Africa Business Communities

[Column] Bob Koigi: Internet is king for Africa’s small businesses

As small businesses look for cheaper ways of running business while earning bigger revenues, marketing is becoming an integral part of their business. But the prohibitive cost of traditional marketing is now seeing them court new age marketing tools and they are reaping from them.

Traditionally majority of African companies have relied on traditional media to market themselves as the media platforms become the most plausible ways to reach a critical mass and for companies to build and establish a rapport with their clients, existing and prospective. But the narrative is changing with a dip in circulation numbers for newspapers and the electronic media is not as ubiquitous as it was before.

The culprit is the internet. With impressive internet penetration and literacy levels even in some of Africa’s hinterlands, the battle for customers has shifted to online media.

Companies with huge advertisement budget have now realized why they need to embrace the internet to reach a changing trend.

This  traditional big advertisers in print media whose budget accounted for more than 50 per  cent  of media's advertising revenue, like , telcos, banks and beer brands among others have now aggressively taken their advertisements online in platforms like google and Facebook ads which are allowing them to spend less and monitor how popular their brands are online.

It is a creed that has equally inspired small businesses where every shilling counts and prudence in spending is a must. For example Jimmy Manga a director of a Kenyan SME involved in supply of technology knows too well that Kenyan print media is no more.

Five years ago, he told me, he could place an advert in the classified section of the Nation or Standard newspapers and receive over 500 responses, two years ago he would place a one eighth page full colour advert only to receive 150 responses, and a few months ago he placed a quarter page advert in the Nation and only received 5 responses.

He decided to place an ad on Facebook and recorded 1200 views within the first day despite spending a fraction of what he used to spend in the papers. It is something that has inspired his complete shift to new media. “And customer interaction is instant through for example Facebook inbox which my guys monitor,” he told me.

It is a trend corroborated by a recent survey by Africa Paynet which showed that over 70 percent of small businesses in Africa were actively involved in marketing themselves online and believed that the platform was bearing fruit. Affordability, fast results and convenience are some of the key reasons that the small businesses cited for courting internet advertising.

Ability to decide when and where to advertise, how much to spend on advertisement and getting fast results after advertisement attracted more SMEs to online advertising. Infact, in the next two years competition between SMEs will be taken online and will be about who advertises in as many websites, the survey noted.

Multiple award winning Kenyan journalist Bob Koigi is the Chief Editor East Africa at Africa Business Communities

 

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