Wednesday, July 01, 2009

Google Android in iPhone territory

TCG researchers took a close look at the launch of the first Android phone last year as a sample case of using social media as a market research tool. The results are now up as a white paper: "Surviving
 in 
iPhone 
Territory" (warning PDF direct download link).

Our team examined 93,228 relevant & unique posts referencing the first Android phone, the G1, on English language blogs. This sounds like a lot but it was vastly overshadowed by ongoing conversation about Apple's iPhone.

There are some important lessons here for what companies need to do when they participate in social media, especially when a competitor's brand is already dominant in the conversation. Despite the size of Google and their relative sophistication, this is not a story of social media success.

This is also a great example of the kind of work The Conversation Group does for its clients. When we do a report like this for a paying client, we can't share it publicly. This report was done specifically so that we could share an example of our work. Let me know what you think!