1 Billion Views Later: From Gen Z to Gen "Zote"
A Deep Dive into Africa's Digital Defiance and What We've Been Up To.
👋🏽 Mhoro!
(That's hello in the Shona language, spoken in Southern Africa.)
To the +540 attendees of Nendo's Social Media for Social Change webinar, I'm glad to reach you through our newsletter here on Substack. Details on the webinar recording and slide summary will be below. Fair warning: This is a longer newsletter than usual, but it has been a few months, so enjoy it all. The following is a summary.
To long-time readers of The Letter N, it is a pleasure to reach out with another serving of a three-course meal of Nendo's insights.
This newsletter contains updates three main updates:
What work have we been doing at Nendo this year, and are there some ways we can work together?
Insights on the protests across Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, and possibly elsewhere?
A 3-course serving of links to read, consume, and consider, including access to Nendo's webinar from mid-July and an explanation of why it took so long.
What's Keeping Nendo Busy (and not sending newsletters often) in Marketing & Research:
In my last newsletter, I updated you on our work and shared several of our recent publications. In this one, I will give you a snapshot of our activities this year.
On the 29th of July 2024, I delivered my State of Nendo address to my teammates, reflecting on the year we've had. Despite the challenging economic and environmental conditions, Nendo has continued to thrive, achieving significant milestones and adding incredibly talented individuals to our team. We're excited to continue this journey, with plans to expand our research, marketing, and operations teams. Watch for updates on our Nendo website and our soon-to-be revamped careers page.
In research, a few of the clients we've done some groundbreaking work for this year include:
🤖 In artificial intelligence, Nendo examined the rise, reach, and uses of large language models (LLMs) and generative AI across Nigeria and Kenya over the past 12 months. The comparisons, findings, and predictions have come to bear in the recent protests in both countries.
🦷 In oral care, Nendo worked with a market-leading brand to conduct a data-rich TV media audit, which provided valuable insights into value-for-money, target audience mapping, and better media investment in 2024.
💊🇹🇿 In pharmaceuticals, Nendo did an end-to-end market study on Tanzania within the analgesic (painkillers) space to help chart a new route to market for a fast-growing challenger brand.
📊 In pharmaceuticals, Nendo provided marketing effectiveness consultancy focused on what media mix and investment level would drive reach, penetration, sales, and market share growth.
📱 In the smartphone industry, Nendo led insights and consumer research to discover customer and market perception around a locally manufactured phone brand with insights for branding, positioning, and product feedback across four urban Kenyan cities.
🌾 In agriculture, Nendo did brand & communications testing in Ghana & Nigeria for a West-Africa-focused scientific agricultural collective.
🌐 In internet safety, Nendo conducted social media listening and digital analysis into online gender-based violence in Burundi and Kenya. This work was funded by USAID and worked through Search for Common Ground with CREAW.
In marketing, we've done provocative and engaging creative work across the continent:
👪 In family history, Nendo worked with an American family history and genealogy organisation, FamilySearch.org, to bring the brand to market in Kenya and Nigeria. Nendo's marketing campaign, Know Your Roots, Know Your Story, reached millions through radio, billboards, out-of-home, influencer marketing, and online campaigns. Africa's rich history and storytelling are passed down from generation to generation, and this was an exciting project that we'll publish the full case study on soon.
🛡️ In internet safety, Nendo created "Dada Disinfo" and worked alongside Pollicy. This groundbreaking online gender-based violence program took research from 100 social media users in 16 Kenyan cities, +100,000 social media posts of online gender-based violence, interviews with 14 content creators (with a combined +5 million followers) and a co-creation workshop with +25 content creators (with a combined 1 million followers). All this research led to a report, playbook, and behaviour-change social media campaign that reached +2 million Kenyans on social media. One of our most exciting projects in a long time and, in many ways, a life-changing one, given the impact we've seen on the creators we worked with and the behaviour change we drove with the audiences we reached. We're looking for partners for this project and funding for phase 2, so if you know of any referrals, we'd be glad to have them.
👓 In vision and eyecare, Nendo built a brand called "Tazama Glasses" to create a behaviour-change campaign to help low-income Kenyans over 40 who suffer from presbyopia get care. The campaign and marketing done in Kisumu, Kakamega, and Mombasa used the Maisha Meds network of pharmacies to create awareness and generate demand for a free 5-minute eye test and purchase of subsidised high-quality reading glasses. Billboards, radio, and below-the-line marketing shaped some great insights captured on our blog.
