Local online marketing tips for south african businesses

Local Online Marketing Tips for South African Businesses
By Pucka Marketing Solutions

Local Online Marketing Tips for
South African Businesses
BY

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Badisheng Isaac Morena, Cell No: 0767859821, Follow us on Facebook & Twitter (@BadishengMorena) © 2011


Copyright © 2011 Pucka Marketing Solutions CC

Notice of Rights
All rights reserved. No part of this eBook may be reproduced, modified or sold to
anyone. The recipient of these eBook may distribute it electronically or print it and
distribute it that way. You may use it in any other way that is not prohibited above.

Notice of Liability
The author and publisher have made every effort to ensure the accuracy of the
information herein. However, the information contained in this book is given without
warranty, either expressed or implied. The author will not be held liable for any
damages caused either directly or indirectly by the instructions contained in this eBook.

Other Notices
Any recipient of this eBook can contact me for more information. You may also contact
me to get a description of the services Pucka Marketing Solutions offers and get a
quotation. For more information you can go to Pucka Marketing Solutions’ Facebook
Fan Page. You can also send me a private email via Facebook. You can connect with
me on LinkedIn and follow me on Twitter.

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Table of Contents
(Click on the headings and go straight to the section of interest)

1. INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 4

2. ONLINE MARKETING ............................................................................................. 5

3.1. BUSINESS WEBSITE .............................................................................................. 6

3.2. GOOGLE PLACES .................................................................................................. 7

3.3. FACEBOOK PLACES ............................................................................................ 10

3.4. ONLINE BUSINESS DIRECTORIES .......................................................................... 11

3.5. SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING.................................................................................. 12

3.6. SEM AND SEO .................................................................................................. 27

3.7. DIGITAL INFORMATION PRODUCTS........................................................................ 34

3.8. SOFTWARE ........................................................................................................ 35

3. MOBILE MARKETING ........................................................................................... 35

3.1. VODACOM MOBILE MEDIA ................................................................................... 36

3.2. MXIT .................................................................................................................. 37

3.3. ADMOB BY GOOGLE ........................................................................................... 39

4. CONCLUSIONS ..................................................................................................... 41

(Click on the links below to check the sources used for this eBook)

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1. Introduction

The purpose of this eBook is to provide useful and concise online marketing tips for
business people. I will do this by showing you the different ways to increase the visibility
of your business online. I will also discuss an exciting new type of media which has
taken South Africa by storm and show you ways to use it in your marketing process.

Now look at the two terms that epitomise what I will be discussing in this eBook. I also
hope they help you understand why it is important to adopt new marketing strategies.

According to wordnetweb.princeton.edu the Information Age is “a period beginning in the
last quarter of the 20th century when information became easily accessible through
publications and through the manipulation of information by computers and computer
networks”.

According to Wikipedia.org New Media “is a broad term in media studies that emerged in
the later part of the 20th century. For example, new media holds out a possibility of on-
demand access to content anytime, anywhere, on any digital device, as well as interactive
user feedback, creative participation and community formation around the media content.
Another important promise of New Media is the "democratization" of the creation,
publishing, distribution and consumption of media content. What distinguishes new media
from traditional media is the digitizing of content into bits”.

The information age has long been upon us. The reason we have to take notice now is
that most of our customers are using new media platforms to interact with each other
and other brands. The customers we want to interact with are using mobile phones,
laptops, other mobile devices and desktop computers. Today’s people are looking for
easier ways to find and verify information.

Business people thus have to adapt to the change in behaviour of their current and
future customers. The business community needs to know where its target market is
spending its time and engage them. New Media platforms collect a lot of information
about their users and they can assist business people to reach their target audience.

This eBook will cover the whole scope of online marketing and mobile marketing
platforms and methods. I will help you understand the different platforms and which
ones are worth pursuing depending on your specific target market. I will give you
enough information to take the first step in engaging your customers on these platforms.
My hope is that you will see how important online marketing and mobile marketing are
and seek the help of marketing experts like Pucka Marketing Solutions.

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2. Online Marketing

The online community is the largest community that can be accessed without leaving
your home or office. This fact is the reason the World Wide Web is the place to be for
any size business. If that does not convince you, the fact that your direct competitor is
using this platform must. If you are using the net and you are not sure if you are using it
the right way read the tips below. The tips I have for you should also help you get a
professional and be able to gauge if they know their story.

Figure 1: Top African Internet Users. (Source: internetworldstats.com)

As you can see in figure 1 the number of people that are accessing the internet via
laptops and desktop computers is 6.8 million. The market is substantial and it requires
that you give it the attention it deserves and do it properly. If done properly online
marketing can increase your brand popularity.

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3.1. Business Website

A business website is a digital storefront where you can show information about your
business to your target market. According to Wikipedia.org “a website (also written Web
site or simply site) is a collection of related web pages containing images, videos or
other digital assets. A website is hosted on at least one web server, accessible via a
network such as the Internet or a private local area network through an Internet address
also called URL”.

The benefit of a website is that it can be found by billions of internet users worldwide.
More importantly a website is a platform on which you can engage your customers in
the comfort of their own homes, office or any other place they choose to surf the net.
The other benefit of a website is that you can include links to other online platforms
where you want your clients to interact with you.

Figure 2: Example of a website (source: http://www.garyromhairdressing.co.za/new/home.html )

As shown in figure 2, a website can have picture links to Facebook and Twitter. A
website can also have links to LinkedIn, YouTube and any other place you want to
interact with your customers. Later on in this book I will be speaking about other types
of websites where you can find and interact with your customers.

The key characteristics of a good website are as follows:
Purpose: The purpose of a website must be clear to a visitor within 15 seconds
or else a visitor will leave your site. A visitor must get the impression that your
site has what they want in order for that person to stay on the site for a longer
period. Look at figure 2.

