GOtv positions for digital switch-over era

In a bid to prepare for the digital switch-over era, GOtv, a digital pay-TV on the terrestrial platform, has devised strategies with which to champion the market in Jos, the Plateau State capital.

Elizabeth Amkpa, general manager, GOtv, says it is no mistake that MulitiChoice, which is partnering with NBC on the digital switch-over, arrived Jos around March this year.

Amkpa, at a press conference held in Jos over the weekend, said MultiChoice, the pioneer of pay-TV in Nigeria, “launched the Digital Terrestrial Television in 2011 in Ibadan, being historic of advent of television in Nigeria and moving to Jos for the digital switch over because of its historic antecedent as the first colour TV in Africa.”

The general manager said subscribers will not need a Set Top Box for the digital switch over, as she explained that DStv was on a satellite platform while GOtv was a Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) using transmitter, adding that “DTT serves a different market to position the country for the digital switch over.”

According to her, the company is not deter from coming to Jos because of security challenges, because “GO is an action word to create the urgency in seamless digital migration in Nigeria, and there is life in Jos.”

Dare Kafar, marketing manager, said the GOtv had employed many strategies in launching into the market, such as personalising it, using geographical symbols peculiar to Jos and choosing houses and walls to paint to advertise GOtv.

“We signed Mr. Ibu as our brand ambassador with exciting phrases like “Digilevez Don Land,” ‘GO Digi Digi,’ and we will have tricycles known as ‘Mr. Ibu on tricycle’ that can move to the doorstep of consumers to install and resolve problems.”

The licence of GOtv is per city and not state, Kafar said, saying in the last three months the company had covered Jos North, Jos South, Jos East, and Bassa.

“We are working at covering more places in Plateau once the digital switch over flag off is done, the NBC will be giving us licence to cover the whole of Plateau State,” according to Kafar.

Meanwhile, GOtv rewarded its first subscriber in Jos, Samson Ayoola, with a power generating set, a DVD player and a GOtv decoder as an incentive to keep on using GOtv.

Hope Ikwe