We know how much you enjoyed our Heavy Chef session in Joburg last month with Nic Haralambous and we’ve picked up a lot of chatter online concerning the mobile development industry in Africa. We decided to interview Nic and learn from him once more about the Mobile industry in emerging markets.
We’ve all heard a lot of stories about mobisites; should you build one? functionality vs simplicty etc. What would be the most important thing to keep in mind when building a mobisite targeted at emerging markets?
In terms of building, the answer is context. There is no silver bullet but if I have to say one thing that matters it is context. Don’t try and sell a high end product to a feature phone market with a cost-heavy mobile website.
Can you name some marketing agencies that you know are doing it right when targeting emerging markets via mobile marketing?
Praekelt is the agency that is getting it right and creating successes. Motribe worked very closely with them on the Guinness Nigeria campaign.
Emerging Markets seem to be a really popular buzz word these days, but where does this leave developed countries? Can you think of some really cool mobile campaigns in the US or Europe?
Nope, I can’t think of any cracking mobile-web focused campaigns in the US or Europe. In fact I can’t really think of any amazing case studies of phenomenal apps either. I know that there are a lot of very high-end fashion brands entering the market of apps right now. I did see this angry birds campaign recently that looked pretty smart.
What phone do you use?
I use a Samsung Nexus S
What’s the biggest mistake you see companies / agencies / marketers making today?
Agencies letting their clients dictate mobile strategy (which usually goes like this: “We want an iPhone and iPad app”).
Thanks a mil for sharing your insights with us Nic and we look forward to seeing you, Vince and Motribe take over the mobile development world!
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