DJ S’bu: marketing genius or ‘African hustler’ finding his feet?

SIBUSISO LEOPE, AKA DJ S’bu, has certainly proved to be the Moflava of the week.

SIBUSISO LEOPE, AKA DJ S’bu, has certainly proved to be the Moflava of the week.

In his attempt to pull out all the stops to promote his energy drink, the “young African industrialist”, as he referred to himself in an interview with Forbes magazine, has certainly been industrial about scoring free advertising wherever possible.

As the old adage goes, any publicity is good publicity, and Leope is treading a fine line between social media savviness, guerrilla marketing and media law.

He seems to have quite a knack for unconventional advertising methods.

First, he created a mini media frenzy when he was suspended by Metro FM after unashamedly promoting his energy drink, Mo Faya, at the radio station’s recent awards function.

And then the South African Broadcasting Corporation announced its intent to make him cough up for every time he punted his products on his popular Sound Revival show.

This week he landed in hot water for retweeting a fake Forbes Africa Magazine cover that features him clutching a can of Mo Faya.

By retweeting the fake cover, Leope – who has said that he saw the cover on social media and thought it was cool – has placed himself in line for possible legal action.

Forbes’ legal department is busy drafting correspondence for one of his representatives, but hasn’t indicated yet what action they plan on taking, if any.
Forbes’ legal department is busy drafting correspondence for one of his representatives, but hasn’t indicated yet what action they plan on taking, if any.

Forbes’ legal department is busy drafting correspondence for one of his representatives, but hasn’t indicated yet what action they plan on taking, if any.

The onus is on the Twitter user to take responsibility for everything that is posted on his or her account, just as the case is with any other publication.

The retweet function may be an easy way of creating posts, but the reality is that if users don’t have a basic grasp of media law, they could land themselves in hot water or court.

Just ask the 10 000 Twitter users in the United Kingdom who were sued by a politician, Lord Alistair McAlpine, when they hit that retweet icon on allegations of child abuse in 2012.

The allegations turned out to be false, and McAlpine successfully sued the BBC, who had initially broadcast the story, even though they hadn’t named him, for £185 000.

Those who had retweeted the claims avoided legal action by making donations to charity but one, the wife of another politician, had to cough up £15 000 after the high court ruled that the tweet was libelous.

It’s not as though Leope is new to the game. And his guerrilla marketing strategy may turn out to be an expensive exercise.

But the truth of the matter is that Leope’s gung ho tactics, and the fallout from them, have garnered him far more publicity – and thus free advertising – than he would have.

– City Press

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