🧠 In behaviour change, Nendo was chosen to deliver an upcoming behaviour-change marketing campaign against femicide for Hivos/We Lead, working for M&C Saatchi in London. We're blending our research, marketing, and creative expertise to create a national conversation that should launch in Q4 2024.
I say all this to show some of the work we're doing and if you're interested in sending Nendo a brief or inviting us to respond to a marketing campaign, social and behaviour change communication work, demand-generation project, or marketing/creative services or research (of all kinds) grants, requests for proposal, or requests for information, please let me know. I'd appreciate it.
From Gen Z to Gen "Zote" (All Generations) A Lens Into Digital Defiance: From Kenya's 🇰🇪 #RejectFinanceBill2024 to #RutoMustGo to Uganda's 🇺🇬 #March2Parliament and Nigeria's 🇳🇬 #EndBadGovernance
Kenya has been going through an unprecedented stretch since the middle of June 2024. What started as online discussions and discontent surrounding a raft of proposed taxes in the Finance Bill of 2024 evolved from online debate to offline action, with nationwide protests recorded in over 34 counties across Kenya's 47 counties. Nendo has been chronicling the social media data behind this, publishing public and private reports with research and insights to explain, expound, and explore trends and data points.
The protests were initially focused on the Finance Bill and described as "Gen Z" protests. Some disagree with this labelling of the protests as "Gen Z" and have described this as infantilising the movement that has seen millennials, Gen X, and people of all ages participate countrywide. Owing to increasingly excessive use of force during protests by the police and authorities, including abductions that have led to protesters turning up dead days or weeks later, the movement appears in flux with no set date for the next of Kenya's protests.
I would also be remiss if I didn't spend a moment to recognise, hold space, and honour the departed. There are dozens dead, with some counts placing it at well over 60 in Kenya, with many more still unaccounted for, dozens more missing, and hundreds injured, maimed, and deeply affected by the past two months in the clamour for change in Kenya.
From #OccupyPixels to #OccupyParliament
From the 18th of June, when they began, to the 25th of June, when protesters breached the National Assembly where Kenya's parliament sits, to a music concert on the 7th of July, various protests and expectations around the 8th of August, when the next protest is scheduled for, Kenyans of all ages have been clamouring for change. The winds of change have blown elsewhere across Africa. On the 23rd of July, Ugandans took place in their #March2Parliament. On the 1st of August, Nigerians protested bad governance, hunger, cost of living, and youth jobs in the #EndBadGovernance protests.
Some highlights of some of the key stats we've covered so far include:
1.1 Billion views on TikTok for #RejectFinanceBill2024 and 430 Million views for #FinanceBill2024 while #RutoMustGo has over 778 Million views.
Nendo has analysed more than 75 million tweets (now known as posts) on X, and these have recently appeared on Nendo's blog and other publications, and other publications.
There is also a historical precedent that's forgotten within all the waves of change across Kenya. From over a decade ago, similarly themed online protests, hashtags, and activism would occur. I wrote about this in 2016 in a chapter titled From Cyber Café to Smartphone: Kenya’s Social Media Lens Zooms In on the Country and Out to the World. You can peruse that chapter for a historical view that shows that fundraising, activism, and more have been taking place a decade in advance.
Each Nendo newsletter features a three-course 'meal' of links served fresh for your reading, watching, or listening delight. So, with no further ado, here's your serving.
What to Nibble
The Olympics have been a real treat to watch. I've missed bits of them here and there, but I am immensely proud of Kenya's Faith Kipyegon, who added another brick to the wall of her status as the Greatest of All Time (G.O.A.T) at Women's Distance Running by being the first ever athlete to win gold at 3 successive Olympics in the 1,500-metre race. Our quote this week is an analogy courtesy of media & advertising aficionado Simon Andrews, which I got in his Fix newsletter recently.
“ When things change, smart people change their approach.’’ Reflections on the Fosbury Flop.
At the 1968 Mexico Olympics, America's Dick Fosbury revolutionised the High Jump when he started to do the Fosbury Flop. His competitors all stuck with the traditional scissor kick, and he took home a gold medal, setting a new world record and changing the sport forever. For years after this moment, his rivals stuck to what they knew, attempting the scissors method of the following high jump.
Fosbury's eureka moment was realising that landing mats for the sport were substantial enough to make landing on your back safe. He took the risk, practised it, and reset the sport, raising the bar (literally—pardon the pun).
This analogy fits perfectly with what my team and I are currently seeing with artificial intelligence. Early days, but one where there are changes to how knowledge works, like the Olympics and the Fosbury Flop. I've been doing several trend briefings and discussions, and we're excited to run a few pilots in Q4 of this year going into 2025 to incorporate this more into work and life for nonprofits, for-profits, and a range of clients.
