HOW INDONESIAN

JOURNALISTS USE
SOCIAL MEDIA

And how it can affect traditional media coverage. This is the This  needs  a  
first research of its kind in Indonesia exploring the date  to  be  
technographics of Indonesian journalists inserted  

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 FOREWORD
Some of the questions our clients ask during our social
media workshops are “How important is social media
compared to conventional ones (newspapers, TV,
radio)?”, “Does social media change anything in our
relationships with conventional media?” and “When
do I have to take social media seriously.”
We used to answer based on our observations and
anecdotal evidence that social media has become too
pervasive and popular, at least among Indonesia’s
chattering classes, to ignore. We observed that most
journalists seemed to be on Twitter and Facebook ;
that some of them have become celebrity Twitterers
with followers rivaling the circulation of Kompas, the
nation’s largest circulating daily.
“But do you have numbers?” the clients will ask. “What
about the majority of journalists? Do they blog? Do
they have Twitter or Facebook accounts?
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How many of them are actually influenced by what
goes on in social media?”
Good questions. But no-one in Indonesia has these
numbers. So we decided to take the guesswork out of
what we see as an important area of communications
– how journalists consume social media – and worked
with The London School of Public Relations Jakarta’s
Research Center to conduct Indonesia’s first ever
technographics survey of Indonesian journalists.
Together we polled 321 respondents, ranging from
journalists, photojournalists, and editors from 141
media in Indonesia, from June to September 2010.
The result is this document that you’re about to read
just now – and yes, social media affects your business
more than most people realize.
 ONG HOCK CHUAN, Technical Advisor, Maverick.
 9 out of 10 journalists have
Facebook accounts.
- Maverick-LSPR Indonesian Journalists Technographic Survey, 2010 -
1. MEDIA RELATIONS HAS CHANGED. NOW, IT’S ABOUT MAFIA WARS.
“Asking a journalist out for lunch or coffee is so last
year. Social media has changed the way we do media
relations,” said Adwi Yudiansyah (or Awie), our
consultant who heads Maverick’s media relations
team. Though he still engages journalists in face-to-
face meetings, he has supplemented his efforts with a
more entertaining way of conducting media relations
from his office desk. He plays Mafia Wars and
FarmVille with his journalist friends on Facebook.
“Now, the so-called ‘relations’ have become more
personal, thanks to social media,” says Awie. “These
days you make friends with journalists on Facebook,
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and you may discover that they share a love for
playing Mafia Wars or FarmVille, and the next thing
you know, you’re buddies because you’ve fought, or
farmed, together in the virtual ‘hood’. ”
Social media makes it easier for you to connect; to
know where your passion and the journalists’ passion
intersect. Then the relationship you build becomes
even more authentic. You’re connected because you
love the same thing. It’s no longer about work alone.
“It’s a truer relationship when it’s based on common
likes rather than just a professional use-and-be-used
maxim,” says Awie.
 Social networks like
Things that you Things that the Facebook enable you to
find out whether you and
your journalist friends
like journos like share the same interests,
like watching the same
kind of movies, follow the
same sports or being a
member of the same
group on the Net.

Social networks like Facebook or micro-blogging services
like Twitter actually make it easier for you to keep an up-
to-date database of journalists.
If you are “friends” with the journalists, you’ll have
ready access to comprehensive information about
them that goes beyond their birthdays, beats and
number of children. You can see what they like,
what they’re passionate about, issues they are
interested in, things they find worthy enough to be
shared with others on their network, products
they’re using, people they’re friends with, and
much more.
The question is: are you there with them? Are you
on Facebook? Are you on Twitter? Are you friends
with them? Do the journalists follow you on
Twitter? Do you even know the journalists’ Twitter
account?
“It’s always surprising to know that some corporate
PR people proudly say that they don’t want to be
on Facebook,” says Awie. “I think a good PR
practitioner has to keep up with what’s going on in
the industry. They have to be in those channels
where people communicate.”

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 More than a half of Indonesian
journalists have Twitter accounts
- Maverick-LSPR Indonesian Journalists Technographic Survey, 2010 -

2. CONVERSATION HAS CHANGED. IT’S ABOUT BEING RELEVANT, NOT ABOUT BEING NOISY.

Make meaning, not buzz. This is what Lois Kelly said
in her book Beyond Buzz. And it’s true. Look at the
number of journalists who are on Twitter right now.
Two simple questions for corporations/businesses
who are on Twitter: Do you know what other people
are saying about you on Twitter? Are you seeing the
same stream of information that the journalists are
seeing?
“Being on Twitter is not only about throwing quizzes
and having online competitions,” says Hanny
Kusumawati, who heads Maverick’s New Media
Division that helps clients communicate and market
themselves using Social Media.
“You’ve got to be relevant to your audience as well.
It’s not only about how many followers you have or
how many hashtags you can get in a week.
“It’s also about how many complaints you have
answered, how many questions you have addressed,
how many product/service-related issues you have
commented upon, how many inputs you can get
from your customers and about knowing who are
your true ambassadors out there.”
“It’s all about having a conversation with your
audience, not blasting them with traditional
marketing messages using Social Media.”

