There’re no poor
people but financially challengedpeople
By WALE ALABI
Monday,
August 7, 2006
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•Lola Ogunbambi, Executive Director, Citiserve
Photo: The Sun News Publishing |
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There’s new gospel in town. It’s the gospel of
wealth making; and wealth spreading. And leading the army
of the new wealth creators is a woman.
The woman, Ms Lola Ogunbambi, Executive Director, Citiserve,
a subsidiary of Vigeo Holdings, has for the past one-and-
half year empowered 10,000 people and she’s targeting
20,000 more people before the end of this year, 2006.
The Citiserve Network Partners model which kicked off early
last year initially started off by creating entrepreneurs
in communities to market phone airtime, Recharge and vend
popular soft drinks, Refresh, at designated spots. Following
the success of Recharge and Refresh, Citiserve recently added
insurance products sales to its offerings.
The products, Citilife and Citimoto, are currently making
waves in the country. Ogunbambi who says her vision and mission
in business is beyond profit making but poverty alleviation
in the country in this encounter opens up on her experience
and the challenges of grooming new entrepreneurs. Excerpts:
Experience
First and foremost, we have been accepted as a formidable
brand. We are recognised, everywhere we go. People want to
learn more about what we are doing. And also, a lot of people
want to find out more about how to come in and partner with
us. Many government agents, organisations, individuals, NGOs
that want people to make a little more income in addition
to whatever they are making always come to us and want to
join our network.
Besides airtime and drinks, our platform can carry many other
products and services.
Recently, we added Citimoto which is our insurance product
for vehicles and Citilife which is our life insurance policy.
We launched the two products two months ago.
With the channel we have created, we can take products, wholesale
products to the end consumers. We are creating an army of
entrepreneurs who would market the products.
Objectives and values
Our objectives and vision is to provide access to affordable,
reliable and quality services within five minutes reach of
our target audience 24/7 in the country. While our value proposition
is to promote the easier life concept through the timely provision
of appropriately priced unique products and services. We’ll
also offer superior value for consumers and lower distribution
costs for suppliers.
Partners and collaborators
Since we started over a year ago, states, NGOs and government
parastatals have been trying to partner with us. About two
months ago, Bauchi State joined our network. We confirmed
our appointment with Lagos State government on collaboration
which would be in few weeks.
Also, we are talking with Plateau State governor, Mr. Joshua
Dariye, and we are hoping that he would partner with us so
that we would sell more. We have some other states that I
would not mention until we have concluded the process. We
also have partnership agreement with Ondo State governor,
Dr Agagu.
We have some NGOs partnering with us. For example NAPEP has
been very supportive. They love the idea of what we are doing.
In terms of how it relates to them, poverty alleviation. We
don’t have poor people, we have financially challenged
people.
We are going to work with Oyo and Kogi. We are going to work
with different states. We are also going to work with the
Ministry of Women Affairs. They’ve actually supported
our project. We hope to conclude discussion with them very
soon and we are looking at the other angles of women empowerment.
We have the youths, and so many other people.
Uniqueness of our platform
The Citiserve platform is a unique model in that, it is not
specific to one particular product. It is a distribution channel
that we are creating. We are now handling two different products
on our channel. Right now, we have above 10,000 network partners
working with us. We have a diverse category of partners. Every
stratum of the economy has its peculiar appeal and need. So,
you find out that with your brother, your sister, your cousin,
living in your house or your neighbourhood, you must have
something to sell to them. From airtime, commodities to insurance
products. And if it’s international call cards we’re
partnering with Cool talk. So something must appeal to a particular
neighourhood. So, you don’t have to sell all our products,
you can choose to focus on things that appeal to your neighourhood.
All these are done to encourage and empower our partners.
Our objective is a means of livelihood for each network partners
uniquely in a specific area.
It is something that we believe that will touch at one point
in time, every Nigerian. And beyond making and getting profit,
we make everybody useful to his community. We train you, depending
on what you want. I had a meeting recently with the Minister
for Women Affairs and she said some of our women are in purdah,
some of our women have no formal education. I said yes we
will come down to the level of teaching them how to write,
because we are not going to reject them because they cannot
read.
For women in purdah, they don’t even have to leave their
homes to do the businesses we are going to introduce to them.
We’ll first look at individuals or the community before
giving them a model. As a community-based concept, you don’t
have to go outside of your family to do business. At least,
everybody in Nigeria has an extended family. You do your business
and everybody in your family buys from you. You don’t
have to go outside.
The African tradition says you don’t leave your home
to look outside for what you can get at home. So that is the
uniqueness of the Citiserve.
The next level
We are looking at new products everyday because our objective
is to make life easier for our network partners and for the
community that we serve. We have some new products that are
coming up. International calls is something new, it gives
you more commission, the Cool talk is new, gives you more
commission too. We are also working a relationship with major
manufacturers of food products.
So, we are looking at how to give those commodities we can
distribute. We deliberated on the issue at the last CNP congress.
We are building a community of people that are working together
to make things work for them. I know our coming together is
going to be formidable and we’ll also have to extend
this relationship beyond the community level.
Expansion drive
We believe that by the end of this year, we will have over
25,000 set of network partners across Nigeria. Right now,
we have five products on our platform. Before the end of the
year, we’ll have more products from companies that are
enthralled by our network.
In terms of growth, we’ll get partners and products
whose average volume will increase and the commission too
will also increase. That is our plans for Citiserve.
Management model
For every 150 network partners (cluster) we have one Citiserve
relationship officer. And one senior manager that takes Citiserve
clusters together. So, one person can service 150 people in
a week. By SMS, by calls or by our link on the server we reach
every CNP. But it has not been too easy. That is what I said
about the headache of the 24 hours business. We have a software
on management information system that also monitors anybody
whom we haven’t talk with in the business.
Going to rural areas in Lagos and other areas
Right now in Epe area of Lagos, we have a programme that is
coming up there. We have already operated in Ikorodu, we have
network partners in all the places and if you go to Badagry,
Abeokuta, Ijebu-Ode, we have network partners in all those
areas. Our objective is to go down into the community. We
have our offices also in urban areas. We go to hamlets and
talk to them there.
What qualifies one for Citiserve membership
First of all, you have to make something of your life. You’ll
have to want to overcome your handicap, whatever the handicap
is. You must also want to work harder. We will lecture you
more on how to do that. So, it goes beyond just making money.
It goes into bringing out your qualities. If you have somebody
that has no formal education, you can bring him in for module
changing and we give him a certificate. He will want to come
again because he feels a sense of belonging. He has a certificate.
We are giving a nice relationship to everybody without discriminating.
Nobody is good. Nobody is bad. We get everybody to this platform
together. We have some majors and captains in the army as
our network partners. They have secretaries in their offices
but they still come and want to be part of this. Apart from
that, you are meeting people, you are making new friends,
you are improving and you are making money if you join Citiserve.
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