GRBusiness
Mobile Marketing for Nigerian SMEs
By Godslove Adagbonyin, Communications Manager at Kirusa
Mobile is now a key part of the marketing strategy for Nigerian businesses. But it doesn’t have to be limited solely to large companies.
Today, a world of mobile opportunity awaits for smart SMEs who are willing and able to get behind the mobile revolution and put a strategy in place. And it doesn’t have to require a huge commitment in terms of time or budget.
Here are four tried-and-tested mobile marketing quick wins that you can start implementing today.
The Flash call
Companies of all sizes traditionally devote much of their efforts to outbound marketing activities – pushing out messages and offers to prospects and customers through a variety of channels, including mobile of course.
However, mobile has a critical role to play in so-called inbound marketing – the art of creating pull from customers and prospects to build relationships and generate leads.
Just one example is the simple flash call – where a prospect is given a specific mobile number to use to express interest in a product; or pledge to a particular cause; enter a contest; vote for something they love or provide feedback on a company.
The consumer’s call is not answered so no calling charge is incurred. Instead your company grabs the caller’s number so that they can be either called back or provided with more information via text.
Getting a flash call campaign up-and-running couldn’t be easier. You simply buy a batch of mobile phone numbers (either long or short) and advertise them on printed materials such as billboards, posters, brochures, flyers, and even invoices.
Best of all, the success of a flash call campaign can be easily measured by simply tracing the calls made to the mobile numbers you’ve purchased.
- Outbound Dialling
You don’t need expensive call center agents to reach out to customers via mobile technology. It’s now very easy for companies to send customised voice messages to large groups of customers and prospects.
These messages can be used to provide information about new products and special deals; or to check on customer orders and activity.
3. SMS Tagging
Many of us are bombarded with promotional text messages from multiple (and sometimes unknown) sources. As a result, we activate DND lists, and get used to ignoring these messages.
So how can you ensure that your promotional SMS gets opened and viewed by the recipient? One solution is SMS Tagging, a unique service that sends your message as part of a transactional SMS from the prospect’s operator.
Because this message comes from a trusted source (the operator) it is far more likely to be viewed – and acted upon.
In the past, SMS Tagging could be difficult to deploy because operators didn’t make it easy. However, this has now changed with the advent of CPaaS, which leads me neatly onto my next tip…
- CPaaS
This acronym stands for Communications Platform as a Service. It’s a cloud-based platform that provides companies with an easy and cost-effective way to communicate with customers and prospects via SMS, voice, email and chat.
Most importantly, it does all this without the need to build expensive and time-consuming backend infrastructure and interfaces.
In fact all the examples outlined above – Flash Calling, SMS Tagging and outbound dialling – are extremely easy to conduct using a CPaaS system. The infrastructure is established and ready to use, along with the necessary relationships – for example with all the Nigerian and West Africa’s operators. It’s a genuine plug-and-play solution.
Taking the first steps to success…
There has never been a better time for Nigerian SMEs to benefit from mobile marketing technology. Campaigns are now very easy to deploy, manage, monitor and measure.
As the industry evolves, companies like Kirusa are now enabling smaller organisations to conduct successful mobile marketing campaigns using the CPaaS and so avoiding the need for a huge capital investment.
Kirusa has been active in Nigeria and West Africa for 6+ years and is known for the high-quality voice over data services that it provides for Mobile Network Operators. The company has used its R&D team and existing expertise to develop Kirusa Konnect – a family of voice and message-based tools that organisations of all sizes can use to create unique and meaningful mobile communications campaigns for their target audiences.
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has directed deposit money banks in the country to start charging 0.5% cybersecurity levy on some transactions done by their customers.
The apex bank gave the directive in a circular dated May 6, 2024 and sent to all commercial, merchant, non-interest and payment service banks as well as mobile money operators and payment service providers.
