South Africa, Sept. 5 -- For years, South Africa's commuter class has been treated as too broad, too hard to reach, or too low-value to matter. But fresh data tells a different story. Far from being a passive audience in the "backseat," commuters are a powerful growth engine hiding in plain sight.

Here are five reasons every brand and agency should be paying attention:

1. They're not 'mass market'. They're diverse decision-makers

The term "mass market" is often used to lump everyone outside of LSM 9-10 into one homogenous bucket. But commuters are anything but. They include salaried professionals, students, entrepreneurs, and parents making daily purchase decisions.

What unites them is mobility: over 15 million South Africans travel t...