Author: kullin

More than half of Swedes and Danes use social media for travel

Smartphones and tablet computers are transforming the traveller experience. A new report – “The always-connected traveller: How mobile will transform the future of air travel” – by Amadeus, explains how the way travellers interact with the airline industry, as well as travel and tourism in general, is about to change.

One hardly surprising finding from the study is that social media is having a major impact on all parts of the travel life cycle. A majority of the respondents in a survey commissioned by Amadeus use social media for travel related purposes.

In Sweden and Denmark, 53% of respondents report that they use social media related travel sites. Depending on how that question was asked, I wouldn’t be surprised to see that the overall use of social media during travel is much higher. Other surveys show that as many as 48% of Swedes use Facebook during vacation.

Click image to enlarge.

social media use for travel purposes - chart

Read the entire report below.

Amadeus -The Always Connected Traveller 2011

Follow my travel blog at hanskullin.se.

40% use social media while watching tv

Social media adds another dimension to watching tv. According to a new study, “TV & Video Consumer Trend Report 2011” from Ericsson ConsumerLab, more than 40% of consumers use social media while they are watching tv, on a weekly basis.

social media chart

Anders Erlandsson, Senior Advisor at Ericsson ConsumerLab, says:

“Our in-depth interviews – especially those in the us, which is a frontrunner in TV/video consumer trends – show how social media usage is impacting viewing. The majority of families combined TV viewing with the use of Twitter, facebook, texting, voice calls and forum discussions about what they watched. This is particularly the case when watching reality shows and sports. This communication adds another dimension to the TV experience, as consumers found an annoying reality show funnier when they were able to comment on social media about ‘terrible singers’, ugly clothing or when your favorite team scores a goal. It is safe to say that this behavior is increasing. It is time to welcome the ‘virtual TV sofa’.”

Data was collected in Australia, Austria, Brazil, China, Germany, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, the UK, the US and South Korea.

Full report in pdf here.

Instagram now has 9 million users

The popular photo app Instagram is growing rapidly. As I blogged this weekend, it now hosts more than 200 million photos and it continues to grow. Instagram has also just passed another milstone since it now has more than 9 million members (today, even more than 9.1 million). In June it had 5 million members, as reported by TechCrunch, which means that it has added an additional 4 million in less than three months.

instagram logo Account number 9 million is “taylorswift13” and details about it can be found on Statigram or Inkstagram. The first account on Instagram which is not private is number 3, and it belongs to its CEO and co-founder Kevin Systrom (“kevin”). His account can be found here and here.

If you want to follow me, I’m “kullin” on Instagram, details here.

Four Swedish PR agencies on Holmes Report’s Top 250 Global Rankings

The Holmes Report has just published its Top 250 Global Rankings of the world’s leading PR agencies. Edelman moves ut two spots to claim the number one position this year at the expense of Weber Shandwick. Fleishman-Hillard drops one place from second to third this year.

Four Swedish based PR agencies are among the 250 top agencies on the list. KREAB Gavin Anderson drops one spot from 20 to 21, Prime International is ranked 49 (up from 52), Hallvarsson & Halvarsson is at 56 (56) and Diplomat PR at 159 (171).

Norwegian agency Geelmuyden.Kiese drops to 87 (78) and Pohjoisranta in Finland drops to 165 (117).

Full list in pdf.

 

Did Instagram just pass 200 million photos?

So, here’s an idea. In the beginning of August, TechCrunch and others reported that Instagram had reached 150 million hosted photos. They actually even posted the 150 millionth photo that was taken by the user “janefot”. There is no way from the URL of each photo to determine what number it has. But one intersting thing happens when you check each URL using the site Inkstagram.

The 150 millionth photo actually has the following unique web address on Inkstagram:  http://inkstagram.com/#/photos/150000003 (Update: Inkstagram is now ink361.com so the correct URL is now http://ink361.com/#/photos/150000003 ) Sounds like that number would be pretty accurate to the confirmed numbers by Instagram, right?

So when I look at my recently uploaded photos, I see that we today have passed 200 million photos, if these numbers are correct.

That would also mean that the 200 millionth photo is the one below, by user “tomvandenbogaerde”. According to the Inkstagram site, it was uploaded today, three hours ago.

http://inkstagram.com/#/photos/200000000 (new URL: http://ink361.com/#/photos/200000000 )

What do you think? Can this be true?

Update: A fact that would support my theory above is that the photo with the serial number #2 on Inkstagram, is this one by Instagram founder Kevin Systrom, who in a comment confirms that this is the first photo ever on Instagram: http://inkstagram.com/#/photos/2. (new URL: http://ink361.com/#/photos/2 ) Number 1 seems to be missing, but still, it seems that Inkstagram have been able to track all photos and number them in sequence as they were published.

And as is mentioned in the comments below, it may be that we should count photo number 200,000,003 as the 200 millionth. That photo however seems to be private, or at least we are not able to view it: http://inkstagram.com/#/photos/200000003

Why we follow brands on Twitter

Market research firm Labs42 surveyed 500 Twitter users about how they interact with brands. The majority of respondents (aged 18+) followed 10 brands or less. The main reason to follow a brand on Twitter was to get discounts.

chart why we follow brands on twitter

Based on these answers, it would be easy to conclude that discounts and promotions would be the quickest way to build a large following on Twitter. However, when looking at some Swedish brands, the really successful ones are using Twitter mainly as a channel to inform about products and business related topics, in combination with answering questions from consumers. Check out @hm and@spotify as good examples. Sports retail chain Stadium is one example of an account with mainly promotions, but it is only followed by 500 people.

This survey had very few options to the question “why do you follow [brands]”. Another similar survey from last year revealed that information about new products is one of the main reasons to follow brands.

Why we follow brands on Twitter

Also see this white paper about Swedish businesses on Twitter:

Swedish businesses on Twitter  

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