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Theme: A website must follow the same theme as the business establishment.
This is important so as not to send your customers conflicting messages about
what your business is all about.
Looks and Style: A website must be aesthetically pleasing because you have
about 15 seconds to make an impression on a visitor to your site. If a site does
not look good, people doubt if they want to deal with the owner of that site.
Functionality: A website must be easy to navigate. The user experience is
enhanced and visitors then stay longer on your site.
Clear Call to Action: A website must also have a clear call to action for a visitor.
This is so that a visitor who knows what they want can take action quickly and
the one who still needs to read on can do so with the knowledge of what you
expect them to do. For example you can include “follow XXX” links as in figure 2,
“contact us” links, “order now” links, “place an order” links, etc. In figure 1the site
owners have decided that in order for their business to succeed they must
engage their customers on twitter and Facebook.
Optimized: A website must also be optimized so that people may find you using
search engines (i.e. Search Engine Optimization). Your site should be optimized
so that people may know on what social media websites they can find you and so
that they can share your site with people they know (i.e. Social Media
Optimization).

A website is a critical part of a business establishment and if you market it properly it
has the potential to increase your customers quite dramatically. It is also important to
take time refining your business identity and make sure it shows on your website.
Remember that your website is your online brand ambassador and your message
needs to be consistent to be effective.

3.2. Google Places

Google Places is a great place to list your business as it offers you the opportunity to
show up on the first page of Google results for your service in your town or next to it.
Google Places is an online business directory like the online yellow pages. According to
Google.com, their search technology (algorithm) decides the order in which businesses
in their database are listed in accordance with the relevance to the keyword and the
location in which the required business is.

According to MarketingTitan.com, “Keywords are defined as the exact phrases used by
prospects to search for something.”

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Figure 3: Google Results Page for the Keyword “Salon in Pretoria” on the 14/06/2011.
When Google Places first came out they used to show only seven business listings and
a map at the top of the search results (see Figure 3).

Figure 4: Google Results Page for the Keyword “SEO Company” on the 14/06/2011.

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Now you also get mixed results (see figure 4). According to a report by
publicdomaindetective.com, websites that are performing well in organic results and
Google Places listings for a specific keyword also performed well in the mixed results
page as seen in figure 4. This source also states that well performing Google places
listings have the effect of pulling up a site’s organic ranking. This means that if a site
appears very high on Google Places and very low on organic results it will appear
higher in the mixed results. I will make this report available to you on my Facebook
page, you can go through it get an in depth understanding of Google Places.

Google is showing increasingly local results because it wants to provide the most useful
results for the person searching for a service or business type in a specific area. You
get the results shown in figure 3 and figure 4 by doing two of the following things. Firstly
when you search for a service or a type of business and you do not specify the location
of the service or business, Google will use your assumed location which you can see on
the left-hand-side of the results. Google thus gives you a list of businesses next to the
stated location. This location can be changed to give Google a more accurate position.
The second way is that you can include a specific location when searching for a service
or business type, for example “hair salon Witbank”. The second way has a better
chance of giving you the desired results, location and all.

In order to increase your chances of appearing in the first page of Google’s results for a
query of your business type or service you need to do the following:

You firstly need to register your business with Google Places. It is important to fill
in all the details that are required in the form. It will be very beneficial for you if
you upload pictures and videos as well.
Claim your listing. You can do this by choosing to receive a verification code by
SMS. I found that this is by far the fastest way to claim your listing.
Put your contact details on your website on every webpage. This contact details
on your webpages must be the same as the contact details on Google Places.
This so Google can verify your contact details.
You also need to list your businesses with other online business directories. The
experts say that the more listings the better. It is critical that you list with Yellow
pages because Google trusts it and a listing with the yellow pages will get you a
higher listing on Google Places.
You also need to ensure that you get reviews and ratings.

There are reports that give you more detail than is shown above and if you want them
you can contact me through Facebook and I will send them to you. The information
above is meant to give you an idea of what Google places is all about.

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3.3. Facebook Places

Facebook places is a mobile phone application that enables Facebook users to alert
their fans about where they are. This is good advertisement for your business because
the status report appears in the wall (small area where people write what they are doing
currently or any other thing they want to write.) and all their friends have an opportunity
to see your business. Facebook is running Face Places in South Africa now, but it is
only available to iPhone users. According to Doug Gross, Facebook will release
Facebook Places applications for Blackberry and the Android system soon.

Figure 5: iPhone Facebook Places Application Screenshot

In order to make sure that your business is on Facebook Places, you need to use the
iPhone mobile phone. The iPhone that you use must have the most recent version of
the Facebook application, which will have the Facebook Places Feature. According to
Nick O’Neill you need to follow the following steps to get listed:

Create your listing by clicking on “Add” and filling in the required information.
You need to do this in the actual business premises since Facebook Places
uses GPS to verify the position of your mobile phone.
You then need to claim your business. To do this you need to log into
Facebook and search for your business listing and click on the “Is this your

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business?” link (see figure 5). You will then receive a verification code, which
you must use to complete the verification process.
The last step is to merge your Facebook Places listing with your Facebook
Fan page.

When you are done you then let Facebook users spread the word about your
establishment. Ensure that you are always at the top of your game because this
application allows users to comment on the service quality.

3.4. Online Business Directories

Online Business Directories are like the yellow pages in your local telephone directory.
The things that make them different to the traditional yellow pages also make them
better. Online directories are better because they allow the business owner to show
more critical information like a map, pictures, videos, services and a short description of
your business.

As a business person you need to view these listings in two ways. The first way is to
look at the listing as a listing that is meant to be seen by users of that particular
directory. Good business directories have thousands of people visiting them and
searching for businesses daily. The second way to look at your listing is as a form of
verification for Google. Google has special programs that will find your listing and if the
contact information (Physical address, phone number, fax number, etc) is the same,
Google will thus give your Google Places listing more preference.

Below I have listed the web addresses and the PageRank of the most popular online
Business directories. As far as I am concerned it is an absolute must that you have a
presence on these websites. Your presence will go a long way in increasing the
credibility of your business online as well as making it much easier to find through
search engines.

According to Wikipedia.org “PageRank is a link analysis algorithm, named after Larry
Page and used by the Google Internet search engine, that assigns a numerical weighting
to each element of a hyperlinked set of documents, such as the World Wide Web, with the
purpose of "measuring" its relative importance within the set. The algorithm may be
applied to any collection of entities with reciprocal quotations and references. The
numerical weight that it assigns to any given element E is referred to as the PageRank of
E and denoted by PR (E).”

