Damilola Teidi is the CEO/Co-Founder of GoMyWay Africa, Nigeria’s leading ridesharing service connecting travellers with private car owners who have spare seats to share. Armed with a Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology from Eastern Mediterranean University, Northern Cyprus and a Master’s degree in Strategy and Innovation Management from the University of Southampton, England, Damilola has worked with technology startups as a business analyst for Co-Creation Hub’s pre-incubation and incubation programme, as a market research analyst, and as a software developer. She talks to Connect Nigeria about GoMyWay Africa, her passion for using technology to solve problems, and her interest in the entire process involved in commercializing new technologies.
CN: What is the story behind GoMyWay Africa, what inspired you to start this?
We identified the need for a more efficient transport system that is cost affordable, efficient, safe and convenient. We knew how big of a problem the transport system is in the country and wanted to provide a solution.
CN: How exactly does the whole thing work between you, vehicle owners and commuters?
Vehicle owners come on the website, sign up, put in their car details (e.g car photo, car model, preferences, etc.) and publish the details of their ride offer (departure and arrival point, date, price per passenger, etc.). Once published, the car owner’s ride is then available for passengers to request to join.
A limit is placed on how much a car owner can charge per seat. This is because the idea is to share the cost of the trip not make profit. Here the car owner can recoup part of his vehicle costs on a trip he/she would have made either way while the passenger gets an affordable ride.
Passengers go on the site and do a search for a particular route, the search results show car owners driving along that route. Once a passenger is satisfied with details of a ride, he/she can contact the car owner to book the ride. All passengers are also required to sign up and do the necessary verifications before they can contact a car owner.
Once a booking is made, the car owner will then receive a notification and can choose to accept or decline the request. If accepted, both car owner and passenger can continue the conversation and agree on other details concerning the ride via our private messaging function. Passengers pay cash to the passenger during or after the ride.
CN: How did you raise capital for the business?
So far, we have been running on investment funds from members of the founding management team, which include Sim Shagaya, Bill Paladino and Co-Creation Hub.
CN: What were your biggest challenges starting out?
Creating awareness was a big challenge starting out. The concept of ride sharing was really new when we started in June 2015 – it still is – and so we needed to get the word out but at the same time educate people about it. We also needed to be able to reach car owners as well as passengers and ensure we are matching the demand with the supply. This means we had to continuously experiment and find effective ways of getting the word out. Our first ride offer from a car owner came in the day after we launched but it took a couple of months before we completed our first trip on the platform.
CN: How do you source customers and get people on board?
We do a mix of online and offline marketing; from Facebook ads to radio. We also get new sign ups on the platform from referrals.
CN: How would you rate the customer satisfaction level?
Over 10, I will say an 8. Most of our members that rideshare via our platform are happy about the service and you can see that from their testimonials/reviews. I let each staff member know, on their first day at work, the importance of ensuring our customers are satisfied.
CN: What is your unique selling point and why should people choose GoMyWay Africa over competitors?
With GoMyWay, you can get a really comfortable ride at an affordable price. For example, you can get a ride from Benin to Lagos for ₦1800. During this past holiday, we had members that travelled to the east from Lagos for as low as ₦1,500. For intracity trips, you can get a ride from your house in Ajah to your workplace in Ikoyi for ₦250. The platform is also accessible nationwide and has ride offers from different parts of the country.
The platform has built-in functions geared towards building a trusted and safe rideshare community. For example, members can see each other’s profile and get to know a potential ride buddy before deciding to even share a ride with the person. This way, a good percentage of our members have built real business and personal connections with their ride buddies. We have had a car owner tell us he was able to hire people he needed at his workplace through his ridesharing partner and we have people that started dating through the platform.
We also have a culture that puts the community (our members) first. As a team, we put in our best to ensure people have a great user experience from the time they come on the website to when their trip ends.
CN: What do you consider to be the best career decision you have ever made?
I have made different great choices that have put me on the path I am on now. First, it was deciding to change my course on my first day at the University to Information Technology and then after years of working as a software developer, switching to do a master’s degree in Innovation Management. However, I think the decision to apply for a job as a business analyst with Co-Creation Hub’s Pre-incubation programme, is top on my list. With my degree and result, maybe I could have got a job in a big established firm but I really wanted to work in the start-up environment in Nigeria. I wanted to learn what it takes and what is needed to bring a technology idea to market in a country like Nigeria.
CN: What’s your long-term vision for GoMyWay Africa?
My long-term vision is to make GoMyWay.com a sustainable and efficient ride-sharing platform that is operational in different countries in the Africa.
Email: help[@]gomyway.com Telephone: 08027748157, 07010041948 Twitter: @gomywayafrica Instagram: @gomywayafrica Facebook: facebook.com/gomywayafrica Website: www.gomyway.com
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