Facebook remains top social-media platform for APAC marketers: report

Source: Meltwater's State of Social Media 2023 report is based on a survey of 1,700 global marketing and communications professionals.

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• Five of the most used social media channels in APAC are a long way ahead of the rest: Facebook (87%), LinkedIn (81%), Instagram (81%), YouTube (67%) and Twitter (50%).

• But TikTok, in sixth place (29%), is rapidly growing (globally 30% vs 16% in 2021), with nearly half (41%) of organisations across APAC planning on introducing it to their marketing mix in 2023.

• Globally the top five are: Facebook (90%), LinkedIn (88%), Instagram (85%), YouTube (69%), and Twitter (67%).

• Branding remains the primary reason for using social media, with the majority of marketers (79%) using social to "raise brand awareness" and (71%) to "increase brand engagement". This was followed by acquiring new customers (53%) and increasing web traffic (46%), with only 36% using social to directly increase sales, and only 19% to increase customer satisfaction.

• Measuring social media marketing performance also continues to be a top challenge for marketers, with over half (56%) of APAC marketers stating that "measuring the impact/ROI of social media" was the biggest social media marketing challenge, with 40% struggling to "prove the value of social media". This was also reflected by ‘revenue generated’ being the lowest used metric by marketers (21%), suggesting marketers are still finding it challenging to directly link social spend to the bottom line.

• The top three social media metrics for APAC marketers are social media engagement (82%), web traffic (64%) and social media followers (63%).

• Social listening is also on the rise with 42% currently running a social listening program, and another 15% planning to do so in 2023—with the goal to gain a better understanding of audiences and target groups (64%).

• While influencer marketing has been growing steadily, the report found less than half of marketers (39%) currently use influencers, and a further 16% are planning to do so.

• Most APAC marketers (72%) also see organic social playing a more important role in driving business and marketing strategy in 2023, and 60% see paid social playing a more important role.

• 77% plan to maintain or increase social budgets in 2023, with 60% saying that the current economic development has led to social media being perceived as more important by their organisation.