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Table 1: Online Business Directory List
Online Business Directory Google PageRank (max =10)
www.yellowpages.co.za 6
www.easyinfo.co.za 5
www.infohub.co.za 5
www.mbendi.co.za 5
www.ezsearch.co.za 5
www.hotfrog.co.za 5
www.firstier.co.za 4
www.cylex.co.za 3
www.tuugo.co.za 3

I gave you this list of directories so that you can get started today and increase your
online presence. It is tedious but you only need to do it once and reap the rewards for
as long as you stay in business.

3.5. Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing (SMM) is the use of social media
sites to promote products and brands, to advertise, to
engage and communicate with customers and other
related activities that must be in line with the company’s
marketing strategy. Social Media Optimisation differs
from SMM in that SMO is the effective use of social
networks, see definition below.
Figure 6: The Biggest Social Media
Networks

Here is a really good explanation of SMO by hudsonhorizon.com:
“Social media optimization (a.k.a. SMO) is the process of optimizing your company's
social role on the web in order to increase business, boost sales, and enhance visibility,
traffic, and overall web presence.

SMO differs from SEO in that the underlying goal of SMO is to generate company
awareness from channels other than search engines. SMO seeks to generate company
success by stimulating a social buzz about your website through a variety of social
media tools, services and platforms.

Some of the most popular methods of SMO include content distribution through blogs,
vlogs, social networks, RSS feeds, and third-party applications or widgets.”

In light of the above stated definitions of SMM and SMO, companies need to know their
target market and how best to engage that target market in order to increase revenue. I

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will now explain the social media landscape by listing and discussing the biggest social
networks. The aim is to help you decide which social media strategy you need to adopt.

Facebook

According to Facebook.com, Facebook has more than 500 million active users
worldwide, 50% of which log on to Facebook in a given day. The average user has 130
friends. There are more than 900 million objects that people interact with i.e. pages,
groups, events and community pages. The average user is connected to 80 community
pages, groups and events and creates 90 pieces of content each month.

According to InternetWorldStats.com, South Africa has 3.8 million Facebook users with
a penetration rate of 7.8%. This source also states that there are 6.8 million internet
users, which is 13.9% of the population.

Now here are the demographics of South African Facebook users that you can use as a
starting point to see if your target market is on Facebook. You can also see how much
time you want to invest in Facebook if any. Figure 7 below shows the total number of
male and female users.

Figure 7: Male and Female Facebook Users in South Africa (Source: socialmedialogue.com)
Figure 8 below shows the age breakdown of Facebook users.

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Figure 8: Demographics of Facebook Users in South Africa (Source: socialmedialogue.com)

Now we can look at the age breakdown of by percentages of South African Facebook
users (see figure 9).

Figure 9: South African Users by Age (%) (Source: socialmedialogue.com)

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Now that you know who is on Facebook I think it is time to go through what you can do
on Facebook. The following points show what can be done on Facebook.
You can create an account after which you need to create a profile where you will
disclose your personal details, work experience, interests, hobbies and
educational history. Facebook then uses the information about the schools you
attended and companies you previously worked for or are working for to suggest
people you may know. You can then send them a friend request and the receiver
of the request has to confirm that they want to be your friend. This is how you get
friends on Facebook.
You can also create Fan Pages (see figure 10) and Groups. Fan Pages are used
normally for brands, societies, celebrities, products, companies, etc. While
Groups are used mainly for causes and campaigns. Fan Pages also appear in
Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs).
You can also send private emails through Facebook and you can chat to them if
they are on Facebook at the same time as you.
Facebook has a paid advertising option where you pay for clicks or impressions.
The advert consists of a picture and some text. You can target your audience by
age, race, gender, education level and interests.

Figure 9: Screenshot of Pucka Marketing Solutions Fan Page

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Companies use Facebook to interact with their customers so the customers can have a
closer relationship with the company and thus have greater brand loyalty. Facebook is
primarily a Business to Customer (B2C) marketing platform.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a business networking site. Its members are comprised of business owners,
company executives and other professionals in various industries. LinkedIn has more
than 100 million members worldwide and more than 1 million members in South Africa
and More than 3 million in Africa. This is a very good platform to connect with people
you might be interested in and advertise to your target market.

I found a great presentation by Amodiovalerio Verde, which provided great insight into
the users of LinkedIn. I think it will be wise for me to take you through parts of this
presentation that I think you would like to know about.

Figure 11: LinkedIn’s Worldwide Demographics. (Source: Amodiovalerio Verde)

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Figure 12: Key Facts about LinkedIn. (Source: Amodiovalerio Verde)

Figure 13: Pie Chart of Distribution of LinkedIn Members. (Source: Amodiovalerio Verde)

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Figure 14: LinkedIn’s Members Demographic by Area. (Source: Amodiovalerio Verde)

The information I have given should give you an idea about who is on LinkedIn and
whether it would be beneficial for you and your business or profession. In business
networking plays an important role in the growth of the individual because of what you
stand to learn from other people. LinkedIn also allows you to make key contacts that will
be vital in growing your business. Depending on the kind of business you run you can
use Linked as a platform to network with professionals in the same industry as you or
use it as a platform to attract customers or both.

It is important to state that LinkedIn should not replace traditional methods of
networking. Linked should instead augment the networking strategy you have now and
increase the pool of people you can network with. The result of employing this strategy
has the potential of helping you improve yourself and the performance of your business
much faster.

Now let us look at LinkedIn and what a few of the critical features look like. Figure 15
shows the LinkedIn’s home page of my account. You can click on the links on the
navigation bar to check the other features they offer.

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Figure 15: Snapshot of My LinkedIn Home Page.

Figure 16: Snapshot of a Group on LinkedIn.

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Figure 16 is a snapshot of a group on LinkedIn. A group is a forum where LinkedIn
members join and share advice, opinions and content. You have the choice of joining
existing groups or starting your own group. This is a good way to increase your
reputation in the industry you are working in and learn as well.

You can also pay to have your ad shown to your target market. LinkedIn Ads allows you
to target your audience by Geography, Gender, Job Title, Job Function, Industry,
Company Size, Seniority, Age and LinkedIn Group. The figure below shows where your
ads will show up on the Home page. You can choose from Text ads (1) and Picture and
Text ads (2).

