Social Lender
Globally, millions of people and well over 50% of adult Africans lack access to formal financial services.
Social Lender helps financial institutions offer financial services based on social reputation to individuals who are underbanked or have little or no access to formal financial services. Social Lender is a fintech solution based on social reputation on mobile, online and social communities.
The solution is designed to bridge the gap of immediate access for people with limited access to formal financial services. Social Lender uses its own proprietary algorithm to perform a social audit of the user on mobile, on social media, online and other related platforms and gives a Social Reputation Score to each user. Financial Services are guaranteed by the user's social profile and network. Users gain access to services like credit, savings, leasing and much more from financial institutions based on their social reputation.
Social Lender uses its own proprietary algorithm to perform a social audit of the users' online, on mobile, on social media and other related platforms and give a Social Reputation Score to each user. Users can borrow from banks and other fi nancial institutions based on their Social Reputation Score. Social Reputation Score can be improved by providing more information eg social reputation score is improved by the introduction of Social Guarantor who provides electronic personal guarantee on the personality of the borrower or the transaction
Social Lender delivers cash guaranteed by social reputation in most cases within 10 minutes. In three easy steps, users are able to get quick cash from Social Lender's platform using any of the following channels; Web, SMS, USSD, Mobile App (Partner App Add-On or Dedicated Apps), Partner Bank ATMs, APIs or Pay with Social Lender (E-commerce Checkout).
The customer segmentation is youth between the age of 18 - 40 who are currently under-banked or lack access to formal financial services. Some of these people are young professional, small business owners, farmers, traders, National Youth corps members and even students.
- Deploying features that promote the continuity of contributions to social insurance schemes from informal sector workers, incorporating behavioral tools that incentivize and encourage financial savings, transparency, and accountability
- Échelle : Un individu ou une organisation travaillant dans plusieurs endroits et qui cherche à s'agrandir de manière significative, en se concentrant sur une efficacité accrue.
- Un nouveau modèle ou processus commercial
Social Lender is a Digital Financial Service startup changing the lives of thousands in Africa (currently 2 Countries - Nigeria & South Africa). It uses an Innovative Model (Social Reputation Scoring) to extend access to formal financial services to the under-banked and un-banked.
The Social Reputation Score is a measure of Trust. In lending (the first industry use case), this can be seen as a measure of creditworthiness. In the future, the Social Reputation Score will be useful for several other Financial Services including but not limited to KYC, Insurance, etc.
Furthermore, the unique approach of Social Lender to the market also solves the problem of Identity management which is one of the major challenges of Financial Inclusion in Africa. Using our Social Guarantor model, a feature which leverages on the User's Social Community to qualify the user in the form of Sureties and Referees, Social Lender is able to solve the major problem in this group.
Our growth strategy in Nigeria is to focus on this segment showing financial institutions that this is a viable solution to the needs of even Low Income users.
Social Impact:
Beyond financial measures, Social Lender's traction can be quantified by the number of people impacted by the inclusive nature of its innovation.
These customer testimonial sums up the impact Social Lender is making on our every day Users' lives:
https://blog.sociallenderng.com/testimonial-category/sterling-bank-social-lender/
Social Lender is designed to bridge the gap of immediate access for people with limited access to formal financial services. The Financial Institutions ignore this huge market today because it is too expensive for them to deal with this market segment using traditional banking channels. Social Lender bridges this gap by providing access to this huge demography of people many of which have never gotten a formal financial services before now using their Social Reputation.
Most of our deep tech is done by our technology team. Our Team is proficient in building Machine Learning Models to solve real world problem using Social Lender's main asset - Social Reputation Scoring.
The Social Reputation Score is a measure of Trust. In lending (the first industry use case), this can be seen as a measure of creditworthiness. In the future, the Social Reputation Score will be useful for several other Financial Services including but not limited to KYC, Insurance, etc.
