Performing beyond the stage Prosper Ngomashi (right) with Hope Masike and Tehn Diamond at Shoko Festival
Prosper Ngomashi (right) with Hope Masike and Tehn Diamond at Shoko Festival

Prosper Ngomashi (right) with Hope Masike and Tehn Diamond at Shoko Festival

Godwin Muzari Arts Editor—
The power of social media networks should never be underestimated. A few weeks ago, Prosper Ngomashi — who is popularly known as The Comic Pastor — posted a comic video that has become popularly known as “Shamhu skit”. In the skit, Ngomashi begins a seemingly serious statement about how he is inspired by successful inventors and technology gurus like Steve Jobs to have a noble idea that would help young people.

His statement creates expectations in his listeners and he appears to have come up with a big project for the youths. Then, he unveils his invention. He says he has designed various rods of different sizes that should be used for disciplining wayward young people. He shows a number of bamboo sticks, indicating that each is meant for a certain age-group and priced according to the age ranges.

The final rod is made “for Zimdancehall musicians and this one comes with a sjambok”. The joke has gone viral and last week Ngomashi was on an advert for a local bank with his bamboo stick. From his Facebook jokes, he is now an advertiser. He has posted many other comic skits on social media to announce himself as a comedian.

Such is the power of social media networks.

While most people around the world post images, texts, videos, graphics and other forms of information about the lighter sides of their daily endeavours, failures and successes, others take advantage of such platforms to make serious business. Many companies have taken advantage of social media networks for their marketing strategies and the results have been good. These platforms have become modes of daily communication between and among people across the world. Technology continues to develop and those that follow such developments always have positive results to show for their ability to remain abreast with new ways of disseminating and sharing information. Technology grows fast in the quest to conquer constraints of space and time.

Many sectors have benefited from this rapid growth, but locally artistes of various genres have been found wanting in technology utilisation. Unlike Ngomashi, few artistes have been able to embrace technology to market themselves and their products because of a dependence syndrome. Most artistes depend on marketing companies that sometimes fail to sell individual brands to target audiences because of the huge numbers that they have to serve.

Record companies, publishers, galleries and theatres usually use various means to market their products and artistes, but they can only do so to a certain extent. They usually use these platforms to market new products and artists but the details can sometimes be sketchy.

Because of this slow pace of technology among artists and their marketers, online sales of art products are still low. In the case of musicians, big record companies that include Gramma Records, ZMC, Metro Studios and Diamond Studios have not done much in utilising technology, especially social media networks to market their artistes.

Sprouting backyard record labels, most of which specialise in dancehall, have gone ahead of the big guys in the industry in using social media technology. In this era, and with such a scenario, it is imperative that artistes take serious individual initiatives to market their brands and products.

Musicians like Tariro neGitare, Cythia Mare, Jah Prayzah, the Charambas, Peter Moyo, Mokoomba, Alick Macheso, Suluman Chimbetu, Tehn Diamond, Hope Masike and Victor Kunonga among others have social media platforms where they market their shows and products, but most of them do not use the platforms to their advantage.

They also post their videos and pictures online, but a few get direct benefits from the exercise because of poor strategies. Recently, Jah Prayzah’s team sent a number of pictures from tourist destinations that he and his band visited to shoot his upcoming videos but the images were not enough to build anxiety ahead of the DVD release for the album “Jerusarema” that is due soon.

Of course, the pictures looked attractive with boat cruises and men in all-white attire, but the desired expectations ahead of the videos were not achieved. Maybe the musician’s handlers feared that if they posted clips of the raw shoots, they would expose themselves to piracy like what happened to Sabhuku Vharazipi series producers whose YouTube clips were pirated and sold on the streets at “Sabhuku Vharazipi 3”.

But in this era of technology advancement, piracy will always come in any form – before or after release of products – and using artists’ official social media accounts can be a good way to fight piracy head-on.

After all, the focus is no longer on sales these days for performing artistes, but on marketing brands and creating anxiety and expectations ahead of new products. A few snippets or clips from upcoming productions can build excitement and create good grounds for launch of final products.

Filmmakers have always employed this trick through unveiling movie trailers ahead of the premieres. Film enthusiasts get excited when they watch trailers of upcoming movies and prepare themselves for the launch of the final product.

Macheso would not lose anything if he posted what he deems as most interesting parts of some of songs from his upcoming album on social media. It builds anxiety and, in his case, it would be an advantage because his fans do not know if he is indeed in the studio or still plans to release another album in the near future. His fans that are losing hope about the upcoming musician would at least have solace in the snippets and know that Macheso is indeed up to serious business.

Then, the wait would not be the empty and boring stretch that has seen the musician being at the centre of ridicule despite sampling the upcoming songs at his shows. Not all his fans go to live shows and stage material is far much different from studio output.

Instead, Macheso has now been a victim of technology. Poor images and video clips of his studio slots have gone viral on social networks, creating an impression that the musician is struggling to come up with a new release. Such developments could have negative impact on his build-up to a new release.

Macheso could have used social media to his advantage and countered his haters. Recently, this section published an article about how visual artists expressed their deep need for resource centres where they can utilise technological platforms to market their products.

The artists argued that the galleries and art centres could not fully market their individual art products because they had to compress the works of hundreds of artists on their platforms. The artists noted that it was important to have platforms for individual marketing so that they can create contacts and avail their pieces to the outside world.

Other artistes in other genres have access to these individual platforms, but the challenge is to fully utilise the space. Comedians will always be outstanding in this exercise. Maybe it is because people follow jokes and fun a lot on social media networks as compared to serious business.

Comedy skits always get more views and comedians use the platforms to launch their careers. The example of the “Shamhu” comedian noted above trails a chain of other successful skits on social media done by comedians. Ugandan comedian Anne Kansiime who recently performed in the country, popularised her art through clips on social media platforms.

Her numerous skits made her an international star of comedy before she embarked on international tours and she continues to unleash the short videos that are extremely popular around the world.

The trick has worked for her and she has made a name. Local comedian Carl Joshua Ncube has also used social media networks to market his acts while other comedians like Doc Vikela, Simba the Comic King, P.O Box crew and Zambezi News team are following suit.

So, beyond the stage and the studio, artists across genres should seriously consider using social networks to market their brands and products. It has to be more of individual effort, not dependence on record companies, publishers or producers.

As marketing companies focus on sales and figures, artists should focus on marketing their brands and products individually. Social media networks become the right channels for this exercise and given examples have shown that the results can be tremendous.

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