Figure 17: Snapshot of a LinkedIn Account Showing Where Paid Ads Appear. (Source: LinkedIn Ads FAQ)

Finally, In order to get started in LinkedIn you need to get registered and create a
profile. In this profile you need to disclose your personal details, work experience
details, education details, interests, hobbies, etc. LinkedIn then finds people you may
know using the company name, school you attended and people you are already
connected to. You can also join or create a group. You can also search for people by
name and invite them to be your connection. They have to confirm that they want to be
your connection. LinkedIn is primarily a Business to Business (B2B) marketing Platform.

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Twitter

Twitter has more than 106 million users worldwide. Twitter also has 55000 active user in
South Africa (see figure 19), meaning that only 55000 users post at least once a day on
Twitter. According to Author Goldstuck, South Africa has about 1 million Twitter
members. This might be true since according to Alexa.com, Twitter.com is the 7th most
popular website in South Africa, which is better than Gumtree (9th), News24 (10th),
LinkedIn (11th), Bid or Buy (12th), Standard Bank (13th) and FNB (14th). I believe that the
rest of the Twitter members in South Africa are just followers of brands and other people
of influence. Figures 18 and 19 have really useful facts about Twitter world users and
South African users.

Figure 18: Twitter Demographics from 2010. (Source: bandwidthblog.com)

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Figure 19: Interesting Facts about South African Twitter Users. (Source: PracticalMarketing.co.za)

Here are some more great facts that I took from PracticalMarketing.co.za.
“Other interesting statistics include:

SA mostly tweets at night, between 7 and 8 pm. Many also tweet first thing in the
morning, and over lunch.
A surprising find is that SA tweets more on Tuesday than any other day of the
week. The least popular day to tweet is Sunday.
The bulk of SA Twitter users are located in Cape Town, which has almost a third
of all users. Tweeting is still confined to the few developed cities, with Cape
Town and Johannesburg taking a vast lead. Pretoria, while being a large city,
does not take much interest in Twitter.
The most popular companies that users talk about on Twitter are Vodacom,
Eskom and Microsoft. Sentiment analysis of these tweets has indicated that
many of them are negative.”

After all those facts and figures I think it is time for me to tell how Twitter works and how
best you can use it to benefit your business.

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Twitter is a social network that allows you to have other twitter users follow you and
receive all sorts of information and content from you. Unlike Facebook and LinkedIn
Groups you are the only one who can post on your message board and whatever you
post is seen by users who follow you. You on the other hand receive messages and
other forms of content from users you follow. When people decide to follow you there is
no action required from you.

As a business owner you want an audience to whom you can make announcements to,
who will receive your announcement immediately and save you thousands in
advertising costs. This is the ideal situation and it takes time to get to that point but it is
possible. Remember from figure 18 it is said that 25% of all users follow a brand and
67% of those people actually buy from the brands they follow on Twitter.

Figure 20: Coca Cola’s Twitter Home Page
As you can see Coca Cola has done really well in using this platform. They have more
than 300 000 followers, that means if they put up an update more than 300 000 people
may see it and that is how powerful Twitter is. I must state that as an old company they
still rely a lot on traditional media to keep their brand in people’s eyes. They therefore
do not use Twitter as effectively as Barack Obama (see figure 21) who has 8.6 million
followers and according to twitaholic.com, Lady Gaga (10.9 million followers) and Justin
Bieber (10.4 million followers) are the only people that have more followers.

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Figure 21: Barack Obama’s Twitter Account
Business people need to take notice of the massive potential that lies in this platform.
The fact is people are hungry for information and they will get it where they can get it.
So I believe that business people need to take a leaf out of Coca Cola’s and Barak
Obama’s book and start building a community of loyal followers on twitter. You can use
this platform to tell your customers your side of the story, set the record straight, give
them advice, etc. The key is information about you or your company will be coming from
you. People will then trust you and prefer to deal with you.

There are many ways you can use to increase the number of followers on Twitter. The
easiest way is include a link on your website if you have one or you can include a
picture of the twitter logo and a “follow us” call to action on any traditional advertising
method you use. If it is a radio advert, consider the viability of having the person
speaking on the ad asking the listeners to check you out on Twitter at the end of the ad.

You can get started by signing up to Twitter and start looking for people to follow to get
you started. You can also fill in the details on your profile and Twitter will suggest people
you may be interested in following. Twitter also suggests account to other Twitter users.
Twitter allows you write messages in the message board with the restriction of 140
characters per message or update. You can also upload pictures and videos. You can

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also link your company’s Facebook Fan Page to your Twitter account so that when you
update your Facebook Fans your Twitter followers get updated as well.

YouTube

YouTube is a social network where users can view, upload and share videos. These are
videos that are made by YouTube users. You can upload a professionally made video
or an amateur video made using a camera phone. According to Alexa.com, YouTube is
the 4th most popular website in South Africa. The power in YouTube is in the stats
shown in figure 22 and coverage as shown in figure 23.

Figure 23: Key Statistics about YouTube. (Source: Viralblog.com)

YouTube is unique in that unlike LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, the video you upload
can be found and seen by anyone in the world. Anyone can take your video and add it
to their blog and share it with their friends on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc. There
are literally thousands of social networks, including blogs and forums that people can
share your video in. So the potential of your video becoming a world hit is greatly
improved and your brand can get a tremendous boost. So it is worth trying.

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Figure 24: YouTube’s Coverage. (Source: Viralblog.com)

YouTube also gives you the ability to create a channel. This is like a group because
users can subscribe to your channel. In this channel you can create a unique design
and people can also see all the videos you have ever uploaded in that channel. This
allows you to develop a loyal following, which you know for sure will view your video if
you post it today and they will tell you if it is good or bad.

YouTube also allows users to promote their video on YouTube at a fee. They use the
same system as online classifieds where you pay to have your listing or video in this
case show up at the top of the page for your selected keywords or category.

