When it comes to branding, whether you’re promoting your product lineup, services, or your brand as a whole, creating content that truly resonates with your audience and drives conversions is crucial. However, it’s essential to recognize that every audience, especially in a country as multiculturally diverse as Malaysia, has its own unique preferences, cultural dynamics, and nuances.
The Malaysian audience is incredibly diverse, reflecting a vibrant mix of cultures and languages. The population comprises primarily Malays and Bumiputera (indigenous peoples) (70%), followed by Chinese (23%), Indians (6%), and other ethnic groups (1%). The vibrant mix of cultural diversity also extends to religious practices, cultural celebrations, and linguistic variations and dialects across different communities.
To effectively connect with Malaysian audiences, it’s important to know your target audience and demographic group, perform audience analysis, and leverage Malaysia’s multicultural aspects.
Let’s explore five types of content that are highly effective in capturing the attention and interest of Malaysian consumers, ultimately driving engagement and conversions.
1. Make Them Laugh Out Loud
“Laughter is the shortest distance between two people,” said Victor Borge, a Danish-American comedian. Humor successfully bridges cultural divides, transcends racial differences, and brings people closer together.
When collaborating with influencers, brands may opt to incorporate humor as a content strategy to resonate with broad audiences, both within and beyond Malaysia.
During the Movement Control Order (MCO) or pandemic lockdown in 2020, numerous content creators stuck at home successfully connected with Malaysians by infusing humor into their narratives.
Content creators and influencers who infuse humor into their content, particularly on topics relatable to Malaysians, attract sizable followings across various social media platforms.
Examples include comedian Douglas Lim (YouTube/@thedouglaslim), renowned for his satirical take on politics and racial idiosyncrasies, and mixed-race actress Timur Gabriel (Instagram/@timurgabriel), whose videos comparing Asian and Western cultures are highly popular.
Timur Gabriel’s videos poke fun at Malaysian culture, Asian parenting and various other multicultural highlights of Malaysia.
2. Bridge the Cultural Divide
Many brands and creators are tapping into Malaysia’s multicultural composition in their content creation efforts. What’s even more impactful is when this content successfully bridges cultural divides, especially when showcased during festive seasons.
Instead of solely spotlighting one ethnic group, content that embraces all three major races of Malaysia tends to have a broader appeal.
Take, for instance, Gigi Cheoh (@gigicheoh), a popular influencer on TikTok and Instagram, who has collaborated with numerous brands to showcase their products and services. Her engaging videos often feature her singing patriotic Malaysian songs while gracefully transitioning between various traditional costumes representing each ethnic group. Similarly, Chin Pui Ting, better known as TikTok/@deadpudds, transcended the cosplaying niche into the mass market when she dressed up and danced in traditional Malay costumes from different states in Malaysia.
she has danced her way to fame in smooth costume transitions.
3. Promote Malaysian Values
As a nation situated in Southeast Asia, Malaysia shares numerous common values with its neighboring countries in the Asian and Eastern regions. This shared cultural ethos forms a strong foundation for content that resonates deeply with Malaysian audiences.
One of the key values that holds significant importance across Asian societies is filial piety: the respect and care for one’s elders and family members. Videos and content showcasing acts of filial piety, whether it’s caring for parents, and grandparents, or honoring family traditions, gain wide appreciation among Malaysians, and by extension, are widely forwarded and shared.
Furthermore, emphasis on adab and public decorum, respect for elders, community, and communal harmony are other aspects that strongly resonate with Malaysian audiences. Therefore, when developing your content marketing strategy, choose to highlight acts of kindness, generosity, and compassion towards others; doing so not only garners attention but also reinforces communal harmony.
Petronas’ festival advertisements often touch on family values. This CNY ad from 2006 is an evergreen one with the message ‘action speaks louder than words’
Particularly during festive seasons such as Chinese New Year, Hari Raya, or Deepavali, videos spotlighting these Asian values tend to gain significant traction across various social media platforms. Brands may leverage these occasions to produce content that reinforces the importance of these values, aligning with your brand’s core values and indirectly signifying your commitment to upholding such cultural values.
4. Up the Drama
Just like in the movies, content with dramatic, shocking, or horrific elements form a deep impression on the viewer. It also has the potential to create wider engagement and attract attention from social media users who are not already followers of your brand.
Several influencers have used this content strategy to collaborate with brands for online marketing, successfully marketing the content to unexpected and new audiences.
Storylines may include romantic drama, family drama, workplace drama, or drama with horror elements. Such videos are created in the style of a short film, and featured on either YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram. Starting with scenes that pique the viewer’s curiosity before escalating into a dramatic plotline, the video keeps viewers guessing about the product or service being featured right till the end.
out to be an advertisement for hair brand, Kérastese.
5. Leveraging Shared Experiences and Pain Points
Collaborating with influencers who resonate with shared Malaysian experiences and passions can be a powerful strategy for brands to promote their products and services.
Food is a universal Malaysian passion, and influencers who celebrate local cuisine can effectively endorse food-related products or dining experiences. Using mouth-watering visuals and authentic endorsements, they can create engaging content featuring your brand’s offerings.
Influencers who can address the common pain points of everyday Malaysian challenges such as the traffic jams in the city and during festival periods, tropical weather, seasonal floods, love for the king of fruits (durian), and more are those who can forge genuine connections with their target audience, driving engagement, trust, and ultimately, sales.
One of the foreign influencers who has garnered immense success in Malaysia is Mark O’dea (@markodea8), better known as Alamark. He cleverly leverages the uniqueness of Malaysia compared to his home country of Britain in his content, effectively uniting Malaysians through their shared similarities.
Mark O’dea and Timur Gabriel in a collaboration video about the difference between British and Malaysian weather.
natural makeup looks, hijab tutorials and beauty reviews.
Similarly, in the hot, tropical climate of Malaysia, brands who offer beauty products can target their content marketing towards those who want to cope with the heat, protect their skin from harmful UV rays, and stay fresh and radiant.
By aligning with beauty influencers who understand the challenges of Malaysia’s climate, brands can offer practical solutions and promote effective skincare solutions for audiences in the region who are experiencing the same climate.
Conclusion
To sum up, crafting compelling content for Malaysian audiences involves deeply understanding their diverse cultural landscape and unique preferences. Through the content localization examples featured in this article, brands can effectively connect with their target audience, driving engagement and conversion rates.
By incorporating humor, bridging cultural divides, and highlighting Malaysian values, brands can create content that resonates with the local audience and maximizes reach. Collaborating with influencers who share Malaysian experiences and passions further enhances the authenticity and effectiveness of content marketing efforts.
From addressing shared experiences to leveraging dramatic narratives, brands can employ several online marketing strategies to create engaging content tailored to Malaysian audiences. Whether through localized videos or partnerships with advertising agencies, social media agencies, and influencer marketing agencies in Malaysia, brands have ample opportunities to captivate Malaysian consumers in the online marketing landscape.
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