FaceBook South Africa Stats & Overview September 2009

Eshaam Rabaney

Sep 7 |11:42

Data is the new creative. We can observe people from their searching behavior, from profile selections, what causes action. The social networking site with the biggest South African audience is FaceBook. With nearly two million local users, a lot could be learnt from the success in adoption of FaceBook in a rather “broadband deprived” culture.

Other than the benefits of projecting possible exposure of your FaceBook Ad or “Ad targeting” as FaceBook puts it, the real-time data provided through this feature is most certainly useful in more ways than one.

As of September 2009:

Overall Scope of Penetration

South Africa Male vs. Female Breakdown

South Africa Facebook Age Trend Analysis

This is by far the most interesting stat to come out of FaceBook’s advertising tool. Three reason why:

a) The declining trend as the age group goes older shows that we are new entrants into these things – spelling “o-p-p-o-r-t-u-n-i-t-y”, opportunity.

b) The spike in the 18-25 age group is no co-incidence. This group of the High school finalists, college attendees and generally new entrants to life, suggest SA’s “tech-savvy” generation. They will be more susceptible to the benefits of web-technology like Twitter, LinkedIn and WordPress etc and become the trend setters for SA’s overall social media revolution.

c) Notice how the <17 group has a greater uptake compared to the uptake in age groups 41 – 45, 46 – 50-, 51 – 55, 56 – 60 and 61+. Although this age group cannot offer us much in terms of online purchases and/or premium membership etc. However, I believe they remain vitally important in “spreading the word” to their moms, dads, aunties and uncles etc about the cool things their favorite brands say and do online.

South Africa FaceBook Social Stats

These are just a collection of some stats which you are able to pull from the advertising tool. These stats are far from accurate as not every single South African facebook user has specified the applicable field in their profile. However, these stats are still useful in terms of understanding and finding reason for action.

Social Media Education to Beat SA’s 23.6% Unemployed?

Eshaam Rabaney

Sep 3 |10:59

In a developing country where socio-economic problems are rife, unemployment figures are alarming and the quality of your education depends on where you matriculated from, seeking alternative means to beat these harsh realities is a MUST to ensure success.

I’m sure we can all relate to the ideology infused into us by parents and career counselors etc – That we go to high school, matriculate with exceptional grades then attain access to a fine university, where we then will graduate, enter the job market and start building on our careers.

A career is typically made up of many jobs. However, with steep competition for jobs that are far scarcer now day’s means that job seekers need to find new and creative ways to stand out amongst the barrage of other applicants, all vying for the same position.

The job hunting world is continually changing, driven primarily by advancements in technology and leveraging the Internet. I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately, which is why I wrote this post to direct your attention to something I both believe in and hold to be mandatory in these times of economic uncertainty.

I want you to examine the picture above. You’ll notice that there are two LinkedIn profiles, but both tell a different story. The profile on the left story’s reads savvier and illustrates that person’s unique position. The profile on the right however reads less savvy, but illustrates that the buzz around “Social Media for career advancements” has reached that person.

The common factor here is not that they both have a presence on LinkedIn, but the fact that “buzz” both reached them. Profile on the left has executed on that buzz whereas profile on the right suggests that that buzz was dismissed.

I ask you though, which profile is more likely to find success?

With attention such as “Social networking sites are the new recruitment platform”, niche communities such as “South Africa’s Recruitment Community” and “The Social Media Education Community“ – there is indeed great opportunity (both ways) in which web technology can, but probably will, be leveraged to stand out from the crowd (23.6%) and help people onto the career ladder.

Unemployment Stat adapted from STATSSA

A Coming South Africa 2.0

Eshaam Rabaney

Aug 19 |08:29

A Coming South Africa 2.0

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State of South African Twittersphere – Top 5 Questions

Eshaam Rabaney

Aug 11 |00:00

Naturally as an online media strategist, the first thing I would want to do is to gain some insight and perspective for tactical definition. As Twitter is an international channel, pulling data for just local users is an extremely difficult task. Not being stopped by this fact, I went through just over two hundred local twitter accounts. Either through their location specified or twitter stream – I was able to ensure the local user. Two hundred may same as to short of a total to want to audit, however all that was needed was perspective to be guided by and insight to project on.

I then went on to collect my findings and presented the “State of the South African Twittersphere”. I received a number of questions relating to the publication. In it, I have found some not so surprising things (to me at least). Namely, that many South African users show no real interest in it or show knowledge about the micro-blogging platform.

