Nigerian customer insight platform PressOne Africa is now working with over 3,000 businesses since it launched two years ago.
Launched by Opeyemi Shokunbi and Mayowa Okegbenle, who have known each other for 20 years, in 2021, PressOne Africa makes it possible for any business, no matter their size, to set up a phone system for their sales or customer support team in 10 minutes.
“With PressOne, businesses across Africa no longer need to suffer from consequences of allowing employees to use personal lines for business,” Okegbenle told Disrupt Africa.
“When you subscribe to PressOne, you get a phone number for your business or team, and access to our web solution where you can see all calls made across your team, setup what you want potential customers to hear when they call your business, and add notes to any conversation.”
Starting PressOne came from solving a personal problem for Okegbenle.
“I was going to register a business entity, and needed an official line for that business – a phone number that anyone could call, and hear a professional greeting, plus information about the business,” he said.
“I couldn’t find any existing solution other than traditional network solution providers, who offered to send me a proposal. I didn’t want a proposal, I wanted something I could just set up in minutes and be done with it.”
PressOne does just that, and rolled out in 2022 with just an Android app. Since then, over 3,000 businesses have subscribed, and the solution is also available on Web, iOS, and Chrome, as well as popular customer engagement solutions like Zoho, Hubspot, and Freshdesk.
“We are pretty much in a market where existing alternatives don’t have the same focus we have on making proper business phone solutions accessible and affordable to businesses of any size,” said Okegbenle.
PressOne is backed by Ventures Platform, Techstars, Voltron Capital, Impact Hub, and a number of angels, and has raised over US$1 million to date. It has ambitious expansion plans.
“Today, we sell exclusively in Nigeria, and we allow any Nigerian business to purchase phone numbers from Nigeria, Kenya, and United States,” said Okegbenle. “However, that is changing soon. First, we are going to allow Nigerians to purchase phone numbers from 25 more countries, and secondly, we are going to open up the service in Ghana, Kenya and South Africa.”
Product-wise, PressOne has also expanded its use case, including services like Voice OTP, Bulk Voice Campaigns, and embeddable voice.
“With embeddable voice, developers and product owners can embed phone calls in their apps. Imagine the call feature you find in logistics and e-commerce apps? We can power that easily, and locally,” said Okegbenle.
PressOne primarily makes money through subscriptions, and also earns usage-based revenue on services like Voice OTP and Bulk Voice Campaigns.
