6 reports about global digital marketing

6 Reports about global digital marketing.

Sometimes reports can come in handy. Especially for market research or writing an online strategy. I summarized a few interesting reports about international digital marketing. Most of the reports described can be downloaded free of charge. If not an extensive summary can be downloaded.

1. Nielsen: Global Trust in Advertising.

This report writes about all forms of digital advertising and the trust people give to these forms of advertising.
Differences between continents are described. We read that in the middle east and Africa, people trust mobile text ads, much more then the global average. Maybe this is because mobile internet penetration is higher in these regions due to in some cases absense of fixed landlines.
As I described earlier, especially the Chinese are very fond of user recommendations and especially from people they know. Also online video advertisements are more trustworthy for the Asia Pacific region then the global average.

Trust in different forms of digital advertising Asia vs Global average

2. McKinsey: The Net's sweeping impact on growth, jobs and prosperity.

This study is all about the impact the internet can have at countries.The reports starts with some nice quotes as: small and medium businesses heavily using web technologies grow and export twice as much as others. Or 10 % increase in productivity for small and medium businesses from internet usage.

It also describes the differences between countries. For example South Korea is rapidly accelerating its influence at the internet economy. Their influence rate is growing faster then big neighbor Japan.

Russia, Brasil and Italy have a big potential to grow. They are still at early stages of the internet supply. chain. The report describes how to build strong internet ecosystems and gives directions at how find ways to optimize the participation of countries in the global internet ecosystem. At average at this moment with a 3.4 percent to GDP, Internet is weighing more then agriculture, energy and other industries. The impact of internet at the GDP will only grow, but it is important to educate, encourage usage, getting the right infrastructure, providing human capital etc.

Contribution of internet to GDP

3. Burson Marsteller: The Global Social Media Check-up

The report starts by telling what is already known by everybody who is busy with online marketing and especially social marketing. They tell that only by engaging with others an organization can remain master of its own reputation.Burson Marsteller explored the use of social media among 100 global companies and explored the use of social media among them.

Nice again to read about the differences between continents. Asian companies have more active blogs then the US and Europe. Logical, since blogging is still big in Asia. Asian companies are much less active at Twitter. The report also takes into account the big local players like Mixi in Japan. But still it says there is no real activity to stakeholders via this channel. It concludes that Asian companies currently prefer to be more comfortable to communicate via blogs.

Many companies also make choices at what platforms they are active. 79% of the researched companies use at least one social platform. But only 20% use all four platforms to engage with stakeholders.

The report zooms in at different countries, like Brazil and Japan. Japanese organisations mainly use social media for their international audiences. In Japan itself websites are still prefered. I wonder how they make their online strategy in this case, if at the head office, they don't really are into social media. I think the importance is that a head office also understands the impact of social media at the organisation.

Anyway, the report can be downloaded here. (after leaving an e-mail adress)

4. Swiss post: Distance selling in the Nordic Countries

As we all know, the Nordic countries have more or less the highest penetration of internet usage in the world, also they are among the countries with the highest incomes, and the distances are large. There is an enormous online shopping potential. But Scandinavian online shoppers, are not so fond of shopping with foreign companies. What kind of strategy is needed to make a succes of your online activities in Scandinavia. 

The Swiss post did some investigations. How often do people buy from neighboring countries, what did they buy then? And most important what are the reasons not to buy.

It is important to focus at products that are not (widely) available in these countries, they have to be cheaper priced and the shipping costs may not be so high. A challenge in these countries, I can tell you. I think besides the main reasons mentioned, of course an excellent shipping service (including delivering to droppoints and notify messages), good local knowledge of the language (not just do it in English or only in Swedish) will also help. Of course, like everywhere, but even more in the Nordic's an efficient and

good customer service is very important.

The report can be downloaded here.

5. Datainsight: Russia: Russian e-commerce market

Russia's ecommerce sector is among the most rapidly growing in the world. They expect that in 2012 the volume of internet sales in Russia will grow with more then 45 percent. Russia's biggest problem is still logistics. Russia's infrastructure is still lacking behind. 

Now only the two metropolitan areas of Moscow and St Petersburg contribute the most to the online sales. 

But there are so many chances. In the countryside a lot of products are impossible to buy and if it is available it is much more expensive then in Moscow. Big chances for online shopping. 

If focusing at Russia, datainsights report from last year, gives some directions. The report shows figures of popular branches and also branches that are (still) very small. Big chances! Russians like to buy electronics and tickets online. Buying food online is not popular. But many other countries are also struggling with this problem.

6. Asia Digital Marketing Associaton

The ADMA releases every year it's asia digital marketing yearbook via this URL. (found this mirror as well) A short version can be downloaded for free. The extensive version needs to be paid. 

A very well written document with all kind of statistics related to online advertising per country in Asia Pacific. It describes statistics about what users buy online, which social networks they use, a lot of demographics, statistics and e-commerce facts. Such a report should be made for every continent.

It really helps writing strategy's and making choices. The document has sections per country. From Hong Kong digital's information to Vietnam's online usage. A must download.

Screenshot from the ADMA's digital marketing yearbook