What VodaMedia is doing for SME’S with digital advertising

Up to as many as 70% of South African start-ups do not survive their first 24 months in business. Although this alarming statistic may fluctuate from year to year, the sad reality is that the full impact of COVID still remains allusion with more that 40% of SME’s closing doors in 2020 and another 40% of that expected in 2021.

Why is there such a high rate of failure and what determines whether a business succeeds or not?

According to Eustace Mashimbye, the CEO of Proudly South African, on an IOL Business Report, “the two key contributing factors to this are access to funding and access to markets. But it is the latter, and not financing, which is the main determinant of the success or failure of a small to medium-sized enterprise.”

Access to markets

While most SME’s start out as survivalist, comfortable in their immediate sphere with the initial trickle of customers, it is only those enterprises that think, plan and act ahead in terms of market share that weather the stormy days and go on to percolate to the top of the success pile. Without a sound go-to-market strategy, the most mercurial start-up will inevitably flounder rather than flourish.

As such, providing SME’s with tangible solutions for reaching their potential markets is imperative to the contribution of the sector in the growth of the local economy. For said solutions to be effective, they must resonantly speak to the needs of the market. This demands the correct message, using the correct channel, at the correct time to the correct person.

Enter the digital marketplace. By their very nature, digital marketing tools are capable of delivering appropriate messages to the right audiences, with a measured effectiveness above and beyond the fact. None more so than the mobile device.

The role of mobile

There are countless reasons why mobile stands, head and shoulders above all other digital media. The most obvious of these being sheer scale:

ITWeb reports that South Africa's smartphone penetration has nearly doubled in the last two years and is now sitting at over 80%. This is according to the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa's (ICASA's) new report on the State of ICT Sector in SA 2019 that found that SA's smartphone penetration was 81.72% as at September 2018, compared to 43.5% in September 2016.

Of course, the penetration rate must be taken in the context of many South Africans having more than one smartphone as a significant portion of citizens are still reliant on basic or feature phones.

Beyond the scale here are 6 benefits that make the cell phone a superior marketing tool:

• the first personal mass media permanently carried upon the person
• it is the only truly always-on mass media
• it is available at the point of creative inspiration
• mobile has a built-in payment mechanism
• provides accurate audience measurement
• You can track responses to your marketing efforts immediately

The emergence of mobile as the dominant platform in the space has necessitated the establishment of a sound mobile strategy as the foundation of any successful business campaign.

It takes an intricate knowledge of the mobile landscape as a cluster of audience sets to effectively use mobile; such knowledge could make all the difference between a business tailoring its messages and it stalking its customers.

And no one knows the South African mobile landscape quite like its largest mobile network operator, Vodacom.

Viva Vodacom

With a South African mobile market share of over 42%, the behemoth that is Vodacom delivers the scale an SME needs for impactful marketing.

However, impact without control is just chaos; and so here are some interesting numbers and facts of how VodaMedia hones its scale to deliver results.

34 000 000 – the number of unique browsers and users

2 137 857 393 (yes, you read that right, 2 billion) – number of impressions served per month

Vodacom Digital Advertising’s promise to any SMEs

By giving SMEs the ability to advertise directly on all its text and display channels across web and mobile, VodaMedia is:

• Empowering small business to drive their objectives: Build awareness, drive traffic and conversions thought its eziADS ad builder.
• Giving them access to premium display, video and text advertising aligned with Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standards.
• Enabling SME to engage audiences using premium mobile and web ad inventory across all Vodacom platforms and affiliates’ networks.
• Introducing them to first-of-its-kind, network agnostic programmatic solution to extend their reach.
• Promote education and know-how with the free self-paced and step-by-step tutorials that can help build digital marketing knowledge online via the eziADS Academy.

With these tools, any small to medium sized business enterprise greatly increases its chances of powering past the challenges that limit SME growth.

To take advantage of this edge, simply contact the VodaMedia today and find out what is your next digital and mobile campaign budget’s true potential.