Competition in Indonesia's messaging market heats up

Korea's messaging apps go on offensive in text-happy Indonesia - DAWN.COM

Quote:

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"South Korea's pioneering mobile messaging apps have taken their oversized emoticons to Indonesia, intent on breaking the dominance of BlackBerry Ltd's BBM messaging service in one of the world's most active social media markets.

Kakao Corp has hired pop stars and Naver Corp unit Line Corp has partnered Samsung Electronics in a country whose capital Jakarta boasts the most users of Twitter Inc's microblog by city, according to researcher McKinsey & Company.

BBM has long been Indonesia's most popular messaging app, with Facebook Inc's $19 billion buyout target WhatsApp in pursuit. But KakaoTalk and Line have connected with younger users by also offering voice calls, games, shopping, merchandise and stickers, or message-conveying cartoons.

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I hope BlackBerry has a new version of BBM available at Z3 launch time that includes the features we've seen in the beta - stickers, larger attachments, etc - to try to hold their place there. It's not going to be easy...

It's not gonna be easy for BBM to keep their lead. When these companies launch in countries they do so with a big marketing push. I've seen it when I was on vacation in India, you actually had TV ads for Line and WeChat.

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The one good thing is that advertising in those markets should be way cheaper than somewhere like the USA.

We shall see..

Originally Posted by Omnitech

The one good thing is that advertising in those markets should be way cheaper than somewhere like the USA.

We shall see..

Ya but BBM is not the one advertising in those markets. I have never seen a BBM Ad, but the competitors have many ads.

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Originally Posted by koolrosh

Ya but BBM is not the one advertising in those markets. I have never seen a BBM Ad, but the competitors have many ads.

Well that would be a problem then.

If they were smart (in my personal opinion), they would roll a new BBM version with stickers etc, and start running ads for both the Z3 and the new BBM when the Z3 hits the stores in April.

Indonesians are not like the rest the world they are perfectly fine with carrying more than one device and having multiple messengers.. that being said bbm is dominate by a large margin, I would say 95% of time I look at someone's smartphone screen here they are on bbm, and 5% of the time they are on PATH.

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Originally Posted by koolrosh

It's not gonna be easy for BBM to keep their lead. When these companies launch in countries they do so with a big marketing push. I've seen it when I was on vacation in India, you actually had TV ads for Line and WeChat.

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Yes, true! It's all about marketing.

Originally Posted by z10baby

Indonesians are not like the rest the world they are perfectly fine with carrying more than one device and having multiple messengers.. that being said bbm is dominate by a large margin, I would say 95% of time I look at someone's smartphone screen here they are on bbm, and 5% of the time they are on PATH.

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The news reports for the Z3 seem to very positive from Nigeria, Indonesia and India. Hope so.

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Originally Posted by Bbnivende

The news reports for the Z3 seem to very positive from Nigeria, Indonesia and India. Hope so.

Which news reports? Link?

BBM for android is not quite smooth for low end android device, thats why many potential users can't leave WA or line for BBM. Make bbm lite version with stickers the story will change.

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Originally Posted by Omnitech

Which news reports? Link?

OK maybe not very positive just not negative ...

BlackBerry's Z3 May Thrive in African Market'

Blackberry still King of Nigeria - One place in the world where they are doing something right | TechEye

BlackBerry to Sell New Z3 Smartphone for Indonesia in April - The Jakarta Globe

Originally Posted by Bbnivende

OK maybe not very positive just not negative ...

BlackBerry's Z3 May Thrive in African Market'

Blackberry still King of Nigeria - One place in the world where they are doing something right | TechEye

BlackBerry to Sell New Z3 Smartphone for Indonesia in April - The Jakarta Globe

Thanks..