Trying to use a single e-commerce strategy across various regions is bad business.
This was the word from Luke McKend, country head for Google SA, who was speaking at the World Retail Congress Africa, held in Sandton this week. McKend said this statement is particularly relevant in an African context.
People are increasingly using the Internet to look for an instantaneous response that is related to where they are, according to McKend. "Fully a third of all Google searches have some kind of implicit location information," he said, adding that this ties very closely to the global drive towards mobility.
With 1.5 million Android activations every day, he believes businesses that lack a mobile strategy, especially in Africa, are "dead in the water". There is a big shift happening in consumer behaviour, he said, with mobile queries starting to outdo desktop queries in many regions. But this overarching mobile trend should not be misunderstood, McKend noted, adding that having the same mobile strategy for the entire African continent is a mistake. "It is so important to not paint every country in Africa with the same brush when it comes to mobile. Different markets require different strategies."
According to McKend, Google is currently based in seven countries across Africa. In line with this, he stated that in order for a company like Google to be relevant to the African market, it needs to have a lot of local content. While this is not such a problem in SA, said McKend, it does prove tricky throughout the rest of Africa where there is an incredible dearth of content. "When there is no local content, people tend to not use the Internet and source their news from more traditional media."
Similarly, McKend pointed out that having people on the ground and having local knowledge of the environment is extremely important. "Without these offices across Africa, it would have been impossible for Google to produce the kind of services that it does for these markets."
Part of Google's focus in Africa is around building infrastructure and an ecosystem of connectivity so that everyone in the region can have access to the Internet, said McKend. He mentioned the search engine giant's Project Loon, which sees high-altitude balloons being launched into the sky to create an aerial wireless network, as one way that Google is trying to improve connectivity in remote areas. "Once you have raised enough balloons, it would be possible to connect the entire world to the Internet. Yes, it is kind of crazy, but this sort of thing could be the start of further innovation."
There are many African success stories where businesses are using online in areas with poor connectivity; all of which tap into the needs of people in a specific region, noted McKend. "You cannot have a one-size-fits-all strategy. It is incredibly important to understand the nuances that reflect what different people are doing online."
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