“Imagine a Freelancer.com adaptable to the Cameroonian context, scalable to other African countries, and able to generate thousands of jobs per month for thousands of unemployed youths.”
That, at least, is the vision of Charlie Wandji, founder of Cameroonian startup 1task1job, a marketplace that connects global businesses to freelancers in Africa
Launched in April of last year with the goal of tackling unemployment, 1task1job has so far registered over 400 online clients and has more than 550 registered freelancers. Uptake has been mostly in Cameroon thus far, but Wandji’s goal is to take his company across Africa.
“The freelancers here are skillful university students, underemployed recent graduates, and unemployed youths in need of income generating activities,” he said.
“These skillful unemployed youths are exposed to all the opportunities in the marketplace and every freelancer has an equal opportunity to sub-contract all tasks posted in the virtual marketplace.”
The 1task1job marketplaces provides a channel for direct communication between the freelancers and the businesses who post tasks, with tasks awarded based on merit.
Other freelancing platforms exists across the continent, such as Kuhustle in Kenya, but Wandji said 1task1job has identified a niche in focusing on diaspora Africans who want to outsource jobs back home.
“Besides, while implementing our current strategy, we discovered a blue ocean in the market. This blue ocean is actually local SMEs and companies willing to outsource in search of cheaper labour while still being sure of the quality of work rendered,” he said.
The startup received US$25,000 as a result of its participation in US President Barack Obama’s programme for young African leaders – the Mandela Washington Fellowship – and is currently attempting to raise around US$200,000 to update its current platform, develop mobile apps and expand.
“We are currently operating in the Cameroonian market and have signed strategic partnerships with organisations in Mali, Namibia and Gabon to replicate our model in their respective countries,” Wandji said. “Our goal is to spread rapidly into other countries.”
1task1job makes revenues through a 10 per cent commission on all tasks outsourced through our platform. In cases where clients prefer the startup outsources for them, monitors the tasks and provides the final product, an extra charge is levied.
Getting companies to outsource through the platform in the first place is the major difficulty Wandji and the team at 1task1job have encountered.
Clients don’t yet understand the culture of outsourcing via our platform directly to freelancers. They prefer we do the dirty work and just submit them the final product when done,” he said.
“We have been forced to modify our model to include monitoring and communicating with freelancers. For freelancers, however, it is easier. They can easily create their profiles, it is free, and they have an opportunity to generate income from the services rendered.”
