Staying hyper-relevant to the Southeast Asian consumer: Hear from Axiata and Shopee

This post is sponsored by Talkwalker.

The Southeast Asian consumer looks very different today. Consumers in this region have evolved in tandem with the unforeseen changes we have seen take place in the world over the past few years. To keep up with these changes, brands – now living in the “age of the consumer” – need to put consumers at the centre of everything they do.

However, a multitude of challenges stand in the way when it comes to staying relevant to their audiences. In this article, we look at some of the ways to overcome these challenges with the right data-driven strategies, as well as share some of the ways leading brands in the region, Axiata and Shopee, have successfully driven a hyper-relevant consumer strategy in Southeast Asia.

In staying consumer-centric, brands must overcome an array of challenges, some of which are more pressing than others.

• Changing consumer preferences.
• Higher consumer expectations.
• Heightened competition.
• Complex consumer journeys.
• Unique trends and expectations across Southeast Asian markets.

To address the challenges above, brands need to first understand their consumers. They need to develop their audience’s emotional connection to the brand, and engage them in ways that are best suited to their needs.

Decoding the consumer chatter

The Southeast Asian consumer today is more connected than ever before, driving millions of conversations across multiple digital platforms. To understand what consumers are really saying, brands need to make sense of the data. They need to derive actionable insights from these conversations. This can be done with the right consumer intelligence tool that will analyse the chatter, and identify the patterns and trends brands need to be aware of to anticipate their consumers’ next step. 

The various sources of consumer data that brands need to decode

How Axiata drives customer centricity and engagement

Leading telco provider Axiata has long understood that online audiences today are strongly opinionated, and that they have the power to influence the reputation of the brand.

To effectively manage this, Axiata actively uses consumer intelligence data to understand and measure the sentiments of its different target groups towards its brands through qualitative and quantitative insights. Today, the Axiata Group works with Talkwalker to measure and manage the online reputation of the digital telco’s brands.

By implementing a custom metric digital reputation score (DRS), Axiata is able to monitor the reputation of the different brands under the group. For Axiata, its DRS measurement places great emphasis on positive scores. By examining the impact of each component in contributing to positive scores, Axiata is able to identify the exact campaign, activity or theme that struck a positive note with its audiences.

These insights help to inspire and inform the brand’s social media and PR strategy. With the right sentiment analysis tools, the brand ensures its activities are strongly rooted in the needs of its consumers.

Power of personalisation

A survey conducted by McKinsey in 2021 revealed that 71% of consumers expect companies to deliver personalised experiences. They want brands to tailor the customer experience to meet their individual needs. For this to be done effectively, brands need to truly understand what their consumers care about, and build their personalisation strategy around consumer insights.

How Shopee creates a hyperlocal and personalised customer experience

Shopee ensures users in all its markets constantly enjoy relevant and personalised shopping experiences. According to Huiyan Pan, regional marketing lead at Shopee, during the 3.15 Consumer Day campaign, which was all about celebrating users, the brand used Talkwalker to surprise some of its fans.

As the theme for the event was “Shopee Celebrates You”, the brand decided to drive a social-led campaign to engage users and create buzz around the first mega sale of the year.

Campaign banner for Shopee’s 3.15 Consumer Day

With Talkwalker’s technology, Shopee dived into understanding its consumers, and unearthing the most positive conversations around its campaigns. Through Talkwalker dashboards, Shopee was able to monitor organic conversations around the brand all across social media. This gave Shopee insights into the positive experiences users had with the brand, allowing it to identify top Shopee fans and even casual shoppers who were talking about the brand.

Beyond the 3.15 Consumer Day, Shopee also regularly uses Talkwalker to help improve the Shopee experience. For instance, Shopee uses social listening to identify conversations around its in-app games. Through these various data-driven initiatives, Shopee is able to stay relevant and engaged with the Southeast Asian audience by putting the human element in all that it does.

The examples from Shopee and Axiata give us a clear picture of how leveraging the right data, coupled with the right techniques, help the two leading brands ensure customer centricity in their activities. To stay close to audiences in Southeast Asia, brands need to master three important elements – data, technology, and people. They also need to derive actionable insights from real-time data, and use these insights to put the human element in all of their decisions.

For more insights into how you can decode the connected Southeast Asian consumer with the right data, click here to download the white paper that was jointly developed by Talkwalker and Marketing Interactive.