When Millicent Okoth, 26, opened her boutique in March this year, she spent many nights thinking about how best she could wean her young enterprise from the marketing problems that face most startups. It was her firsthand in business and hoped she had embarked on the road to her first million shillings.
With passion and conviction, she sunk all her savings into the venture. But two months after opening the shop in Nairobi’s Central Business District, she noticed there was little traffic to her stall. On a good day she would get two enquiries, let alone make any sale.
Her fairly priced chic dresses and jewellery did not catch the attention of her targeted customers and the reason was not had to find: the boutique was tacked inside one of the exhibition malls. But it was the only premises she could afford. The alternative would have been to take her chances on the streets as a hawker where she would have been exposed to mean City Council officers or, even worse, extortionist gangs.
Being helpless as her dream slipped away was depressing. She had racked her brains out and each time concluded that she needed market her business, but did not have enough cash for this. She was almost giving up when a friend suggested an inexpensive solution: using social media to market her business. Unlike conventional marketing channels, the friend advised, she wouldn’t have to spend a penny besides internet connection charges, which are negligible, and visibility is guaranteed.
And so Millicent decided to convert her Facebook page where she has over 1,000 friends into a marketing platform for her dresses and jewelry. She posted photos of her dresses and almost immediately enquiries started flowing in. Today, thanks to Facebook, her boutique is vibrant. “Without this marketing tool, I would have closed shop a few months ago. Business is so good that some of my customers are now placing orders. When I am not selling dresses on my shop I’m always busy on my Facebook page answering queries,” said Millicent.
POSTING PHOTOS
Cheptoo Cece has been earning a handsome income through social media. Her clientele at her boutique, La Belle Trends, located at Jevanjee Gardens Shopping Mall has been growing at the back of aggressive marketing. Ms Cheptoo’s typical day is marked by posting photos of different clothes on sale at her shop, often using herself as a model.
Based on the close to 1,500 Facebook friends and followers who are always alerted whenever she posts something new, her marketing model is paying off, so much so that she is now looking to employ an ‘experienced sales assistant’. But it is not only small businesses that are taking advantage of social media to drive business.
Big corporates are increasingly cutting back on their conventional advertising budgets in favor of social media. According to Jayson DeMers, a social media analyst who writes for Forbes Magazine, a recent survey indicates that 92% of business owners perceive social media as important to their business. “Businesses are continuing to re-allocate budgets away from traditional methods of advertising towards social media and other inbound marketing strategies,” said DeMers.
But the local and marketing industry is moving in droves online, with more Kenyans getting connected to the internet. Besides having traditional offices where customers can drop by, they are using the platform to market their goods and services. By virtue of having sponsored pages, they are guaranteed targeted exposure on the site.
ONLINE OPTIMISATION
Tuongee Kenya Digital Marketing Agency, an online presence optimisation company that doubles as a marketing outsourcing company, works with SMEs. Formed in July this year, its Facebook page has a following of more than 2,000 people.
“This package is for all businesses that wish to daily put their products/services out there without the hustle of having to do it themselves. The client emails/ texts or inboxes the product to be posted to us together with pictures and their contacts details. We will then run this ad until the client changes the post.
These posts are done to a daily audience of about 2,000,000 people for just Sh2,500 per month,” reads an introductory statement on the page. With Kenyans increasingly taking advantage of the freedom of expression offered by social media platforms to voice their views about goods and services, it has become a necessity for corporates to monitor these sites to protect their businesses.
To this end companies such as Globe Track International and Reach Creatives have come in handy, making a case for the growing prominence of the social media in driving business.