We have built many models that predict the credibility of borrowers. The Artificial Intelligence embedded in these models has made the system to be stable thus the occurrence of bad debts has been significantly reduced. These models were built using Python and some libraries on top of NLTK, Convolutional Neural Networks and Artificial Neural Networks. Due to continuous increase in data available to the organization, there is a constant requirement to analyze data and make meaningful organizational decision as surrounding risk and a measure of Trust.
- Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning
- Internet of Things
- Intelligence artificielle / Apprentissage automatique
- Internet des objets (IdO)
Social Lender uses its own proprietary algorithm to perform a social audit of the users' online, on mobile and other related platforms and give a Social Reputation Score to each user. Users gain access to services like credit, savings, leasing and much more from banks and other organizations based on their social reputation. Social Reputation Score can be improved by providing more information eg social reputation score is improved by the introduction of Social Guarantor who provides electronic personal guarantee on the personality of the borrower or the transaction
Social Lender delivers cash guaranteed by social reputation in most cases within 10 minutes. In three easy steps, users are able to get quick cash from Social Lender. First, users access Social Lender's platform using any of the following channels; Web, SMS, USSD, Messaging (WhatsApp & Telegram), Mobile App (Partner App Add-On or Dedicated Apps), Partner Bank ATMs, APIs or Pay with Social Lender (E-commerce Checkout). Immediately, a social audit is conducted on the user (with user's permission) and the user obtains a social reputation score based on their digital fingerprint. Second, the user applies for cash using any of the available channels. Third, funds are approved based on partner specific business rules and funds are disbursed to the users' verified Account (Bank Account or Mobile Money Account) usually within 10 minutes.
Social Lender is now expanding from 6 states in Nigeria to over 30 locations (a strategic partnership with OCP Africa in Nigeria). We are also adding 2 new strategic partners and expanding to Morocco. (OCP Africa and CIH Bank) In addition, Social Lender is better positioned to serve the Agriculture value chain which has a significant share of people who are underbanked across Africa. Social Lender platform is now offering tailored solutions for farmers like input credit (fertilizer). Financial Literacy sessions for farmers will now incorporate agriculture best practice training. We have added a new feature for cash withdrawal and deposit services at OCP Locations due to the lack of Cash machines in rural areas
Currently Social Lender is well integrated to Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter and Mobile platforms for Social Reputation Scoring and Social Guarantor management. On our roadmap is to add additional online, mobile and social data sources, include machine learning and Improve our algorithm, all to reduce our already low bad debt of 2% to even lower.
Furthermore, out of the over 45 million internet users in Nigeria, 7.1 million Nigerians use Facebook daily and 15 million are active monthly.Similar statistics are also available for other Social Networks like Twitter, LinkedIn that Social Lender is integrated with. We estimate that a significant portion of this population will be able to access the product.
To Users:
- Social Lender empowers users with access to formal financial services leveraging on their social reputation score
- Social Lender helps users build credit worthiness over time.
To Client Companies:
- Social Lender drives customers acquisitions for banks and financial institutions.
- Provides the bank with good social analytics.
- Help the bank reduce dormant or inactive account.
- A new stream of revenue for the partner organization.
Social Lender HAS APIs for easy integration with other core banking and non-banking platforms.Social Lender is very flexible platform partners That can adapted to business rules and outlook.
We noticed a lack of access to formal financial services for a vast number of people in Africa (50% of Adult population). These people do not have the typical collateral required by the banks (commercial & Microfinance) and as such are excluded. By leveraging on Mobile, Online, and Social Media & Other external data sources, we are able to provide a Social reputation score for these users which our partners are able to use in providing formal financial services. The intervention includes leveraging on Social Lender robust agent network to deliver financial literacy education to the unbanked and underbanked.
Social Lender is bringing the target people to the formal financial system to enable them to access other financial services. Lending is only an entry point. We are building a network for trust and enabling Financial Inclusion.
- Women & Girls
- Urban
- Poor
- Low-Income
- Middle-Income
- Femmes et filles
- Milieu Péri-urbain
- Revenu moyen
- Nigeria
- Ghana
- Nigeria
- South Africa
Social Lender has over 100,000 users on the platform
In 1 year:
-1 million users with access and positively impacted
In 5 years:
- Expanding beyond Africa to offer our solution across the developed world.
