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By Edward Qorro
The Citizen Reporter
Dar es Salaam.Half a million Tanzanians would become Facebook clients shortly and help add up to several billions of shillings in income to the owners of the popular social network website.
With an online population penetration of 63.07 per cent for Facebook alone, the country is among the fastest growing in terms of people joining to link with friends and share information.
According to official statistics, there are currently 426,360 Facebook users in Tanzania, putting the country at 101 in the ranking of all Facebook statistics by country. The numbers grew by more than 94,000 in the last 6 months.
General internet penetration is however still low and even for Facebook, it still was 1.02 per cent of the population.
But while the significance of the growing popularity of the social networking site may be lost on those joining in locally, for the newly crowned billionaires who started Facebook, or those who joined the bandwagon as the juggernaut bestrode the internet, all it mattered was that every head signing up adds up to the riches of each of the would-be-shareholder when the firm finally goes public this May.
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) experts say unlike those riding on Facebook wave and the internet in general to become overnight billionaires, Tanzanian numbers have so far accounted for an insignificant monetary value for users worth talking about.
Interviewed in the week over how the world reacted in awe to revelations that Facebook’s worth is nearly $100 billion (over Sh155 trillion), the experts said more work needed to be done to help the public learn how to meaningfully use the internet to earn a living out of it.
The IT experts claim that there is so much in store for internet users, should they aspire to learn more and scale the heights.Dr Respicus Casmir from the University of Dar es Salaam’s computing centre said bloggers and web hosts should learn how to advertise their content. Dr Casmir also challenged the internet users to go local in their content, so as to attract a large audience.
“People like to read and see what their friends are doing, and it is best for the hosts to use their accounts as a platform for advertisement…I don’t see much of that being done at the moment,” he said.
Referring to Mark Zuckerberg owner and co founder of Facebook, Mr Aashiq Sharif from Raha, highlighted that advertising one’s blog or website not only makes you command a large audience but also assures you more revenue in terms of cash. “Zuckerberg had done that using Google and Yahoo and the results are just evident today, internet users can also try doing that,” he said. As of 2011, Zuckerberg’s personal wealth was estimated to be $17.5 billion, making him one of the world’s youngest billionaires.
Mr Sharif however noted that it would not be an easy walk in the park because not all Tanzanians are conversant with Internet usage.
“In the US for example, millions of people have access and use the internet, but that is not the case with Tanzanians where only a few thousand use it.” Mr Roy Foya from Africa On Line says a blogger would only benefit from getting followers whereas, indirectly, the expert says one might wish to use SMS interacting and welcoming companies and other firms to use their site as their avenue for publicity.
“Issa Michuzi is a good example of a local blogger who is taking the internet usage to the next level,” said Mr Foya.
Mr Benedict Claver from Clalon Technologies adds that the internet was now becoming a ‘lucrative business’ if used effectively.
He says websites and blogs were now turning into ‘electronic marketing places’ where buyers and sellers meet and negotiate on some merchandises.
He cited some renowned car dealers who engage their customers online when they want to purchase their vehicles on line.
“Some big companies have started capitalising on these opportunities, particularly by posting their products for publicity,” he said.He said mobile phone operators and brewers were in fact the main beneficiaries of the internet especially when they advertise their products.“They pay for such advertisements, as a host one is assured of getting some revenue,” added Mr Claver.
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