Business Value with Social Media

Research on OnePlus

Submitted to:
Prof. Mukund Prasad

Submitted by:
Raghav Rawat
A051
Group 7

1
 Table of Contents

1. About the Industry .................................................................................................................... 3

2. About the Company .................................................................................................................. 5

3. Social Media Strategy of OnePlus ............................................................................................. 6

4. Business Value with Social Media for OnePlus ...................................................................... 7

How Social Media is Vital for OnePlus ................................................................................... 7

What Social Media Tools do OnePlus use .............................................................................. 8

How Social Media adds Value to the Company …………………………………………...…………………..9

How Social Media Effectiveness is measured for OnePlus ..…………………………...……………….10

Parameters that Customers look on Social Media before Buying a Mobile Phone …..........11

5. Conclusion .………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...….12

6. References …....…………………………………………………………………………………………….....………......13

2
 About the Industry
India is the world’s second largest mobile phone market by volume, after China. The
smartphone market grew by 14.5 per cent year-on-year with a shipment of 142.3 million units
in 2018. In 2019, India is expected to manufacture around 302 million handsets.

While the introduction of feature phones in the country during the last decade of the 20th
century found good penetration, introduction of smartphones galvanized the market further.
India is expected to have 829 million smartphone users by 2022. With the growth in Internet
services, smartphones became popular amongst the urban/Internet savvy population.

India’s demographic profile has undergone a characteristic evolution, which is highly

beneficial to the mobile phone adoption. Gen Y, the working-age population, working women,
and rising income level of the great Indian middle class have evolved to be the most influential
segments of the population triggering new social, technological, and economic trends.
Urbanization will also affect the market such that 64% of the total Indian population will be
urbanized by 2025, and cities will account for 70% of India’s GDP in 2030. This in turn will
fuel the growth for the smartphone market.

The intense competition among the mobile phone manufacturers is driving down the price of
mobile phones, which is helping in increased penetration across the country. The intense
competition among the mobile companies with several initiatives such as bundled offers,
discounts and aggressive pricing is substantially driving growth. With increasing network
infrastructure development and rising use of wireless technologies such as 3G and 4G, the
overall Internet user base in India is expected to be around 600 million users in 2020,

3
accounting for 27% penetration. Considering the rising demand, the market doesn’t seem to
slow down in the years to come. It is projected that mobile phone manufacturing will grow at
a CAGR of 48.4% between 2017 and 2025 and also potentially make India a net exporter of
mobile handsets thereafter.

4
 About the Company

Launched in 2014, OnePlus today is one of the most influential smartphone brand in the
global tech industry. The company is owned by BBK Electronics, which also owns popular
brands such as Oppo and Vivo. Since its debut, OnePlus had grabbed the headlines for
delivering smartphones with flagship specifications at significantly lower prices than that of
its rivals. The co-founders of OnePlus Peter Lau (Lau) and Pei emphasized the “Never Settle”
motto of OnePlus, which aimed at providing the best possible technology to users globally by
creating elegantly designed devices with premium build quality and high performance
hardware.

The business model of OnePlus was built around razor-thin margins. The company initially
employed an unconventional invite-only system that limited buyers to those who had
received an invite from the company directly or from someone who had already purchased
the device, thereby generating brand equity at a much higher pace.

OnePlus came in India in December 2014 with their OnePlus One, which became a huge
success given its best-in-class features at an affordable rate. Since then, their revenue graph
shows only increasing trend and have never looked back. As of 2017, their revenue stood at
$1.4 billion worldwide. Today, OnePlus has become one of the top smartphone brand in the
premium phone category in India. For 3 quarters consecutively in 2018-19, OnePlus was the
top selling brand, followed by Samsung. Moreover, the company currently has the best
customer service as compared to its competitors in this segment.

Shenzhen, China based OnePlus is also going to diversify in the Smart TV segment in the late
2019, where Xiaomi maintains the top position.

5
 Social Media Strategy of OnePlus

OnePlus marketers use the Lean Startup Methodology (Build > Measure > Learn). This kind
of approach allows the campaign to adapt to the market. It involves quick implementation,
examination and adjustment. A genius move on the part of the company was to discard
traditional advertising at the time of launch. The idea was to restrict expenditure on advertising
in order to give customers a cost benefit.

The growing tech-tuned community of the world gave OnePlus just the opportunity it needed
to gain traction. The community platform allowed the company to understand, analyse and
work on user’s reviews and feedback about their products. Not only this, it also became the
way for OnePlus to identify the new trends following in the market, on which the company
could easily work on and offer the best of experience at a much lower price as compared to its
competitors, i.e. Samsung and Apple.

OnePlus has managed to keep it creative in terms of marketing campaigns, which has also
given them a competitive edge. Many of their marketing campaigns are also creatively
executed to engage their audience. One of their campaigns on Instagram involved their users
to create something that has ‘6T’ in it. One of their responses is shown below.

6
 Business Value with Social Media for OnePlus

How Social Media is Vital for OnePlus

If said correctly, OnePlus today is in existence because of its excellent social media strategies.
Back in 2014 when the company started, it focused on social media platforms to promote their
product which was being sold on an invite basis. Coupled with exclusivity and social media
push helped the brand to gain the market share swiftly, in a matter of months. At the initial
stage, OnePlus showcased its product as an outcome based on customer feedback. This helped
the company to set the right brand image in the minds of the people.

