How To Market Your Business Online In Africa - Issue #0011

Having a strong online presence as a business owner is very crucial and helps in the growth of your business, whether it is a small business or an already established business running in millions of rand; the importance of online marketing cannot be underestimated.?

As a matter of fact, most consumers learn about businesses online even before they step out. And this gives you a win-win situation because, even when they see your competitor's billboard their minds are already made up.?

Now the question; which is the most frequently asked question is - "how do I promote my business online? or what market strategy should I implement to market my business online?"

Research has shown that most companies, especially small businesses or beginners, all have one problem in common. Most of them think that their products and services are unique from their competitors.?

But the sad truth is; it is not. Whether you are a beginner or a CEO in the South African market, it is important to understand that it is a marketing business no matter what your product or service is.

But let’s assume there is a chance that your products are unique. How do you intend on telling the world about it? The first thing you should consider is a marketing plan - A Digital Marketing Strategy.

Most business beginners in Africa spread their focus on every area of their business without considering marketing as a priority. This is a common costly mistake. Look at it this way, the goal of digital marketing is to raise brand awareness and generate qualified leads that convert into sales. So without marketing, your business remains unknown and you have no customers.?

That's why in this article, we’ll help you with digital marketing strategies and techniques that will help you attract new customers all over Africa and ultimately grow your business.

Digital Marketing In Africa

?In the 21st century, the internet has become an essential channel for reaching customers. You can literally reach half of the world's population just with a push of a button.?

More than 50% of the world today has access to the internet. That is to say that a minimum number of 3.7 billion people use the internet. In Africa, around 570 million people spend at least 3 hours on the internet every day. Now, imagine if you can put your products and services right in front of them.?

Many business beginners think that the hard work is over when their e-commerce website or blog is built; but the shocker is that hard work? just began. People will not just visit your website in numbers just because you opened or launched one.?

So you will need to market your website so that people can find it and that is where digital marketing comes in. And I know you’re probably wondering how you can start to tap into the potential of digital marketing?

Now let's look at the Beginner's Guide that will help you know how to start, plan and execute your first or next digital marketing strategy.

3 Major Digital Marketing Strategies For Beginners

• Search engine Optimization (SEO) and Search engine Marketing (SEM)

Whenever the word "search engine" is mentioned, it is directly referring to platforms like Google, Yahoo etc. It is simply the process of creating visibility for your e-commerce website, store or blog.?

The simple difference between SEO and SEM is that SEO is all about increasing the visibility of your website in a manner that is free while, SEM on the other hand, is about increasing your visibility through paid advertising.?

While optimising your store for search may seem like a daunting task and takes time, it’s a lot easier than you think. According to Wolfgang Digital, online businesses should expect 35% of total traffic and 33% of revenue to come from search engine results pages.?

Come to think of it, when you think of an answer to a particular question, what is the first thing you do? You Google it right? In this way, more than 85% consumers find their answers most of the time, searches result in sales.?

Take Gymshark, for example. As of June 2022, the retailer ranks fourth for the keyword “workout clothes,” which gets nearly 90,500 searches per month. The average click-through rate for URLs in position four is about 4.87%.? And If we do the math well, Gymshark should be getting around 4,400 visitors per month from this one keyword, which is a lot of potential customers.?

The chance is that there is a huge number of potential customers out there looking for your business. And if they can't find you online, they will probably be influenced to visit your competitors.

• Social media marketing (SMM)

As mentioned earlier, about 26.8 million internet users spend approx. 3 hours a day on social media websites. And there are over 200 different social media networks on the web today. Even though not all of them are popular, the majority of them are unique in their own way.

?Facebook is currently one the most popular social media networks sitting with over 1.7 billion monthly users worldwide. Facebook owns Instagram, which is the second most popular social network with over 700 million users a month.

So as a business owner, social media networks are a must to consider because the majority of your customers are on these platforms making it the perfect place to be for your business.

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• SMS and Email Marketing

SMS is an owned marketing channel where you can send one to many messages to your customers. They can be one-off campaigns, or a part of an automated drip campaign WHILE Email Marketing refers to sending marketing messages to potential and current customers to sell, educate, and build affinity.

According to DMA, conversion rates on email are higher when compared to social media and email marketing can help you boost your ROI (Return On Investment) up to 3800%. Nevertheless, don't take all this figure to heart but it is positive and a good way to start.

Similarly, a well-designed SMS marketing plan will build brand awareness, drive sales, and turn your customers into your biggest fans.?

Conclusively, Marketing your business is time consuming, but effective when done right. There is no doubt that digital marketing is evolving every day and that it is the future of advertising. The strategies shared above works for both small and local businesses, whether you’re reaching new audiences or retaining existing customers. It just takes a little know-how and execution to see results. You just have to implement each strategy to determine what works best for you.

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