The Man Shatta Wale, Face Mask or Exfoliation and Branding lessons

Let’s gbaa sane (have a conversation) about Shatta Wale, face mask or exfoliation and the beauty industry. From a business development and Communication angle, I have noticed a lot of trends. First things first; anyone who’s got a beauty service should take note.

I’m sure at one point, we’ve seen social media videos of Shatta Wale talking about something humorous or satirical while applying some face mask. Right? Most of these videos are live with tons of live viewership. People extend the shelf life of the videos via screen grabbing and further circulating across plenty WhatsApp groups and statuses.

The random dots

The dots connect in this beautiful case study of a potential brand strategy.

1. Shatta is a very iconic brand who has a lot of brand loyalty, hate it or love it. He is at the cult following level of brands like Harley Davidson etc. whose customers will tattoo the brand on their skin and will literally die for the brand.

2. Digital is the new normal. It is crucial to understand that digitization enables rapid responses to customer needs, ensuring consistent customer experiences across all business units, products, and channels. Shatta Wale uses and understands digital to pave the way for further transformations. Be like Shatta.

3. Shatta has a fairly specific digital output where he’s using a beauty product (mostly at night I presume)

4. Consistency is the key to behavior formation, advertisers, marketers and consumer behaviour professionals worth their salt know this.

Now add all these random dots together, what can happen?…

Face mask or exfoliation speculations

1. A beauty brand which sees the opportunity and has the money to spend on a product placement/endorsement deal should have capitalized on this Shatta routine from lockdown period.

2. Logo embedded on his videos of him actually using the product in his videos; even endorsing it in his usual fun approach, would influence his followers’ beauty routines. With his cult level brand loyalty, I think so. It’s worth testing though.

3. I sincerely hope a brand is actually doing this with him; but, I won’t be surprised if it’s not happening. The beauty industry particularly in black Africa has been following a particular marketing script which is actually from neo colonial brands of western orientation. Five years ago, it was all light skin models; because the script from pre-colonial days was light skin is more superior.

So clearly, anyone in that industry would likely have what’s called a tunnel vision and would not see the potential new (but difficult) market of a certain skin tone in a male audience (which maybe Shatta Wale as a brand through his routines can attract). But funnily, the audience profile might even be female! Have you seen the numbers in his female audience?

Shatta Wale and his Influence

Charles Nii Armah Mensah Jr, born October 17, 1984, is known professionally as Shatta Wale. Shatta is a Ghanaian singer, songwriter, actor and CEO of Shatta Movement Empire. He has boosted the sales and fame of some brands as an ambassador.

1. Storm Energy Drink

It is safe to say that many people know about Storm Energy Drink or patronize it because of Shatta Wale. He personalized it to the extent that when you think Storm Energy Drink, Shatta comes to mind. Storm Energy Drink being the number one energy drink in Ghana, this can largely be attributed to the support and promotion by Shatta Wale.

In May 2019, Shatta announced a multi-million-dollar deal with Kasapreko Company Limited to produce a special edition of the Storm Energy drink for the Shatta Movement Fans. The special Storm Energy Drink which was produced for SM Fans has the Shatta Movement logo printed as part of the packaging of the bottle… And it is right to say that a brand will not go this far to do such a thing for its brand ambassador if what he’s doing for them in terms of promotion is not significant.

2. Infinix Hot 10 & 8

The October 2020 Infinix Hot 10 with Shatta Wale as its brand ambassador is a double-edged blessing.

An October 3, 2019 Joy News report states that Infinix sold about 6000 Hot 8 phones in one day at the launch in Legon in September 2019. Hot 8 was available on the Ghanaian market on October 1, 2019, and within three days it has sold out.

What more could be expected from the man Shatta Wale?