Thailand 'lucky to have' pantip.com
With the arrival of Facebook and other modern social-media platforms, pantip.com, the 23-year-old Thai community website, may look a bit old but it has remained very relevant to Thai consumers and businesses.
Norasit Sitivechvichit, digital business director of Dentsu 360, told the “SME Biz Asia” conference last week a survey had found that the top factors leading Thais to make an online purchase were the need for the business to have an online store, especially on Facebook; offers such as discounts and coupons; and positive reviews on its products or services.
“Nowadays, Thai consumers, whatever they are looking to buy, will search [consumer] reviews on Pantip first,” he said.
Facebook has become an essential tool for Thai marketers considering the fact that half the population is now on the social-media site. Facebook Messenger is also the top messaging app, ahead of Line, Skype and WhatsApp.
Norasit said he recommended that small and medium-sized enterprises with limited budgets use Facebook because it is the most comprehensive platform, offering a wide range of services. These include Facebook for Business, a platform for commercial enterprises, Facebook Ads, offering many useful tools, and Facebook Insight, which offers analytics useful for marketers.
But he said SMEs that have “no budget” at all had to work hard on writing reviews of their products or services, and actively participated in community websites, especially pantip.com.
“Thailand is lucky to have Pantip,” he said, noting that businesses can use it to help drive organic ranking on websites, Facebook and search engines.
He said Thai consumers had utmost trust in what they read on pantip.com, which sometimes could significantly affect sales of some companies.
Chat like buying from friends
At a media conference hosted by Facebook last week, when asked what the social-media site could do to improve its service to business users, Vithavin Lertsaroj, co-founder of 425 Degree, an online seller of mobile-phone cases and accessories, said Thai online shoppers liked to “chat” with their merchants before making a purchase, in the same way they did when shopping at physical stores.
“Customers like it because it feels like they are talking with the real sellers at the shops. It feels like they are buying from friends,” he said.
But online merchants, if they have a lot of customers bombarding them with messages, feel it is too difficult to handle. Hence Vithavin said he wished Facebook could come up with a tool to help merchants handle their massive amounts of messages and inquiries from customers.
His 425 Degree Facebook Page now has nearly 1 million “likes”.
