Ever since I decided to leave the corporate world to start Infinity Growth Digital Marketing, I have been very excited and optimistic about the future of digital media in South Africa and I have never looked back.
It is without a doubt that even before Covid-19, the world’s digital economy was already growing rapidly. Three years after the start of Covid-19, now almost 4.6 billon people around the world have access to the internet while 64% of the population is actively on social media. Interestingly, today an average person spends almost 2 hours 47 minutes on social media daily. These shifts alone have presented a number of exciting opportunities in the market.
In South Africa, driven by the steady increase of mobile internet access and connection speeds, the growing number of smart mobile devices have led to growth in the demand for digital media platforms. Since South African markets tend to follow global patterns, growth in our media industry will mirror global trends of migrating towards digital media channels and so over the next 5-10 years the rapid growth of digital media is imminent.
Thanks to technology, owned media, paid media and earned media will be the next areas of focus for content creators. These rapid technological advancements are disrupting the media sector and have changed the way content is created, marketed and consumed. The major turning point in the market can be attributed to the Covid-19, pandemic as it caused a tremendous increase in the demand for media and the need for digitalisation in a lot of businesses. As the shift to digital media consumption grows, digital media will most likely remain predominant even years after the pandemic.
The digital commerce market in South Africa is also growing at an unprecedented speed and some of the impacts can be seen in the decline of traditional print media. But while online advertising is expected to surpass traditional media models by 2023, the South African broadcast sector will still have a solid conventional focus with integrated live streaming a big focus on the future. However, we should expect online advertising to outpace TV advertising by far in terms of growth. These global disruptions may seem exciting to some but to many they also bring a bit of nervousness.
To survive, adapt and grow access is key. People and media companies also need to focus on unlocking the value of the digital economy. By embracing and implementing digital technologies through earned media, owned media and paid media, the true digital value to our society will be unlocked, this will the provide benefit to consumers and our communities with access to high quality, relevant and reliable global content.
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