The Need for More Women E-Commerce Entrepreneurs

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In Africa, mobile phones are the main source of internet access, and they accounted for two thirds of global e-commerce spending in 2019. On Afrikrea.com, 80% of transactions are done on mobile, which illustrates why we are a mobile-first product.

For that reason, the e-commerce industry needs to ensure that platforms aren’t just easily accessible on computers, but are also mobile-friendly. Since most of our African sellers use smartphones to manage their shops, we’ve focused on maximising the responsiveness and accessibility of our platform’s mobile design, making it easier for both vendors and their customers to use.

But mobile devices don’t just provide access to e-commerce, they are also used as a payment instrument. We introduced a mobile money payment option on Afrikrea in response to requests from sellers, who found mobile money to be the easiest (and sometimes the only) way to receive their funds.

We also recognised that a crucial aspect of providing better japan whatsapp number data support to the e-commerce sector in Africa was simplifying the facilitation of payments. The African landscape of digital payments is quite unique, with multiple mobile money services operating across the region – from M-Pesa in Kenya to OPay in Nigeria. In order to support our sellers long-term, we had to think of a holistic payment solution to enable them to navigate the e-commerce space – a solution that would put more money in our sellers’ hands and increase women’s participation in digital payments. So we created ANKA, an all-in-one solution for selling African products globally.

Along with providing vendors with the functionality to accept payments from all the region’s major mobile money providers and withdraw their funds from anywhere, ANKA offers the other services required at each step of the selling process, centralising it all in a single place. Sellers can upload and sell their items, manage their inventory, process orders and respond to messages, share payment links via WhatsApp, Instagram and other social media platforms, and deliver products with discounted shipping rates. Women entrepreneurs using Afrikrea are now better placed to compete online and strengthen their businesses. They can save money on shipping prices, save time on the packages to be shipped, and save energy by avoiding errors made in the business process – while also easily managing regular updates with their customers. ANKA is even available to vendors that don’t use Afrikrea, but that want to access these services for their own online businesses.