Fred Kithinzi, the CEO of Belva Digital, says organisations can only grow if they have three Ps in line.
“These are the product, the people and the processes. If your product is not fit, marketing won’t fix it – marketing does not fix bad products – you will flash all the money in the world, but your product won’t sell,” Kithinzi said.
He was speaking at the launch of a survey by Belva Digital on the state of digital marketing in Uganda.
“There are organisations with good products but no proper people or processes in place. Some have very good people but not supported by the processes in the organisation or you have the people and processes but your product is not market fit,” he explained during a panel discussion at the report launch on Thursday in Kampala.
According to Kithinzi, the survey shows that social media marketing is offering marketers in Uganda the best business results.
Background to the report
After nearly two years of lockdowns in Uganda due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most businesses in Uganda are emerging from the pandemic and seeking the best channels to generate business results.
To answer the question of how organisations are faring during this recovery period, Belva partnered with the Uganda Marketers Society (UMS) to survey hundreds of marketers in Uganda on the role they are playing to help organizations recover.
The survey was done over four weeks, covering more than seven sectors of the Ugandan economy.
Digital marketing
According to the survey, 55.3% of the marketers asked about budget allocation to digital channels said less than 5% is allocated from the marketing budget, and 23.6% indicated that it’s more than 30%.
Similarly, larger organizations are more comfortable with digital marketing and are allocating more budgets to it in comparison to SMEs.
Digital marketing is the only medium that can be measured end-to-end and with more than 22 million Ugandans now accessing the Internet, it benefits organisations if the budget allocation is higher.
Marketing approach
According to the survey, marketers have taken a collaborative approach to working with agencies.
Whereas some organizations have in-house teams for social media marketing, the survey points out that a significant number are engaging agencies for creative work, strategies, paid media, website development and influencer marketing.
Ultimately what the survey shows is that marketers are assigning the right work to the right resources to ensure the organizational goals are met.
In terms of prioritisation, marketers are 48% keen on customer acquisition and revenue growth, while 31% are prioritising brand awareness and 12% are prioritising increasing customer referrals.
Marketing is no longer an expense centre but a revenue generator, and that will continue to be the case as brands pursue value from their marketing efforts.
The Numbers
Fifty-eight percent of the participants were mid-to-large organisations with revenues between sh3.5b and sh70b. The rest (42%) represent businesses with a turnover of less than sh3.5b per year.
Findings showed that half of businesses with more than sh17b in revenue are spending more on marketing (more than 10% of their total revenue). Almost six out of every 10 SMEs are spending less than 5% of their revenue on marketing.
The survey points out a lack of understanding and capacity to carry out and measure the value of marketing. There is a need to develop a correlation between marketing spending and revenue growth; this will unlock more budgets and more growth for organizations.
Source: NewVision