Burson-Marsteller Study Finds Huge Missed Opportunity For Country Promotion On Twitter
Countries have started to realize the true potential of social media. They have understood the power of 'branding' and are using social media tools like Twitter for promotion across the globe.
- (1888PressRelease) December 05, 2012 - Geneva - Burson-Marsteller, a leading global public relations and communications firm, today released the second part of its "Twiplomacy" study (http://twiplomacy.com), looking specifically at country branding on Twitter. The study shows that only 9 governments out of 193 UN member states own their country name Twitter handle.
Interestingly the ( @ ) India account is owned by an Indian person living in Guangzhou, China dot The account owner shares pictures from his daily life and has made it clear that his Twitter handle is not for sale dot With respect to other social media channels, India is one of just 19 YouTube channels owned by the tourism office dot
The accounts of ( @ ) GreatBritain, ( @ ) Israel, and ( @ ) Sweden are the most significant examples of country promotion on Twitter dot ( @ ) GreatBritain is part of the 'Britain is Great' campaign launched in March 2012 to highlight everything that is great about the United Kingdom dot
( @ ) Israel is the country's official Twitter channel, maintained by the Foreign Ministry's Digital Diplomacy Team. The account is one of the most followed country accounts with more than 66,000 followers and serves as the focal point for Israel's government Twitter activity.
The Twitter accounts of ( @ ) AntiguaBarbuda, @Barbados, @Lithuania, the @Maldives, @SouthAfrica, and @Spain are run by their respective official tourism organisations to promote tourism in each country.
However, three out of five country accounts are either protected, dormant, inactive, or suspended and almost half of the 71 remaining active accounts are tweeting an automated news feed broadcasting news about the country.
"Looking at the findings it becomes clear that few governments and tourism organizations have understood the power of country branding and marketing on Twitter," said Matthias Lüfkens, head of the Burson-Marsteller EMEA Digital Practice.
"There is a huge opportunity for countries to use Twitter as part of their communications to engage with a large and growing audience."
Data used was taken in November 2012 looking at the Twitter handles of the 193 UN member countries. Burson-Marsteller used Twitonomy (http://twitonomy.com) to analyze tweeting patterns and the Twitter history of each account.
To access the complete analysis of these findings, visit: http://twiplomacy.com/country-promotion.
About Burson-Marsteller:
Burson-Marsteller, established in 1953, is a leading global public relations and communications firm. It provides clients with strategic thinking and program execution across a full range of public relations, public affairs, reputation and crisis management, advertising and digital strategies. The firm's seamless worldwide network consists of 73 offices and 83 affiliate offices, together operating in 108 countries across six continents. Burson-Marsteller is a unit of WPP, the world's leading communications services network. For more information, please visit bm.com.
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