These screens can also be connected to Wi-Fi and to a platform where users can be able to purchase ad space in real time, choose a route where they would like their ads to be displayed…
In Kenya they are called Matatus, in Nigeria they are called Danfo, in Benin and Togo you will hear Bush Taxi, Kombi in Zimbabwe and so on and so forth. The only constant is that in every major city or town in an African country you will find these 14 seater minibuses being used for public service transportation mostly over short distances even though in some cases they also ply long distance routes.
In some of the capital cities there are also 36 to 48 seater busses that are used over relatively short distances connecting the Central Business District to the city’s outskirt residential areas.
In most of these cities, outdoor advertising is still being done largely on roadside billboards, on buildings, using roadshows and public activation and in some instances you will see large stickers on the minibuses. The use of digital screens is still very scarce and this is what we will be talking about today.
The Idea
Advertising within local public service vehicles in certain African cities. These vehicles are usually 14 seater vehicles or might also have a higher capacity and they normally transport passengers from the Central Business District to the suburbs or outskirts of town and back. This means there are always eyes that can be advertised to. You can have screens at the front of these vehicles that can display adverts.
The screens can also be used to watch videos for entertainment. For instance, in Kenya you will find a lot of Matatus already have screens that are being used to play music video mixes and mostly the Djs who make these mixes are the ones who use them to advertise themselves.
The innovative part
These screens can also be connected to Wi-Fi and to a platform where users can be able to purchase ad space in real time, choose a route where they would like their ads to be displayed, choose the number of cars they would like the ads to be displayed in and the time limit e.g. number of days, deploy the ads in graphic or video format and possibly monitor and increase the number of routes or cars where the ad is displayed where necessary.
How?
If you have been following the Tech space in Africa, in this case Kenya, then you should have heard of the startup Brck. Brck started by build hardware products that helped provide consistent access to the internet even in the most remote areas and had consistently worked towards providing affordable connection to the internet for all people in the countries where they operated.
With their most prominent product Moja, users could access free Wi-Fi services while commuting on public transportation or when near their Wi-Fi signal and access Moja’s stored content to watch shows, listen to music, or read books.
Organizations could also reach and engage an untapped audience through various ways such as: surveys, video ads etc. All this happened right on the users’ mobile phones. Moja had a platform and proved that a part of this model can work, all they would have had to do was adapt their platform to allow anyone to purchase advertising space much like Google ads does and give room for larger screen viewing as well.
It was never done thus if you think you can, the games are only just beginning, best part is you are not limited to just public service transportation, you can have large screens strategically placed in areas where people frequent within the city like bus terminals and in malls as well.
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