Social Media Marketing Conclusion

The fact there are many more social networks you can go on and promote your brand.
The question is that will be worth your time, I believe not, especially if you are just
starting out is social media marketing. The four networks I explained to you are a very
good starting point and they offer you a wide enough market to find your target market

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on them. The thing to remember about social media users is that they enjoy fun,
interesting and useful content. If you consistently provide good content on any of the
four sites people will trust you and you will always have their attention. Social media
users are not very patient nor are they tolerant. If you do not provide them with good
content you will lose their attention, and they might stop visiting your page. That is what
makes social media tricky in that it requires you to allocate time to update your fans and
followers.

3.6. SEM and SEO

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) are forms of
marketing that promote websites on search engines. The reason SEM and SEO are
important is that all the internet users need to use a search engine to navigate the vast
World Wide Web. SEO and SEM play an important role in making websites more visible
to search engine users. There are two ways that a promoted website appears on a
search engine results page (SERP) (see figure 25).

1

2
Figure 25: Screenshot of SERP for the keyword “Dentist”.

Figure 25 shows two ways a website is displayed in SERPs. The position denoted by
the number 1 is a position occupied by websites which are promoted by using SEM,
which is the paid promotion option. The position denoted by the number 2 is a position
occupied by websites which are promoted by using SEO, which is the free promotion
option. The difference between SEM and SEO is not a hard and fast rule. It is just the
way internet marketers choose to define the two terms to make life easier.

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On that enlightening note, when you hear someone explaining any other way do not
worry as long as they perform all the tasks that comprise of SEM and SEO. For the
sake of this eBook I will stick to the definitions as stated above. I will start by explaining
SEM and then SEO.

Search Engine Marketing

This form of marketing is the paid form of search marketing where you can use the paid
marketing options offered by search engines. The most popular search engine paid
advertising platform is Google Adwords. Keywords are put up for auction and Google
users bid for keywords they are interested in and the highest bidder will get the highest
position on the SERPs. Every keyword has a suggested bid price and the more popular
the keyword the higher the suggested bid price. The other positions are filled by users
who offered lower bids. The bidding price is stated in US$ as cost per click, so you are
actually paying for clicks. Google does however reward websites that get a high Click-
Through-Rate (CTR) by reducing the cost per click of your listing for the same position.

Yahoo uses a much more simple paid advertising system. In Yahoo’s case the highest
bidder gets the highest position for a specific keyword. In Yahoo’s system CTR is not
considered as a factor to improve your position on the SERP.

For this reason Google Adwords is preferred by small business owners because they
can get their cost per click reduced if they get high levels of traffic on their site.

Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimisation is the use of free methods to optimise websites so that the
websites can get a high rating from the search engine and appear high in SERPs for
specific keywords. This is because search engines have rules that they follow to give
one website a better rating than other websites for the same keyword. This rating
determines which websites appear first, second, third, etc. The aim of a SEO campaign
is to get your website to the first page of SERPs and to the top for keywords that will
help your site receive a lot of visitors.

In this eBook I will be discussing SEO for Google. The reason is that Google is the most
widely used search engine in South Africa (see figure 26). The other reason is that SEO
for Google is very different to SEO for Yahoo. A Yahoo optimised website is considered
“spammy” by Google but a Google optimised website is still good enough to make it into
the Yahoo directory. So, best practice suggests that you optimise for Google first and

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then get your website listed and indexed in other directories and search engines of
interest. For the reasons stated above, I will only be dealing with SEO for Google.

Figure 26: Snapshot of the most popular websites in South Africa. (Source: Alexa.com.)

Let us first look at the demographics as provided by Alexa.com (see figure 27). The first
thing you will notice is that relative to “the general internet population” the users in the
age range (35-44) are “over-represented” at google.co.za. You also notice that users in
the age range (18-24) very “under-represented”. This information is interesting when
you consider the user demographics for Facebook (see figure 9): 33% (18-24yrs), 31%
(25-34yrs) and 14% (35-44%). Now that we know who uses Google SA the most I can
now show you how to increase your chances of being seen by these users.

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Figure 27: Snapshot of Audience Demographics from Alexa.com.

SEO for Google is divided in to on-page optimisation and off-page optimisation. On-
page optimisation is the optimisation tasks that need to be performed on every page of
your website. Off-page optimisation is the optimisation tasks that take place off the page
and website. The ultimate reason for performing SEO tasks is to increase visitor traffic
(or just “traffic”) to your web page and website. It is important to remember that anyone
can do SEO and SEM. The only issue might be whether or not you have the time to
learn, apply and keep applying SEO and SEM. SEO and SEM campaigns are not set
and forget campaigns because they need to be monitored to see if they are effective.

How Google Works

Before we get into on-page SEO and off-page SEO let firstly look at how Google works.
I found a great Google guide that can help you understand Google. I suggest you go
through it if you want in-depth knowledge about Google. I am only going to give you a
very simplified explanation about how Google works. According to Googleguide.com,
Google has three types of computers which are:
“Googlebot, which is a web crawler (or spider) that finds and fetches web
pages.
The indexer, which sorts every word on every page and stores the resulting
index of words in a huge database.
The query processor, which compares your search query to the index and
recommends the documents that it considers most relevant.”

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The Googlebot is a computer that automatically requests web pages like a person using
a web browser would. The retrieved page then gets crawled by a special program
(spider or crawler) that has been designed to send specific information to the indexer.
The data that gets sent to the indexer is in code form. The crawler does not like crawling
JavaScript and Flash code because they take up too much space. Thus websites which
use HTML perform better than those that use Flash or JavaScript.

The indexer then stores all the pages it received in alphabetical order of search queries
in a huge database. As seen in figure 28, when you make a query it the responsibility of
the indexer to suggest the most relevant results to show in the SERP. The indexer uses
a system called PageRank, which is named after Google’s co-founder Larry Page.
PageRank is the rating system I mentioned above, where the indexer rates a certain
webpage from 0 (min) to 10 (max). The webpage with the higher pagerank for a
particular keyword will be listed above a webpage with a lower pagerank.

There are a lot of factors that go into determining the pagerank of a website with respect
to a particular key word. I will go through some of the main and well known factors
below.

Figure 28: A Schematic that Shows What Happens When You Enter a Search Query.
(Source: Googleguide.com.)

