This is Part II in the series on Google Plus: Is India Heading Towards the Biggest Virtual Migration after Part I.
Though the post investigates India's potential adoption of Google Plus, it may be a big hit in other countries too. However, examining cultural and contextual nuances for every country is beyond the scope of this post.
Demographic Make-Up of India
A Big Pool of Technocrats
India has one of the biggest pool of technocrats; with most of them working for global IT firms as software developers and engineers. People in IT are not afraid of trying new technologies; as a matter of fact, they are the "innovators" and "early adopters" of adoption curve.
The young crowd in India loves technology, trusts Google products, and adopts new products real fast. They loved Orkut at one time, therefore, they will be more than willing to try Google Plus.
Age of the Targeted Population
India has one of the biggest population of youngsters and young adults. According to Wikipedia: India has more than 50% of its population below the age of 25 and more than 65% hovers below the age of 35. Younger population exhibits curiosity, experimental nature, and higher risk taking ability with new things. According to a study on age related difference in risk taking: when compared to their younger peers, older adults are supposed to prefer to make safe as opposed to risky responses.
With such a young population the chances of number of users trying Google Plus increases manyfold - and, therefore the chances of conversion.
No Language Barrier
India speaks and understands English. India is second largest English speaking country with 11.38% eligible speaker population after USA.
Therefore, India can quickly embrace any new service - in English - without waiting for local translations. Google Plus is good - as is for Indians.
Existence of Collectivistic Society
Unlike West, where the society is "Individualistic," Indians are motivated by group needs. In these societies, kinship ties are much stronger and may take precedence over expertise in matters of appointments and promotions.
Indians are more likely than not get influenced and persuaded by trusted recommendations. The more the number of people recommending Google Plus, the more will be the number of users adopting it. Once this process gets into infinite loop, Facebook will be out of the picture.
Huge Overseas Population
Many Indians have migrated abroad. The NRI (Non-Resident Indians) and PIO (Person of Indian Origin) population across the world is estimated at over 30 millions. Most of them are still in active contact with their friends and family back in India; and, many rely of social media websites for real-time news and updates from their near-and-dear ones.
Sometimes members of the same family live in different countries and cities. Talking to all of them at the same is a big technical challenge. Skype allows video chat with one person at a time and so does Facebook. Hangout feature from Google Plus allows such geographically distributed families to video chat at the same time. Certainly, this feature is going to attract the attention of these families.
Migrate Orkut Accounts to Google Plus
Although, as of today, Google has not announced any migration option to Google Plus for its Orkut users. But sooner or later Google will allow Orkut users to port their data to Google Plus - after all, both the products come from Google. This will help Orkut users to carry over all their photographs, contacts, posts, and other details to Google Plus without any data loss.
Considering that India is the second largest user of Orkut in the world, the migration option will certainly work like a charm for Orkut users. Imagine moving your entire history on a click of a button. This will not only help Google to consolidate all its Orkut user base on Google Plus but also increase the number of users dramatically.
For all the reasons mentioned above, I believe that Google Plus will certainly usher in a new dawn of social networking in India.
In my last post in the series on Google Plus, I will be discussing about Google Plus features.
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