South Africa’s digital landscape is catching up to the rest of the world, after a study conducted by World Wide Worx and Fuseware there is evidence that there is immense growth across platforms. South African jobs are also evolving to suit the social media landscape and the marketing industry has grown to accommodate roles such as Social Media jobs. According to the survey, South Africa has 13 million Facebook users, 7.4 million Twitter users, 8.28 million YouTube users and 2.68 million Instagram users.
Usage across platforms is mainly on mobile, particularly Facebook where people mostly use their smartphones and tablets. Instagram is mainly used by celebrities but companies are fast using this platform as an extension to their online presence. Instagram has doubled its South African following. Free social media apps such are amongst the most popular downloads, including WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and Instagram.
This gives South Africa a unique in edge in online marketing, in addition the world of web hosting is growing immensely and world class web hosting companies. Web design is a growing industry alongside social media usage; this is an interesting dynamic as the county’s website hosting grows immensely. The top 3 companies, according to market share are Hetzner (23, 1%), Webafrica (5, 2%) and Afrihost (4, 6%). The companies offer reasonable packages for companies who require varying domains; from .co.za to .com and even .africa and .capetown amongst others.
Amongst other factors, it is very important to choose the right hosting company and communication strategy in communicating across platforms and South Africa is becoming a leader in this regard. Social media management also entails the efficient management of a website and having a clear communication strategy is key.
The digital landscape has developed fast over the past 5 years, to accommodate the international community and South Africa may become the next go-to hub alongside Silicon Valley and other international tech hubs. In South Africa, marketing has always been a booming business and with the rise of the internet, we are seeing a lot of innovation coming out of South Africa with a wide array of companies specialising in offering digital products and services.
