media update’s David Jenkin asked him about his story and Kenya’s digital journey.

What inspired you to start your own blog?

I started my blog moseskemibaro.com almost 10 years ago. At first, I used it to re-publish articles on digital marketing that I had contributed to a number of mainstream newspapers and magazines. I then started writing about anything under the sun, but always focussed on technology and digital marketing matters in Kenya and East Africa.

My thinking, at the time, was that there was so much happening on the ground and mainstream media was either not covering it adequately or was missing the finer details that really mattered. It really did start off as a hobby of sorts, and over time, it became really serious as I realised that people really valued what I was writing about. From there, it’s been snowballing and has essentially blossomed into part-time career of sorts. I love blogging!

In 2002 you founded Dotsavvy Limited. Please give us a quick overview of what Dotsavvy is all about?

Dotsavvy started in a really small apartment I once lived in with pokey old computer and lots of gusto. That was back in 2002. I was initially moonlighting as I was employed and made the big jump to go full-time once we had enough business in the pipeline to do so.

When we first started, we were focused on building and managing websites for a range of clients, large and small. The business started with me and a co-founder, who has since moved on, and slowly by slowly we grew organically for the past 15 years or so – imagine that.

Today, Dotsavvy is a fully fledged digital agency with a multi-disciplined team of 20 digital marketing gurus. We offer everything from social media marketing, digital business consulting, digital advertising, and website design services. Dotsavvy has evolved significantly and today we see ourselves as doing more than digital marketing – we see ourselves as a partner for our clients and their businesses to offer end-to-end digital marketing solutions that impact the bottom-line. We believe in performance-driven digital marketing solutions where there is a clear path to ROI by generating sales, building brand, streamlining operations, and improving service for our clients. 

Looking back to 2002, I’m sure the changes in Kenya’s digital landscape have been huge. Tell us a bit about the inception and growth of the “Silicon Savannah”.

It’s hard to say when it really took off, but it feels to me that the Silicon Savannah moment was around 10 years ago when M-Pesa happened. We also had lots of technology start-ups mushrooming in Kenya. The Internet was still nascent and mobile broadband Internet was only starting to happen. We have come a long way since then.

One thing that comes to mind is that it was at that point that we saw all sorts of Internet initiatives taking off and, in 2009, we had the first undersea high speed cable go live in Kenya, which changed everything we knew about the Internet. We also had places like the iHub open up co-working spaces and Ushahidi became a global phenomenon. It was more or less around that time that the term ‘Silicon Savannah’ was coined and it’s been growing massively ever since. 

Can you say roughly what proportion of the Kenyan population are using social media? How quickly would you say that number is growing?

It’s hard to get all the numbers since quite a few of the social media platforms that we use in Kenya do not disclose their numbers. We do know, for a fact, that Facebook has 7 million users in Kenya and that Linkedin has around 1.6 million. When you look at all the estimates around lnstagram, SnapChat, Twitter, and YouTube, our best guess is Kenya should have more than 10 million social media users and possibly as many as 13 million, if not more.

This is really some guesswork based on what we see happening on the ground. We can say that Facebook is still growing massively as they added over one-million new users in under a year, so that’s interesting. We also note that Instant Messaging with WhatsApp and Telegram is massive and these could have more than 10 million users collectively. WhatsApp, in particular, has essentially taken a big chunk of the messaging traffic that used to go to SMS. 

Are there any developments, technologies, or initiatives that you are particularly excited about at the moment?

I think Kenya is certainly a global leader in mobile money uptake thanks to the rise of Safaricom's M-Pesa. It’s on the back of M-Pesa where we see mobile financial services using smartphones and mobile apps really taking off. Consider the success of companies like Branch and Tala in Kenya who have billions of Shillings in their loan books.

In addition, the sports betting space which relies heavily on mobile money in Kenya is on fire following the wildly successful SportPesa service that is probably one of Kenya's most successful startups ever.

Then we can see also that the Internet of Things (IoT) is really taking off with the solar companies like M-Kopa and MobiSol, where you can buy solar systems for your home that power lights and all.

Then we have PayGo which enables Kenyans in low-income areas to buy LPG (liquid petroleum gas) for cooking using mobile money micro-payments. So, IoT is an area that’s really taking off in Kenya. 

What do you think is the biggest obstacle for the expansion of digital literacy in Kenya, and Africa more broadly, and what do you think the future might hold in that regard?

In terms of digital literacy in Kenyan and Africa, one of the biggest obstacles is the cost of using digital technologies. This is still too expensive, even with US$30 smartphones being sold. The other issue is that Internet bandwidth is still quite expensive for the masses, and also broadband is not as widely spread as it could be.

This is changing as we now have 4G with Telkom Kenya and Safaricom as of the past couple of weeks. In terms of the next steps, we need to ensure that kids get access to the Internet at an early age so that they are exposed to it and can use it competently. This is also happening in Kenya with the government's digital literacy programmes in primary schools. 

What do you enjoy about blogging and what advice would you offer to someone in Africa interested in starting their own blog?

I enjoy blogging because it lets me tell the stories of Kenya and Africa's technology and digital marketing revolution as it happens.

If you want to blog well, don't do it for the money, because it’s not about the money but the love of the topics you want to write about. Blog what you love and love what you blog. Focus on a niche that you can own and keep it as local as possible on stuff that you know best and have authority on. That’s how you can be a really good blogger.

For more information, visit www.moseskemibaro.com.

Interested in the growth of Africa’s digital industry? Read more in our article, Five global case studies that prove digital marketing works.