(This is an excerpt from my upcoming eBook, Social Media Guide for Filipino Entrepreneurs. Sign-up at the side bar for your free copy. You’ll get it on April 5, 2010 – Carlo)
Another trend that a lot of people have probably noticed by now is that traditional media is giving new media a giant push into the mainstream. Popular media stations in print, radio, and television have aggressively been using and integrating social media platforms into their operations. Let’s go through some of them right now.
FM Station Magic 89.9 is one of the most popular stations in Metro Manila. They’re actually one of the first stations to aggressively push for building a Facebook online community.

As of 5:19 PM, April 1, 2010, they’ve amassed more than 98,000 fans on Facebook. I’m not talking about passive fans here. These guys actively participate in the promos and discussions on the social network as well as the radio show. The DJ’s constantly promote their Facebook accounts on-air. If you think about it, Magic 89.9 is giving Facebook insane amounts of media mileage. It’s time that you also jump in and take advantage of that. Note that I’m not saying that you spam Magic 89.9’s fan profile. That would be rude, unethical, and it will just backfire. What I am saying though is that you should be in the game. If you’re not there, you don’t exist in their world.

Another media station that’s pushing social media and the internet is ABS-CBN. They’ve integrated Facebook and Twitter into their news programs and special events like the recently concluded HARAPAN: Vice-Presidential Debates. I was even interviewed by Ces Drilon for TV Patrol to discuss the impact of social media in the 2010 campaign.
What does this all mean? Traditional media is pushing people to create accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and other forms of social media so that they can connect and interact with one another. ABS-CBN and Magic 89.9 are part of the reasons why there are now more than 11,000,000 Filipino Facebook users. These stations have integrated social media in their broadcast which means that the number of Filipino social media users will continue to sky rocket.
