It is necessary to look at trends and predictions, but the most critical question for any business during these unprecedented times should be, “why are you here?” In other words, what is your purpose? People are looking more and more towards companies to solve global issues, not governments or even non-profits.
By continuing to ask “why” at the centre of your operations, you will amplify your purpose. Profits and purpose are starting to be linked more closely together. As such, business decisions require policies and practices that are fundamentally aligned.
Digital, mobile, and social media has become an indispensable part of everyday life. According to dataportal.com, more than 4.5 billion people are using the internet. Social media users have surpassed 3.8 billion people.
Nearly 60% of the world’s population is online, spending more than two hours daily across social media platforms. Social media users in Africa reached 217.5 million, representing a 16% penetration. Internet users in Africa are now more than 453 million representing a 34% penetration.
Africa’s mobile phone boom
Africa has one of the fastest-growing penetrations of mobile subscribers, with 1.08 billion active mobile users. According to Wamkele Mene, Secretary-General of the African Continental Free Trade Area Secretariat, digital trade is the next big thing in Africa.
“First, digital trade is possible through mobile phones. People can access distant markets using your mobile phone. I identified young people and women in trade as segments of society that we must bring with us to benefit from the implementation of this agreement,” he argues.
This growth provides opportunities for business in Africa to increase social media users and digital ad spending. Marketers also need to take note of the significant increase in internet marketing.
The question is how effectively and how fast are African businesses adapting to the digital transformation. Companies need to combine creative digital capabilities with digital advertising, marketing strategies and outstanding technical expertise. Investing in upskilling, especially sales and marketing teams, to operate effectively in the digital sphere is key to achieving this goal.
Data and new trends
We live in a data-driven world that is customer-centric, where profits are closely linked to customer service initiatives. Data is the new advertising and marketing currency. Analytics put consumer behaviour and habits at your fingertips.
This shift has identified the need to institutionalize communication, planning, and sharing of information across marketing, digital, IT teams, or staff. The core of social media marketing lies in storytelling, not product promotion.
Formats such as short videos, pictures, picture slides, short, creative and engaging text and infographics are most effective. Video messaging has increased dramatically with Facebook, WhatsApp and Telegram, to name but a few.
Other trends are micro and macro social media influences that influence e-commerce, boosts in TV co-viewing, and video on demand, blogging, and vlogging continue to proliferate, driven by user-generated content. Short-form online entertainment, streaming services and virtual events are also growing.
Branded digital experiences
According to Gartner Peer Insights, by 2023, 60% of companies that pivoted to virtual events will incorporate real-time or real-space experiences into their virtual events with live streaming, synchronous experiences or virtual simultaneity.
This creates the opportunity for marketers to create branded digital experiences. By 2023, 25% of organizations will integrate marketing, sales and customer experience into a single function. By 2024, 30% of large organizations will identify content generation services for user-generated content as a priority.
Storytelling that matters
Regardless of the digital business model you choose; multi-sided platform, subscription, user-generated content model, online education or instant news model to name a few, addressing your audience needs has to be at the heart of what drives your content and marketing.
Storytelling matters in digital marketing, and content is still king. The most important thing is to create engagement. Like Amazon, big brands have shifted their focus to building a relationship between the customer and the brand for long-term success.
In addition, we have seen the success of emphatic or compassionate marketing by big brands.
In conclusion, we can predict that digital technology and innovation will continue to grow exponentially.
Eva GeorgiaReport by Aga Khan University’s Media Innovation Centre analyses the country’s millennials and digital natives’ media consumption habits.
For the media to flourish, and the society to have free flow of accurate and verifiable information, journalists, the drivers in the passing of information are expected to be well grounded in laws and the legal aspect pertaining to the job, writes Alfred Ganzo.
Pitching provides numerous opportunities for your new or existing business ideas to be discovered and realized; and as Simon Mtabazi writes, some startups have become billion-dollar companies due to efffevie pitches
The success you achieve with your media startup business will heavily rely on your reputation as a trustworthy company, and as Nandi Mwiyombella writes, it will also open a new window for customers and potential investors.
That’s why I think today is such a great space for us to sit back and reflect on the questions that could help us shape the kind of journalism that we want to see in our local and global community.
The report specifically analysed eight major variables which include: newsroom structure and resources, media ownership and business models, organisational capacity, innovation culture, journalism culture, financial trends and results, content quality and COVID-19.
Mudi, in her role as Media Council of Kenya regional coordinator in charge of Mombasa(covering the entire coastal region), has found herself at the forefront in advocating and fighting to protect journalists’ rights, culminating in her being awarded for her peace efforts in the run-up and during the 2022 general elections in Kenya.
