LINE

Prepared by Mio O.

Supervised by

Adam Acar

~How companies are using this popular application to attract

customers?

What is LINE? LINE is one of the popular social networking

services(SNS) in Japan. There are 41.5million registered Line users in

Japan. It reached 100million users in 19 months.

→facebook 54months, Twitter 49months It is used in over 230 countries and got no.1 in

41 regions. 100MILLION users in only 19MONTHS!?

Functions

Free phone call Chat Group chat Time line Coupons Games Stamps

Similar Applications

There are many similar smart phone based messaging applications,

Skype, Kakao talk, WeChat, Viber, Comm...etc

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

LINE

Skype

Kakao talk

Viver

Table1: Percentage of people's usage of messaging application

Company usage of LINE

There are about 30 companies using LINE (As of January 30, 2013)

They design unique stamps (a digital item/sign/logo) to make customers feel closer to them.

Distribution of coupons Campaign information Latest news about their products

A stamp from LAWSON

How Do Companies use LINE? Companies often send

information about their new stamps and campaigns only to LINE followers.

Many companies have campaigns for big events such as Christmas, New Year and Valentine's day.

TSUTAYA had a campaign for celebration of LINE users reached 100million.

Coca cola's Christmas stamps

Shiseido's Christmas/ New Year stamps

Reserch about what companies sent

Six companies from different industries(au, Sukiya, TSUTAYA, Shiseido, Lawson, Coca cola) were analyzed.

10 latest messages they posted on LINE were collected.

Contents (How many pictures, coupons, campaign information and URLs they sent. )

ResultsUpdate frequency

# Pictures

Time # Coupons

# Campaigns

IncludesURL

# of Emoticons

au Once or twice a week

5 12:0017:00

1 3 7 9

Sukiya Twice a week

5 11:00 6 0 10 6

TSUTAYA

Once in 1~20days

2 (+2 videos)

9~10:0018~19:00

0 4 5 11

Shiseido Once in 7~10days

2 12:30 0 2 7 6

Lawson Once a month

3 10~12:00 6 0 6 8

Coca Cola

Once in 7~20days

3 12:0019:00

0 5 10 18

Companies' reply to our message 1

2

The responses are sent automatically.

Companies can't read what we send.

When users start following a brand they get a few messages right away like these…

What do they say?

- “Thanks for adding me as your friend.” and

- “We are going to inform you about our coupons and campaigns from now on.” These two messages were sent by all six companies.

- Au, Sukiya and TSUTAYA’s messages include that …”we cannot reply or read your messages…

- Also, Sukiya and Coca Cola sent a message saying if our messages are bothering you, please turn off notification. They even sent an page that explains how to turn of notifications.

Some messages from Coca Cola and Lawson

Some messages from Shiseido and Sukiya

What do they say?

• Au: How are you? I’m doing well.

• Sukiya: What about going to eat lunch at Sukiya? It tastes good!

• TSUTAYA: a famous saying from movie

• Shiseido: I’m sorry but we can’t read your message, so if you have any questions, please go to this page.

• Lawson: Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. Go to this page and check out my advice.

• Coca Cola: Limited campaign for LINE

Recently 56 LINE users were asked…

About 60% of LINE users are following at least 1 brand

Sample: 83 College Students who are registered at a public university in Japan. 80% of the respondents reported having a smart phone. Among those who had a smart phone 56 answered this question,

BRANDS are way more popular than celebrities…

Sample: 83 College Students who are registered at a public university in Japan. 80% of the respondents reported having a smart phone. Among those who had a smart phone 56 answered this question,

Recently 56 LINE users were asked…

References

http://www.techinasia.com/line-100-million-infographic/

http://www.itmedia.co.jp/news/articles/1208/20/news103.html

http://consult.nikkeibp.co.jp/consult/news/2012/0726sp/

http://markezine.jp/article/detail/16139?date=1130711

http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/2925/1/MPRA_paper_2925.pdf

Thank you!