“Following the enactment of the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc) (amendment) Act 2024 and pursuant to the provision of Section 44 (2) (a) of the Act, ‘a levy of 0.5% (0.005) equivalent to a half percent of all electronic transactions value by the business specified in the Second Schedule of the Act’, is to be remitted to the National Cybersecurity Fund (NCF), which shall be administered by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA),” the circular partly read.
The apex bank said that the implementation of the levy would start two weeks from the date of the circular.
“The levy shall be applied at the point of electronic transfer origination, then deducted and remitted by the financial institution. The deducted amount shall be reflected in the customer’s account with the narration, ‘Cybersecurity Levy’. Deductions shall commence within two weeks from the date of this circular for all financial institutions and the monthly remittance of the levies collected in bulk to the NCF account domiciled at the CBN by the fifth business day of every subsequent month,” the circular said
The apex bank added that this new levy will not be applied on transactions such as loan disbursements and repayments, salary payments, intra-account transfers within the same bank or between different banks for the same customer, intra-bank transfers between customers of the same bank.
Also exempted from the levy were inter-branch transfers within a bank, cheque clearing and settlements, Letters of Credits, Banks’ recapitalisation-related funding only bulk funds movement from collection accounts, savings and deposits including transactions involving long-term investments, among others.
This current implementation however is not sitting well with some netizens as they reacted to the new development.
Here were some of their reactions from X.
The Chairman of Economic Finance Crime Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, has stressed the need for Nigerian Youth to see themselves as agents of positive change that have a lot to contribute to the socioeconomic development of the Nation.
Speaking at the 2nd edition of a Leadership Trainings Programme in Abuja, Olukoyede, who was represented by the Head Enlightenment and Re-orientation unit, (EFCC), Aisha Mohammed, said the commission’s dream is to see the youth contribute meaningfully to the society, emphasizing on the need to work together in bringing positive change to society.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission Boss declared the readiness of his agency to work with all Stakeholders, including the youth towards changing the narrative and reposition the country to greater exploit.
Also speaking, the representative of the Executive Secretary of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND), Sonny Echono, appealed to the youths is to eschew social vices that could deter their full potential in life.
Other speakers at the event, including the Chairperson, Zero Tolerance for Social Immoralities Initiative (ZEITI) Africa, Rasak Jeje called on all stakeholders to join hands in collective pursuit of empowering new generation of leaders to curb the rising tides of social Vice among Nigerian youths.
The Chairperson, Zero Tolerance for Social Immoralities Initiative (ZEITI) Africa, Rasak Jeje made the call while addressing journalists at the 2nd edition of it Leadership Trainings Programme in Abuja on Thursday.
He said the training was aimed to intimate students leaders with knowledge and insights that will help them drive positive change and become exemplary leaders in their respective spheres.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) says the American International School Abuja (AISA) has refunded the fees paid by the immediate past governor of Kogi state, Yahaya Bello, for his children attending the school.
In response to a letter addressed to the Lagos zonal commander of the EFCC, the school said $845,852 was paid in tuition “since the 7th of September 2021 to date”.
AISA said the sum to be refunded is $760,910 because it had deducted educational services already rendered.
“Please forward to us an official written request, with the authentic banking details of the EFCC, for the refund of the above-mentioned funds as previously indicated as part of your investigation into the alleged money laundering activities by the Bello family.
Since the 7th September 2021 to date, $845,852.84 (Eight Hundred and Forty-Five Thousand, Eight Hundred and Fifty Two US Dollars and eighty four cents) in tuition and other fees has been deposited into our Bank account.
We have calculated the net amount to be transferred and refunded to the State, after deducting the educational services rendered as $760,910.84. (Seven Hundred and Sixty Thousand, Nine Hundred and Ten US Dollars and Eighty Four cents).
No further additional fees are expected in respect of tuition as the students’ fees have now been settled until they graduate from ASIA.”
In a chat with The Cable, the spokesperson of the EFCC, Dele Oyewale, confirmed that the school has refunded the money.
‘’The money has been paid into public account,” Dele Oyewale was quoted as saying
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