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On-Page SEO

The first thing to optimise is content. You need to make sure that your most important
keywords appear at the top of the webpage in the H1 tag. You then need to make sure
that the keyword density for that keyword is 1-3% of the number of words in the page
contents. You also need to use synonyms of your most important keywords as this will
help keep you within the required keyword density and it will increase the relevancy of
your page to that specific keyword. You should type a couple of your keywords in bold
to make the spider take notice of them.

The next thing is to make sure that the Googlebot crawls all the pages you want Google
to index. Assuming the Googlebot found its way to your homepage first, you should
ensure that all the links to the pages you want the spider to crawl are on the homepage.
The best way to ensure that your pages are indexed is to make your links “text links” in
HTML code.

Another way to link to other pages on your website is to have text links in your content.
Make sure that the word you are using to link to that page is a keyword for that page so
that Google does not penalise that page and thus lower its page rank. One of the
factors in the PageRank algorithm is link quality. This means that the word by which you
link to the webpage must be one of the keywords for which that page has been
optimised or a synonym of that word.

The last issue is that Google likes fresh content so if you have a static website it is a
good idea to change the content once a month or so. If you have a blog this will not be a
problem as long as you post at least twice a month.

Off-Page Optimisation

This type of optimisation involves increasing the link popularity of your webpages. Link
popularity refers to the number of websites that link back to your webpages (backlinks).
This is where the concept of link quality comes back again. You need to ensure that like
the on-page links discussed above the links on other websites follow the same rule.

The most effective ways to increase link popularity are as follows:
Article Marketing- This includes the writing of article (350 to 600 words long)
and submitting them to article directories. You must optimise these articles the
same way you optimise the content in your webpage. You must remember to link
back to a relevant page on your website. Here are the top 10 article directories
According to makemoneyonlinegeeks.com:

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o Ezinearticles
o Goarticles.com
o ArticlesBase
o ArticleDashboard
o SearchWarp
o Buzzle
o Suite101
o ISnare
o Article City
o Article Alley

Blogging- This refers to writing blog posts for someone in your niche and you
can link back to your webpage in the “About the Author” section at the bottom of
the blog post. You can also leave comments on other people’s blogs and include
a link to your website. These comments can be deleted so make several
comments and create a relationship with the blogger and then add your link when
it makes sense to do so. You can also buy advertising space on popular blogs.
Press Releases- You should submit press releases to online news sites by
means of press release submission websites. You will include a link to your site
in the information box at the bottom of the press release. You can start with free
press release websites such as: www.prlog.org, www.free-press-release.com
and www.pr.com (source: newsbrief.co.za). According to cyberzoo.co.za, the
best paid press release websites are www.marketwire.com and
www.pitchengine.com.
Online Directories- You can list your website in high pagerank directories.
According to cyberzoo.co.za, the directories you should get your site listed in are
www.dmoz.com, www.yahoo.com and www.botw.com. Google trust DMOZ (the
open directory) because they own it and they trust Yahoo because it is a world
class directory with a good track record for accurate listing.
Writing in Wikipedia- Wikipedia is the largest open source encyclopaedia on the
net. That means the content is written and checked by anyone who wants to. It is
important to write your article as an impartial observer or else the other users will
notice it and report it or edit it themselves. You can add your link only as a
reference to the source. Go to www.wikipedia.org.
Forums- You can also get involved in industry related forums. Forums are part of
social media it is just that they are so many I could not profile any one forum.
When you find that one forum that you can get involved in, start by just watching
what is being said before you get involved. Then post a couple more times before
inserting your link. When you do post your link make sure it is a genuinely helpful
statement, preferably when you answer a question.
Answer Questions- Go to www.answers.yahoo.com, www.answers.com and
www.wiki.answers.com. These three sites are very respected by Google and

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Yahoo because the answers given are answers to real questions, so they can
show up in the first page of SERPs. Follow the same tactics as in forums and
blogs because people do not appreciate blatant advertising.

These are the most effective methods in use right now and it will be in your best interest
if you are serious about SEO to follow the above advice. You need to remember that
Google prefers local results, so in order to show Google that you are an authority in
your local area you need backlinks from local sites. It might be difficult but it is
necessary.

3.7. Digital Information Products

Digital information products can take the form of eBooks, audio-books and video-books.
The purpose of digital information products is to increase your reputation as an expert in
the particular field you are in. These products follow the trend that social media set in
that you are sharing useful information and you are not blatantly advertising yourself or
your brand.

The thing is if people appreciate the content you create they will market it for you by
sharing it with people they think might need it and your brand will get noticed by a lot of
people. If people appreciate your content, they will tend to trust that you know what you
are doing and they will give you their business or refer you. You can’t really tell if your
product is going to be a hit, the trick is just to keep on going because if the information
your providing is truly helpful you will get recognised for the good work and it will
translate into increase in business.

It is important then to choose the digital information product type that you are
comfortable producing. I say this because as time goes on people will expect to receive
these products from you some will even ask. This is good it means you are making an
impact and it means they have developed a dependency for your advice.

My advice on this issue is that you should look at your industry and see what
information or tips you can give away for free, which are actually useful and make a
product out of that. If people see that you are good at what you are doing and that you
really care about helping people they will give you their business. Just remember to
mention your name and/or company name on these products.

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3.8. Software

Software is another practical way to create brand awareness. The use of software can
increase brand awareness a lot if done the right way. I for one believe it is much more
difficult to develop software and apps that will create the level of hype around your
product as you want. For one they may need skills that you do not personally have like
coding.

Software can also help you increase your link popularity especially if the software needs
to be used on site. The bottom line is that if you have popular software your brand name
which will be on the dashboard of the software your brand will be better known.

3. Mobile Marketing

Mobile Marketing is the promotion of product or brand to mobile phone users. There are
different ways to do this and some of the most used ways are SMS and MMS
advertising, Please Call Me ads, ads on mobile based social media and mobile search
marketing. I believe that the mobile marketing scene is the most exciting marketing
method in Africa right now. The main reason for my sentiment is that according to Rick
Joubert, as of 2009 there are more mobile phone owners than radio and TV owners
(see figure 29). According to SAARF AMPS, 76% percent of adults (15yrs and older)
have mobile phones. On the other hand according to Mobile Africa report 2011 (page
29) the penetration of mobile use in South Africa is 98%. The bottom line is that the
mobile market is the biggest market in South Africa and we must take it seriously.