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 Knowing how fast information travels, especially on
Twitter, corporations and businesses need to keep
up with the speed and stay alert. You can no longer
“be there” only to tweet your promotional messages
and ignoring the rest. Answering Twitter complaints
and settling it in 5 minutes directly with the
customer can save you from a Twitter hashtag
campaign initiated by an angry customer that can
then spill over to conventional media; especially
news portals. It will make all the difference.
Why? Because...

9 out of 10 journalists rely on the

Internet to find news stories.

Apart from visiting news portals,

72% of our journalists monitor and
seek information through social
networks.
- Maverick-LSPR Indonesian Journalists Technographic Survey, 2010 -

.
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 3. WHAT’S SAID ABOUT YOU ON THE NET INFLUENCES JOURNALISTS. ARE YOU LISTENING?

Our survey indicates that most journalists not only keep While traditional media monitoring is still essential
an eye on the Net for news; about half of them then go on you now need to know the conversation threads
to verify the stories on the Net. about your company and reactions to your initiatives.

Like it or not, the Net now shapes their sense of what’s
news and the corroborating evidence of the veracity of
these news items.
This being the case, would it not make sense for businesses
to at least find out what’s being said about them on the
Net? What people are saying about you on
But you have to go about it intelligently as there’s a
lot of rubbish on the Net. You need to analyze the
threads of conversation and get a sense of whether
the people talking about you really matter or can be
ignored. This goes beyond a search for keywords and
a tallying up of hashtags.

Facebook, Twitter and other Social Media platforms are

shaping journalist’s perception of your company.

Only 5 out of 10 journalists verify

the stories they got from the
Internet.
- Maverick-LSPR Indonesian Journalists Technographic Survey, 2010 -

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 It’s about seeing what are the top complaints about
your product/services and who’s the person
complaining (are they influential in your industry or
line of business, or is he an editor in a respected
publication?). It’s about knowing who are your real
brand ambassadors, people who’ve been using
your products/services, and happy enough to share
it with their networks. It’s about knowing how they
compare you with your competitors. It’s about how
you can map your target audience and listen to
what they’re talking about, what kind of
information they are sharing with others, what are
the trends in their conversation with the rest of the
group?

Knowing that journalists

are now relying on the
Internet to find stories,
Your offline Your online and the fact that only half
of them verify the
reputation reputation information they receive
from the Net, you need to
guard your online
reputation as well. Your
offline and online
reputation could be really
different.

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 7 out of 10 journalists get their
story ideas from the Internet.
- Maverick-LSPR Indonesian Journalists Technographic Survey, 2010 -

4. MEDIA ENGAGEMENT HAS CHANGED. IT’S ABOUT BEING RESPONSIVE AND RESOURCEFUL.

The numbers above should give us a hint on what we
need to do when it comes to feed journalists with
story ideas. It’s no longer about holding a press
conference or giving out press releases. Rather, it’s
about being responsive and resourceful. When you
have befriended the journalists online, you’ll know
things they are interested in. The kind of stories they
are looking for. Questions they posted in their
timeline. Will you be able to help them and offer
relevant information?
When they’re asking about your product, how fast can
you respond to it---and put an effort so the journalists
can review your product? When they need
information related to your industry, could you
contact them and assign your spokesperson to say
something? How responsive and resourceful are you
to address journalists’ needs in getting information,
online?
Another way of looking at it: do you have a certain
campaign or stories about you, your product, or your
activities running online? What’s the chance to get
these stories out to the journalists’ timeline or their
Facebook homepages?

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 INDONESIAN JOURNALISTS’ TECHNOGRAPHIC* LADDER
How they stack up – How Indonesian journalists use the Net?

CREATORS 1 Publish a blog 70.3% (180)

2 Publish your own web pages 23.3% (56)
3 Upload video you created 3.9% (10)
4 Upload video/music you created 5.2% (14)
5 Write articles or stories and post them 5.7% (15)

CRITICS 6 Post ratings/reviews of products or services 3.6% (9)

7 Comment on someone else’s blog 9.6% (25)
8 Contribute to online forums 32.1% (84)
9 Contribute to/edit articles at Wiki 2.4% (6)

COLLECTORS 10 Use RSS feeds 7.9% (19)

11 Vote for websites online 10.6% (28)
    12 Add tags to web pages/photos 4.1% (10)

JOINERS 13 Maintain profile in social networking sites 26.4% (71)

14 Visit social networking sites 72.1% (196)

SPECTATORS 15 Read blogs 48.9% (133)

16 Watch videos from other users 21.5% (56)
17 Read online forums 42.3% (112)
18 Read customer ratings/reviews 24.3% (62)
19 Read friends status 46.5% (121)

INACTIVES 20 Not using any social technologies 0

Note:
2-19: calculated on a daily basis
20: the research is conducted online

* Technographics is a term coined by Charlene Li of Forester Research to make sense of how people use and consume information from the Net

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