Toyota Yaris cars at a 30,000 RMB discount.  Read Ellen’s story to also see how the tuan gou group has stayed connected since the purchase, serving as a sort of support group and circle of friends.

Of course, 4S auto dealers don’t always get it right. In this video, you can see a fight breaking out between potential customers and  Ford dealer who broke its promise on a tuan gou.  The fallout from this incident accounted for almost half of Focus buzz for the month of December 2008, which we wrote about here in our white paper co-authored with Roland Berger.

It is worth noting that sites similar to 51tuangou.com (now part of Liba) and SHtuangou.com are now being set up in other markets and are garnering interest, including Groupon in the United States which has raised over US$30 million in investment at a valuation of US $250 million. In fact, Western pundits for years there have been discussing the potential of the Internet to support ‘crowdsourcing.’ What is most interesting however is that crowdsourcing, and specifically the group purchase phenomena has been alive and well in China since the early days of the Chinese Internet.

While Groupon and other overseas sites must build a large community of consumers with a sort of “build it and they will come” approach, Chinese consumers have already organized themselves online within massive communities and even initiate group purchases without the help of a formal service offered by any site as we saw with Ellen’s case.

As I suggest in the American Public Radio piece:

“The community’s already there. So all it takes is for someone to virtually raise their hand and say, “Hey let’s organize.”

Sites like SHtuangou.com did not start the wave of group purchase, they rode the wave started by netizens.  Techcrunch writes how European startups are racing to emulate Groupon…perhaps they should look to emulate Shtuangou.com

It is these massive communities which make up the larger collective of what we call the Internet Community, and these self-organized group purchases are an example the power of the Internet Community to transform the relationship between brands and consumers. This transformation is not unique to China, but it is happening at an advanced and an accelerated rate in a market due to the fact that compared to other markets, the Chinese Internet not only has the most people online, but also the most places to talk, the most people talking and among the highest levels of participation online.

Related Articles:

• 2009.02.26 :: Online group car purchase: a real story
• 2008.10.30 :: IWOM Watch Sep 16-30: Retailers reverse the “Group Purchase” trend
• 2008.04.10 :: Interview on CBC radio about tuangou “group purchase” in China
• 2007.03.19 :: SEEISEE blog Chinese article summary (Feb 1st – March 7th )
• 2006.05.17 :: Online tuangou “group purchase” giving offline retailers a run for their money

Below are some snippet translations of this past week’s IWOM mark.

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version

[1]Take a warm ChunYun trip through microblogging

For the upcoming Chinese New Year holiday, Sina Microblog has launched an event aimed at engaging users who are heading home for the holidays. The event is called “Put on a neck scarf (which sounds like the word for “microblog” in Chinese “微博” and “围脖”) and go home for the holidays.” The event encourages users to share funny, sad or interesting stories from their Chunyun trips with other travelers on Sina Microblog. The once lonely trip home is now a social experience that users can share with others through Sina Microblog. (See here)

[2] A look back at hot topics and events on the internet in 2009
Looking back on 2009, many interesting trends and events have occurred within the internet communities, such as “Cao Ni Ma”, “Qi Shi Ma”, “XXX, your mother call you back to have dinner” and so on. “The powerful 2009,” a cartoon starring a giraffe named “Dante”, is a collection of the hottest issues online in 2009.

[3] Luo Yu Feng, the most unbelievable marriage-crazy woman ever! (see video here)

[4] Learnings in Microblog marketing from the “Hou Gong Elegant Girl” issue (see here)

[5] Acer Notebook: I believe, I choose (我信我选) (see here)

[6] Youku and Tudou deleted U.S.TV dramas (see here)

[7] Yao Chen, the first Microblogger with more than 1 million fans on Sina Microblog (see @姚晨)

Below are some snippet translations of this past week’s IWOM mark.

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version

[1]Media reported that a Beijing middle school student was mercury poisoned by Sprite while as another consumer experience the same situation 2 months ago. A negetive trends happend in netizen’s discussion.

[2]600 air hostess will join sina micro blog from China Eastern Airlines
“Around 600 air hostess from China Eastern Airlines will join sina micro blog which intent to better communicate with netizens, their ID are all Marked with “凌燕“”. said by cabin general manager Jiupeng Li of MU throug micro blog.
MU is very pay active and pay attention in China social media marketing, 2 weeks ago, A very special offer in a very low price was released in MU offical website: The frist class from Nanchagn to Xiamen only cost 20RMB while as 10RMB for economy class. Several lanes appears a very low discount. It’s obvious a operation mistake but MU still declare all sold tickets are valid. This cuased a very strong postive word of mouth during the internet community in netizen’s discussion after reported by Media. 