Figure 29: Estimation of owners of different media. (Source: Rick Joubert.)

Page 35 of 45

According to Rick Joubert, 14+ million mobile phones are WAP enabled and 4+ million
mobile phones have a mobile web browser. This data is important because it shows you
that the biggest portion of mobile phone users can be reached by SMS and “Please Call
Me” ads as primary methods of advertising. The methods discussed above are not the
only way to reach your target market and thus does not always have to be your primary
method of advertising. In the following sections I will take you through the most
important and most effective mobile marketing methods on popular networks and
platforms.

3.1. Vodacom Mobile Media

Vodacom is the largest mobile phone operator in South Africa and it is closely followed
by MTN (see figure 30). The reason I am writing about Vodacom in this eBook is that
Vodacom is the largest mobile network that offers the most mobile marketing solutions.
You can go to vodacommobilemedia.com, and see the mobile marketing services that
Vodacom is offering.

Figure 30: Market Share of Different Mobile Networks in South Africa (2010).
(Source- Africatelecomnews.com)

Page 36 of 45

Mobile Messaging

This is the first type of service that Vodacom
mobile media provides and it comprises of
Please Call Me (PCM) advertising and Promo
Voice Caller service. PCM is a service where
people who send and receive PCMs see text
adverts with links if necessary. PCMs are sent
to 23 million users a month and are sent about
600 million times a month. This is according to
a presentation by Rick Joubert (Sandton, 2008) Figure 31: PCM users demographic.
Source: vodacommobilemedia.com
Promo Voice Caller service is an automatic
calling service, where ad messages or any other messages are recorded and your
target audience is called with those messages.

Mobile Internet Marketing

According to vodacommobilemedia.com, this
service is targeted at 4.1 million users of The Grid
and the Vlive! Portals. These portals provide
approximately 55 million impressions per month.
The Grid is a location based social network where
you can display banner link ads and text link ads.
Vlife! is an internet portal by Vodafone where you
can display banner link ads and Tenancies. You Figure 32: Internet users demographic.
can also have a mini site and show videos on a Source: vodacommobilemedia.com
branded mobile channel.

The biggest competition to this service is MTN’s “Bulk Messaging” solutions. I will
include a full discussion on this option in a 2nd version of this eBook. You can go to
mtnsp.co.za, and read more about MTN’s “Bulk Messaging” solution.

3.2. Mxit

Mxit is the most popular social media network in South Africa. According to
NumberOf.net, Mxit declared in a newsletter in March 2010 that they had 19 million
subscribers. Mxit is a free application which can be downloaded onto a mobile phone or
a computer. Most Mxit subscribers use the mobile application that is why I am writing
about it in the mobile marketing section. According to heavychef.com, 77% of their
subscribers are under the age of 25 (see figure 33) and they have slightly more male

Page 37 of 45

subscribers (see figure 34). Mxit also provides good marketing services for advertisers
and I discuss these services after the two figures below.

Figure 33: Mxit Age Demographic. (Source: Heavychef.com.)

Figure 34: Mxit Gender Demographic. (Source: Heavychef.com.)

Page 38 of 45

According to Heavychef.com, Mxit provides various advertising options. They are as
follows:
Splash Screens- These are full colour advertisements that appear for a few
seconds when a subscriber logs on. These advertisements fill up the user’s
screen.
Broadcast Messages- These are plain text messages that appear to everyone.
Competitions- Competitions are run through Tradepost, which is a contact that
is automatically added to all Mxit subscribers contact lists. Here messages can
be broadcasted as described above and also allow for voucher redemption.
Portals- You can have a complete portal where subscribers can choose to add
your community. You could have live feeds, voting polls and also allow users to
download content such as ringtones, wallpapers, games and videos.
Xchange- This is a classifieds service, where you can post items for sale and
look for and buy items that are listed.

3.3. AdMob by Google

AdMob is a mobile marketing platform owned by Google. AdMob is the mobile version
of Adwords and it works in the same way. The difference is that your ads appear on
mobile phones as opposed to computers. The ads have been optimised for mobile
SERPs and mobile sties. I will now show you the demographics of mobile internet
users. The portion of the mobile market that can see your ads consists of 18+ million
mobile phone users. As stated above 14+ million users have WAP enabled mobile
phones and 4+ million users have mobile phones with internet browsers.

Figure 35: Internet user Mobile Operator Preferences (2009) (Source: Raymond Buckle.)

Page 39 of 45


Figure 36: SA Mobile Internet Age Demographic (2009) (Source: Raymond Buckle.)

Figure 37: SA’s Mobile Internet Users by Race and Gender (2009) (Source: Raymond Buckle.)

Mobile Marketing is a great way to reach your target market no matter where they are in
South Africa. Mobile Marketing can be your primary form of marketing and bring much
success. I suggest that Mobile Marketing should be used as part of a broader marketing
strategy that also includes Online Marketing and Offline Marketing. As time goes by you
will know which method is more effective for your business and you can then put a
greater proportion of your budget into that method.

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4. Conclusions

The Information Age is definitely upon us and to prove that you do not have to look
further than this eBook. Your target market is definitely using New Media to interact with
other people and brands. Your target market is also using New Media to find and verify
information. People are using the information they find on New Media platforms to
decide whether or not to buy.

As a business owner you can claim your place on these New Media platforms and play
an active role in building your brand popularity. The benefit of using these platforms is
that they give you a lot of control in how you spend your advertising budget. These
platforms allow you to identify the most effective campaign ads in real time, which will
allow you to use your marketing budget effectively. You also have the ability to target
specific users according to gender, race, age, etc. These platforms thus allow you to
target your market with pin point accuracy (as illustrated by Pucka marketing Solutions
Logo), which has the benefit of increasing your Return on Investment (ROI).

Page 41 of 45


Appendix – SAARF Factsheet

I found this great resource that is used widely by marketing professionals. You can use
it to do your own investigations and see where you need to spend your marketing funds.
The source is www.saarf.co.za in the FAQ section.

