Super apps and on demand for FMCG brands have the pandemic to thank for its fast progression. Globally, consumers are moving away from using various apps to fulfil specific needs to adopting single sign-in apps that allow multiple functions such as applying for credit, making retail purchases, conducting service enquiries, and taking advantage of social media offerings. This shift has motivated key businesses like Vodacom and Nedbank (Avo app) to adopt the technology making them the first in South Africa to do so.
With these apps currently in the market and many more to enter, it is becoming crucial for household and consumable brands such as detergents and food products to have a strategy in place if they wish to compete in the super app world. Super apps combined with the rise of the on-demand shopping apps such as Onecart, Zulzi, Takealot and Quench, to name a few, offer dynamic and new ecosystems for consumer brands.
We are currently working at creating solutions and strategies to help our clients at King James Digital to compete in this space. What we have discovered is that it is going to be essential for all brand managers, marketing managers and ecommerce teams to focus on the shift from 3rd party tracking of cookies to a new frontier of marketing placement, measurement, and performance if they want their campaigns to be successful.
To be merely in these spaces will not be enough, brands will need to intelligently bundle offerings, optimize product placement as well as offer compelling incentives to purchase whether it be discounting, couponing or delivering incentives.
With rising consumer costs and marginal to flat salary growth expected in 2021, consumers will be shopping for value over product loyalty. Brands will therefore need to maintain loyalty through competitive means.
With super apps here to stay, the fight for market share will be won in the baskets of the on-demand consumer. Afterall the model makes economic sense for both the businesses and their consumers, especially in a fast consumer growing and mobile-first market like Africa.
By Ryan Sauer Managing Director of the King James Digital
Leave a Reply