The 2022 general elections have been mentally draining for journalists, some of whom have had to stay on the campaign trail for over a year. Others have had to toy with the tough call of managing teams in the newsroom. East Site’s Isaac Swila and political writer Rawlings Otieno recount their experiences
What role did social media influencers play in the election? What voice did they give in political discourses during and around the election period? And to what extent did political candidates involve the influencers in marketing their manifestos to sway votes in their favour? East Site writer Steven Omondi unpacks the details
The media industry is experiencing enormous transformation as new digital trends emerge. With the vast opportunities that the digital space offers, media owners and content producers must deliberately adapt to how the audience consumes content.
With the increased Digital Technology at the palm of just anybody; there are a lot of information that distort whether deliberately or not highlighting the need of robust Fact0checking as Asha D. Abinallah explains
Is there a danger in media personalities having a vibrant social media presence? Assuming they have a massive media following, should they self-regulate and filter what they post? And when they engage with followers, should their opinions be taken as personal, or does it represent the journalist’s media house? East Site writer Isaac Swila explores
Media stakeholders are raising concerns over the lack of gender-inclusive reporting in East African newsrooms. They want concerted efforts to ensure more female journalists get equal opportunities like their male counterparts.
The partnership will also ensure that local content is curated and distributed to better optimize the product and meet the needs of Kenyan online users.
The news industry is constantly changing, and in the last few years, User Generated Content (UGC) has become a ubiquitous feature in news sourcing and packaging. However, media houses and journalists need to establish verification and credibility safeguards to avoid the misinformation trap.
Reporting on elections is, for many journalists, an opportunity to establish themselves as reliable political reporters. But the task comes with certain risks, particularly in the East African sub-region.
Stakeholders are now calling for concerted efforts, better planning and preparations for journalists before they are sent out on the field to cover Kenya’s high-stakes August 9 General Elections.
East Africa’s media grapples with a myriad of challenges whenever general elections approach. Not only do editors struggle with balancing the competing political interests, at times at the altar of professionalism, but individual journalists pay dearly, many suffering attacks in the course of their duties.
As Form One students settle into a new life in secondary school, this has also been a period of reflection. We have read tear-jerking and heart-warming stories of determined students who overcame many odds to get an education and how well-wishers came together in their aid.
There is renewed optimism in the Tanzanian media space following the ascension to power of President Samia Suluhu whose regime is keen to relax some of the laws deemed punitive to journalists and media houses
Uganda fell behind, whereas Kenya improved its press freedom ranking in the Reporters Without Borders 2022 Press Freedom Index. And after years of media freedom decline, Tanzania appears to be on the right track. But overall, media freedom activists say there is still work to be done.
A free and independent press is the cornerstone of any democracy and the foundation of economic success, mostly because through our free press, we’re able to hold the leadership to account.
To align with the changing times and stay relevant in the business, media houses are challenged to rethink their strategy and to adopt and understand obstacles and challenges they face towards rethinking and exploring alternative sources of revenue and on developing the digital strategy.
A team of young, Tanzanian tech-savvy communication professionals is dreaming big. It seeks to usher a new dawn in media business management in Tanzania by optimising employee output and offering consultancy to media businesses on how they can operate with a minimal budget but still attain their goals.
Bloggers and influencers have become an integral component of information sourcing across East Africa. The public uses blogs, privately run websites and social networks to crowdsource information from social networks, which they then publish and distribute. But it’s not all rosy for this group of content makers.
The chances of meeting a medical graduate practising journalism are usually very slim, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. But two Tanzanian physicians have broken away from that norm by inventing a start-up called Afyatoon. It uses visual art technology to tell compelling medical stories. They narrate to the EAST Site their experience and share their vision for the future.
Did you know that in 2021 Kenyans watched less TV and spent more time on social media? Or that some Kenyans rely on family, friends, or even social media icons and bloggers as a source of news and information? These are some of the conclusions highlighted in the 2021 State of the Media Survey conducted by the Media Council of Kenya (MCK).
The effects of the Covid pandemic continue to change the world in ways we had not imagined possible. The media is going through a painful transformation to keep up with changing production, distribution and consumption habits. In East Africa, Uganda’s Media Challenge Initiative (MCI) recently hosted a panel discussion on Media Viability comprising experienced journalists from Television, Radio, Print and Online/Digital media to address lessons learned from the pandemic. East Site’s Moses Mutente attended the panel and compiled this article.
In this commentary, Uganda-based journalist Caleb Okereke shares deep personal insights into why media schools in East Africa must rethink their curriculum. He stresses the need for trainers to begin teaching media ownership to better equip journalism students for the dynamic and cutthroat job market by taking us through his journey as a journalism student and media owner.
For the second year running, a survey commissioned by the Media Council of Kenya shows that the trust level in Kenyan media has nosedived, raising fundamental questions on how media will play its watchdog role more so with landmark elections set for August 9. EAST Site writer Isaac Swila explores.
