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Financial Inclusion means that individuals and businesses have access to useful and affordable financial products and services such as transactions, payments, savings, credit and insurance delivered to them in a responsible and sustainable way.
Not all Nigerians are financially included, which is why two young entrepreneurs are deepening this industry to close the yawning gap.
Victor Tobi Olojo
Victor Tobi Olojo is the founder of Credit Me, a start-up mobile money payment system that facilitates financial inclusion across the country. Victor is also the national president of the Association of Mobile Agents in Nigeria (AMMAN).
He was inspired to establish Credit Me in 2012 out of his quest to deepen financial inclusion in rural communities.
“The inspiration to establish started from wanting to deepen financial inclusion rate in the country. Then, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had newly introduced mobile money, and we wanted to be part of it,” Victor tells Start-Up Digest.
The International Relations graduate says that the goal of his business is to help drive the financial inclusion targets of the country, stating that with it, 80 percent of the country’s population will be financially included.
“It is expected that in year 2020, 80 percent of the Nigerian population will have been financially included in the formal financial sector, and that is what Credit Me is trying to plug into,” the entrepreneur says.
“Currently, the formal financial system, as we have now, is unable to cater for all strata of the Nigerian population. We have people who are at the bottom of the pyramid. This set of people generally has no interest in formal banking system due to a number of reasons.
“To ensure that this set of people is included in the country’s financial system, mobile money and agency banking come in place,” he adds.
Apart from deepening the country’s financial inclusion, Victor says that mobile money and agency banking also help in addressing the issue of congestion and delays in the banking system.
“An average bank’s Automated Teller Machine (ATM) point is so clogged by long queues and this really is not the idea behind the ATM. Ordinarily, ATM centres are supposed to be quick-stops for cash needs. With the advent of mobile money and agency banking channels, banking is brought closer to the people,” he says.
Victor was able to raise his initial start-up capital for his business from personal savings. The business, which was initially involved in telecoms/IT marketing, has grown massively since starting.
Answering questions on the challenges the business is facing, he says that lack of trust from the public remains the major problem confronting his business.
“The core issue we experienced was the issue of trust, because mobile money and agency banking are relatively new in Nigeria and Nigerians are yet to fully understand the concept and how it works,” he discloses.
He says that the business is addressing the issue of lack of trust by ensuring that all their transactions are done timely with effective and efficient customer care service delivery to guarantee customer satisfaction.
“All these are very important and doing them has helped us thrive in our business over the years,” he says.
He laments that huge infrastructural gap in the country is a major problem confronting his business. He tells Start-Up Digest that multiple taxes levelled on the business are also impacting negatively on it.
He urges the government to create more awareness about mobile money and its operation, stressing that Nigerians are yet to fully embrace it.
He also wants the government to bridge the huge infrastructural deficit in the country, stating that businesses can only survive when critical infrastructures are within their reach.
According to him, despite over 154 million mobile subscribers in the country, mobile money penetration in the country is still at a very slow rate due partly to infrastructural gaps in the system.
Victor is spreading the business of ‘nano-finance’ product, having launched the CreditMe Mobile app.
According to him, the new app helps businesses to spread their frontiers and break barriers.
Asked about his advice to other entrepreneurs, he says, “Put God first in everything. Then these three important things are essential for entrepreneurs to achieve success: character, competence and capacity.”
Yemi Olalekan
Yemi Olalekan is the cofounder of Pennylender.com, a fin-tech start-up that deals in online lending and financial literacy.
Yemi was inspired to establish this business out of her quest to be financially independent and to deepen financial inclusion and penetration in the country. The entrepreneur says her desire to be an inspiration to the younger generation was also a serious motivating factor.
“We wanted to improve financial inclusion in the country and make financial services freely and easily accessible to the under-served population. Our focus is helping the hardworking but low income earners and small business owners to take care of their cash flow shortfalls,” she tells Start-Up Digest.
The young entrepreneur alongside Olayinka Olonode cofounded the business with their personal savings, an amount that was then spent on designing their website.
After some period of time, Yemi and her cofounder pitched their business idea to some investors who found it viable and later pumped money into the it.
Since starting, the business has grown tremendously as market acceptance for its products and services has been fantastic, says Yemi.
Also, the business has continued to sign on new customers on daily basis with feedback on excellent customers’ satisfaction rising by the day.
Answering questions on the challenges the business is facing, Yemi says that getting the right employees for the business remains her biggest challenging.
She notes that that getting young graduates that are ambitious and trainable at first recruitment is quite difficult. It takes her and the partner several recruitments exercises to find the right people, which is increasing the firm’s spending on recruitment.
Apart from getting the right people, the young entrepreneur says that the country’s huge infrastructural gaps have remained a challenge to her business. She laments that poor power supply has continued to impact negatively on the business, hurting margins while raising operational costs.
She calls on the Federal Government to bridge the huge infrastructural gaps, saying that it will help increase the survival rate of start-ups in the country.
Yemi believes that Nigeria has innovative and creative entrepreneurs but are hugely limited by infrastructure gaps and the environment.
She urges the government to assist technology-based businesses, saying that technology has the potential to jump start the country’s economic growth and development.
She argues that Nigerians should have access to cheap and quality data while calling for the establishment of more incubation hubs and technology labs for young tech entrepreneurs in the country.
“We also need many small business technology labs and incubation hubs where young entrepreneurs can have access to start-up tools and systems to bootstrap their start-ups. This is very pivotal,” she says.
The mass communicator-turned-entrepreneur says Pennylender has remained in business owing to its ability to cover the gaps in the financial service sector. “We are still in business because we focus on the market niches most financial services providers have left unserved.”
She notes that technology has the potential to diversify the Nigerian economy away from oil, saying it remains the only enabler of every other sector in the economy to perform optimally.
“Nigeria needs to take a cue from some of these countries that have used technology to grow their economies. We should not only have conferences and conversations about Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education, but we should institutionalise it and allow it to take root from primary to through post university/polytechnic study.
“STEM education in itself will not deliver the results, but we must also create a supportive, enabling environment and market to build, practise, experiment and commercialise technology,” Yemi further says.
Speaking on the business expansion plan, she says that Pennylender.com plans to expand into other Africa countries and replicate the Nigerian model all across the continent.
Asked what his advice is to other entrepreneurs, Yemi says, “You will lose your vitality, you will get tired and this is absolutely normal. Your strength and motivation must come from the goals you have before you, from the customers and clients who depend on your solutions. So keep your eyes on your goals always.”
“Never stop learning; starting and growing a business will take all kinds of education. Trust and believe in the people who work for or with you. Take care of them and they will in turn take care of the business,” she adds.
Josephine Okojie
