Social Media Stats in South Africa and the Importance of Social Media Ads
Before the social media boom, marketers thought social media marketing was just another fad that would soon pass. But when Facebook started attracting attention from 2004, more and more companies saw the necessity of developing social media marketing strategies. Today this marketing tool has allowed start-ups as well as established companies to gain the attention of consumers on a larger scale. Even in South Africa the social media landscape has dramatically developed. We’re going to give you the latest stats and look at why social media platforms are essential for any company’s marketing strategy, but specifically the use of social media ads as the number one way your brand is likely to be discovered. This could seem a bit overwhelming for those who aren’t aware of the importance of online marketing, this is why you might need the assistance of an agency, such as Go Ninja.
Social Media Stats in SA.
These are the latest social media usage stats in South Africa for 2021:
94.6 % of South Africans’ have internet access through their mobiles
41% of our population is active on social media, this means that 25 million of us active on these platforms.
On average, per day a user will spend 3 hours and 32 minutes on social media.
The 10 most used social media platforms in South Africa are:
WhatsApp
YouTube
Facebook
Instagram
Facebook Messenger
Twitter
LinkedIn
Pinterest
TikTok
Snapchat
It’s quite apparent that social media is a definite part of millions of South Africans lives. This is evidence that no matter what company you have social media platforms allow you to have access to a large consumer base. But it is vital that you understand how to make use of these platforms as marketing tools. Now let's consider the social media stats for advertisers.
5 Ways Brands are Discovered in South Africa
5 Channels Marketers use to Research their Target Audience
These stats reveal the key to successful advertising. The number one way that your brand will be discovered by your prospective customer is via social media ads. There are a number of benefits of advertising through social media. You have the capability to increase your sales and client base. You can use customer generated content for ads, which performs better. You will be able to target your ads better, increasing the likelihood of returning customers. This will also allow you access to specific platform analytics, giving you insight into how well your ads are performing.
The social media platforms that you choose to advertise on will depend on 3 VERY important factors:
Where your target customers are most concentrated.
Where your target customers are most accessible.
Where your target customers most actively engage with ads.
There are a number of factors to consider when advertising on social media platforms. It is very important to create original content, in a visually striking way. There are a number of elements that have to be instituted in order to promote your company. Your brand must be clearly defined or redefined to make an impact on consumers. You will need a website carefully constructed to display your products or services. Your company will have to gain followers on various social media platforms in order to gain traction online. You will have to understand advertising on the various social media platforms.
Let's consider advertising on 6 of the largest social media platforms.
Social ads on Facebook. This is the world’s largest social media platform, with one of the largest user bases especially when you consider that Facebook owns WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger as well. Their advertising platform is considered to be well founded and reliable. Besides having a massive potential audience base, it has the advantage of being visually based and offers multiple and detailed segmentation options, from demographics to lookalike audiences.
Social ads on Instagram. As a predominantly visual platform, users tend to consume a massive amount of posts. To take advantage of Instagram’s potential, it’s suggested that you find examples of Instagram advertising that you would like to imitate and focus on optimising your images and videos in a similar way.
Social ads on Twitter. This platform offers interesting social ads options, it allows advertisers to create campaigns adapted to various objectives (conversion, leads, app installs, etc.) and increase their potential audience with Twitter Audience Platform.
Social ads on YouTube. Video marketing on YouTube is the probably the closest thing to traditional advertising that still exists. Use its potential to tell your audience stories they will connect with.
Social ads on TikTok. TikTok is one of the newest social media platforms. Don’t underestimate its potential, most importantly with younger audiences. TikTok advertising is a new and exciting option in the world of social ads.
Social ads on Pinterest. Pinterest users mostly a female audience. to social media and is an absolute hotspot for topics such as weddings, cooking, or fashion, making it very useful for advertisers in these areas.
The way that your ads are designed, the images and text you use, and the context they work in will all have an impact on encouraging users to click on your ads.
