South African comedian Trevor Noah has been named the SA Social Star of 2015 by technology research organisation World Wide Worx and media analytics company Fuseware.
A powerful performance across multiple social media platforms earned him the title as he prepares to take over as host of the popular US political satire show, the Daily Show, at the end of the month.
The award came out of data gathered for World Wide Worx and Fuseware's annual South African Social Media Landscape study. The study is based on access to consumer data from seven major social networks and a corporate survey conducted among more than a hundred of South Africa's leading brands.
The study found Noah does not have the biggest following in any of the individual networks, but is the only person who features among the top performers across all these networks. He has 2.6 million followers on Twitter, and 2.6 million Likes on Facebook. His Instagram posts are seen by 368 000 followers, and on YouTube he has 255 000 subscribers and 26.3 million views on his videos.
Noah was also responsible for the most retweeted posting on Twitter this year when he declared that "No one can replace Jon Stewart". The tweet that paid homage to his Daily Show predecessor was retweeted more than 16 000 times.
"Trevor has not only made a successful transition from being a leading South Africa performer to being a global media star, but has also shown how it is possible to create a successful presence across diverse social media platforms," says World Wide Worx MD Arthur Goldstuck.
"He may be an individual personality, but he also provides a powerful case study of how brands can leverage social networks through quality content."
Mike Wronski, MD of Fuseware, says it's not only about being a big name.
"Even more important is the extent to which your audience engages with you wherever you are. Trevor Noah is the best example of that in 2015."
In general, the study found South African Facebook use has grown by 8% in the last year, from 12 million to 13 million. Twitter grew 12% from 6.6 million to 7.4 million local users. The biggest growth, however, came from photo-sharing network Instagram, which rose 133% from 1.1 million to 2.68 million. Video sharing platform YouTube also showed growth of 15% by increasing its user base from 7.2 million to 8.28 million.
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