Every business needs a digital strategy – MTN CEO

Ebenezer Twum Asante, the CEO of MTN has urged all businesses to search and tap into the digital opportunities that abound, irrespective of one’s industry.

He said, looking at the way businesses are rapidly shifting from the physical interaction to a more digital space, businesses without digital strategies would have a hard time connecting with consumers.

Mr. Asante was engaging members of the Chartered Institute of Marketing Ghana (CIMG), as part of CIMG’s annual strategy to enable members engage industry leaders. He spoke on the theme Digital Lifestyle & Mobile Financial Services: Inclusiveness, Trends & Opportunities.

He said, “You do not need to be a digital business to have a digital strategy”. “So long as your customers are going more and more digital, it is not only about communication, advertising or product visibility in the digital environment, but it is also about how you re-model your own business to take advantage of this trend.”

The Africa consumer is more mobile ready now than ever and consumers are leapfrogging landline infrastructure and jumping straight into digital mobile technology.

This fast growth in internet penetration is in tandem with the growing spate of Mobile Money subscription. Thus the best way to monetise digital business innovations is through Mobile Financial Services.

“The debit and credit card penetration in Ghana is very marginal,” he said. “So if you manage to pull up a wonderful digital strategy, the best way to monetise it is mainly through Mobile Financial Service.”

Following the introduction of the MTN Mobile Money Service in Ghana in 2009, the subscriber base has grown to approximately 7.8 million registered customers, with over 48,000 Mobile Money agents performing over 40 million transactions monthly across the country.

Also, in line with the EMI Guidelines issued by the Bank of Ghana in July 2015, MTN made a total payment of GH? 13.4million in interest to over 6.2 million Mobile Money customers in September. MTN Mobile Money continues to partner financial institutions and other values to deliver the best value propositions to customers. One of such is the TBILL4ALL service launched recently in partnership with Ecobank.