Digitata Insights partners with Ntare Insights in Rwanda

Pan-African mobile intelligence and digital media provider, Digitata Insights has extended its footprint on the continent by appointing management consulting firm Ntare Insights as its preferred partner in Rwanda. The two companies wasted no time in establishing their presence in the market, successfully implementing a local mobile awareness campaign for Coke Studio in the country.

Having concluded a successful mobile marketing campaign for a South African-based multinational cellular services provider in Rwanda using its innovative MeMe measurable mobile advertising technology solution, Digitata Insights, a subsidiary of Digitata Limited, part of 4Sights Holdings, a JSE AltX-listed diversified holding company, required a strategic local partner to expand its reach in the region and leverage the company’s previous success to drive new business.

“Following extensive research and our on-going work in the region, Ntare Insights was a name that kept coming up in discussions,” explains Henk Swanepoel, chief marketing officer of Digitata Insights. “Following our initial meetings and discussions, we were extremely impressed with the team. Their understanding of the application of technology in general and mobile in particular, in delivering impactful business solutions was evident from the outset.”

Kigali-based Ntare Insights delivers trusted strategy, policy and business advisory services for government, businesses and industries, including small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and non-government organisations (NGOs) and civil society.

“Our philosophy is to understand the needs, issues and opportunities for our clients in order to provide high-impact and sustainable solutions, particularly in the areas of strategy development, private sector development, SME incubation, regional integration and trade, value chain development, and export growth,” explains Jack Gazana, Client Service Director at Ntare Insights.

“Jack Gazana and his team immediately assigned a dedicated resource to ensure the partnership gets the focus it requires to drive growth and expansion,” continues Swanepoel. “The team is also very well connected in the region, offering us instant access to a broad network with immense potential. This was evidenced in the fact that we were able to secure a mobile awareness campaign for Coke Studio in the region soon after concluding the partnership agreement.”

Coke Studio Africa is a multi-national non-competitive music show sponsored by Coca Cola that brings together different artistes from the continent to collaborate and learn from some of the biggest local and international musicians and producers. Sixteen countries participated in the 2017 campaign, with Rwanda represented for the first time in the campaign.

“As it was the first time that a Rwandan artist – popular R&B singer, Bruce Melody – would be on the show, and the fact that it would air on local television, our brief from the marketing team at Bralirwa, Rwanda’s official Coca Cola agent, was to drive awareness about the show,” explains Swanepoel. “To achieve broad reach, we used the Digitata Insights MeMe measurable mobile advertising platform to target mobile phone users in specified key locations with information about the show and at precise times before it aired.”

Another aspect of the Coke Studio Africa campaign marketed directly to mobile users was the under-the-crown promotion, where consumers stood a chance to win instant digital content, such as music, photos and videos of Coke Studio Africa artists, by simply SMSing the code on their cap underliner to a short-code.

“As the MeMe platform utilises Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) mobile technology, which enables non-data-enabled mobile devices to engage in internet-based services over GSM networks, winners were able to download the content without using any data, which proved to be a key attribute to the success of our first campaign together,” explains Gazana.

“The MeMe platform changed our campaign’s marketing strategy more than we anticipated. By being able to reach hundreds of people directly, knowing they’re guaranteed to read our message, we were able to make our engagement with them vastly more personal, in comparison to the standard SMS blasts we used previously. These capabilities are therefore making mobile marketing the most dominant form of marketing at present, and the MeMe platform is leading the way,” commented Eric Manzi, Marketing Associate at Bralirwa Ltd.

Based on the success of the Coke Studio Africa campaign, Gazana says the Ntare Insights team is confident that USSD marketing will continue to grow in prominence in the Rwandan market for its ability to precisely target consumers with zero-rated mobile marketing and advertising campaigns.

“Our partnership with Digitata Insights also opens many new exciting opportunities as the company and its MeMe platform are leading providers of mobile gamification campaigns. Given the prominence of mobile devices in Rwanda, we’re confident that this will become an increasingly popular form of marketing with vast benefits that will resonate with many brands in the country,” concludes Gazana.