“SAARF AMPS® is an acronym for the SAARF All Media and Products Survey. It is a
single source survey, because information on media usage, product consumption and
demographics are collected from the same respondent.

SAARF AMPS® is an in-home face to face personal interview. It is currently done using
Double Screen Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing (DS-CAPI). With DS-CAPI,
both the interviewer and the respondent have a laptop. The interviewer’s laptop has all
the interview questions loaded onto it and allows the interviewer to capture the
respondent’s answers. The respondent’s laptop displays all prompt materials (e.g.
publication mastheads and response options) at the appropriate time during the
interview.

The SAARF AMPS® sample is currently about 25 000 adults (15 years and older) per
annum. The interviewing is conducted in two fully national fieldwork waves – January to
June and July to December. Results are published every 6 months in the form of 12-
month rolling data which covers the two most recent fieldwork periods.

Selection of addresses

The residential addresses of almost all urban communities are listed on our contractor
Nielsen Media Research’s geo-frame. The addresses are arranged within each
geographic stratum (area) alphabetically by suburb name, then by street name within
suburb and numerically by street number within street. Multiple dwelling units such as
flats, cluster houses with the same street number are listed individually. The sample is
selected in urban areas by using a random starting point, and then selecting
systematically with a fixed interval every nth address number. A cluster of two
addresses are selected at each primary sampling point to save travelling costs.

In rural areas (villages and farms) and informal settlements where there are no formal
addresses sampling points are selected using global positioning technology.
Interviewers are given a longitude and latitude co-ordinate and a GPS device to enable
them to navigate to the selected point. A cluster of two addresses are selected at each
primary sampling point to save travelling costs.

Selection of respondents

Two addresses are selected at each sampling point, one for a female interview and one
for a male interview. At each of this one respondent is selected using age to ensure a
proportionate sample. Inhabits at mines and hostels and domestic workers are sampled
differently in accordance with their gender composition. ”

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Table 1: Cell Phone Trends. (Source: http://www.saarf.co.za/- AMPS Trended Media Data)
July-Dec Jul-Dec09
Jul07- Jan-Dec Jan-Dec Jan-Dec
08 & Jan- & Jan-
Jun08 08 09 2010
June 09 Jun10
(2008BA) (2008AB) (2009AB) (Dec10)
(2009BA) (2010BA)
AMPS Universe
(Adult Poulation in
'000)
31,303 31,305 31,524 31,524 34,020 34,020
Cell Phones: 000
Own/Rent/Use 67 67.9 67 71.3 73.8 25,945 76.3
Company/Privately
Maintained:
Privately
Maintained 65.9 66.7 65.9 70 72.5 25,538 75.1

Company
Maintained 1 1.1 1 1.3 1.3 407 1.2

Contract/Pre-paid:
Contract 8.2 8.6 8.2 8.7 8.5 2,861 8.4
Pre-paid 58.8 59.3 58.8 62.6 65.3 23,085 67.9
Service Provider:
Cell C 5.7 5.8 5.7 8.3 8.8 2,903 8.5
MTN 28.4 29.4 28.4 30.5 31.8 11,531 33.9
Virgin Mobile 0.2 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.2 72 0.2
Vodacom 32.7 32.3 32.7 32.4 32.9 11,439 33.6

Page 43 of 45


Table 2: Internet Trends (source: http://www.saarf.co.za/- AMPS Trended Media Data)
July-Dec Jul-Dec09
Jul07- Jan-Dec
Jan-Dec08 08 & Jan- Jan-Dec09 & Jan-
Jun08 2010
(2008AB) June 09 (2009AB) Jun10
(2008BA) (Dec10)
(2009BA) (2010BA)
AMPS Universe
(Adult Poulation in
'000)
31,303 31,305 31,524 31,524 34,020 34,020
WWW Accessed: 000
Past 12 Months 10.3 10.7 12.6 13.4 15.6 6,138 18
Past 4 Weeks 9.1 9.5 11 11.7 13.4 5,315 15.6
Past 7 Days 7.7 8.1 9.3 9.8 11.1 4,482 13.2
Yesterday 5.2 5.6 6.4 6.8 7.7 3,066 9.0
Place Accessed:
Educational
Institution where
1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9 2 741 2.2
study

Home 4.5 4.8 5.7 6.2 7.3 2883 8.5
Internet Café 1.4 1.5 2.1 2.4 2.6 944 2.8
Office 4.1 4.2 4.6 4.6 4.5 1614 4.7
Elsewhere 1.1 1.1 1.7 2.1 3.2 1605 4.7
Emails Penetration:
Sent/Received e-mail
Past 4 Weeks 8.9 9.3 10.3 10.8 11.8 4,432 13.0

Used Internet:
Search 7.7 8 9.1 9.5 10.9 4,087 12.0
Directory Services 1.3 1.3 1.4 1.4 1.6 597 1.8
Games 1.7 1.7 2.1 2.3 2.6 1092 3.2
Gambling 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 87 0.3

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Dating 0.4 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.6 244 0.7
Social Networking — — — 4.2 6.3 2,730 8.0
E-mail 6.4 6.6 7.4 7.9 9.3 3,632 10.7
Instant Messaging 2.6 2.7 2.1 1.9 2.3 941 2.8
Chat (Excl
Mail/Instant Mess) 2 2.2 2.4 2.6 3.2 1,349 4.0

Music Downloads 2.1 2.1 2.8 3.1 3.4 1,365 4.0
Download a Podcast 0.3 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.3 120 0.4
Shopping 0.9 0.8 1.2 1.2 1.1 346 1.0
Banking 3.1 3.2 3.6 3.8 3.8 1,386 4.1
Share Trading 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.7 0.6 201 0.6
Research/Obtaining
info 6.9 7 7.3 7.3 8.3 3,158 9.3

Listen Radio on-line 0.8 0.8 0.9 0.9 0.8 282 0.8
Watch TV On-line 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 111 0.3
Read
Magazine/newspaper 2 2 2.5 2.6 2.5 891 2.6
on-line

Obtain Latest News 1.8 1.8 1.7 1.8 1.8 605 1.8

Page 45 of 45

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