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Google Urges Nigerian Businesses to Drive Growth With AI Tools

Published

1 year ago

on

Google Accelerator Programme

By Adedapo Adesanya

Google has intensified calls for Nigerian businesses to tap into the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) as data shows how it is fundamentally transforming consumer behavior and creating unprecedented opportunities.

According to Mr Brendon Kraham, Vice President of Search and Commerce, Global Ads Solutions, the numbers show that Google products around the intersection of searching, streaming, scrolling, and shopping can help position businesses for growth.

Amid Nigeria’s economic challenges, technology is proving to be a pathway to drive brand awareness that resort to action.

“We’re observing a significant evolution in how people interact with technology and brands. This evolution is driven by AI and characterized by a multi-modal consumer journey, where searching, streaming, scrolling, and shopping seamlessly intertwine,” Mr Kraham stated.

He added that AI is now powering businesses when it comes to modern search and advertising with Google’s AI Overviews, powered by Gemini, demonstrating how AI can provide richer, more conversational answers, leading to increased user engagement and exploration.

“This shift is reflected in the fact that 15 per cent of daily searches on Google are new, indicating a growing demand for complex, nuanced information,” he explained, adding that, “AI is supercharging search, and allowing for new ways to search, such as with images and voice.”

He explained that for consumers, there has been rising reliance on searching, streaming on YouTube, scrolling through Shorts, and shopping across Google’s platforms evidenced by the rise of visual search with Google Lens, where nearly 20 billion monthly searches demonstrate the power of seeing and searching.

“YouTube’s dominance in streaming, particularly on connected TVs, and the rapid growth of Shorts, further underscore this trend,” he noted.

Mr Kraham stated that Google and YouTube hold a unique position of trust, guiding consumers throughout their purchase journeys with data showing that over a billion daily shopping interactions occur and billions of hours of YouTube content watched.

He called for businesses to leveraged AI-powered tools like Performance Max and Demand Gen to achieve tangible outcomes, painting two success stories in the form of FairMoney and Wakanow.

FairMoney was able to quantify the incremental value of its Google App Campaigns for installs, seeing a 47 per cent increase in installs, 30 per cent increase in loan applications, and a 24 per cent  increase in loans disbursed while Wakanow, an online travel platform, saw double booking revenue and achieve a tenfold increase in booking volume, according to data shared with Business Post.

“Marketers who have deeply integrated AI tools report 60 per cent greater revenue growth (BCG),” Mr Kraham noted.

Showing more data, he noted that there was a strong positive outlook on AI’s potential, with 87 per cent believing its benefits outweigh the risks, adding that a vast majority of Nigerians anticipate AI’s positive impact on the economy (81 per cent) and crucial sectors like science and medicine (90 per cent).

“The multi modal consumer journey, with the integration of shopping, search, and video, is very relevant in Nigeria, which is a very mobile first market. The growth of visual search and AI powered shopping tools, will greatly assist Nigerian consumers and businesses,” he said.

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Adedapo Adesanya is a journalist, polymath, and connoisseur of everything art. When he is not writing, he has his nose buried in one of the many books or articles he has bookmarked or simply listening to good music with a bottle of beer or wine. He supports the greatest club in the world, Manchester United F.C.

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