The Afropreneur

Hello Afropreneur,

We all know that the perfect world doesn’t exist and even much so in our continent Africa. We often make the mistake of waiting to have the ideal conditions before we start working on an idea/service/solution.

Eventually, a lot of the ideas become obsolete and lose relevance with the times and trends in the market. You also run the risk of someone else working on that solution you thought of and then the realization that Ideas are not exclusive dawns on you.

The CEO of Retrocode, Cohan Nnanta (read about him here) spoke to us about his entrepreneurial journey. How he started with what he had to get him to where he is now.

You can’t be an entrepreneur in your head, you need to have a visible product or service to be called an entrepreneur. Your idea is nothing without action. So are you an entrepreneur or a ‘mouthpreneur’?

Decide after listening to this

This is the longest interview we’ve ever had but it was totally worth it. Don’t let the length dissuade you from learning vital lessons to ease your entrepreneurial journey.

We would love to hear from you, do share your thoughts in the comment section or drop a comment on our Facebook or Twitter.

Make the execution of your idea your first passion, not money”

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Hello Afropreneur,

It is no news that a large amount of startups in Africa fail in the first year. Doesn’t this worry you?

So today we took time out to discuss why African Startups fail, other that obvious reasons like poor government policies, deteriorating or non existent infrastructure and access to Finance.

Listen and share.

We would also love to hear from you, so please your thoughts in the comment section or drop a comment on our Facebook or Twitter.

I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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Hello Afropreneurs,

In this episode we discussed if women Entrepreneurs are being given an equal playing field in Africa and what they must do to compete and standout in this episode.

We decided to discuss this because one of our listeners, Stella Ozemoya, suggested and sent us an article on ‘Women Empowerment’. You can read it here.

We also mentioned Engr. Oduwa in this podcast, she is the CEO of Neni Auto Care, you can read all about her here.

It is general knowledge that women in Africa feel less opportuned than men because of the culture and gender bias that exist but can women do anything to change it? Would the fight for feminism and women empowerment make the difference? What can women do better?

Gender equity is smart economics but women need to take the bull by the horn and take what they want. Black women are the fastest group of growing entrepreneurs in the US and have increased 327% since 1997 (Remember feminism came from there) but we cannot rule out the fact that Africa is not represented in the top 3 continents bubbling with female entrepreneurs. What can we do?

Is the society to blame or the women?

Does it matter who is blamed? what can be done?

Listen to the podcast and share your opinion

Don’t let gender, culture or what the society says limit you…. if you think you can, do it

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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Hello Afropreneurs,

Do you think it is wise for Entrepreneurs to share their business ideas with everyone?

Hold that thought! You should hear what Momarr Taal had to say about this. (In case you don’t know who he is, we did a short article on him – Click here)

We are all for sharing your ideas, but that does not come with its risks. What then are the benefits of sharing your ideas?

* Sharing ideas raise your creativity and learning from the feedback you get.

* Sharing your ideas help solve issues quickly.

* Sharing ideas helps you gain networking opportunities.

Of course, there are several way you may protect your ideas:

* Avoid revealing too much, don’t share everything with everyone.

* Always document and use Non Disclosure Agreements (NDA’s)

* Apply for a Patent

* Research the recipients/people who you are pitching to and choose confidants wisely.

Sharing your ideas is the first step to making your idea real, and often times, and I dare say, most of the times the idea you started with may not be the finished product you end up with later.

Finally, ideas are meaningless without effective execution!!

Having an idea is one thing, what value are you bringing to the table?

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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Hello Afropreneurs,

Today we are going to discuss one issue businesses and entrepreneurs grapple with, should their focus be on creating and selling a product with great features or should the development and branding of their products be tied to the ‘needs’ of the target market.

It is very easy to fall into the trap of believing you know what the market needs based on your experience (not saying ‘experience’ isn’t vital in product development and marketing).

First of, let’s define each of the terms in our topic for today.

[highlight1]Product-centric[/highlight1]: Placing emphasis on the product and it features, trying to sell it to as many people as possible. A one size fits all approach. A product centric business focuses on the products it brings to market rather than the customers that buy those products.

[highlight1]Customer-centric[/highlight1]: The focus is on the needs of the customer, product development and marketing is targeted and showing each customer how his/her life gets better by using the product/service.  This is done by creating a positive consumer experience at the point of sale and post-sale.

Research shows that Customer-centric companies stand the test of time, examples are the likes of Apple and Coke. These companies are known for selling ’emotions’. Making your company/product more customer centric results in you having more loyal customers.

Make sure you listen to this episode and share your feedback.

Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they even realize it themselves.

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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Hi Afropreneurs,

Welcome to Episode 2 of The Afropreneur Show. On this episode we tracked down [highlight1]Lemi Ghariokwu[/highlight1] (you can read all about him here) and had a ‘lengthy discussion’ with him on his life as an entrepreneur.

The theme for this episode is based on the subject ‘[highlight1]Are free services compulsory for Budding Entrepreneurs?[/highlight1]’

Lemi believes that one can offer free services as a startup, this will help you establish a relationship and help spread your services/goods via word of mouth. He also believes that each entrepreneur should design a pricing strategy that will cater to a broad section of your customers.

As usual, we debated the ‘free service’ issue in the studio and settled with the following:

* You do not need to always give your products/services away for free all the time. Technology has made it easy to showcase your works e.g Social Media.

* Not all industries require that a startup give out free service(s).

* When you constantly give away your goods/services for free, you lessen the value of what you sell.

* Your time is your most valuable resource and it becomes wasted every time you offer your goods and services for free.

* If people don’t value your services it will affect your pricing. Learn to brand and sell yourself, make people see your value. People negotiate based on perceived value.

“Your Certificate is not the paper you get from school, it’s the results you can deliver” – Lemi Ghariokwu

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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Welcome to the maiden edition of our podcast – The Afropreneur Show. The Afropreneur Show is all about Entrepreneurs doing business in Africa.

Our aim is to celebrate Entrepreneurs, highlight the problems and challenges that may be hindering business growth in Africa and also learn from the experiences of these Entrepreneurs.

On this episode we discussed ‘Packaging‘ and how it is important to the Entrepreneur.

You can join the conversation by following us on Twitter – @TheAfropreneur or using hash tag #TheAfropreneur. You can also comment and share your views on Facebook – TheAfropreneur, listen to this podcast on Soundcloud or send your questions to questions[@]theafropreneur.net.

On our next episode we will be chatting live with an Entrepreneur (so excited). Don’t Miss it.

Lastly, Please share to your network on all the Social Media Platforms.

Catch you on our next episode which will be published on the 19th of June, 2016.

“If Dogs don’t like your dog food, the Packaging doesn’t matter”

If You Enjoyed the Show

You can subscribe to The Afropreneur Podcast on iTunes. Please also leave an honest review on iTunes . If you want to hear more news from The Afropreneur Podcast including and beyond the podcasts, join the enewsletter mailing list.

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