Digital Marketing Nigeria: Why Nigerian Brands Should Do Content Marketing.
Please Note: This is an excerpt from the E-book on Content Marketing The Dawn of a new Age of Marketing.
Download the Complete book here for free.
Marketers in other more developed climes have had a head-start in understanding the concept of content marketing. In fact, there have already been apocalyptic talks about a Content Shock.
However, Nigeria is still way behind in the game.
One may begin to argue “Content is content. If the internet is already saturated with content created by other climes, what difference will ours make?. The answer is –plenty. Despite the world being a global village, there is a psychological and cultural facet of content. Content must have context and reflect a common reality.
Content that has this attribute will connect with its audience.
People will be loyal to the brands that are able to create content that they like and that connects with them. That is where the opportunities lie for Nigerian and African brands. The land is green and waiting to be taken.
The internet has given brands the revolutionary ability for brands to communicate directly with its customers-without necessarily the need for a media industry intermediary. Unlike the US, Europe, and other more developed climes-who have been developing content for years, in Africa and Nigeria, the CSI, “Content Saturation Index” of industries is still very low (CSI is the saturation levels of content in every industry). There is still a lot of work that needs to be done in the area of creating relevant local content.
Brands that take advantage of this gap will succeed and reap loads in loyalty.
Indeed brands who are taking on the challenge of becoming publishers and embracing content marketing as part and parcel of their digital endeavors will reap great returns and most likely dominate their industries for years to come.
If done right, they will amass large audiences and hold oligopolies. What would happen then is that over time the consumers of content online will begin to visit a group of their established and trusted media outlets and niche industry sites to get their information.
Latecomers will have to struggle hard for the already divided attention.
Take the apt example of gossips sites like The Linda Ikeji Blog. The Linda Ikeji blog has, over time amassed a large audience. Other gossip sites like that have mushroomed, with the same style of reporting but are finding it hard to amass the returns the site had from being amongst first in that category.
It’s one of the rules of positioning -get there the firstest the mostest.
If you have a problem with not getting there first, look for another category- whether within or without that category to be first. Of course, with time, the dial will begin to push towards quality and those who neglect quality will slowly fall off the ladder but those who started early enough, like Linda did, will rule for a long time.
On the other hand the slow movers who do not jump in soon enough will, when they do(and trust me they will), produce equal or even better content, put in the same effort and sweat, and still will not be able to move the traffic and conversion buttons like the digital Sooners did when they started out.
Industries would have saturated the internet with helpful branded content. The path to the top will be rocky. It would become immensely more difficult for their voices to be heard above the noise.
This is because in a saturated arena, rising above the noise is harder.
Over time it would be clear that the price to be paid to play the game now will be virtually nothing compared to the respectable sum(in cash or kind) that would be needed years later when the Content Saturation Index of industries have risen considerably.
There are still opportunities to stake strong claims in certain industries. The sooner your brand gets into the fray before the digital information highway gets crowded the better. In Nigeria, and Africa as a whole, the ‘’lands’’ are still wide open to be taken but it won’t stay that way for long. I don’t know if you see it in front of you or not. But one fact remains if you move now, you dominate if you don’t, someone else will.
Download the complete E-book on Content Marketing for free
