Mobile Banking

By Chester Ng, Sales Director (Southeast Asia)

After selling livestock or milk in local markets, Maasai herdsman living in the Serengeti Plains of Kenya, used to return home with cash in their pockets, which might sound nice but also meant they were walking targets for theft. No more. Thanks to a mobile banking service, a herdsman's customers now transfer payment direct to the seller's account.

Kenyans in the city, meanwhile, are using the same service to pay for transport. But as a BBC reporter points out, try to do this in London, New York or Hong Kong or Singapore, for that matter, and you'll likely “find yourself with a very upset cab driver”.

At BuzzCity, we've noticed an increasing number of banks and financial institutions using mobile advertising to share information and promote services. But very few have actually introduced full-service m-banking. This is going to change. And as it does, there are a number of things that banks need to keep in mind . . . .

Mobile Advertising Index (Q4 2010)

2010 saw a huge growth of the mobile internet as more users took advantage of cheaper data rates and much improved handsets. Our ad network grew by over 90% compared to 2009 and advertiser campaigns have also increased.

More than 2500 advertisers ran campaigns and increased their expenditure in several key markets.

India continued on its growth curve – in Q4 more than four billion ads were delivered to Indian audiences - and for the first time outpaced Indonesia to secure the number one spot.

The top 5 most active countries in Q4 were:

1. India : 4 billion impressions served
2. Indonesia : 3.0 billion impressions served
3. United States : 1.1 billion impressions served
4. South Africa : 0.9 billion impressions served
5. Kenya : 0.5 billion impressions served.

To view the report in full, please visit the Reports section of the BuzzCity website.

Shoprite, Shop Right!

By Hawa Omar, Sales Director, South Africa

Whether you want to buy an iron, a birthday present for your nephew, a bus ticket, haircare products or meat for the braai, Shoprite has it all and usually at a good price. With over 1000 outlets in South Africa, Shoprite is South Africa's largest supermarket chain. The company, which also has 36 stores in twelve more African countries, focuses on turnover and targets middle-income consumers.

And like a growing number of Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) businesses, the South African superstore has begun promoting its goods on the mobile internet with banner ads and interactive pages.

FMCGs, in general though, are not making the most of mobile. CEOs need to take a step back and look at how internet giants like Amazon grew their online communities and markets, then adapt these lessons for the unwired.