Alumni stories: jo and mel of Africa Podfest
This month, we have 21 questions for Africa Podfest founders Melissa Mbugua and Josephine Karianjahi. The co-founders are building an ecosystem of support for African podcasters, and making their voices heard across and beyond the continent – listen to their story on CNN). ‘Mel and Jo’ recently took part in Brand The Change Academy to take a new fresh look at their brand, and rebuild it from the ground up.
Josephine Karianjahi and Melissa Mbugua in Nairobi, 2021
1. If you were a car brand, which brand would you be?
J: I would be a red Mini.
M: I would be a VW Beetle
2. Name one thing that you love about the place where you live
J: I love how walkable the whole city is in Dusseldorf, Germany
M: I love the trees and sunshine in Nairobi
3. What problem in the world keeps you up at night?
J: Youth unemployment
M: Poverty
4. What inspires you to get out of bed in the morning?
J: Knowing what I do makes a difference in the world
M: Realising that I have another day to write my story in the world. Another day means the show is not over yet!
5. What is the big change you want to see in the world?
J: For too long, lots of powerful people outside Africa have decided its future, and not enough Africans have been heard in global forums.
M: I want the African economic system to be inclusive so that all people have opportunities and access to be who they want to be in their lives.
6. How are you working towards that change in your own way?
J: I use my storytelling voice to help people everywhere to make social change, chipping away slowly at the belief that only the strong and wealthy deserve to be heard.
M: I am using my talents as a creative thinker and a leader to build new ventures where the rules are different and freedom for the most vulnerable people is at the heart.
7. Which podcast episode should everyone across the world listen to and why?
The co-founders of Africa Podfest live on Africa Podcast Day: 12th of February 2021.
J: Everyone should listen to one African podcast episode because I bet it contains a perspective you have never heard. Check out a list of our favourites here.
M: Everyone should listen to the AfroQueer episode called 'Gibson' because they will see life from a totally different perspective and realise that life for most people in the world is not how people think it is.
8. What is the biggest branding mistake you ever made?
J: I left out whole sections of my experience on my CV thus telling an incomplete story
M: When I was 22 I designed and led a groundbreaking integrated marketing campaign in Kenya that combined reality TV, youth leadership and social media (which was new at the time) but very few people know that I was responsible for it because I didn't show it off. That was a wasted opportunity to let the world know about my work and put myself on the map.
9. What is your biggest branding success?
J: Learning how to tell the Africa Podfest story afresh
M: Building the Africa Podfest brand from scratch and telling the story of African podcasting in a world that didn't realise there was a story to be told about it.
10. What do you want people to think and feel about your brand?
J: Enlightened, seen and centred
M: That possibilities are limitless and they are free to carve their own path
11. What would you love to figure out about brand building that you still can't quite master?
J: Testing is something I’d love to get a firmer grip on.
M: Building brand ambassadors.
12. What is your first memory of a brand?
J: A hotel (now defunct) called Two Fishes in Diani, whose pools were in the shape of 2 giant fish.
Photo by Robert Anasch on Unsplash
M: M&Ms. I remember being so fascinated because it sounded like my initials. It’s still my favourite candy because of this.
13. Which brand is totally overrated?
J: Apple
M: Beyoncé (I should be afraid to admit this publicly).
14. What brand should finally get the attention it deserves?
M & J: Africa Podfest!!!
15. Who is your biggest change-maker hero?
M & J: Wangari Maathai [ed: a Kenyan social, environmental, and political activist and the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize and the first woman in East and Central Africa to become a Doctor of Philosophy, receiving her Ph.D. from the University of Nairobi in Kenya. In 1977, Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, an environmental non-governmental organization focused on the planting of trees, environmental conservation, and women's rights, which became a global model for environmental action]
16. Business is/can be a force for good. Agree or disagree?
J: I disagree. Businesses are often beholden to shareholders and act in their best interests. However, people are the biggest drivers of lasting social change, which to me, is the ultimate good.
M: I agree. Business is a tool that can do risky, innovative things that bring to life ideas which most other social institutions are not able to make happen. And the high rewards are part of what ignites that level of innovation. But I think that once businesses get to the point where they are so powerful that they impact the daily life of communities, they should transition into a structure of public ownership where they are accountable to the public and not only shareholders.
17. If you could have one person be your brand ambassador for a day, who would it be?
J: I would have Trevor Noah be our Brand Ambassador for a day.
M: I would choose Angélique Kidjo.
18. If you could give someone or something one million dollars in services from the best brand builders in the world, who would you give it to and what would you want them to do with it?
J: I would give it to The Action Foundation which supports children and young people with disabilities as well as their parents in Kibera, and other low-income settlements in Kenya. I know they work with parents, teachers and young people to make a more inclusive world, and where people pay little attention to people with disabilities, the million dollars would be incredible enhancements for their work.
M: I would give it to The GoDown Arts Centre, a cultural institute that supports the creative practices of young people in Nairobi who would otherwise not have access to opportunities to grow their careers and change their lives. I would want their story to reach around the world because it is the story of the potential of young people and the creative industries, which are under-appreciated but where so much potential for social and economic growth in Kenya lies.
19. We always say it takes a village to build a brand. Who is in your village - who is supporting you?
J: We have terrific partners both individual and institutional who support all our efforts.
M: We have a community of changemakers from diverse backgrounds and parts of the world who support our mission and we are grateful for them.
20. If you and your co-founder split up, and a judge ordered one of you to take the product and one of you to take the brand, which would you choose?
J: We would likely amicably split both.
M: This is impossible to split - the brand is the soul and the product is the body that expresses the soul.