By 
Econet Wireless Zimbabwe has the biggest digital footprint in Zimbabwe. It defines digital trends with more than 12 million natives riding on its network, this is a gold mine at their fingertips, alas this huge digital footprint has not been visible under its past Digital marketing manager, David Tendekai Duri.
Its on a sad note that yours truly is penning this one, after he has just relieved himself from Econet Wireless Zimbabwe, I would have wanted a robust introspection of his greatest achievements and fails at the helm of the biggest mobile network in Zimbabwe.
A quick look up under his Facebook page still claims that he is still with Econet Wireless Zimbabwe, maybe it’s simply because he last posted last year, before packing, so much for a digital native.
However with such a huge digital capital, David Duri, is by far one of the failed digital marketing managers, who failed to excite and leverage on this serious opportunity, forcing many to be either completely in the dark of the goings on, or had pathetic digital campaigns worth our attention.
For a mobile network operator with ,lots of give aways, exciting activities , real ground traction and screaming market share of more than 65%, the animal was a giant , which is yet to unleash its greatness.
If Econet has 12 million active subscribers how come the social media pages under him were virtually dead, unresponsive, and never trended
Unfortunately for the know-it-all, young gentleman, David drastically failed to strike the Goliath, rewriting the script with very spectacular misses, which we have been watching for years.
The biggest fail was shown by the Econet Wireless Zimbabwe Twitter Account, now X, with a total following of 494 000, this is half a million, the X account was a dismal performance, speaking to less than 2 000 followers at whatever given times for the past 2 years, under his leadership, this was so evident.
poor performance and interaction
One may also begin to wonder whether these are real humans or he bought some bots as the page seems to be struggling with fighting human-to-bot interactions, with bad and low interests on his posts, this misdemeanor is screaming loud than any other action.
Even the popular baba Shero got a cold welcome, but only on his page.
One way to flag a twitter account with fake followers is to simply check its reach, reaction or interaction, the X algorithm is a simple one, if your followers are excited it spreads; if they are not, it simply does not propagate.
Even at the best of times, when winners were announced and freebies were given away, the page simply did not budge; something was very wrong.
Exciting times like their annual marathon, ZAS and Trade Fair where millions will be glued to their phones and looking forward to updates, simply did not strike gold, there was just not any excitement.
poor performance and interaction
One of the easiest low-hanging fruits was simple collaborations with content creators, digital natives, leveraging on their huge social media platforms and basic media engagements, a simple task he could not unlock, but when done well after his departure, someone was striking gold.
this Promotion reched more than 1 million Zimbabweans.
While many have tried to do collabos with him, David Duri was popularly know by many content creators as the block plug, very popular for blocking any new creatives and ideas, if it was not done by him, through him then it does not fly, this is just how bad he misrepresented Econet Wireless Zimbabwe. Yours truly once suffered shame and embarrassment at the trade fair for trying to introduce an innovative and creative way, but this is nothing personal, just a confirmation of a self-driven ego.
Social media is not a one-way broadcast where one just posts and goes home to sleep after ticking job done, its an interaction, there must be. back and forth rapport, your audience must respond, they must react and most importantly, they must communicate, it was never like so to a major extent on this page , it was a way of communication, for long, just unabated.
Econet Wireless Zimbabwe, has great products, promotions, and exciting traction, this was however never reflected by their X account. Something was totally wrong, no likes, no retweets, and rarely did the followers dare to even comment. Wait a minute, but these are 450 000 people, how was this pattern so clear?
Their Facebook page is another gold mine, with more than 900 000 followers, this is almost a whopping million, and speaking to these natives daily makes great sense for any brand.
They host one of the largest marathon events in Africa, and for those who attend in person the experience is remarkable. The atmosphere, pristine organization, and overall execution reflect world-class standards. However, this excellence is not reflected in their digital presence. For followers of their online platforms, it would be easy to miss that such a significant event even took place. In essence, the on-ground experience and the digital narrative are disconnected—the two are not effectively communicating with each other.
Simple tactics like leveraging on other popular accounts, social media influencers, media relations and cross-posting would have simply taken over the digital space, affording the brand the traction it deserves
What was the conversion rate here? How was it so different from X, and more importantly, what kind of people and values do you derive from X community that you won’t get from Facebook? This calls for part 2 of this separate analysis, as we look into another classic example of digital media management.
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