J-talk Show

 

Jason and Anthony Gachara an Africa MBA fellow at Stanford during an Interview. Photo credit: Louis Baudoin

As Facebook announced a new milestone: two billion people connecting and building communities on Facebook every month is a vast market to share ideas, sell products and create a brand. Jason Dunford, a retired Kenyan Olympic swimmer, incubated an idea that is quickly becoming a new brand for him. After interviewing attendees at The Africa Business Conference at Stanford, where he was Marketing lead, Jason realized how much he loved to listen to people tell their stories, and the J-talk show was born. 

The program started in March 2017 on Facebook and focuses mainly on African stories, but he is even experimenting with others beyond the continent. We asked, Jason, why an online company? This is what he had to say “Facebook provided an easy outlet for me to get my work out there and start the conversations I wanted to have.  I had the epiphany that there are so many people with amazing stories out there that are not getting out in the world, and with my platform from swimming, I felt a calling to do so.”

With no prior experience in journalism, Jason currently runs all the departments to ensure quality content. With each interaction, he learns from what has worked and what hasn’t and tries to provide even better content for his viewers. The live show has hosted people from Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America, and the USA. He’s hosted authors, professional sportspeople, entrepreneurs, and activists. Jason’s platform has attracted 40,000 followers and an average of 30,000 views. His most-watched interview to date was of Rwandan sensation Pauline Mutumwinka, which has garnered over 700,000 views, over 1,000 comments, and 500 shares. 

“The number of people following me on Facebook has doubled since my swimming days. Back then, I had 12,000 followers. Now I am approaching 50,000. When I was swimming, I was appealing to people who love sports only, but the content I am producing. Now it has widely attracted people who love business, academics, art, and music. This show is appealing to people because they can tell there is no ulterior motive. It's simply a conversation." Jason stated about his vast following.

Unlike Youtube, where there is revenue-sharing for views, Facebook only offers communities who share, like, and contribute to meaningful discussion. To make the show self-sustainable, Jason has been in talks with media managers on potentially getting backing for the show from a media company.  

Each day on Facebook, more than 175 million people share a Love emoji, over 800 million people like something, and more than 1 billion people use social groups every month.