Linda
Ikeji, Africa’s most famous news and
gossip writers Linda Ikeji is on the move to take on Facebook with her own social network, which she says gotten over 50,000 sign-ups
on the first day.
Ikeji, a former model says her
social network; LIS (Linda Ikeji Social) has something others lack: a one-stop
shop for everything online.
“About 30-40 million Nigerians
are now online, and they go through so many sites,” Ikeji told CNN.
“They go to Facebook for
connecting with friends. They come to my blog to read the news. They buy and
sell things and go to places like Nairaland where they exchange opinions.” Just
six days in, the network has 86,000 followers.
Within the next five years, Ikeji
said she hopes to be the new Facebook. Linda Ikeji “Facebook is my
competition,” said the businesswoman, who is famous for her tabloid reporting,
which many have criticized for promoting gossip and lacking in credibility.
Celebrities have said in the past that Ikeji
makes up stories, while others have accused her of plagiarism. Apart from her
controversial ways, she differs from Facebook in another major way, however.
The plan is to pay people who
gain a lot of followers on the site. “Once they have 50,000 followers on their
page, we will automatically start monetizing it. That means we will put our
client’s banners on the page and pay you a commission from what they pay us.”
The cash incentives are paid out to the
so-called ‘wallet’ — a section on the network where people add their bank
account details. It remains to be seen if anyone will hit that high.
For
now, she will pay out a weekly share of her advertising revenue to the most
popular accounts, she says. “Next week we are putting N20, 000 ($63) each into
50 people’s wallets,” Ikeji said.
The
network also plans to pay users N8, 000 (around $25) for original news content.
The aim of the business is to give back to the online community.
The strategy could mean good
money for users, and the social network who gets help with attracting people to
sign-up. A win win, she explains.
“Being on social networking sites
make the (site) owners billionaires. You being on our site will make us money,
but at the same time we will share some of that money with you.”
A million dollar business. Ikeji is everywhere
in the online sphere, with 1.32 million Twitter followers and 796,000 following
her Instagram account. It all started 10 years ago, when she was modeling, and
came across a blog post about herself.
“I liked it and I wanted to start
my own blog.” Back then, blogs were more personal accounts of people’s lives,
she said. “I wanted something more interesting. I wanted to do gossip and news,
and I gave them something different.”
Already a celebrity, it quickly
drew a lot of readers. “It was like a celebrity blog: people knew who I was and
were very interested in what I had to say.” It seems to have worked.
Today her
blog has around 7 million page views per day and is especially popular with
Nigerians living abroad in countries such as China, Dubai and the U.S.,
according to Ikeji. “It’s the number one blog in Nigeria.”
However popular and successful
she claims to be, Ikeji continues to be controversial. Some say she is getting
rich on gossip. She says the criticism is mainly down to two things: Jealousy
and the usual online critique famous people often endure.
“There are people who are jealous, because
they don’t understand how somebody can be so successful at something so many
others are trying to do.” Others simply don’t like what she does, but Ikeji
seems unfazed. “They may not agree with the way I do stuff. They will criticize
and show their opinion, which is fine with me.”
Source:
Vanguard
No comments:
Post a Comment