Mobile Freebies in Zambia: Airtel vs MTN

As the festive season draws near so the demand to call loved ones far and wide steadily increases. Concomitantly, this means that telecommunications networks are vying to draw that demand towards their camps. In this vein, there are promotions galore. This year, however, the promotions have a new twist. The catch is that your SIM must be registered with that network for you to enjoy the promotion. At least this is what applies to the MTN Mwauka Bwanji Zambia campaign. On the other hand, for their good morning, Zambia! campaign, Airtel is only requesting customers to register their SIM cards before December 31, as per ZICTA guidelines.

To participate in the Airtel campaign, all you have to do is dial *141# to surf for free every morning. You can enjoy 50MB of internet everyday between 6am and 7am until January 31, 2014. Once you have exhausted the 50MB data, normal rates will apply. And of course, other terms and conditions apply. This seems to be quite a generous offer considering the 50MB data bundle costs K20.00. So, for an hour of everyday until next year, Airtel is dishing out K20.00 to their subscribers. Realistically speaking, how many people will get to truly enjoy this promotion with only 13 out of 100 people in Zambia being internet users?

Alternatively, the MTN campaign is offering one free minute everyday between 6am and 9am. To participate in their promotion, all you have to do is dial *340*1# for an opportunity to say good morning to your loved ones. The free minute only applies for MTN to MTN calls and your SIM must be registered in order to take advantage of the promotion. Equivalently, it can be said that MTN is giving away K1.00, give or take, worth of airtime to their registered SIM subscribers. It is estimated that 76 out of 100 people in Zambia are mobile cellular subscribers, therefore, how many of these 76 people belong to the MTN market share?

On the other hand, we have not gotten wind of any freebies promotions from Zamtel. Perhaps, the Real Mahala tariff plan is sufficient for the Zamtel users.

If the average cell phone user in Zambia was faced with a choice of having 50MB of free internet data or having a free minute of airtime, what would they choose? Bearing in mind that not everybody has a smartphone. Which promotion appeals to you more than the other? By the way, if you are not sure whether your SIM card is registered you can refer to this post which shows you how to check here.

Data credits: World Bank Databank