Selling with Klasha: what do I need to know before I sell my products online in Africa?

Africa is a growing e-commerce market due to more significant investors entering the market, the increase in the digital audience, and the projected market value, which is expected to value up to $75 billion by 2025.

With 60% of Africa’s population aged below 25, it has been forecasted that the continent will have the world’s youngest and largest population by 2030.

This means Africa is primed and ready to join other continents like Europe and Asia as leaders in the e-commerce market space. With this in mind, you can rest easy when you introduce your online platform in Africa while ensuring that you have a user-friendly interface, an easy payment gateway, and checkout.

What are some erroneous facts about selling online in Africa?

In reality, there is a digital divide between Africa and the developed world and within different regions of Africa. For decades, the imbalance in I.C.T. infrastructure between the developed and developing world has existed. This affected Africa as it catches up with the rest of the world in terms of internet use and e-commerce audience. Despite this, there are untrue specific facts about selling in Africa.

Most Africans still prefer to pay via cash.

The COVID-19 pandemic saw an unprecedented increase in e-commerce of global retail trade from 14% to 17% in 2020 when more people adopted online shopping as a result of the physical movement restrictions. This trend continued to accelerate despite more stores opening up as more businesses created an online presence and more people continued to use online stores to buy the essential items. The increased use of e-commerce shops naturally increased online payment methods such as payment links, virtual cards, and mobile money.

Africans do not trust online stores.
In the past, with the initial introduction of online shopping, as expected when launching something new, most Africans had reservations about shopping online as it was new, untested territory. However, with the launch of Jumia Group, which was founded in 2012 by the Berlin-based company Rocket Internet, more businesses and customers could trade and buy products online without fear. This unleashed more e-commerce platforms and stores, making life easy for Africans.

As a business hoping to sell into Africa, ensure that your website is trusted and has the necessary checks users look out for before using a store online. These include customer testimonials, data and privacy policies, and a responsive checkout.

How does Klasha help new e-commerce stores sell in Africa?

Klasha understands that Africa is the future, so we created solutions to ensure Africans get the same frictionless cross-border payments experience already available on other continents. Our B2B solutions include:

KlashaCheckout - This is an easy-to-integrate and responsive checkout that ensures that your customers can pay in their African currencies. At the same time, you get the payment in a currency of your choice.
KlashaWire - KlashaWire helps businesses send money to their suppliers in their African currencies with ease. The suppliers receive the money in their chosen currency within 3 business days. This method is 100% secure and processed promptly.

Payment Links - As a business, you can create, customise and share your payment links with your customers easily.

Selling in Africa is a promising venture as more and more Africans, and businesses migrate to online e-commerce platforms to reach their target audience and hit their targets. Do your research to position your brand and reach out to Klasha to help you with your payment gateway!