BuddyMedia just competed some new research on social media in the Asia-Pacific region titled, “The State of Social Media Marketing in Asia-Pacific“. Ken Mandel of BuddyMedia will be sharing the results at the 2012 Ad:Tech Singapore conference, but he decided to share some of the highlights with us first on their blog site.

Take a look at what they found:

Mandel comments on the results of the the study:

It doesn’t surprise me that Facebook, Twitter and YouTube were the most widely used social networks in the region. The three have established themselves as dominant platforms across the world. But it was certainly interesting to see Pinterest cited more often that Google+, and serves to further show the rapid growth that the young social network continues to show.

Though two-thirds of respondents currently spend less than 5% of their ad budgets on social media, that number is expected to drop to just 26% in two years’ time. Additionally, the percentage of brands expected to spend between 5% and 25% of their ad budgets on social media is expected to increase from 28% to 63% in the next two years.

It’s encouraging that so many brands and agencies are focused on using social media to engage with fans, followers and consumers. That tells me that respondents are taking a very mature and understanding approach to social media marketing in the region. I was surprised that nearly 50% of respondents are using social media to generate sales, leads or conversions. That so many brands and agencies are looking to social media to directly help revenue is a very good sign for the region.

We know that mobile usage is growing rapidly. According to a presentation by Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins, three of the top four countries in terms of 3G subscribers are in the Asia-Pacific region. So I certainly expected brands and agencies to begin formulating a social media strategy for mobile. The fact that over 80% of respondents said that a mobile strategy is either very important or somewhat important confirms that expectation.

So there you have it, things in the Asia-Pacific region are really starting to take off for social marketing. It seems like BuddyMedia is staying on top of it though and will make their presence known in the market just in time to capitalize on the trends.