Understanding Consumer Sentiment Towards Emerging Chinese Brand Cars in Indonesia: A Media Online Analysis

This study analyzes public sentiment towards Chinese-manufactured cars in Indonesia, focusing on perceptions influenced by the rising presence of Chinese car brands in the Indonesian automotive market. While Chinese cars attract attention for their advanced features and competitive pricing, opinions vary widely among consumers and stakeholders. Using Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning algorithms, this research conducts sentiment analysis on data from online articles, news reports, and social media with keywords like “Chinese brand cars, Indonesia.” The methodology involves data collection, processing through sentiment classification models, and visualization of sentiment trends. Specifically, Support Vector Machines (SVM), Naive Bayes, and Random Forest algorithms are applied to classify sentiment polarity effectively. This study's novelty lies in its focus on the Indonesian market context, an underexplored area for Chinese automotive brands, and its comparison with previous sentiment studies on imported products, which often concentrate on Western or Japanese brands. Findings provide insights into factors influencing public opinion, offering recommendations to improve market acceptance of Chinese-manufactured cars in Indonesia's automotive industry. This study also contributes to understanding consumer behavior and brand perception in emerging markets, informing both industry strategies and policy decisions.