With billions of people using sharing apps globally, it’s becoming increasingly easy to understand how digital patterns and routines impact their physical lives.
In Nigeria where millions of young users have embraced SHAREit Lite as their preferred content sharing platform, similar behavioural patterns are observed across different segments of the demographic.
Marvin Umebiye, Regional Marketing Director, SHAREit Lite, Nigeria says “Nigeria is widely acclaimed as a high-potential nation with a population of over 200 million people, whose uniquenesses are portrayed in their Music, Art, Culture, Food, and digital lifestyle. This makes Nigerians very important in the grand scheme of life itself..”
Below are interesting facts we’ve come to learn about Nigerians – most of which aren’t surprising given the energetic and animated minds of most Nigerians.
1. Nigerians love sharing content and telling their own stories
Irrespective of age, gender, religion, or beliefs, storytelling is a big part of life for an average Nigerian. This is reflected in how much they like to take pictures and document videos to later share within their networks. On key occasions such as birthdays, family parties, weddings, housewarming parties, and even outings, the sharing habit quadruples. The affinity of Nigerians to savor memories through pictures and videos contributes to why smartphone penetration is on the rise, exceeding 30 million people compared to the previous decade. It equally explains why many Nigerians use SHAREit Lite to ensure that their stories and content are shared in a coordinated manner and the quality of shared files is retained, compared to other platforms.
2. Music is a big part of Nigerians’ way of life
On a platform like SHAREit Lite, music is one of the most-shared file categories in recent times. If history is anything to go by, Nigerians are largely drawn to their music. Little wonder its music industry has recorded major success with Nigerian songs and artistes taking the center stage in the global music mainstream. Currently, Nigeria’s multi-billion dollar music industry is valued at $8billion. Beyond intellectual royalties, the digital behaviour of Nigerians towards streaming, downloading, and sharing local songs contributes to the industry’s success.
As afro-beats and African music continue to evolve, Nigerians are getting more attached to indigenous artists and their works. Of late, there has been a surge in music content sharing and this trend continues to rise among the young demographic.
3. Nigerians give high importance to education and learning
Education is important to Nigerians. More often than not, Nigerians rely on digital platforms to enhance their learning processes due to easy content accessibility, group sharing, and peer-to-peer learning. However, when it comes to learning, the content sharing behaviour plays out more vividly during critical times; an example of such is when millions of students enroll for regional or national exams.
As of 2021, the West African Examination Council – WAEC (a regional exam) recorded more than 1.57 million students undergoing the academic exercise. During times like this, documents such as past questions or exam theses are exchanged among studies across mobile devices. A wide range of academic materials is also shared with each other regularly by Nigerian students looking to ace their studies – the rate of academic file sharing only dwindles during non-academic seasons.
4. Nigerians use a wide variety of mobile and creative applications
One important digital behavior of Nigerians is their high appetite for mobile app usage. Nigerians use various social media, gaming, finance, and other apps for their day-to-day activities. For instance, every Nigerian has at least one gaming or creativity application on their phones which they relish during their leisure time.
As such, they are prone to recommending similar apps to their friends and loved ones, thereby improving the sharing frequency of such apps across different mobile devices. Nigerians love spending ample time on their phones and sharing apps that keep them engaged regularly.
5. Entertainment in Nigeria is getting more personalised
Nigeria has one of the largest entertainment industries in the world. PWC reports in its Global E & M Industry Outlook that “Nigeria will be the world’s fastest-growing E&M market”. Currently, its movie industry, Nollywood, is regarded as the second-largest producer of movies globally, and it is also valued at $6.4 billion.
More recently, Nigeria’s entertainment landscape is becoming fragmented, leading to the creation of sub-players and personal entertainment hubs. Shifting from the norm of mainstream entertainment, regular Nigerians are now creating and sharing content using their mobile phones. Ultimately, this new shift has resulted in a new crop of content creators, who despite being fragmented, constitute a significant part of Nigeria’s successful entertainment landscape. With transfer apps like SHAREit Lite, emerging content creators have been able to personalise their content, spread their work, and expand their reach faster since they do not have to worry about internet lags or mobile data restrictions.