There’s a bit of salesmanship in most Zimbabweans. You don’t need to go far to see that. Whether it’s because of an entrepreneurial spirit or an adaption to the current harsh economic environment (just look at the vendor saga), there’s always someone who’s dabbling with some sort of sales.
Now, local telecoms operator TelOne is tapping into that sales streak. In a recent advert, TelOne started inviting people interested in becoming sales agents for its products and services to submit their details at Harare’s Main Post Office or through any other publicly available TelOne contacts.
According to the advert, these agents will be selling public WiFi tokens, ADSL services, voice services (presumably handling bill payments) and TelOne’s Fibre to the Home package.
TelOne has extended this offer to entrepreneurs who are willing to set up in Ruwa, Mt Pleasant Heights, GoodHope, Westgate, Mainway Meadows and Norton. These are some of the areas that have received the TelOne Fibre service, so any further rollout will likely be in areas where TelOne Fibre ends up next.
The whole idea is a fairly smart way of growing a distribution network, creating visibility for the brand and offering convenience to subscribers in the areas where these agents operate from.
TelOne won’t be the first telecoms operator to do this, though. Mobile operators like Econet have been taking advantage of the Zimbabwean sales and entrepreneurship streak for a while.
Some of the Econet Shops are actually franchise stores and more recently Telecel introduced its own franchise stores and Kiosks. Africom, an internet service provider, also made a call for entrepreneurs, or wifi-preneurs willing to become Africom WiFi distributors.
These operators realised that in a business environment where setting up a shop and keeping it operational are difficult, franchising has a lot of merit. There’s also the added dynamic of local unemployment that hasn’t been made any easier by recent job cuts. A lot of people who are looking at new opportunities might take this up.
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13 comments
It would have been nice if you have gone to their HQ and ask a bit more like how much these agents are going to get paid, what makes one qualify for to be agent etc etc. Hearing it from the horse mouth is better than speculating from leaflets.
Regardless, its a smart move if they combine that with bandwidth expansion.
Desktop journalism!
and also a favourable price, no matter how many agents they have if price is high no one will connect
macd chip you are on a criticism streak heyi! Visit technomag and dont come here if you no longer like their style
lm banned at technomag! At this rate maybe l will be banned here as well soon. All lm asking is a little bit of an effort to investigate before publishing a story.
But his critisim,, on this particular article makes a lot of sense ka?
I think its ok. Whenever I am local. I am busy with these articles too. Why? Because we get fed half facts. Some facts especially around mobile money, agency banking etc, some of us garnered ages ago. For example last year I asked about CBZ smart Cash eventually had to go and ask. Then I realized that Smart Cash is a watered down version of POSB CELLBANK, but Posb YouthCard or is the same as smart cash just packaged differently. Then for instance yesterday we get told my cash is coming, which turns out to be another smart cash i mean really?
Do the investigations, call the people.
The problem is while I do not expect this to be an eWeek type publication. There is a level of detail required. Right now if I was to pose the questions
1. What are the benefits of the tel*one vs telelcel vs econet agency’s
2. What are the requirements
3. What is the minimum cash required up front.
Zero answers, so how is this different from going to TelOne and asking myself?
Good idea but the above advert is all folded and creased. Looks like someone just pick it up from the trash. Not very appealing or professional. 🙁
Its interesting how telone wifi has moved from being among the cheapest packages econet is offering a better deal with its afternoon daily bundles and night dream bundles anyway i love my wife
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Hey guys,why do you always want to be spoon fed?Standup and go ask yourself.Good work Techzim.
Then they wont be need for techzim if people start looking for stories and facts themselves. What a racing horse view you have!!
So if thats the case, then let us read these articles and adverts in the sunday mail. We want to be spoon fed, because it says “Tel one expanding distribution network through local agents” Therefore we want to know how is it doing this, and if I want in, how do i go about joining the bandwagon.
What is the current up take of telone services in terms of numbers