The Future is Here

Money is mobile

In 2015 they were just three.

Now the mobile phone banking industry has FNB’s ewallet, Ebank, PayToday and PayPulse.

The latter is brought to you by Standard Bank but powered by Mobipay.

Ebank, which was linked to the first lady, had a unique approach, mainly targeting Engen Service Stations.

Mobipay is the first company that lured MTC into the mobile payment market.

However, I believed FNB’s eWallet was the sweetest slice of the pie, in my humble opinion.

This SMS option allows customers to send money to anyone with a valid Namibian cellphone number. JUST A NUMBER MEI BRU!

Then came along Paytoday and Paypulse.

It opens up a new world of consumer choice powered by on-demand technology, changing the Namibian payment experience. It is finally becoming a world where businesses don’t need to keep large amounts of money on their premises.

The Namibian consumer has long demanded convenience, control, and better service in the finance sector.

This is the result of the long relationship of trust we have developed with our phones.

Ever lost a smartphone with all your documents that you failed to back up?

We trust our phones and apps to keep our data secure and private.

If a human being can trust a phone to keep pictures of their children and all their personal “ish” safe, then you best believe that they will trust their phones as payment tools.

I wish there were statistics, but I am pretty sure that a large percentage of people pay their municipal bills with their smartphones.

So is this the beginning of the future?

This is where collaboration wins. Collaborating with key players to form partnerships that will drive the development in establishing new consumer propositions. Across multiple channels such as the obvious online, in-store and in-app.

In doing so, a safer and richer mobile payment experience will enable consumers to make daily payments.

New Word Alert; Adverdiversify

Disclaimer: I might sound and come off as angry and touched but remember, angry people, do not write and sip cappuccinos while listening to Blackcoffee. J

 

Black history month is an American concept. The release of Black Panther in February was probably strategic, but the wave's ripple effects are beyond what many could have imagined. A Namibian indigenous tribe was showcased in the blockbuster movie. Allow me to vent.

Namibia is easily amongst the countries with the fewest people per square kilometre.

Also, a good percentage of Namibia's consumer spending is mainly influenced by blacks.

Yet, it is pretty striking how much the Namibian advertising Industry is controlled by a handful of white people. Lol, like everything else.

Pause and ask, how many black advertising leaders do you know? We are flooded with ads on radio, television, newspapers and billboards, yet how many of our people run these campaigns? Unlike xenophobic South Africa, diversifying should not be difficult in Namibia with just 2.4 million people. 

Most would say that blacks don't know much about careers in advertising. 

Do not get me wrong, and there is no disparity in the workforce; the main issue lies in the gap in the trust to push creative ideas, the lack of black advertising creative directors. Forget how unfair that might sound, but it isn't good for business as well. 

Diversity brings a mixture of ideas, which the industry has been crying out for since the great millennium—good luck naming a great ad or campaign that was or is headed by a black creative.

Recently, ad agencies have partnered up with fashion icon Loux The Vintage Guru on several campaigns. These seemed to have appealed to the masses because fashion in Namibia is enjoying an upward curve. A darkie behind the concepts? I hope so because the work was appealing and was speaking the language of a specific race. 

The thing about unpacking demographics and looking into purchasing power is that a spirit of arrogance is needed when doing the actual creative work. So much of what should happen in advertising is to examine how people behave, and I believe that saying things like "I know these people; I know what they like and what they consume" should be a natural requirement. And that's why Black Panther was a success.

My interest in advertising started over six years ago, and I have probably read more than 30 pieces titled in the lines of "THE DEATH OF ADVERTISING", yet the great industry continues to thrive.

Advertising will never die. Wipe out the entire black race, and then we might see the death of advertising. The age of consumerism started to blossom when blacks started getting a seat at the table, and with consumerism on the rise, advertising will sneak in to hold its hand, so they walk side by side.

There's a new wave mixed with so much beautiful tension, which I suspect is due to a new generation of people coming toe to toe with archaic systems, be part of it!

An Open Letter to the Namibian Creative Industry

Firstly, you are doing fantastic, darling!

You have won 2017.

It is impossible not to look forward to this year, as the pieces you dropped in 2k17 were introductory gems.

The creative industry, who are you lot? People might ask, but I refer to more than 15 industries extending from the arts to science and technology. 

The notion has for years remained very broad as it embraces cultural goods and services and the domain of research, development, and entertainment. What is the relationship between commerce and art, they might ask? You lot have all the answers.

The industry was accustomed to creating bland and mediocre work that brought about relaxation when it is supposed to consistently urge us to get out of our comfort zones and creatively stretch the length of what is not impossible. And oh boy, did you push the realms of possibility in the year 2017. 

Of course, social media has a huge role to play as many concepts are being consumed visually. 

Television, fashion, photography, visual arts, with music consistently doing well, have also been bizarre. Lots of Trace airplay, cyphers, beat auctions and who hasn’t heard Slickartie play?

What does this mean? Specific establishments aren’t the only creative heads in town anymore. Not only do they now have a vast creative pool to choose from, but boutique creative consultants are popping out of nowhere, and, yes, of course, why not!?

Creatives are known to be most productive at odd hours, producing some attention-grabbing severe work, not because it pays ridiculously well but because they know that their futures depend on it and that they are judged a lot. Companies will always want people with ideas, and the days of “we need to use foreign talent” are disappearing. I don’t believe that it was much of a “doing creative work” problem but rather a lack “of thinking creatively problem”.

Small wins, maybe, but we must celebrate every small victory.

Enjoy the blank page of 2018 ;)