Digital sales represent the next frontier of business expansion. However, only a small portion of this potential has been fully utilized. Business owners who can effectively implement a digital marketing campaign for their organization are likely to succeed in this ever-increasingly competitive landscape.
Approximately, about 10 % of Africans have made online purchases in the past five years. And while this shift has been mainly influenced by the pandemic, online sales continue to shoot up even as economies return to normalcy.
This means that a huge market opportunity awaits African enterprises. With over 10 million individuals shopping online every year, internet sales are skyrocketing at a fast rate. However, a majority of African organizations are yet to catch up.
African organizations should consider these 5 key principles when it comes to developing a strong digital marketing function:
Obtain global expert knowledge.
Global advertising and social media platforms such as Google, Bing, and WhatsApp are quite dominant in Africa, so seeking the expertise of global specialists working with these channels will be critical.
In South Africa, for instance, Google accounts for 94% of searches, with Bing coming in second at 5.12%. Global Web Index (GWI) digital marketing data for African countries indicates that Google also holds a dominant share of the search market in both Nigeria and Kenya, with 98.6% and 97.7% of the market share, respectively. With 93.2% of users in South Africa, 93% in Nigeria, 96.5% in Kenya, 83.9% in Ghana, and 73.7% in Morocco, WhatsApp is the most widely used social media platform for networking. Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube are often the next most popular platforms.
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An important way to gain a competitive advantage is probably to invest in creating in-house teams of experts in digital client acquisition who are familiar with these channels. Luckily for African organizations, hiring people from around the world has become simpler as remote working arrangements have proliferated since the outbreak. Because of the potential shortage of specialized talent in African nations, this can be very significant.
An effective way to gain a competitive advantage would be to create in-house teams of experts. The team should comprise experts who are familiar with these channels. Luckily, hiring people from around the world has been simplified for African organisations. This is due to the rise of remote working arrangements since the COVID outbreak.
Consider starting your own marketing channels
While international advertising networks offer unrivalled chances to expand the clientele, engaging with clients through owned channels can also help expand business domestically. Businesses might, for instance, think about delivering customized content and increasing conversion rates using social media groups or messengers, websites, email, and mobile apps. Increasing relevant client engagement may hold the key to unlocking these channels.
Data is the key to success
Business mathematics plays a major role in digital marketing, as it is important to determine the cost of each user activity, such as a click, an application, or a sale. It becomes possible to effectively manage channels and campaigns using these precise data after a corporation learns to measure critical parameters.
Experiment constantly
The main principle of digital marketing is to regularly generate, test, and evaluate the efficiency of new ideas. These may relate to working with new channels, launching new types of communications and formats for creative solutions, and testing new audiences. The secret of success lies in the skillset of a well-coordinated team.
