The Branson Centre is propelling small businesses into the big time...

The golden opportunity:
In his freelance marketing work and dealings with other entrepreneurs and agencies, Mongezi saw
that advertisers were often failing to reach their target audiences through organic conversation
that leads to buying decisions. Now, with the exponential growth of social media – people
trust their friends’ recommendations more than traditional advertising.

So, Mongezi did his research and found that less than a handful of agencies in South Africa were
using dedicated peer-to-peer word of mouth marketing to start conversations about their clients on, and outside of, social media. Most of them neither targeted young black nor Indian South Africans in their work.

The business in a nutshell:
Word of mouth marketing is when real people talk about, and recommend, a product, service or
brand to people they know. WordStart is a word of mouth agency whose network comprises 90% young black and Indian South Africans and gets them talking both online and offline about their client’s products.

The agency recruits “WordStarters” to join their network and talk about client’s products on
blogs, Twitter, Facebook and other online portals. WordStart monitors what they say and feeds back to clients, with analysis and recommendations based on WordStarters’ conversations.

	The world is going less mass, more niche, and we are increasingly becoming more influential in our mention of brands we associate ourselves with.
	- Mongezi

How it’s helping the community:
WordStart connects emerging local professionals with products they want access to, products like
books, phones, clothes, cars and games, as well as social spaces like clubs. Mongezi also provides free word of mouth marketing advice and brainstorming to small businesses and is a director at YBSA Young Business for South Africa, which supports young entrepreneurs.

The business will develop in two ways, with the overall aim of becoming the leading word of mouth marketing agency in Africa and leading opinions in youth culture.

Firstly, Mongezi plans to target larger South African-based companies to provide the agency’s services.

Secondly, he is developing software that companies can buy to measure online conversations themselves, creating an affordable alternative for smaller companies.

Got what it takes to become a Branson Centre Entrepreneur?

Then what are you waiting for? We would love to hear from you please outline your business plan to us using the link below.
Application form for the Entrepreneur Development Program