Local agency, HaveYouHeard, this week released its analysis of Facebook engagement over the first four months of the year, in which it found MTN and Vodacom response rates dropped significantly compared to the same period in 2014.
Some 200 South African brands on Facebook were analysed by the Cape Town-based social media agency.
Each brand performance was analysed, in the first four months of this year, by looking at the total number of interactions on each page. The total of interactions was then divided by the number of fans to calculate the interaction engagement score. The score allows for brands with varied community sizes to be compared to one another. Statistics from social analytics company SocialBakers were used to measure interaction.
The different economic sectors analysed included airlines, the automotive industry, beauty, finance, FMCG, food, retail, services and telecoms.
Industry in trouble
"Telecoms have an incredibly high comment rate as an industry, most probably reflecting complaints and queries as consumers take their frustrations online. This should be viewed in line with its high response rate of 50%, and a 53% interaction engagement rate," says HaveYouHeard joint-MD Jason Stewart.
"What is interesting is that, while MTN has been listed as having the second most interactions on its page, its response rate since the last quarter of last year has dropped by 80% while total interactions have also dropped by 76%. In addition, Vodacom has seen a significant drop in activity by 90%. Reads like an industry in trouble to me."
The brands looked at within the telecoms sector included Cell C, DStv, MTN SA, Telkom and Vodacom.
Gumtree fans share
The services industry is one of the best performers on Facebook, according to the research. The services analysed for the study included AutoTraderSA, Cars.co.za, Dimension Data, Gumtree SA, OLX SA, Private Property and Virgin Active SA.
Fans who engage on these pages are the most likely to share content ? over twice the amount of all other industries. Gumtree is the top performer in the industry with over 50 000 shares.
SA telecoms and services industries on Facebook, as per HaveYouHeard's analysis of the first four months of the year:
Local Fans | Fan growth % | PTAT % | Page score | Response rate | comments | PTAT | shares | Total interactions | Interactions engagement % | |
Telecoms average | 414 853 | 3% | 1% | 68 | 57% | 27 514 | 5 832 | 4 606 | 131 721 | 26% |
Cell C | 321 558 | 6% | 1% | 75 | 73% | 37 448 | 4 583 | 1 393 | 84 275 | 26% |
DStv | 365 873 | 5% | 1% | 69 | 80% | 9 260 | 5 867 | 1 691 | 43 204 | 12% |
MTN SA | 664 189 | 3% | 1% | 65 | 10% | 59 315 | 8 408 | 16 685 | 340 780 | 51% |
Telkom | 143 149 | 1% | 1% | 57 | NA | 9 607 | 974 | 1 405 | 17 360 | 12% |
Vodacom | 579 494 | 1% | 2% | 74 | 66% | 2 1941 | 9 329 | 1 856 | 172 988 | 30% |
Services average | 331 300 | 5% | 3% | 68 | 44% | 15 525 | 7 534 | 8 671 | 85 922 | 34% |
AutoTraderSA | 177 738 | 26% | 7% | 91 | 40% | 3 085 | 12 704 | 5 177 | 71 955 | 40% |
Cars.co.za | 206 073 | 8% | 7% | 86 | 3% | 12 926 | 15 879 | 5 463 | 133 848 | 65% |
Dimension Data | 102 071 | 1% | 3% | 78 3 | 3% | 179 | 3 261 | 395 | 34 079 | 33% |
Gumtree SA | 904 228 | 1% | 0.37% | 58 | NA | 2 123 | 3 368 | 736 | 17 335 | 2% |
OLX SA | 735 772 | 1% | 0.36% | 61 | NA | 2 762 | 2 631 | 1 271 | 38 270 | 5% |
Private Property | 91 446 | 3% | 3% | 69 | 50% | 4 867 | 2 430 | 2 317 | 31 965 | 35% |
Virgin Active SA | 207 184 | 1% | 2% | 71 | 93% | 1 093 | 4 950 | 1 364 | 29 626 | 14% |
While the above table uses figures from HaveYouHeard's analysis of the first four months of this year, most fans bases have grown substantially since then, as reflected in the table below. (Growth, response and engagement rates will be subject to further analysis.)
Fans of SA telecoms and services industries on Facebook pages, as of August 2015:
Facebook fans (August 2015) | |
Cell C | 378 751 |
DStv | 1 274 219 |
MTN SA | 719 295 |
Telkom | 186 387 |
Vodacom | 630 575 |
AutoTraderSA | 285 222 |
Cars.co.za | 251 039 |
Dimension Data | 104 115 |
Gumtree SA | 955 158 |
OLX SA | 739 591 |
Private Property | 100 068 |
Virgin Active SA | 218 078 |
Other sectors
Airlines: "Airlines have the largest community sizes but one of the lowest engagement rates and a very disappointing interaction/fan engagement rate of 20%," says Stewart.
Automotive: Stewart says content posted by car manufacturers is similar to that posted of kittens - it very easily goes viral. As a result, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, Ford and BMW all ranked within the top 20 of South Africa's favourite Facebook brands.
Beauty: Beauty is a highly competitive space, with 19 brands making the top 200 list and the highest rate of fan community growth taking place within this industry.
Finance: "There's great potential, but very disappointing results," says Stewart. The industry historically has the largest budgets but has the lowest average engagement rate across sectors.
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