Before launching a new product or service in a foreign market, brands should always assess the market to get a sense of how the local market would feel about the product, based on using Social Listening to measure the social media sites that are common in the area. If you’re looking into tapping into the Chinese market, RenRen would be a go-to site to measure.
In 2005, RenRen started with the name Xiaonei (校内网), which means “on-campus network” in Chinese. RenRen was originally designed for an Emerging Media class project by graduate student Yiting Mao in Marquette University. The site’s original goals were to explore some differences between the development of social network in China and the U.S.
In August 2009, the platform’s name changed their name to The RenRen Network (人人网), which translated to “Everyone’s Website” in Chinese. This was part of its shift from just targeting college students (like how Facebook started) to becoming a platform for everyone.
By 2012, the platform already had around 178 million users in 2012, when monthly unique logins were growing by 47% a month. This provides brands with billions of conversations to measure. Here are 5 reasons your brand should be listening to conversations on RenRen:
RenRen already has over 178 million registered users.
By using a Social Intelligence tool (like Synthesio’s) that is able to pull in data, this gives you over 178 million new people to learn about. Are they talking about your brand and/or your competitors? What can you infer from their posts, and how do they affect how you’re performing?
Tap into the Chinese market
It is no secret that the Chinese market is growing exponentially. Brands want to do whatever they can to gain information about China and find ways to target the Chinese population. By pulling in data from a local social media site for the Chinese community (just like Facebook is to the United States), you are able to find countless leads to their interests.
Honest opinions from consumers
Social media allows consumers to voice their opinions in an honest and unbiased way. By pulling data from social media profiles, brands and researchers are able to gain information about how consumer really feel, rather than being restricted by survey questions.
Find out which competitors are dominating the Chinese market
By using a Social Listening Platform, not only can you measure the success of your brand within a certain region or language, but you can also benchmark your brand up against key competitors. How much of the consumer Share of Voice does your brand own?
Without pulling data from RenRen, you’re missing out
RenRen is a huge part of the Chinese market. It’s known as the Facebook of China. Without listening to RenRen, you are missing out on billions of online conversations.
To learn more about researching foreign markets, download our guide Cultural Differences and Social Media: How Can Brands Benefit?