[3]Toyota recalled it’s hidden trouble cars.
Because of the security hidden trouble on accelerator pedal, the model of “RAV4″ was recalled in a very large-scale except it’s not recalled in Japan. Parts netizen feel angry and incomprehension about this and doubt the the different quality for same motorcycle type in Japan and other countries. A Toyota recall history record during 2007 – 2010 is spread in internet community

[4]“Seckill” is popular in online shopping
A frequent game player used word “Seckill” is more and more popular in online shopping. Seckill means “A kind of shopping mode that all buyer rush to purchase for some products in unbelievably low prices released by seller through internet”, it might going to be a new online shopping model. We reported Taobao Seckill gate in IWOM Mark Vol. 2 previously. 

[5]“melamine” was exposure again with the start of investigation and renovate by food rectify office in the whole nation. The rumour on internet community was proofed by Meida reprot.

[6]BAIDU tieba launched it’s value added products “tieba beans”, BAIDU user can get the beans from regular operation in tieba and consume through buying value added service in tieba shopping mall.

[7]Besides integrate the “yuehuo” application in Kaixin001.com, COFCO launched another SNS game application which name is “COFCO production team” under zll.cn, a SNS website belong to Sina. (Offical game website: http://zl.zll.cn/)

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version

We are pretty psyched about the new “ExpoSay” white paper we released with Ogilvy Public Relations yesterday which covers all the buzz around the upcoming World Expo 2010 Shanghai. The first of a monthly series. this report found 128,854 Expo-related comments taken from 13,994 blogs, BBS, news and SNS sites in the Chinese Internet space for the month December. The hottest discussed topics included tickets, sponsors, pavilions, countries and cities.

One thing I like about this report is that we look at not only the quantity of buzz, but also the quality, i.e. not only “how much” but also “how” people are talking and “who” is talking. The focus of the talk is on tickets, and we see that netizens are so proud of their tickets that they show them off online with pictures (called “shai,” see here for more on this phenomena).  The tickets are desired to the extent that even the Shanghai Jing’an district government is using tickets as an incentive for people to tour historic communist sites (irony alert!).

We think including such a qualitative analysis important because looking more broadly, Chinese netizens not only talk a lot online, but are very creative and active within their conversations. As this Forrester study indicates, Chinese netizens are twice as creative as Americans within social media. As we always say, Chinese social media is much more developed than western social media, and I think our white paper, with its qualitative analysis, helps demonstrate this. Ultimately, what we are hoping to show with this report is how social media serves as a primary media of self expression in China and how it is woven into the fabric of the everyday experience of brands/events (and how companies can be a part of that).

Here are the links:

• English report_Edition 1
• English press release
• Chinese report_Edition 1
• Chinese press release

Be sure to check out the Ogilvy/Michael Darragh run blog covering everything about the Expo through Worldexpoblog

IWOM watch summary: 

Following the opening of United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen on Dec.7^th 2009, a new awareness ‘green’, also called low-carbon life was generated. In this issue, we took a look at how netizens discussed environmental protection and contributed ideas spontaneously.

We also monitored the reaction of a recent subway accident in which social media played an important role. The popularity of “I love Shanghai” icons show us that netizens also have their own local culture expressed on the Internet Community. In addition, we looked at the Youku collaboration with CMCC (China Mobile Communications Corporation) where a music event was broadcasted live, which allowed netizens to actively participate and finally, we examined the Toyota Highlander in the “Fail-to-Climb Gate“ crisis.

For a sample of the full report and information on pricing, please send an email to info@cicdata.com. 

A topic from the report can be found below.

Sample article: Shanghai’s Subway crash: News came from victim’s microblog first, beating traditional media (上海地铁一号线两车相撞事故受害者领先传统媒体报道事件)

Two Shanghai Subway Line 1 trains collided in the early morning of December 22^nd 2009, forcing thousands of passengers to take alternative transportation and causing a massive traffic jam. The accident and closure of the subway immediately generated hot discussions on the Internet with witnesses and victims sharing pictures and making live reports of the accident on BBS (Link). Topics about the winter solstice (a possible cause), office workers’ tough day, traffic congestion as well as the attitudes of the subway workers and handlers emerged online. Sina (Link) and 163 (Link) also made special coverage of the collision.

