Joyce Muthoni: Starting entrepreneurship at a young age has given me time to make mistakes
[bctt tweet=”The name Viral Gorrrila came from a need to have our audience be curious about what we do ” via=”no”] She calls herself a spirited individual and she has accomplished a lot in a short span of time. Joyce Muthoni is the founder of Viral Gorrrila and has worked in her first business for 6 years. She started her first business Proteque Consulting while still on campus, just before she graduated. After six years of running it, Joyce started a balloon business, retailing helium balloons. In under two years, her balloon business is now getting into retail stores and expanding into other regions in Kenya, after successfully setting up the Nairobi and Mombasa offices. The balloon business led to the founding of Viral Gorrrila, a digital marketing agency. It was because of digital marketing activities that her balloon business grew its client base. Joyce quickly saw an opportunity to venture into an untapped industry and help companies gain more market share through digital activities. Tell us why you choose the name Viral Gorrrila for your business. Viral Gorrrila is a digital marketing company that deals with a number of things including website design, Google analytics, Google ads, social media marketing and advertising, and content development. I believe that content is king and conversion is queen. the coining of the name Viral Gorrrila came from a need to have our audience be intrigued, attracted and curious about what we do. The essence of our work is to ensure that as many people as possible get to learn about our clients’ brands and services. The ‘viral’ bit is coined from this while ‘gorrrila’ came from the word guerilla in guerilla marketing. The goal of the company is to develop creative, captivating and memorable content for our clients and this is what guerilla marketing is about. Our creative content seeks to fulfill this and create advocates out of the audience. The Viral Gorrrila term in its self-symbolizes disruption, doing things differently, changing the way digital marketing has been done in our country and helping our clients and other brands see the value of change. The “rrr” in Gorrrila reflects this. Why do you say you’re a new kind of digital marketing agency? What makes you different? There are a lot of agencies in the country, some with a wealth of experience and others starting out and learning the ropes as they go along. We have a strong team that is conversant with Google advertising and social media advertising. We also have a deep focus on creative content development and we have ventured into animated productions in 2D and 3D for our clients and are pursuing a digital channel that will air only animated content made in Kenya. This will, later on, open up to airing content from the rest of Africa. What exciting projects are you working on lately that you can share with us? My work and keen interest in the animation field has led me to work with a local gaming and animation company that is making great strides in the market. I was approached by the Director of ISHAKA LLC, Mr. Sagwa Chabeda, to assist in the project concept and fundraising. We are currently working on a gaming, animation and manga franchise that is set to take the African, European and American markets by storm. It is a bold statement to make but it is a viable endeavor. We have attracted interest from some international production and distribution companies who are looking for new content to market to the world. The ball is in our court and we want to tell our African stories and help the world understand who we are, our cultures, traditions, and heritage. We want to give our viewers an authentic display of the different countries in Africa, one story at a time. [bctt tweet=”My keen interest in animation has led me to work with ISHAKA a local gaming & animation company” via=”no”] You started your business while in school, what was your experience being a student entrepreneur? I started my business in my final year of campus. I had some work experience previously in my father’s company and it was here that I made the decision not to pursue employment after my education. Understanding my personality and passion, I knew what my dreams were and I didn’t want to wait to pursue them. The great thing about starting my business while I was still on campus was that I got business referrals from my fellow classmates who were older and already running their own businesses. I also received advice from them on business planning and execution. On the other hand, I was inexperienced in many things and my lack of experience cost me a lot of money and brought a lot of tears. I had no HR, finance or management skills. My background was in marketing. I had to quickly learn the ropes and continue to keep an open mind, learning attitude, build tough skin and pursue continuous development. Starting entrepreneurship at a young age has given me time to make mistakes, understand my strengths and grow into the business woman I am today. I am now very clear on what I can and cannot do and this has helped me to avoid taking up projects that I know I will not be able to adequately serve. Starting early has also been beneficial in giving me time to grow my network and I can confidently say I am a very resourceful person. I have come to appreciate the pains and pleasures of entrepreneurship and I have a big heart for those who want to venture into business. I appreciated the assistance I got when I was on campus as I started out and I would not hesitate to help anyone seeking advice as an entrepreneur. You have to tell us about your balloon business, how did the idea to run this come up? How exactly did you use digital marketing to grow it?