Nokia launched its Lumia 925 phone along with a social marketing campaign dubbed “See More Thailand” yesterday in Thailand. The Nokia Lumia 925 runs on Windows Phone 8 and is known for its 8.7 megapixel PureView camera with six Carl Zeiss lenses, which supposedly helps users take better photos.
Although Thailand’s smartphone market has skyrocketed this year with a record of almost three million smartphones sold in just the first four months of this year, Samsung claims the top spot in the country (along with other eight neighboring markets: ສິງກະໂປ, mainland China, ປະເທດອິນເດຍ, ເກົາຫລີໃຕ້, ກົງຮົງ, ມາເລເຊຍ, and Indonesia). Nokia, on the other hand, is in for a struggle as it sold only 20.2M phones across Asia-Pacific in Q2.
With that in mind, Nokia did its homework and came up with a campaign that may help the company boost sales in Thailand. Partnering with the Tourism Authority of Thailand, Nokia invites users to take photos of Thailand from their phones (any brand) to show their different perspectives as part of the See More Thailand campaign.
I think it’s quite a smart move that could help put Nokia back in the minds of Thai people again. Not only is Bangkok the world’s number one tourist destination right now, but Thai people love taking pictures! How do I know this? Well, I’m not ready to disclose how many photos I have saved on my phone, tablets, and computer right now, nor how many of those are selfies. But here’s some more quantitative data: the number one and two most-Instagrammed places in the world in 2012 are both in Bangkok. ຍິ່ງໄປກວ່ານັ້ນ, three Bangkok locations also made Instagram’s Top 15 for the year 2011.
Maybe, it’s not only us Thais who love taking pictures. JinnyboyTv once made a popular video making fun of how Asians take pictures of everything, especially food and selfies, everywhere they go. Talking about understanding the culture in different markets, I think this time the Finnish company has gotten right through to the heart of Thai people. Now we’ll see if the photo-friendly focus can actually help the company accelerate its sales.
(Editing by Charlie Custer, Anh-Minh Do, and Steven Millward)