Facebook threatens Orkut in India

Apr 25, 2010

India has long been an Orkut holdout for Social Media dominance. Lately, however, Orkut’s lead is not looking so certain. Please consider the following three graphs.

CONCLUSION: From below data, we can see a repetition of a trend that took place across SE Asia already. When people try out Facebook, they tend to make it their default social network. They do not, however, tend to delete their old profile. This means that user numbers do not fall for a while, but Social Media habits take a definite shift. While this does not spell death for Orkut in India, it is a worrying trend for them. Any thoughts?

1- ComScore clearly shows that the level of traffic to Orkut has been much higher than that of Orkut on an absolute scale.

2- The latest search trends on Google, however, show that Facebook has surpassed Orkut as the more popular search term since January of this year.

3- A recent survey by Indian research firm Ingene Insights found that an increasing number of internationally-minded Indians (They call them Inglodians) are increasingly turning to Facebook over Orkut. Their survey also found that those using Orkut tend to be those who ONLY use Orkut. In other words, when people sign up for alternate Social Media sites such as Facebook, they will tend to shift over to Facebook.

Discussion

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Paraslim Force

Its very tough to distinguish between Orkut and the Facebook.
Si Ashwin

Thanks Kai and Thomas for your insights and thoughts.
Kai Lukoff

I think the future is bleak for social networks that end up second to Facebook. And I do think that is where Orkut is headed. Moreover, I think the rich Facebook ecosystem (esp. gaming) is globally applicable and will monetize users far better than its competitors.

Si Ashwin -
I think the spread of Fbook and Twitter is far more attributable to global relationships than media coverage. Those with global relationships are elite influencers (intl students, travelers, and businessmen) who are perfect for spreading the Fbook abroad. In the US, Fbook also originally spread from elite students, to all students, to everyone. I don't read Indian media, but I would imagine there's far less coverage of Fbook and Twitter there. I think the global relationships of influencers are most important while media coverage is secondary.
Thomas Crampton

@Kai: Yes, you are absolutely right to highlight the gaming aspect of Facebook. I have a long overdue posting on that. Farmville has been key in Facebook's conquering of Asia. Will try to carve out time to write about it soon!
samavedam_vijay

I use both of them facebook and Orkut.

Orkut to keep in touch with my friends and family

Facebook to keep in touch with my friends in the US,Germany and malaysia
Thomas Crampton

@Samavedam: What will be interesting to see over time is whether you start spending more time on Facebook than Orkut and where it stands 6 months from now. As I mentioned above, the migration often takes a while, but is rather permanent.
Si Ashwin

How much do you think global media coverage drives traffic to social sites? With the sheer volume of coverage both FB and T are receiving in all media channels (free PR), is it overly surprising to see a shift towards these particular offerings in India - or for that matter any country?

Also I'm wondering if that the globalisation of relationships also contributes? I have friends in India and throughout the Asia Pacific who I've suggested join FB so that we can stay in touch.

Interested in your thoughts.
Thomas Crampton

@Si Yes, globalization plays a big role. If I want to keep in touch with my friends from a different country, I will need to join a mutually shared network. The impact of a globalized person on the social network would tend to larger than that of a more local person, since the globalized person would presumably be wealthier and have larger influence in their home community that the non-globalized person. (I do not say this to endorse global over local, but I think it is just an observation of fact. Those who travel tend to be wealthier than those who do not. Those who are wealthier tend to have more influence)