MXit to connect music fans

Social networking works well when it comes to connecting to fans, brand loyalists and the public. And nobody knows this better than global celebrities.

David Guetta, multi-Grammy Award winning superstar, who will be in South Africa for performances in Johannesburg and Cape Town this month, will harness the power of Africa’s largest mobile social network, MXit, to connect to local fans during his visit.

As part of its partnership with Cintron Africa – who is organising The St Yves Music Festival, featuring David Guetta and supporting acts like AKON, Jax Panik and US top 25 DJs Joe Bermudez and DJ Jenny LaFemme – MXit will transform a section of its platform into a special event portal for its community to interact by sending ‚shout-outs’ which will be streamed live at the concert. Further, users will be able to enter competitions to win exclusive tickets to the pre-event dinner, as well as stand a chance of winning one of the 100 tickets on offer.

To visit this environment on MXit, for competition entry and free artist content ‚ go to St Yves Music Festival portal on MXit > Tradepost > Competitions > St Yves Music Festival.

‚This is exciting for MXit,‚ says Juan du Toit, Executive Head of International Business Development & Marketing for MXit. ‚Not only because we will be providing a very special platform for fans to interact, win tickets, and download free content but also because it signals the incredible influence that mobile social media holds today.‚

Fans that log on to the St Yves Music Festival portal on MXit are in for a surprise.

Besides being able to win 100 general admittance tickets to the festival in Cape Town on 14 October and Johannesburg on 15 October, one MXit user and his or her partner will win an opportunity to have dinner with music legend David Guetta, AKON and local celebrity Jax Panik in Cape Town.

This is not the first time that MXit has been chosen by international artist and dignitaries as a platform to connect with African and South African youth.

US President Barack Obama used MXit to receive and answer questions from African youth during his first visit to Africa: and MXit was also the social network used to promote Sean Kingston’s tour of South Africa earlier this year.

Although they are tight-lipped about details at the moment, MXit has confirmed that one of the celebrities will chat to the mobile social network’s community in a chat room before the event. MXit users will be able to queue to participate in the chat room and those queuing to enter will be able to see the questions being posed to the artist and the answers that he or she gives.

‚The big difference in communicating to people on a social network is that the conversation is two-way. Unlike traditional advertising, social networking allows celebrities, brands and people to have deeper, more meaningful discussions, and this is where the true magic of social networking lies,‚ says Du Toit.

MXit has a global community of over 44 million registered user accounts. 75% of these are in South Africa.

To download MXit onto your mobile phone, go to m.mxit.com.

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