What to Sip
The protests in Kenya have seen an unparalleled use of TikTok. It is the game changer for platforms, and the spark has left the region in a new space and time. One thing to understand about TikTok is its use of sound. Kenyans have taken to expressing themselves in song, dance, and many more ways amidst tear gas, water cannons, and running battles between police and protesters. Nendo's friends over at Odipo Dev, Inc. have a wonderful interactive site (including playlists) on the sounds of the protests over the years of Kenya's history, so get some headphones on, and you can read, watch, and listen to the protests in a whole new way.
Bonus: I was excited to see another friend of Nendo, Tayiana Chao, the Headstrong Historian and founder of African Digital Heritage, create an online and offline repository for capturing memorabilia related to the protests. I'm always keen to support ways to capture memories in a world of 7-second videos and infinite scrolling. Learn more about her work here.
What to Bite
When trying to understand the protests, there's a wealth of valuable reads and reference points to consider, each offering unique insights and perspectives.
Georgetown University Associate Professor Ken Opalo gives great context on the political underpinnings and implications of what sparked the protests in a three-part series on his Substack newsletter with part 1, part 2, and part 3 worth your time to get a broader lens into what's happened. His recent piece on the larger ripples across Kenya and the continent is also worth a read.
Online, Nendo's team and I have presented to you several ways to consume our insights:
A 60-minute Citizen TV interview - Kenya's most viewed station with some historical context. Available from Nendo's site to watch the YouTube videos here. My teammates gladly made a blog of it, too, if you're short on time.
I had a 1-hour long radio interview on Spice FM (that they broadcast in technicolour). This was my most recent interview, and what I liked best was how the interviewers, Ndu Okoh, Eric Latffif, and CT Muga chimed in and threw tough questions at me, including a West African proverb I had to decipher.
On Nendo's blog, we had a few pieces that showcase our takes on the protests, from our first free report The #Reject Revolution, to the role of TikTok as the game-changer and "Chime of Change." I've been excited to see my teammates rise to the challenge of creating great content for Nendo at a pivotal time.
What likely brought you here may also have been our webinar. I was immediately cautioned to be careful with sharing the recording owing to concerns for safety and privacy, and we later blurred and amended all our slides. The webinar was done with our good friends at Ushahidi. You can find the recording below accessible here using the password nendo4insights! (and make sure to include the exclamation mark).
Bottom of the newsletter
The final links to round out the newsletter are some articles that have significantly impacted my understanding and have been on my mind during the past weeks. These are not just any articles but insightful pieces from SparkToro and Threats that have the potential to broaden your knowledge and keep you informed.
I pay much attention to what Amanda Natividad and Rand Fishkin publish at SparkToro. Their recent pieces and building on 'zero-click' content are leading a big shift in Nendo's own content publishing approach and that of our clients. It is a counter-intuitive approach that means you don't count on driving clicks to your site, but creating a relationship with your audience that drives them in their own time and means to your site, campaign, or elsewhere. Rewiring +20 years of internet marketing knowledge, so it is worth a read. We're now on TikTok and put our first video out there, so if you could show us some love, we'll share more there in the coming weeks and months.
During the protests, there were questions around the use of excessive force. Richard Ngamita and his team at Threats, have tracked down the types of teargas used and their implications with insights using open-source intelligence reporting that's well worth a read in Israeli Gas, Kenyan Tears.
In my spare time, I work with parents and teens around technology, mobile phones, social media, and the internet. I've been asked to formalise this work and will work on something in the coming months, but suffice it to say that I share the same concern as the United States Surgeon General, who recently published in the New York Times (paywalled link) that social media platforms need a warning label similar to what cigarettes have. I did a session with some parents and teenagers this last weekend and all the same dangers we uncovered from Dada Disinfo appear to be here in Kenya, and definitely across the continent. Jonathan Haidt's recent book Anxious Generation has radical recommendations to postpone social media to 16 years of age and delay giving teenagers a smartphone as long as possible (basic phones, known in Kenya as 'kabambe' are acceptable), but as I saw this weekend, it will take a lot of work, across the world to undo the pull and allure of infinite scrolling, short videos, and social media's peer pull, push, and pressure.
If you made it this far, the team and I at Nendo are grateful for your time and attention.
Nendo's been busy and we're also hiring for a few roles, so if you know good people, please send them our way via talent@nendo.co.ke.
If you find this content valuable, please share it with your network. We appreciate your support.
Mark and the Nendo team.
Lovely read as usual! Well done Nendo.