Women In Ecommerce

Incubator Program 2023 Cohort

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The Women In Ecommerce (WIE) program aims to increase women’s participation in the ecommerce industry. To achieve this objective, the program runs throughout the year using a multi-dimensional approach, including incubations programs, meetups, and workshops. Women participating in the program will receive Mentorship, Ecommerce Education, and opportunities to fund their ecommerce business ideas.

WIE Incubator Program

Our ecommerce incubator for early stage women entrepreneurs helps to bring to reality, transformational ecommerce business ideas that make a difference in the community. Through this program , we empower women by helping them create sustainable ecommerce businesses which alleviate unemployment among women and provide income for sustaining households.
Our team is driven by the desire to exponentially increase the number of successful women-led ecommerce companies and mobilizing the support of those who believe in them and the power of their ideas by working together to provide expertise, resources and support in fundraising.
Our 8-week incubator cohort convenes twice a week virtually or physically and works as a group and one-on-one with the ecommerce startup founders and experts to launch and help shape their current strategy, ultimately accelerating growth opportunities and optimizing the founders potential to raise capital. We cover topics from basic ecommerce go-to-market strategy and customer discovery, product design for non-technical founders, branding including PR, sales techniques for B2C and B2B, public speaking/pitching, building early stage teams to fundraising.

The EAfrica Expo Women Incubator Program for ecommerce startups is the only ecommerce biased incubator program in Zambia.

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Essentials you will learn include:

Legal 101

The first step in setting up any business including an ecommerce business is legal compliance. It is crucial that founders have a solid understanding of the legal needs of their businesses. This session focuses on creating legal entities, drafting team and partnership agreements, copyrights and trademarks, IP, term sheets, and taxes.

Ecommerce Basics

Running an ecommerce business in more than just setting up a Facebook page. Our Ecommerce Basics teaches you the essentials that you need to run an ecommerce business, from website setup to using basic analytics and integration.

Social Media Marketing

This session covers best practices for the social platforms that are the most relevant to the founders’ needs while also digging into when and how a startup should pay for marketing. Paid marketing topics include influencers, generic media spend, and SEO

Accounting & Finance Management

This session provides founders with the building blocks to manage their initial finances and develop business projections. The accounting session focuses on preliminary book keeping and cash flow management. The finance component outlines how to build a unit model and then use that model to create forecasting and sales projections. We then walk the founders through how those models can help determine the amount of money they will need to raise.

Pitching and PR

Each cohort includes pitch session and public relations (PR) sessions. In the sessions, the founders present their short business pitches to the group and receive individual feedback from the coach. The coach then takes the group through common pitching and PR mistakes and a series of exercises to make them more articulate and comfortable in front of an audience. These exercises focus on body language, breathing, annunciation, and handling Q&As.

Fundraising and Venture Capital

We conduct sessions and ‘fireside chats’ on the topic of fundraising. A more formal lecture on VC 101 which covers basics of when, how and who to fundraise from is included based on availability. We educate founders on the type of information investors look for and how much they should look to raise and what valuation. We also have a separate session where we invite an angel investor or a VC who shares best practices, ‘insider secrets’, answers questions from the cohort including how to best pitch and approach investors

Customer Insights

Who are your target customers? And what problems are they really looking to solve? By answering these questions, we help founders identify a common language and a clearer understanding of their customer needs. We look at the different methods for understanding customers and then assist the founders in creating their own discovery materials. This information is then used to ideate on initial MVPs and how to introduce those MVPs to the marketplace

Brand Strategy

As an extension of the Customer Discovery session, this segment deep dives into how to develop an identifiable brand. The session emphasizes the visual aspects of branding (font, logo, digital presence) as well as the written (name, promo language, social posting style and tone). Additionally, we explore how to maintain a clear brand identity across social platforms and partnerships. Our goal is to give our founders an understanding of the branding process so that they are well-prepared to vet and collaborate

Benefits you enjoy include:

  • Meeting twice per week to discuss your current progress, rehearse pitches, and bring in industry subject matter experts
  • Public speaking and media training with our network of coaches
  • Assistance with pitch decks, financial modeling, infrastructure, and team-building
  • Discounted rates with accountants, lawyers, advertising/branding agencies, patent lawyers, and marketers who share a start-up mindset
  • Exclusive and private invitations to industry events that accelerate the time from idea to business success.
  • Collaborations with an extensive and growing list of mentors, which include startup founders, investors and industry experts
  • Potential partnerships, affiliations, and investor opportunities drawn from our robust network
  • Our programming is dynamic and tailored to fit the needs/goals of each cohort

Who Should Apply?

(1). If you are a woman founder or a woman on the founding team of a startup which it atleast 50% women owned.
Stage of your startup ranges from—>
• Idea that you’re actively working on and have made some strides in developing an MVP
• to pre-seed companies with revenues and/or initial capital raised (f&f or angel round)

(2). For-profit only companies. Our program is not designed for non-profit companies, and those who are planning to or actively fundraising capital
• Our program is industry-agnostic, but we vet our cohorts for the strongest and most impactful community.
• Zambia and Malawi based companies

Apply to the 2023 Cohort

Don’t Miss The 2023 Cohort

The Women in Ecommerce Incubator Program is a specialized incubation program focusing solely on ecommerce biased startups led by women. We understand you may have question or would like to let us know you are interested in what we do. Please input you email and we will be in touch