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Cape Town - The eThekwini Municipality has come under fire after it splurged R500 000 on a social media campaign to promote Durban.
According to the Sunday Independent, a Durban media company, Carver Media, was given the contract – which was not put out to tender – to upload two Facebook posts a week, send a bulk email, tweet with the hashtag #weloveDurban, upload YouTube videos and upload 20 images to Instagram.
This comes despite the municipality having a communications team of almost 50 employees.
The newspaper reported that department head Tozi Mthethwa defended their decision to award the contract stating that the city was relying on the “I love Durban” brand, which Carver Media owns.
Late last year, the city launched an economic development and visitor strategy. A key component of the city’s strategy was on growing “brand Durban”, highlighting the majestic infrastructure and showcasing the visitor experience to new markets. The city wants to attract more tourists from Gauteng while rolling out its brand to the United Kingdom, America, Germany, India and China.
They also plan on developing potential new markets in Namibia, Australia, New Zealand, Netherlands, France, Singapore and Mozambique. The plan is to attract over five million tourists yearly to the city and to inject approximately R10m into the economy, which will support 74 000 jobs.
According to the Sunday Independent, a Durban media company, Carver Media, was given the contract – which was not put out to tender – to upload two Facebook posts a week, send a bulk email, tweet with the hashtag #weloveDurban, upload YouTube videos and upload 20 images to Instagram.
This comes despite the municipality having a communications team of almost 50 employees.
The newspaper reported that department head Tozi Mthethwa defended their decision to award the contract stating that the city was relying on the “I love Durban” brand, which Carver Media owns.
Late last year, the city launched an economic development and visitor strategy. A key component of the city’s strategy was on growing “brand Durban”, highlighting the majestic infrastructure and showcasing the visitor experience to new markets. The city wants to attract more tourists from Gauteng while rolling out its brand to the United Kingdom, America, Germany, India and China.
They also plan on developing potential new markets in Namibia, Australia, New Zealand, Netherlands, France, Singapore and Mozambique. The plan is to attract over five million tourists yearly to the city and to inject approximately R10m into the economy, which will support 74 000 jobs.
