How Nigeria’s Selar is enabling content creators to market their digital products
A dynamic affiliate network and the company’s newest offering, Showlove, which allows creators to get tips straight from their fans, are just two of the features that make Nigerian startup Selar a revolutionary e-commerce shop builder that empowers creators to promote and sell their digital items.
Douglas Kendyson founded Selar in 2016 while he was employed at Paystack. It began as a basic MVP that anybody could use to sell simple digital goods like courses, music, and e-books.
But it has changed a lot throughout the years.
We identified a need in the market for a user-friendly platform that makes it simple and quick for anyone to sell digital goods online. In less than five minutes, anyone can set up a digital storefront and begin selling using Selar, Kendyson told Disrupt Africa.
“Without the need for technical expertise or website development, our platform hosts the products, enables cross-border payments, and makes it easy for customers to access these products.”
Selar is now a top platform for monetizing knowledge and abilities online because to its extensive feature set and intuitive layout.
“We differentiate ourselves from the competition by emphasizing accessibility and simplicity, making it possible for those without technological know-how to effectively sell their digital goods online. This sets us apart from other platforms that might call for more intricate configurations or sophisticated technological know-how,” Kendyson stated.
With the exception of two grants of US$50,000 from the Job Tech Alliance Accelerator Program this year and US$5,000 from the Tony Elumelu Foundation in 2018, Selar is a bootstrapped business.
According to Kendyson, “this strategy has allowed us to retain control over our growth and operations, supporting a team of 23 committed individuals.”
And uptake has been pretty impressive.
We grew slowly at first since we were concentrating on improving our platform and learning about what our users needed. Nonetheless, we saw a notable increase in uptake in 2020. Our exponential development can be attributed to the combination of our user-friendly interface and frictionless cross-border payments. As our customers’ needs change, we’re still building on this momentum today by continuously enhancing our platform, according to Kendyson.
We’re currently in roughly fifteen African countries, including Senegal, Tanzania, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Uganda, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Tanzania, Rwanda, and Ghana. More African nations will be added shortly. We are also supporting creators in the US and Europe. One of our main markets in East Africa is Kenya, which we recently entered.
Selar earns money through subscription fees and transaction fees from each sale.
