In this interview, Gaita Wamucii shares some gems of insight in regard to digital marketing in Kenya.
Kachwanya: What is your take on the current state of digital marketing in Kenya, how much embraced is it?
Gaita: Well, things are happening pretty fast. We are on an interesting mile of the digital revolution and quite a good number of organisations are giving serious effort to various digital marketing channels from Search Engine Marketing to Social Media, Email, Online Reputation & Customer Relations Management among others. Yesterday was my Birthday and Equity Bank dropped me an eCard even before my mom could give me a call. When I look around, I have no doubt that digital media marketing in Kenya is finally taking off and from here onwards, it will be a question of early adopters profitably leveraging it while late adopters have no choice but to play quite a serious catch-up game.
Kachwanya: Where do you start in formulating a digital marketing strategy then?
Gaita: Just like any other marketing strategy, it revolves around harnessing an organization’s energies and resources in attracting new customers, retaining the old ones and keeping a tab on all Online Media Marketing efforts in a measurable way. Search Engine Marketing,Email Marketing, Social Media, Online PR and forging Online Partnerships are key elements in this.
Kachwanya: Any advice to those who would like to make a digital leap?
Gaita: By all means the time to position is now. I look around and see numerous digital marketing opportunities that would give businesses a competitive edge. Look around, all the students looking for a college or university to join are online – how about meeting them there. Those that are about to open their first bank account are online- how about signing them up from there.
The next marketing wars are going to take place on the digital realm- and the time to position is now. And the best way to go about it is is to ensure that at least you have a strategy- one that can keep you on track and in line with a given set of objectives. Some components of digital marketing for example Email List building and Search Engine Optimization are long term and therefore you don’t want to aimlessly wander without a proper foundation, only to realize two years down the line that you had it wrong in the first place and then have to restart again.
Kachwanya: And Social Media?
Gaita: Social media currently is a buzzword and in more than one occasion I have had the displeasure of hearing it being used to mean Facebook or Twitter.
While both Facebook & Twitter have a formidable Social Media Market share, they are not enough. Social media offers a myriad other unique platforms for organisations to earn mindshare, build a brand, acquire new customers and engage with existing ones.Youtube for instance, with the current internet speeds in Kenya is a goldmine for Social Marketers. Others like reddit, flickr, wikipedia, tumblr, stumbleupon and lately Quora are definitely worth paying close attention to.
It might seems obvious but you don’t open a twitter or Facebook account just because your competitor has done the same – it need seamlessly integrate with a sound online and offline marketing strategy. Otherwise, it will just be a blind move of copying tactics and Sun Tzu would not have summed it better when he said Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory.
Kachwanya: Any final word?
Gaita: It is an interesting time to be in Africa especially for marketers willing to extend their marketing strategy to the digital realm. Given that we are in the early adoption phase, competition in the online media is less stiff -at a fairly small budget you can complement your offline marketing efforts with amazing results. Speed is of essence though because as Murdoch once famously put it : big will beat small no more, it is the fast beating the slow.
Kachwanya: Thank you.
Gaita: Thank you for inviting me.
Gaita Wamucii is an Online Marketing Specialist with Africa Point – an Africa specialist Travel Agent. You can follow him on twitter at @gaitawamucii
Like the bit on Social Media. Very important to get it right from the word go. Thanks for sharing.
This is a very interesting subject although the interviewee does have the tendancy of using big words at the expense of genuine communication, even when the questions have been kept clear,simple and direct – happens enough when one is making a deliberate effort of sounding intelligent. Good job though kachwanya
I honestly think Gaita is being overly enthusiastic and positive.Ask him who their market is and I will be surprised if it is not the developed world.My reality on the ground is that Digital marketing in kenya is just getting hinted and has a long long way to go. On a little more positive note, it is a good thing to see that there are such people who really understand what digital marketing entails and are practising it.
The big question for the marketers and PR people at the moment is where are the customers. Can you find them in the social media space? What about the old print media? I mean this question can be answered differently depending on the industry and the targeted market. For the educated lots, they are online. For the old guys …it is still the old fashion way… But i think we are heading for interesting time
Thanks.. Great advice to the interviewees all over the world..keep it simple and to the point…
I think it is still about the timing . During the launch of the Huawei Ideos Mr.Ndemo gave a very interesting stats about the internet users in Kenya. According to him about a year ago there were 3 million internet users in Kenya and that increased to about 7.5 million users now. Believe me the number is going go up and up. Let me go back to my earlier question, If you are running a a business you should be asking yourself where are the customers and clients. I mean it might be the initial stages for the digital marketing but the reality is in the next 2 years or so digital world will be huge in Kenya. So are you ready for it?
Thank you. Am sure you wish me luck in my endevour to be concise next time. :)
Dexter,
I am in agreement – we have got quite some ground to cover as far as digital marketing is concerned. I have no doubt however that any way to reach millions of Kenyans online would be a win for any brand. Loved your insight though.
Gaita has started the fact and the situation on the ground. just the other day I had gone to launch of an i phone by safaricom with over 20,000 application and the selling point is the internet and so we are seeing a future where almost everybody will have a phone that has internet and this will translate into people searching for what they want online. Gaita this is the way to go.
Great interview plus straight and to the point insights….