Primera Muthoni; a Products Specialist at MTN Uganda, Leading Innovator and Entrepreneur has today challenged young developers to always ensure that they execute a proper product roll-out plan because ‘Going to Market’ is as important as Product Development.
Primera Muthoni said this while delivering a mentorship session around Technology and Product Go to Market at the 4th day of the Women in FinTech Hackathon that is currently underway in Kampala, Uganda.
With over 10 years’ experience in Telecoms’ products develop and marketing, she shared special insights on when to roll-out a product, how to handle the first launch days and what happens thereafter with focus on the fact that there is no perfect product, and thus all products require upgrades from time to time.
“Not yet good enough to go to market? This is the story today. I have had my app in the market for six years. The day we went to market, it had like two, three features but we went to the market. We have been adding more features and functions all this time,” Primera Muthoni said.
She added: “I have SMSs that clock in my phone every hour. I have emails every single morning showing me statistics of the last seven days plus all sorts of notifications. This is because if there’s a problem with my product, I want to be the first person to see and know it. I am the owner of that product. I do not want the tech team telling me. I don’t want the developer telling me. I don’t want that stuff. I want to know and keep updated because I know that I can never create a product that is problem free completely.”
Organized by HiPipo under its Include EveryOne program in partnership with Crosslake Tech, ModusBox, Mojaloop Foundation and Level One Project, this women focused hackathon has participants conceptualizing and developing different financial inclusion products with special focus on women in areas such as payments, lending, saving, e-commerce, e-education and e-agriculture among others.
Minus the mentorship session, the fourth day of the Women in FinTech Hackathon had teams get introduced to the Level One Principle of Level 1 Principle of Scheme Design & Governance, tackled MVP (minimum viable product) details, and forex cross country use case. The hackathon will culminate in to the Women in FinTech summit on Friday 18th September.
Important Dates.
- 12 September: Women in FinTech hackathon kicks off.
- 14th to 17th September: Women in FinTech hackathon underway.
- 18th September: Women in Fintech summit.
Ends.