In 1 year: -1 million users with access and positively impacted - 5 more Partner organizations leveraging our technology to access a new market - scale to 5 Countries of Operation.
In 5 years: - Expanding beyond Africa to offer our solution across the developed world. - Further expansion beyond lending to other industry use cases - Strategic move beyond a B2B2C model to offer Social Reputation Score directly to customers who can share with other potential service providers.
1. More Strategic Partners to explore industry verticals and other use cases
We are in search of strategic partners who can help accelerate our growth while we in turn deliver value based on our unique value proposition and strong network.
2. Fund raising to help us do more
We have majorly been bootstrapped and achieving organic growth. We now have a need to accelerate our growth. We need to attract top talents, expand staffing, implement and integrate more technology interfaces, expand Social Lender's social impact, brand and marketing reach, and to expand into new markets and countries of operation.
We need support in fundraising.
3. End User Education & Market Awareness:
Our innovation is new to the end-users. The success of the solution is based on people being aware of the solution and recalling that it exists when they are in need. It is also critical that the users have adequate understanding of the product. Social Lender is embarking on customer education campaigns (financial literacy), we however need to reduce the overall cost of these interventions.
1. More Strategic Partners to explore industry verticals and other use cases
2. Fund raising to help us do more
3. End User Education & Market Awareness:
- For-profit, including B-Corp or similar models
nil
9 full time staff
Faith (CEO) has strong experience in the Finance Sector including a 6-year stint at BGL Plc. Faith is an emerging market leader with focus on innovation, driving strategic business growth and scaling solutions driven by technology.
Bade (CTO) won the Future Awards 2010 for Best Use of Technology, an acknowledgment as a young rising star in Sub-Saharan Africa.He has almost 2 decades of experience in Technology
Our team is the right mix of finance and technology experience to make an impact.
Most of our deep tech is done by our technology team. Our Team is proficient in building Machine Learning Models to solve real world problem using Social Lender's main asset - Social Reputation Scoring.
Sterling Bank (Nigeria),
Absa Barclays Bank (South Africa),
iTrust (Nigeria) with a pipeline of 4 partners in 2 new countries.
Social Lender charges a licencing fee per annum to each partner financial institution or organisation and also takes a transaction fee (or revenue share from the income).
End-users access Social Lender’s platform using channels such as Web, SMS, USSD
- Individual consumers or stakeholders (B2C)
-Social Lender charges a licencing fee per annum to each financial partner
-Profit Sharing with Financial Institutions
-Transaction Fee for Pay with Social Lender
1
Barclays Seeker Fund
40000
2019
2
Techstars
80000
2019
3
EFINA
300000
2019
Social lender is seeking to raise $1,000,000 million in equity and to expand their staffing, implement and integrate more technology interfaces, expand Social Lender’s brand and marketing reach, and to expand into new markets and countries of operation.
$100,000
As a growth stage startup, Social Lender is looking towards reaching millions of end users in Africa and beyond.
It would be a great honour to win this prize as this would encourage many startups which we currently mentor.To grow to be a unicorn someday with access to your network.
Fund raising to help us do more
We have majorly been bootstrapped and achieving organic growth. We now have a need to accelerate our growth.
- Solution technology
- Funding and revenue model
- Marketing, media, and exposure
Our innovation is new to the end-users. The success of the solution is based on people being aware of the solution and recalling that it exists when they are in need. It is also critical that the users have adequate understanding of the product. Social Lender is embarking on customer education campaigns (financial literacy), we however need to reduce the overall cost of these interventions.
Microsoft Foundation: We are doing alot of work in education across sub Saharan Africa. Partnering with them will help drive financial illiteracy in rural communities.
Google: We would love to Partner with google for google storage facilities and analytics.
Amazon web service: We would love to partner with Amazon for storage of data in Amazon cloud service at little or no cost.
Bill AND Melinda Gate Foundation: We are doing a lot in poverty alleviation SDD, partnering with them will help deliver more value to alleviate people from poverty.
CEO