Yfm partners MTN to educate Youth on Social Media

Yfm, an Accra based radio station in partnership with MTN, has organized a social media seminar to educate the youth on the enormous potential and opportunities available to them through social media.

The seminar, which was held at the Silverbird Cinemas, featured seasoned social media experts such as Ameyaw Debrah of Ameyawdebrah.com, Amma Baffoe, the head of Communications at Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST), Moses Opoku Agyeman, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Mediapop, and Noel Ganson, General Manager in charge of Consumer Marketing at MTN Ghana.

The seminar was organized as part of activities to mark MTN’s ifest internet revolution. It was held under the theme “Impact of social media on the Ghanaian youth”. Participants were drawn from student groups, corporate organizations, and the public.

In her welcome address, Mary Anna Adu-Gyamfi, who represented the General Manager of Yfm, William Nanka-Bruce, noted that Yfm initiated the seminar to provide the platform for the youth to engage with experts on social media so they could be knowledgeable of the latent positive business opportunities social media offers, aside the social networking aspect.

“As a youth focused station that is driven to entertain and positively impact the lives of our listeners, this initiative, undoubtedly, will provide knowledge and opportunities for the youth and point them in the right direction, whether they want to create businesses or bring to their attention new ideas that will set them on a path of personal development,” she added.

Elaborating on how social media has positively transformed businesses, both Ameyaw Debrah and Moses Opoku Agyeman gave examples of how their businesses have grown exponentially through exposure on social media. Moses cited examples of businesses who have never advertised through the traditional means, but continually book clients and new businesses as a result of a strong marketing presence on social media.

Amma Baffoe, on her part, noted the trend where news, information break out first on social media before the traditional media reports it. She added that social media is driving conversations around all subjects, and has contributed to the explosion of citizen journalism, where people can share news and feedback with organizations about their products and services.

Noel Ganson explained how MTN is supporting developers of applications, who mostly comprise the youth, to start and grow their businesses.

He noted that MTN has created an App store on the network, which houses creative applications developed by Ghanaian youth. Subscribers can go and download applications that are relevant to their needs, and by so doing, these young entrepreneurs receive a revenue share from the patronage of the apps.

According to organizers, this event will be held periodically to bring the youth and experts together to network and share ideas. MTN gave away surprise gifts such as phones, credit and souvenirs.