The highlight of the story came from one of the victims ‘Baojianguang’ (暴剑光), who first published the news on his Sina microblog directly from the scene well before any traditional media (Link) which became a story in and of itself. Similar to twitter coverage from airline crash victims in the US 2008 and 2009, this event may well demonstrate microblogging becoming a mainstream phenomenon in China.

Below is a screen shot of the table of contents for the full IWOM watch report:

Below are some snippet translations of this past week’s IWOM mark.

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version

1. Spring Travel (春运)
Chinese New Year is getting close, and Spring Travel, which each year offers “the biggest migration of human history” where millions upon millions return home has always been a source of hot discussion online. So what’s new for this year? Real name registration on purchasing train tickets or watch The Festival of the Empire (春运帝国an Internet parody video clip focused on spring travel, made last year by Hu Ge, famous for his first parody internet video Steamed Bread). To understand the overall sentiment of travelers, look no further than the tag line of the Spring Travel site (www.chunyun.cn): “Hoping every person who wants to go back home for the spring festival can get home.”

2. “Double-knife guy” asked for his salary in a desperate way

3. Amazon.cn again experiences “pricing gate”, the second time in a month
On January 23^rd, a mobile hard disc drive which was originally priced for 500 RMB showed up as 118 RMB on amazon.cn and attracted lots of orders. However, without any notice, Amazon.cn cancelled the orders 3 PM on January24 ^th , which caused complaints from netizens causing Amazon to send a letter of apology. Similar issues happened one month before for “25 RMB pricing gate.”      

4. Internet Addiction War, a ‘shanzhai’ movie using the World of Warcraft game as the background, creates buzz overnight

5. 2009 Annual Rank for Chinese Characters
In the past one year, the meaning of many Chinese characters were redefined by Chinese netizens. The  “annual character” site, NianDuHanZi.com, called for a vote and the character “Wall” (墙) won the annual award.

Check more summaries on IWOM mark in CN version.

Seth Grossman, Managing Director, Carat China 
November 2009 (Link)
Seth talks about social media from the media agency perspective, including the concept of earned, owned and bought media. Seth has been working in the China agency space since the mid 1990’s.

Jake Drake, President of Cohn & Wolfe Asia Pacific
November 2009 (Link)
Jake talks about social media from PR perspective. Jake was involved in Dell US social media strategy as well as their China strategy.

Bryce Whitwam, General Manager, Wunderman Shanghai
November 2009 (Link)
Bryce talks about social media from the perspective of “below the line,” with a particular focus on auto industry.

Magdalena Wszelaki, Regional Vice President – Strategic Planning
AGENDA Shanghai (now Wunderman US)
May 2009 (Link)
Mag talks about social media and the creative agency. Mag was involved in some of the most innovative social media/digital initiatives in China including Pepsi Creative Challenge and Johnson Baby mom ambassadors.

Shawn Cheng, CEO & Founder, HoopChina.com
March 2009 (Link)
Shawn talks about the power of social media from the perspective of one of the most dynamic, creative online communities in China.

Gang Lu, Co-founder, OpenWeb.Asia Workgroup
January 2009 (Link)
Gang Lu is one of the most prominent “web 2.0” thinkers in China, having both a Chinese and Western perspective.

Tangos Chen, Vice President, China Growth Capital
November 2008 (Link)
Tangos is, along with Gang Lu, one of the prominent “web 2.0” thinkers in China, having worked both from within the industry and as a VC.

Adam Schokora, Manager, China, Edelman Digital (now NeoCha.com)
July 2008 (Link)
Adam talks about social media from a PR perspective. Adam, fluent in Chinese language and essentially bicultural, has a particular knowledge of youth culture in China.

T.R. Harrington, Co-Founder and CEO, Darwin Marketing
July 2008 (Link)
T.R. was one of the first people in China to offer SEO/SEM service and here offers one of the most informed perspectives on social media.

Jan Van den Bergh, Chairman, i-merge China (now Holoba.com)
May 2008 (Link)
Jan was involved in digital from the mid 1990’s. He brings a historical and global perspective to digital and social into the conversation.

Yann Lombard-Platet, Managing Director, Nurun China
March 2008 (Link)
Yann built some of the first corporate websites ever in China in the late 1990’s and talks about Chinese social media as one of the most experienced China digital people in China.