El Jadida (Morocco)- August 27th 2015.
The 4th meeting of Entrepreneur Café El Jadida was successful, new entrepreneurs from El Jadida joined the café and thanked the organizers of the event because there is a lack of the opportunities of meeting between entrepreneurs in this city.

The event took place in the historical hotel called Iglesia, Desire Muhire started by presenting a new idea of an application for Smartphones that improve communication inside companies, the participants were very interested in this project.

Amine Mokrane and Sadeq Naceur, two young who work inside associations that help creators of enterprises in El Jadida. Both of them presented their programs and activities.

The last speaker was Amine Bouhaddi, a young entrepreneur from El Jadida, he shared with the group his experience and he started from zero.

Contacts of speakrs: 

• Amine Mokrane : [email protected] / www.tanmia.ml
• Sadeq Naceur : [email protected]
• Amine Bouhaddi : [email protected] / www.dothostia.com

The last meeting of Entrepreneur Café Nairobi was merged with a meeting of freelancers from 
Upwork. It’s an online platform connecting people looking for services, with those who have the 
relevant skills. Here is what we learned from them:

1. Be personal!

The freelancers bid for certain projects and hope to get the contract. Sometimes more than 50 
people apply for one job. If you want to get it, you need to be personal and stress your specific and unique talents.

The same applies for entrepreneurs, because people will not buy from robots. They will buy from people. If your business plan, your business card and your portfolio are deeply personal and unique, people will remember you better and trust you more.

2. Specialise!

Part of being personal is specialisation. We discussed before, that you can’t sell everything to everyone. The more specific your niche, the higher the potential. You will also eliminate a lot of 
competition. 

If you are a freelancer on Upwork, you may focus on economic analysis for start-ups in Europe in the tech sector. If you are an entrepreneur, you may target families in sub-Saharan Africa in the lower middle class with your educational material. Those are simply examples, but it is important not to try selling everything to anyone.

3. Effort, effort, effort!

Two freelancers from the meeting usually apply with edited videos for the jobs they want to get. And even if they don’t get the job, they always get an impressed comment for that. When they hand in their work, they want to make sure that it’s the best.

Entrepreneurship is not a joy ride. It needs crazy hard work and full power all the time. If your business model or your product are average, there is no reason to pay you. Put a lot of effort, personality and love in your projects and your chances for success are much higher.

4. Be choosy!

One freelancer told us, that he may apply for only two jobs, but he will make sure to get them. Instead of applying for fifty low-paying, not very interesting jobs. It is critical to be choosy. Being personal and unique will help you to do so, because then the offers will be less, but will pay off higher. 

Whether it is a contract, a tender or an investor: Be picky and think twice, whether it is really the right thing for you, whether it will take you forward and whether you will benefit in more ways than just financially.

5. Over-deliver!

Back to hard work! Successful freelancers and entrepreneurs always give out more than the client expected. This will install trust and make them come back. It helps to get great references and referrals. We had a great time learning from each other and expanding our horizons. Thanks to Shipra from Upwork and the host iHub.


By: Laura Kunzig, City Mayor, Nairobi

Debemos pedir excusas a nuestros lectores por el retraso en la publicación de esta entrada del Blog. No hay excusa valedera, solo debemos decir que tenemos un retraso de casi dos semanas y como cualquier retraso es molesto e inoportuno.

Sin más demoras entramos en materia para contarles que sucedió en el 13avo encuentro del Entrepreneur Café Bogotá, pero primero déjenme contextualizarlos un poco mejor al respecto. El Entrepreneur Café es una iniciativa global que inicio a finales de 2014 en India y Marruecos  y que se creó con el fin de facilitar un espacio donde conocer emprendedores, discutir ideas, recibir críticas, hacer amigos, construir relaciones, inspirarse, tomarse una buena taza de café y mucho más.

Con el tiempo la comunidad se ha expandido a 80 ciudades en los 6 continentes y su red de seguidores crece cada día. Bogotá fue la primera ciudad de Latinoamérica en unirse y llevar a cabo estos encuentros y todo gracias a Sofia Gonzales quien como City Mayor lidera la iniciativa que se lleva a cabo el 2do y 4to jueves de cada mes.

For more on this blog please click ..... https://emprendetransparente.wordpress.com/2015/08/27/charla-entrepreneur-cafe/

In our last meeting we discussed a crucial question for entrepreneurs, especially start-ups: Where is the money? The question comes up regularly in our meetings and is definitely a big issue.

Entrepreneurship seems to be a global phenomenon and the mathematics of it work everywhere in the world, or at least that’s what we are told. But especially for entrepreneurs in Kenya it quickly  becomes clear that things don’t work the same as in other parts of the world. 

So while it might be common to reach out to investors or ask others for funding, there are some 
difficulties that come with certain cultures in which we are trying to set our business.

Maybe it is a good idea to get a license and patent your idea. You should make sure to get a  copyright so that nobody can steal your idea. But that already costs money.

There are several funds within Kenya for groups and youth. Unfortunately, many members of 
Entrepreneur Café Nairobi have been frustrated and unsuccessful when applying for that money. 

There is even the possibility to ask for the list of Uwezo Fund in your constituency. Dennis Bossek from Mara Foundation encouraged us to change the mentality and keep asking for what is meant to boost our ideas and businesses. 

But is it really necessary to start with money? Is money really the main challenge? If you approach an investor in order to get funding in any country, they will ask you: What have you done so far? 

So instead of keeping your business idea dormant and waiting for that day when you will hit the 
jackpot, miraculously get a lot of money and then kick off your business, you can start really small 
and build from there.

Ask yourself: What problem am I solving? For whom am I solving it? Have you done it for free before, 

just to test the idea and get some prototypes and feedback on them? Try and offer your unique service or product to a bigger company. A tender like that can open the road to more credibility and popularity for you.

You also should start building a strong network like we do with Entrepreneur Café. More often than not you can find investors or people who are interested in what you are doing in that way. You can use those contacts not only for financial, but also for technical support. 

Also build your knowledge. Keep on learning before you ask for money. We already have the resources. We don’t need to start from the point of money or funding. We need to start from the point of demand. We need to start with motivation.

Despite the upcoming Obama craziness, young Kenyan entrepreneurs met in a much less formal gathering, for the second meeting in July, to once again discuss business plans. 

One of us is currently developing two plans for his businesses, and he gave us a great lesson. 

1. Let all team members own the business plan. He is working with business partners and he lets them contribute to the whole plan. The person in charge of finances therefore brings in the financial part of the plan, the marketing people write the marketing part and so on. 

In that way, they actually own it and won’t just see it as a piece of paper. It will be easier to hold them accountable and show the reasonable next steps through time for the whole team.

2. Visualise your goals in your business plan. For people who are just starting out, those who just have a dream and don’t know how to go about it yet, a business plan will help visualise the venture and then be a road map, guiding them on the way forward. It will also hopefully show you some problems ahead to be anticipated, so that you can minimise the risk a bit.

3. Put it into action. However, especially in Africa, but also in the general global world of entrepreneurship, what counts in the end is action, not what is written on paper. Therefore, the business plan, however much it is a big piece of work, is also just the beginning. 

It is a living document that needs to be developed as you go, and it strongly depends on your own leadership style and how you execute the steps that were planned in the business plan.

Talking about Africa: 

In our international group we figured that there are some differences on the ground between the 
global North and South when it comes to doing business. On the other hand, entrepreneurship and business seem to be global phenomena in which global rules apply. 

We will dive into this topic more in our next meeting, when Obama has left and we will have learned some lessons from the Global Entrepreneurship Summit.