For the fact that online trading is thriving in advance economies, analysts say the business will grow at an exponential rate in developing countries such as Ghana.
Speaking to the Daily Graphic on the sidelines of a forum organised by Tonaton.com to educate media advertisers and other businesses on the benefits of online marketing, dubbed, “Go-Digital-Win Markets”, the Head of Tonaton.com, Ms Estelle Westling, indicated that the country was fast becoming an online hub.
“Internet penetration is growing faster here than it did in Europe. Advancements in mobile technology and the high levels of mobile phone penetration in Ghana have impacted positively on Internet access, the bedrock of successful online marketing,” she noted.
“This mode of trading, therefore, has all the building blocks for positive growth in Ghana,” she says.
According to her, when online marketing was introduced in Europe, the market wasn’t ready for it, as the patronage by online websites was low.
People still preferred traditional offline platforms such as newspapers, TV stations and magazines. As people started going online to see the latest news and getting the latest deals on classified websites, the barriers between traditional and online marketing blurred.
“Marketing managers realised that people went online several times in a day and spent a lot of time on the sites. Advertising online enabled them to focus on their target group more efficiently, change the advertising message easier and more often and measure the marketing effects more efficiently,” Ms Westling said.
With the current rate of Internet penetration pegged at 47 per cent, according to the National Communications Authority, she said online trading was the surest bet for advertisers in Ghana.
“With this growth trend, print advertising will decrease gradually, since the online agenda can capitalise on the growth in Internet penetration. This is the future of advertising, as experienced in so many places such as the United States of America, Europe and other mature markets,” she noted.
Tonaton.com is currently putting in a lot of efforts to sensitise people to the benefits of online marketing.
The forum was part of the drive towards encouraging businesses to invest a sizeable portion of their marketing budgets in online advertising.
The brand itself has invested a lot into online marketing, which has pushed it to the 3rd biggest local website within a year of launch, with as many as 600,00 unique visitors per month. This has made Tonaton.com a household name in Ghana.