In 2016, it was recorded that Nigeria had about 16 million social media users. Having been recently declared as a mobile first nation, it is expected that the numbers have almost tripled in 2018. Adebayo Shittu, Minister of Communications, revealed that 75 percent of Nigeria’s 84 million internet users are on at least one social media platform as a result of easier access to mobile devices.
As a result of this rapid growth, social media is seen to be creating online businesses and has become a crucial aspect of most businesses today.
Experts are of the view that social media has become business globally and Nigeria is starting to realise and adopt these business trends on social media. The experts say that it is more likely for people to visit company and retail websites by clicking on advertorial links on social media and be more interested in things being discussed on social media.
Funke Opeke, CEO of MainOne who gave a presentation on ‘social media business’ at a Nerds Unite forum said “77 percent of people use their mobiles to discover products and services online, 60 percent of social traffic to retail sites originates from Facebook, so it is indeed generating significant revenue for some businesses and 85 percent of all orders from social media come via Facebook.
“When you look at the younger generation and the reach and valuation of some of these social media companies then you will know that they are more than just platforms where you connect to your friends to share jokes, pictures and messages,” Opeke said.
In the past few years, social media has been steadily growing in popularity and apart from individuals setting up businesses and marketing goods and services on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Instagram, most corporate organisations have also increased their social media presence in order to connect with and sell to the general public.
Research data from statcounter.com shows that Facebook takes 86.4 percent of the social media market share in Nigeria, while Twitter has 4.68 percent, Pinterest 4.38 percent and YouTube had 2.5 percent from April 2017 to April 2018.
According to statistics from the last social media week, internet penetration in Africa has seen an increase from 13 percent to 18 percent in the last one year and Nigeria leads the way with the highest number of internet users, Facebook users and active mobile subscriptions.
Opeke said that the sales through social media keep rising and half of social media driven purchasing happenswithin one week of sharing, liking, tweeting or favouriting a product. Hence, the total social commerce sales at the end of 2014 was about $20 billion and 2015 end of year report saw about 50 percent increase to $30 billion for retailers worldwide.
“Africa is a vast continent with millions of people. It possesses a huge market potential for trade and investment. A huge opportunity for growth and improvement and our youth are beginning to rise up to explore the power of ICT and social media to create a new lifestyle for themselves. As we all know, IT offers a tremendous opportunity of job and wealth creation. Building the value chain that will deliver these end results should become the collective responsibilities of many players across the world,” Peter Jack, the former Director General of National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), previously said.
Jumoke Akiyode- Lawanson
