This content is concentrated on how to start a successful digital marketing in Africa. Without mincing words, the market opportunity for African businesses, especially through digital marketing, is significant. Online sales in Africa are growing at around 25%, year-on-year – one of the highest rates in the world – with more than 10 million people starting to buy online each year. Yet online sales in most organizations are only at the beginning of their growth trajectory.
Digital sales are the next horizon of business growth for all consumer-facing businesses in Africa, but only a fraction of this potential has been tapped.
With competition increasing daily, those players that can make digital a strategic priority and systematically build the digital function in their organizations are likely to pull ahead, whether they are digital natives or not.
While bigger organizations have mostly prepared to take their sales and operations digital and have the necessary infrastructure in place to make this shift, few businesses have scaled digital sales as yet.
Comparatively, the digital sales landscape is so competitive in Europe that banks will pay, on average, about 25% of profit per client to attract a client.
How to Start a Successful Digital Marketing in Africa
With global advertising and social media platforms such as Google, Bing, and WhatsApp disproportionately dominant across Africa, and tapping into the expertise of global specialists working with these channels will be key, let us take a ride into how to start a successful digital marketing in Africa:
Activate Reliable Marketing Channels
While global advertising platforms create unparalleled opportunities to grow the customer base, there is potential to grow business locally by interacting with customers on owned channels. For example, businesses could consider using mobile apps, websites, email, and social media groups or messengers to deliver targeted information and improve conversion rates. The key to unlocking these channels could be growing relevant engagement with customers.
Enable A Trusted Data Tracking
Digital marketing deals primarily with business mathematics, where it is necessary to calculate how much each user action costs: a click, an application, or a sale. Once a business learns to measure key metrics, it becomes possible to efficiently manage channels and campaigns using these precise metrics.
To build reliable analytics, organizations could consider building effective data tracking and storage systems and ensuring regular reporting that can give everyone involved a clear picture of digital sales status. It is equally important to build cross-functional teams that include analysts so all participants can access data at any time and use this effectively to leverage customer insights to drive further sales.
Trade SEO services and Learn SEO expert
According to Entrepreneur, SEO experts are some of the best-paid professionals in the digital marketing industry. While SEO is an essential digital marketing strategy, Africans can develop and sell SEO knowledge for monetary rewards.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is constantly changing, and learning new practices can increase your income. The idea is to learn the basics and fine details of search engines and develop your skills. As you grow in knowledge and skills, you can leverage the internet for clients and sell your services. Consider creating a website to build a network of potential clients and earn with digital strategies.
Run an Efficient Affiliate Marketing
According to Shopify, affiliate marketing is a good business model valued at over $8.2 billion in the digital marketing industry. The business model involves earning commissions by recommending sales or selling other people’s products, and Africans can benefit.
This digital marketing strategy is for you if you can perform keyword research and create content for online products. While thousands of websites sell products online, skilled Africans can promote and drive traffic from the customers to the brand or product for commissions.
Read Also: Best Channels for Digital Marketing
Offer Consulting Services
According to Digital Agency Network, offering consultancy services in the digital marketing industry is lucrative with endless possibilities. A digital marketing expert can earn a decent income with this idea by sharing knowledge and expertise. The idea is to define specific services to clients and help them make marketing decisions.
If you’re knowledgeable in web analytics and reporting, local, video, email, social media, and influencer marketing, consider a career in consultancy. Consider blogging, leverage the internet for interested companies, and build a network.
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 organization of a well-coordinated team and reliable processes allowing regular testing.
While there is a common misconception that only digital native organizations – such as Neobanks, Fintechs, or other technology players – can be successful in this game, our experience working with more traditional banking, telecoms, and retailers suggests that digital transformation is within the grasp of all businesses. And given the tremendous growth at stake, this is not something to sit on the fence about.
Open Space for Digital Function
The main thing is to make digital a strategic priority for your business and then work towards consistently building a digital function in the organization, characterized by advanced market competencies and flexible methods of operation. This could allow you to attract the largest number of customers while achieving a good return on investment in marketing.
