Mark Smith
Justwomanly is a B2B2C eCommerce luxury fashion platform that is focused on spotlighting Afro-fashion by creatives globally. We aim to be the go-to place for retail luxury fashion products and services globally.
Tell us about yourself?
I have background in Computer Science from the University of Nigeria Nsukka, with a vast experience in marketing, product and business management.
I have spent 15 years of my life in building, and deploying products that’s aimed at solving critical problemes.
Asides from being in the tech ecosystem, I am also an educational scholar, author and researcher who’s works have been published by advanced academics across numeorus journals.
If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?
If I could go back in time, a year or two I would say to myself to launch whatever it is I am trying to develop.
After learning from experience, I have come to realize that Y Combinator saying “just ship it”. In my earlier years, I belived a product must be perfect before launch, and this has cost me serious problems.
Had I launched most of my products/ideas at the MVP stage, there’ll be better validity in knowing if they’re worth it or not.
Thus, the advice to myslef two years ago will be to not to think of an idea, or try to make it perfect before launch. Just ship it out that way, and get live feedback from users. It’s a startup, you’ll be fine.
What problem does your business solve?
Justwomanly makes it possible for fashion creative who are not well known to get a vocie and sell to a larger audience, thereby buiding their brand.
From concept, design to sale, Justwomanly aim to support thousands of fashion creatives across Africa to scale.
What is the inspiration behind your business?
What got in involved in the line buildng Justwomanly is the fact that there are numerous fashion creatives in Nigeria and Africa at large, but due to their operational practices many of these creatives don’t get to have their works in the local and global spaces.
After talking to my mum, and my dad who one-time sold women wears as a businessman, I got to understand why these creatives are not getting the traction they deserve.
Thus, in early 2022 I was introduced to my co-founder Norah Onyejeni via a tweet she responded to about me needing a female cofounder interested in working in a fashion startup.
She responded to my tweet a few weeks down the line, we had our first conversation, and we began working together.
The reality, is making it easier and wider for fashion creaives to sell more, and boost revenue are among the reson I decided to get involved in this line of work.
What is your magic sauce?
Justwomanly got it’s magic sauce. At Justwomanly, instead of focusing on profits we are aimed at branding creatives and their business to get international recognition which inturn translates into sales.
When you have possible competitors to Justwomanly which includes: Stix, Addison Bay, And Steel City, you know we have to up or game and diversify.
Thus, our magic sauce ranges from partnerships, royalties.and most importantly backend content to engage audiences on how their favourite brands are creating the next big thng!
What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?
For the next 5 years, at Justwomanly we want to garner 100M users, generate over $1B in revenue globally.
We also want to partner with the entertainment industries especially in Nollywood to collaborate onf using our fashion royalty service/system to portray more of creative fashion designs and products on set during movie and music production.
However, our most important plan is to represent and spotlight under-represented fashion creatives and businesses. And in turn generate employment for social good.
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?
So far, the biggest challenge has been shipping our MVP, which we have just done (Friday Oct 7, 2022).
The back and forth of having to deal with creaives isn’t that easy. But then I am glad my co-founder Norah Onyejeni, has been at the fore-front in this regard. She’s the reason we got to lauch our MVP.
How do people get involved/buy into your vision?
We want fashion creatives, designers and vendors to collabaote with us. The aim is to list millions of fashion designs and products that will scale fashion creatives and businesses across Africa.
Interested users who want to sell, can find more information at https:linktr.ee/justwomanly. We are open to partenerships across all geographic regions.
