Crafting Compelling Narratives for African Tech Startups: A How-To-Guide
Great communications is beyond key messages and factoids; to engage with audiences, you need to take them on a journey – through storytelling. This is applicable to both consumer and B2B/Tech products and in our latest post, Vic Onisuru gives insight into best practices when humanising Tech PR and building brands that people want to be associated with.
Storytelling has an unparalleled ability to captivate audiences, inspire action and forge meaningful connections. This is especially true for African tech startups, where crafting compelling narratives isn’t just art; but a superpower that weaves together stories of innovation, impact and human potential. At Wimbart, we’ve worked with companies from start-up to unicorn stage for almost a decade, to help them tell their stories and catapult them onto local and global media stages.
In this short guide, we’ll walk you through the steps on how to master the art of storytelling and help you curate compelling narratives
The Human Element: Going Beyond Technology
Behind every line of code, app interface and innovative solution, there are people. People with dreams, aspirations and the determination to drive change. When crafting narratives for African tech startups, it’s crucial to humanise the technology – placing emphasis on the people behind the startups. Share the founders’ journey – the challenges they faced, the moments of triumph and the lessons they learned. By weaving personal anecdotes, struggles and motivations, startups can connect with their audience on a deeper level.
Addressing Local Challenges: Stories of Impact
An especially engaging way to captivate an audience is by demonstrating real impact. African tech startups often emerge from addressing unique challenges. These startups are uniquely positioned to address local challenges with audacious solutions. By sharing stories of impact, they can showcase how their technologies are making a tangible difference in the lives of the local communities. Whether it’s improving access to healthcare, educational resources or facilitating financial inclusion, these stories highlight these platforms’ social responsibility and commitment to genuine change.
Taking tappi as our example here – the African startup embarking on a mission to build trust for SMEs across the continent. By seamlessly combining a powerful digital commerce tech stack, and the narrative of trustworthiness, tappi is addressing the problem of visibility and credibility for small businesses. Through its innovative platform, tappi is bringing MSMEs into the digital age, enabling discovery by customers online, while also consolidating payments with verified reviews to build their business reputation.
By showcasing stories of impact and highlighting how your technology is making a real difference; whether it’s improving access to essential services or solving a pressing problem, these stories demonstrate a commitment to positive change.
From Grassroots to Global: Scaling African Innovation
The journey of a startup is often a narrative in itself – especially in the African tech space, startups are mostly a story of grit, determination and overcoming obstacles.
Often at the heart of the startup is a narrative of transformation – a journey that starts with a single idea or a grassroots initiative that later blossoms into a force of innovation that can’t be ignored. Fueled by a vision to transform their local communities, these narratives hold a special allure capturing the essence of revolution, resourcefulness, and the unyielding spirit of entrepreneurship.
Scaling African innovation isn’t just about reaching new markets, it’s about amplifying the impact. These narratives demonstrate how technology has the ability to transcend man-made borders and address challenges far beyond their place of origin. They spotlight the fusion of innovation and ambition, showing how an idea that germinated in a local context can blossom into a force that influences industries and transforms lives on a global scale.
Andela, a global private talent marketplace for engineers, dared to script a narrative that merged tech and human potential. From its inception, Andela’s narrative centred on inclusivity and the belief that talent has no boundaries – scripting a movement larger than code. Using empowerment, aspiration and boundless potential, Andela scaled African innovation and integrated themselves into the global tech ecosystem.
All in all, storytelling remains the bridge that connects the abstract world of technology with the hearts and minds of the people it aims to serve. Here at Wimbart, we understand the importance of mastering the art of creating and crafting compelling stories; we harness the endeavours, showcasing the local impact and narratives of their journey of growth. African tech holds a treasure trove of stories that remind us that voices have the potential to shape the world at large and that the pen (or keyboard) is mightier than the algorithm.
