A few weeks ago, there was some crazy news about the Malaysian Tourism Ministry spending RM1.8million (approx. US$600,000) on their Facebook Page – Cuti Cuti 1 Malaysia. Which inspired me to write a post suggesting 3 ways Tourism Malaysia can maximize their social media investment.

This week, the Ministry released a statement to clarify that the total amount spent was for 6 Pages and the development of  their apps, not just that 1 page.

  • Citrawarna 1Malaysia (no confirmation if it’s the official page)
  • 1Malaysia Malaysia Mega Sale/Malaysia Year End Sale
  • Cuti-Cuti 1Malaysia (link as seen above)
  • 1Malaysia Contemporary Art Tourism contest
  • 1Malaysia Green and Clean Campaign
  • Fabulous Food 1Malaysia

Unfortunately, I could not find links to the remaining Pages. Why do we need 6 separate Pages – I have no idea. But I digress.

You see, I believe that you should be paid what you’re worth. And in this industry, there are tons of high quality agencies and individuals out there who would be able to add immense value to this project. So if the Malaysian Tourism Ministry has to pay for quality, I totally get it, and will support it.

But my problem (and I think everyone else’s problem really) is that we do not see quality.

As a Malaysian taxpayer, I’m wondering where that RM1.8 million went to – and for what. I’m also wondering which agency is responsible for the management and who’s responsible for the target-setting.

But this isn’t a political bashing post.

I believe there are 3 basic social media rules. Super, duper, duper basic ones. So far, Tourism Malaysia has not played by these rules.

#1. Success ≠ Number of Fans

The media statement from the ministry’s Facebook Page states:

The success of a digital campaign is reflected in the number of fans joining the Fanpage. We have been very successful in the first campaign i.e the Citrawarna 2011 which has todate,  recorded  24, 736 fans, thereby providing Tourism Malaysia with 24, 736 potential tourists; all these gotten within four (4) weeks only.

I don’t expect the Malaysian Tourism Ministry to be social media experts. But the agency they paid RM1.8million to should be knowledgeable enough to know that that sentence is crazy wrong.

Success is not the number of people who Like your Page, or play your game. That’s a shallow measurement. Success is how engaged these people are. Success is the quality of information you provide them. Success is Tourism Malaysia’s website, or Facebook Page being the most reliable site on the Internet for all things Malaysia. Certainly not the number of fans on the page.

I can safely say that a hefty chunk of Tourism Malaysia 26,000+ fans (as of 15 June 2011), have clicked “Like” just to ridicule / mock / express their objections. I highly doubt they’re real “fans”.

#2. Measurable KPIs

As mentioned in the media statement, these are their KPIs.

  1. An average of 20,000 fans per campaign
  2. Minimum 120,000 fans by the end of December 2011
  3. To increase traffic and encourage domestic and international tourism
  4. To act as a promotional tool to disseminate information for Tourism Malaysia, Ministry of Tourism and Government.
  5. Tourism Malaysia and the Ministry of Tourism will be able to communicate directly with at least 120,000 fans (Malaysians and foreigners) by the end of the year through the Fanpage and Database compiled from the applications.

I have to agree with the GreyReview on this – 120,000 fans by Dec 2011 (for a total of 6 Pages) with that large budget, is highly uninspiring. I mean, my team and I grew the FinerMinds Fan Page from 2K – 22K in a few months – with zero ad budget, and no fancy schmancy flash applications. For a website that has 250,000 subscribers, not a country with 11,164,840 people on Facebook (taken from Facebook Ad data).

So yes, I agree with the GreyReview – 20,000 fans per Page is crazy lame.

But again, I digress. My focus should really be on the following KPI:

To increase traffic and encourage domestic and international tourism

How does our Ministry and their agency plan on measuring this?

That’s a goal, not a KPI. Their KPIs should be about measuring their engagement – how many times were their links clicked? How many people are talking about their campaign – not just on Facebook, but all over the web? How many times their content has been shared?

Those are actual performance indicators.

#3. Engagement Is Not Just Talking – It’s Asking & Listening

A brief overview of the Page shows a lot of talking on the Page admins’ part, and not enough interaction. Instead of asking for experiences, pictures, or questions, all we see is Tourism Malaysia talking. And who wants to listen, really?

To top it all off – comments from fans have been disabled.

//

And I haven’t even gotten into the decently designed, but completely user-unfriendly (and unshare-able) websites that the agencies have cooked up for the ministry.

If you were wondering which agencies have contracts with Tourism Malaysia for 2011-2013, ADOI magazine published this some time ago. They’re:

1)        Naga DDB Sdn Bhd                              (ASEAN)
2)        Smascom & Designs Sdn Bhd        (North & East Asia)
3)        Sen Media Sdn Bhd                            (South Asia, West Asia & Africa)
4)        M & C Saatchi Sdn Bhd                      (Europe, America, Oceania)
5)        Impact Creations (M) Sdn Bhd        (Domestic & Events)

I don’t think the money invested in social media is bad, or wrong, at all. I think it’s quite fair. After all, it’s only 6% of the total Tourism marketing budget. I just think we’re not getting our money’s worth, and the campaign is (so far) not optimized sufficiently to bring about actual results.

Do you think RM1.8million (or US$600K) is unreasonable for this?