Facebook is targeting ad dollars from small businesses in Africa

Facebook is building a team of young executives to win digital advertising dollars from small and medium sized businesses across Africa’s major markets. Since opening its first African office in Johannesburg in 2015, the social media site has been mute about opening offices in other key markets such as Nigeria or Kenya that would deepen its marketing and advertising focus especially among local businesses. However, it is extending its physical reach by hiring international growth managers in Nairobi and Lagos, who will continue the push for Facebook’s wider adoption, which has remained relatively low compared to other continents. With an estimated population of 1.2 billion people, Africa remains particularly attractive to the social networking site but the penetration is still low with only 80 million active users on a monthly basis in sub-Saharan Africa. Nigeria, the largest and most populous economy on the continent has the highest number of monthly users on Facebook in the region at 17 million, followed by South Africa with 14 million. Kenya comes a distant third with 5.7 million active users on Facebook on a monthly basis.