Google has invited advertisers to advertise on Orkut via its blog and also announced a dedicated page for advertisers to know why to advertise one orkut. The only two dedicated pages of geographies for advertising are Brazil and India and there is a generic page for the rest of the world. This shows that India is among the top two advertising markets for orkut and given the growth in digital advertising it probably is the no.1 market. Also the recent launch of a mobile downloadable app for most java phones also points at the growing importance of Indian users and the need to serve the next generation of users whose first access point could very well be the mobile.
Here are the statistics disclosed by orkut regarding its Indian userbase for advertisers:
- 13 million active Indians
- 5 billion page views from India
- Average user visits site 10 times a month and spends 13 minutes per visit
- Over 53% of the audience is under 25 years of age while 31% is between the age group of 25 -34 years
- Almost 80% of the audience is male and 20 % is female
Google has also moved the ad unit up across all the profiles which gives better visibility to ads on orkut.
All in all it seems google is ready and raring to monetize its social networking site which has a huge userbase in India. Shailesh Rao – Google MD had stated earlier in an article that 2009 would be the year when they would monetize their social media presence.
Options for Large and Smaller advertisers
Google is inviting both large and smaller advertisers. While the smaller advertisers are being routed through google’s adwords model larger advertisers would be provided with customized solutions. Google had launched the advertise via adwords model way back in 2006 itself so the adwords model isn’t new to orkut. But the effort taken by google this time around seems a serious one.
Orkut Monetization – would be watched closely by one and all
Orkut monetization and its result would be important for one and all as its by far the largest social network in India. This is the first time google is opening directly to advertisers and offering customized solutions. The success or failure to best monetize orkut will be a case study for other social networks like BigAdda, Ibibo, Indyarocks and even Facebook and Myspace India. Advertisers would also watch the results and impact on their brand when using the orkut platform. Their verdict on orkut would set a benchmark for other social networks and the response they get from advertisers.