• 65.5% failed to provide a homepage URL / web link
• 75.5% of users have not entered a bio in their profile
• 58.0% have not specified a location
• 74.5% have not updated within a 24 hour period
• 87.8% of users show high following numbers, as oppose to a level following‐to‐follower ratio

Top 5 questions I received about this report…

1) Who is really using Twitter in South Africa then?
a. Twitter is very much dominated by our techno-guy or geeks. These kinds of people all run blogs or websites and use the service to promote themselves. Also, people with agenda’s – these are your guys at your South African websites, be it from web affiliated business, photographic/graphic to media etc. Of course there are those odds that use Twitter as a “civilian” – But sadly they are out-numbered by SA’s real Twitter users.

2) Is there a point in including Twitter as part of a Social Media campaign?
a. In terms of ROI, there’s no point. I’ve always said, look at your JSE 100 then tell me why you think they haven’t really come on-board like the Fortune 100 has came on-board with this channel. However, when the time is right, be sure to see them in full action! Right now, I think it’s just a novelty to be on Twitter (For companies) –“like teens being cool at a brand new mall, the place be”.

3) What do I mean by the “right time”
a. Right now, we lack a vital component to social media in general i.e. your “e-citizen”, then we lack “e-citizens” because of an almost non-existing “broadband culture”. Once time spurs a broadband culture which in-turn produces “e-citizens” then let the ROI begin.

4) What does it mean for brands already on twitter i.e is there a competitive advantage to this?
a. I don’t believe so. The problem is that due to the current reality of the South African Twittersphere, content will not travel as effectively, also the time spent trying to maintain a corporate account for about 2000 followers, could of been time spent working on other things serving larger audiences. Once the quality in adoption of Twitter in South Africa improves (dependent on your social media strategy) companies will be able to easily catchup with those who have had a presence for a longer period.

5) If I had to write a Twitter strategy, against this backdrop, what would it look like?
a. I’ve always used liked the analogy of Oxytocin (The hormone which induces labor). If medical technology has advanced to the point where we can induce labor – why can’t we take social media technology and use it to induce an audience. To answer your question, my strategy will be very inducing

MXit’s MXchange, congratulations or condolences?

Eshaam Rabaney

Jul 3 |12:21

We are all familiar with the highly recommended Gumtree.co.za, which gives ordinary people the chance to sell the goods and services, apply for job vacancies or search for accommodation and motor vehicles etc online. Launched recently in BETA, MXit Xchange takes the Gumtree model and allows MXit’s users to access the principal of Gumtree right on their most favored social network.

However, MXit user’s had a different agenda as oppose to the agenda of the heads at MXit Lifestyle. Currently MXit Xchange holds about 35 000 listings, but not a single legitimate listing to even whisper about. What went wrong you may wonder?

Personal Dating Board – Since one must pay “moola” (MXit currency) to chat in the chat rooms to obtain new contacts, most user’s saw this as an opportunity to advertise their age, sex, race and number followed by a short word of their own to describe their appeal, hoping to obtain new contacts for free.
Illegal and Unorthodox goods and services – Some saw the MXit Xchange launch as a means to promote their “Businesses” , these businesses ranged from pirated movies to branded clothing at strangely rock-bottom prices.
Begging Board – Here, every MXiteer took the opportunity to put them out there by advertising their desperation and willingness to do anything for minimum pay. I was surprise to see MXit actually added this category “Jobs”, given current circumstances.
Spam, Spam and more Spam – Blank ads, sick ads, funny ads, stupid ads etc, you name it and MXit Xchange has it all.

In response to this, MXit launched what I call a “sedative”, which encouraged legitimate posts through a chance to win a brand new cell phone. Sure MXit could ban the abusers from the social network or even remove the bad ads, but the severity of this problem is beyond that. These are moola paying MXiteers, and banning them will not reflect too well on the profit margins.

These are the main problems that MXit Lifestyle has to urgently address if this product is to set an evolution, to the way we did our business before on Gumtree. It’s evident that MXit is guilty of anticipating incorrectly and not paying enough strategic attention.

Do not get me wrong, this is no pessimistic tone, but rather a concerned tone. There is great potential out there, but since MXit holds millions of user’s, a holistic approach to these product models is crucial to kick start the South African internet industry to the standard of our international neighbors.

At the same time, the nature of this product is a milestone for the South African internet industry and has all the potential to cut into Gumtree’s big slice as the number one local listings website. MXit users have shown not the slightest bit of support, which makes me question the effect this product will have on MXit’s confidence to venture deeper, and more importantly the confidence to venture deeper into larger endeavors.

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