It’s been five years since the company was launched and today, OnePlus has a robust network
on social media which helps them to maintain its brand presence and recognition. Social media
helps them to understand user’s requirements and needs. For example, at the time when
Samsung and Apple were introducing IP ratings and wireless charging for their phones,
OnePlus decided not to go for it as they found that it’s not adding much value to the user’s
experience. They understood this with the help of their social media network in terms of
feedback and surveys. In contrast of what other companies were doing, OnePlus launched their
Dash Charging technology as they found that battery is more crucial aspect for their customers.
By following this mechanism over the time, OnePlus transformed itself into the market leaders
of the premium smartphone category.

The company take their social media network very seriously and due to which it maintains
numerous social media pages, so that they can cater to different countries and their cultures.
Even in India, OnePlus maintains different groups on Facebook which are differentiated
according to the states such that they can penetrate the market even more.

Overall, social media presence has helped OnePlus to evolve into a prominent brand within a
time span of five years.

7
What Social Media Tools do OnePlus use

The different social media tools that OnePlus use are as follows:

1. Community: OnePlus maintains its community platform where users share their ideas
and feedback to the company based on their perception and experience. It is the most
useful tool for OnePlus.

2. Social Networking Sites: Popular websites such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn,

etc. are used by OnePlus to maintain its brand presence among people. It’s also a
medium for the company where it forms groups organize photoshoot drives or various
campaigns.

3. Multimedia: OnePlus also uses YouTube to post videos of their events and campaigns.

4. Micro-blogging Sites: The company is also active on Twitter where users can post
their concerns to them.

5. Review Sites: Websites such as The Verge, GSM Arena, etc. provide their review
about the products of OnePlus which help the company to spread the brand equity in a
much better way.

6. Search Engines: Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc. provide organic user traffic to the company
which help in generating leads. Also, their analytics tools help them to build strategies
for a much deeper penetration amongst customers.

8
How Social Media adds Value to the Company

Mainly there are four ways how social media adds value to the company and its strategies.
It’s crucial to understand and evaluate all the four ways so that better decision making can be
done.

1. Research: OnePlus extract the most out of social media by conducting regular research
on its community and social media platforms. It posts various feedback forms, surveys,
etc. and allows users to provide their own reviews based on their experience, which
ultimately the company evaluates to analyse the scope of improvements in its products.

2. Marketing: As it is evident that more number of people are using internet every day,
it has become a need for the companies to promote themselves and their products over
the internet. Keeping pace with the trend, OnePlus also promote itself on the social
media platforms to maintain its position. It also promotes different channels where the
product is available so that customers can be facilitated with ease.

3. Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Social media platforms are not only
used just for the promotion purposes but also for addressing the concerns of the
audience. OnePlus has maintained a separate page on different social media platforms
where it addresses the concerns of people and provide solutions to their queries. This
ensures two-way communication between the company and the people, thereby
ensuring brand presence.

4. Transaction: Along with marketing, OnePlus induces its audience to purchase its
products. This is done with the help of offers, promotions, discounts, etc. which attracts
potential buyers. In addition to this, the company also organizes various engagement
activities such as contests in which it provides goodies to the people so as to reward
their loyal fan base.

9
How Social Media Effectiveness is measured for OnePlus

As it is described that social media plays an important role for OnePlus, it is also significant to
understand whether the company’s efforts are giving back fruitful results or not. This is done
with the help of various tools that are available on the internet. Google Analytics, Facebook
Analytics, and Twitter Analytics are mainly used by the company to understand the customer
viewpoints and feedbacks so that future actions can be taken. Keywords, hashtags, perceptions,
etc. are deeply analysed such that prompt corrective action can be taken, if required. Any fault
or wrongdoing from the company’s side can ruin the hard-made reputation within days, and
therefore the audience viewpoints are thoroughly evaluated.

10
Parameters that Customers look on social media before Buying a
Mobile Phone

There are various parameters that are considered by the people before buying a mobile phone.
With the help of the internet, it has become easier for people to know the general feedback of
any product. It happens in this case as well.

People look for the following things on social media before finalising their buying decision:

1. User reviews on Facebook, Instagram, etc.

2. Expert reviews on social media handles run by popular websites (The Verge, Android
Authority, etc.)
3. Expert reviews on multimedia websites such as YouTube
4. Intensity of buzz around social media for the product
5. Product experiences share by people
6. Any associated articles/blogs with the product

11
 Conclusion

The future of OnePlus seems bright in smartphone industry as in five years of existence,
OnePlus has strengthened its brand equity more briskly than any other competitor. Rising
income level of middle class, growing awareness about the brand, and consistency of quality
will contribute to the company’s success in the future. The challenge for OnePlus is that other
competitor like Xiaomi has also developed its community and currently it is larger than that of
OnePlus. While moving towards wider reach and larger customer base, it also needs to look at
the potential threats which can act as a stumbling block for the future. It’ll be interesting to see
the company growing and diversifying into different segments, and its effect on social media.
The question which will remain, is that how company is going to manage and handle such a
large fan base at the time when it’s trying to enter the turf of the segment leaders, i.e. Samsung
and Apple.

12
 References

https://www.ibef.org/research/india-study/india-emerging-as-a-mobile-phone-manufacturing-hub

https://craftinggenius.in/oneplus-digital-marketing-strategy/

http://www.socialsamosa.com/2018/08/oneplus-marketing-strategy/

https://www.gsmaintelligence.com/research/?file=8535289e1005eb248a54069d82ceb824&downlo
ad

13