Creating Digital Market Opportunities for Women-owned SMEs

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About This Project

This project has passed Gate 1 and is currently in the Gate 2 process of testing prototype.

The team has identified the problem as well as the solution required to boost and connect digital economic activity to foster usability of digital financial services. The team ascertains that progress is being made for Gate 2 process.

Gate 1 Write Up:.

  1. Short problem statement summary 

Non- existent digital economic activity to serve  as  incentives to drive financial inclusion/ use of financial services for the unbanked in Kaduna State.

  1. Detailed description of problem

At the brink of financial inclusion is ensuring that whilst women  can access the financial tools/solutions, they also have the ability to use the same. Usability when further broken down will involve the capacity to use financial services to  receive and send money. It then begs the question as to whether or not the unbanked can subscribe to financial service if they don’t have the wherewithal to engage in economic activities to help spur usability. The underlying risk however is the possibility that the unbanked might not associate owning a bank account or subscribing to any financial service with increased access to economic opportunities

  1. Stakeholders Involved

The main stakeholders involved in this project is the Kaduna State Social Investment Office, a social commerce startup called Bumpa and Small business owners or women with entrepreneurial drive willing to start businesses.

  1. Relevant technologies, tools, systems, and APIs for identified solution?
  • APIs built by Bumpa
  1. End user experience? 

We will be using the existing easy onboarding process available on the platform which allows users to create their own marketplaces online.

  1. Which challenges does this solve/ Colab’s Key Design Considerations Framework.

This project will create a strong incentive (earning money) to use and master the usage of DFS leaning on the ability to afford the transition and use of digital tools

  1. Resources:
  • A Project Manager- To co-ordinate and supervise the onboarding of selected beneficiaries
  • Bumpa- To create the financial service embedded platform to spur economic activities of pilot members.
  • Monitoring and Evaluation Officer- To develop key impact indicators, monitor, evaluate and report impact of the said platform on the economic development for pilot users
  1. Expected timeline for this phase.

May 1st- June 27th 2022

Gate 2 write up – Test prototype:

  1. Description/Short Summary of solution 

A platform with embedded financial services that facilitates economic activities for women owned small and medium businesses..

  1. What did we do to validate this solution?

We engaged in consultations with relevant stakeholders such as the Social Investment Office in Kaduna State to validate the need to enable economic activities amongst women to drive financial inclusion. We also leaned on insights from gender-lens research which was carried out by research partners.

*Gates WEE-FI framework on affordability by supporting women-owned businesses with technology subsidies

  1. Benchmarking the identified solution

Previous solutions built includes:

  • Bumpa- a social commerce platform.
  1. Outline of criteria(s) that solution should meet 
  • Platform must intersect and embed financial services as well as drive economic activities- selling of goods or services.
  • Easy to use by pilot users.
  • Less expensive to adapt to.(Must be able to run with little data required.
  • Options to reflect local language for easy adoption.
  • Platform must be trustworthy.
  1. Timeline for developing solutions

We intend to adopt an existing platform to integrate women business owners to participate in economic activities.  Integration will run from July 1st- July 31st 2022.

  1. Prototype plan
  • What are we building or exploring?

We are exploring using a platform that fits above set criteria.

  • What will it test?

Platform will test how enabling economic activities could drive financial inclusion.

  • How will we know it worked? What data to collect/research or observations to make?

We will know this solution has worked when we see a spike in opening bank accounts or use of Digital Financial Services tools amongst pilot users.

The team will collect data around the following metrics:

  • Number of women who started businesses.
  • Number of female entrepreneurs who got onboarded on the platform.
  • Number of sales made within 1 month of test
  • Types of goods or services rendered on the platform.
  • Amount of money received from sales made.
  • Place where money received is transferred or saved to.

6b. Resources: Who is the team for this next phase? What are their roles? What is the budget if any?

Team will include:

i Project Manager- To oversee projects and ensure the team is on track in achieving project objectives.

ii. Product Manager- To oversee product adoption of pilot users. PM will also work with the project Manager to oversee user onboarding

iiiUser Researcher- This person will double as an impact officer who will record and track the impact of the platform towards project objectives. This person will also develop key impact indicators and work with other team members to align on user research findings.

6c. Launch event/engagement plan

  1. Partners/Stakeholders to aid test- prototyping and their roles 
  • Bumpa
  • Social Investment Office , Kaduna
  1. Short Summary of  findings from this phase of testing prototype and decision to proceed to the next phase?
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