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February 2013 Mobile Monday Nigeria Event Recap

It was yet another #MoMoNigeria event this month on the 25th, and it was a great time. The topic of discussion was the means by which new e-commerce businesses could overcome the problems that are faced by all the players in the ecommerce space.

The problems are the issues that either break the business models of these companies or helps them learn their lessons and move on to become stronger Businesses in the future in the future.

Present to speak to the audience were two people who know a lot about the ecommerce space, Lukas Zels and Dika Oha. Here’s a brief bio of each speaker

Dika Oha: Dika was formerly with Dealdey(One of the leading daily deals websites in Nigeria) and he is now the MD of an e-commerce outsourcing firm called EOS (E-Commerce Outsourcing Services) which specializes in setting up various aspects on an ecommerce business including Logistics, Payment and other aspects. He has extensive experience in the processes involved in the e-commerce process.

Lukas Zels: Lukas is the managing director of Kaymu.com.ng, an e-commerce website that allows you to sell your old stuff (very much like eBay). Kaymu is owned and operated by Rocket Internet GMBH. He brings his experience from running e-commerce businesses in Germany to Nigeria.

The problems of setting up and managing an ecommerce Business and how to overcome them

Dika Oha started off the event by speaking about the various problems that face e-commerce business when they first start up. Here are some of his thoughts.

  • Ecommerce dependence on the ecosystem: The ecommerce space depends on the ecosystem.

– There are about 100 e-commerce businesses in Nigeria. Not many of them are doing extremely well.
– There are just about 100,000 people that are loyal and active shoppers online.
– A lot needs to be done in the ecommerce space in terms of building customer loyalty and trust. Without these two key things in place, Customers will always be wary of shopping online
The Problems of e-commerce that he outlined are as follows

  • Logistics: Getting the products to the people in a timely fashion
  • Payment Systems: The current systems are not user friendly and they add additional steps to the checkout process. There is also no viable payment system for in-app purchases .
  • Cost of business: The costs of running the marketing and technical aspects of the business are very prohibitive hence if revenue is not made at the early stages, the business is bound to fail.

He also mentioned that the banks need to boost customer confidence and also listen to merchants by providing products that are tailored to fit their needs. He closed by talking about EOS (http://www.eos.com.ng) will help new merchants to set up every aspect of their ecommerce stores.

Lukas came up and spoke about how a customer centric ecommerce business can improve its revenue by providing convenience (Free Shipping), Variety ( lots of products across a broad number of categories) and low prices. He also talked about how Kaymu (http://www.kaymu.com.ng) is planning to be the number one online marketplace in Nigeria.
You can download their presentations below
Presentation by Lukas Zels of Kaymu at the February MobileMonday Nigeria event for February
Presentation by Dika Oha of EOS at the February MobileMonday Nigeria event for February

The next MobileMonday Nigeria event holds on the 25th of March 2013.

 

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