SkillPatron, the leading digital b2b online
marketplace platform in Nigeria that connects large corporate procurement
departments with specialized services & outsourcing projects, has expanded
to East Africa with its services booking platform in Kenya.
We live, breathe and bleed “outsourcing
specialized tasks & projects”, says Mshima Agah - Client services manager at SkillPatron.
Although Jake Adebayo’ SkillPatron operates
in a relatively old industry as business-to-business platforms have been around
for over two decades, becoming an almost invisible engine of commerce at many
small and medium-sized businesses. Inspite of b2b being around for two decades
there’s one arena that online marketplaces have yet to penetrate to nearly the
same degree and that's the large corporate procurement departments. This holds
true even as of this writing as concerns about scale, quality, and reliability
have made leaders hesitant to change their longstanding reliance on dealing
directly with suppliers. At its conception SkillPatron found this is especially
true for the more complicated purchases that fall under the label “indirect
spend”: everything from IT and telecoms to transportation, professional
services, and marketing.
With the foray of SkillPatron into the b2b
online marketplace that’s starting to change. The project managers hired by
SkillPatron are a new generation of procurement leaders, who have grown up
buying online for increasingly complex personal needs and are beginning to
wonder whether buying online also makes sense for business. SkillPatron’s
powerful digital and analytic tools are also contributing to the new mind-set,
opening new avenues for procurement departments to generate value in areas
outside their traditional focus on transaction management.
Majority of SkillPatron’s customers
indicate that their indirect spending has become a tougher challenge for chief
procurement officers (CPOs). As SkillPatron has found not only is this type of
spending growing but it is also encompassing a widening array of categories in
services as well as goods—as SkillPatron companies become more reliant on
third-party providers. Without the use of b2b services like SkillPatron,
controlling spending, compliance, and risk has become a bigger headache.
SkillPatron as well as other B2B online
marketplaces create self-service, digitally-sourced environments where multiple
vendors can offer products or services to business customers. SkillPatron’s
claim to make it easier to identify the right supplier, improving the customer
experience by making transactions simpler and more transparent.
SkillPatron Buyers gain choice, value, and
greater efficiencies, while SkillPatron sellers, under pressure themselves to
grow revenues, gain access to a broader pool of buyers—without the burden of
marketing or (depending on the specific marketplace) the need for dedicated
sales, fulfillment, transactional, or logistics functions. With SkillPatron
implemented well, marketplace procurement can also facilitate reporting and
data analysis.
SkillPatron as a scope-of-work marketplace
offer services such as marketing, telecoms, utilities, rent and real estate,
insurance, and professional services (such as legal and consulting).
SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B
marketplaces offer several general benefits to business. Notable features on
SkillPatron include greater transparency in product, service, and supplier
availability—as well as in pricing and purchasing terms. For SkillPatron as
well as other Online B2B marketplaces Hours and time zones are irrelevant,
making marketplaces truly global. And SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B
marketplaces perhaps most significantly as they provide CPOs with the means to
offload the tactical, often repetitive work that dominates procurement (especially
in indirect categories), improving their management so they can focus on more
strategic activities.
On the other hand SkillPatron sellers also
benefit from marketplaces, gaining access to new customers, visibility into the
market’s pricing structures, and features and services they might not have
otherwise been able to afford, such as lower shipping costs and better
marketing analytics. Ultimately, SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B
marketplaces promise broader economic impact, expanding opportunities for
smaller vendors.
SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B
marketplaces understand that buying online can be a risky proposition: each
transaction is impersonal, and buyers cannot always be certain they will get
everything they ordered, or that the quality (especially for a first-time
purchase) will meet their needs and expectations. In an automated environment
like SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B marketplaces procurement managers
are sure they will get the same level of service they would get with a direct
vendor relationship—in logistics, billing, credit policies, and refund and
exchange policies?
For SkillPatron as well as other Online B2B
marketplaces to attract buyers they actually
need to attract quality vendors. To do so, they need to promise a bigger
customer base than vendors could otherwise secure on their own. Marketplaces
like SkillPatron must also provide a user experience that is above and beyond
what buyers get from dealing with individual vendors. By “user experience,” we
mean not simply the scale of offerings or the range of amenities and features,
but the total experience: how interactive it is; how much buyers enjoy
shopping; how indispensable the marketplace becomes to them; and how valuable
it is in helping them perform their work and accomplish their goals.
Much like online B2C marketplaces
counterparts, SkillPatron offers access to a broad pool of potential vendors
operating under a wide range of business models, including not only the obscure
and potentially risky operators of the past, but also high-quality, prescreened
vendors. And their value to buyers extends much further, to customization,
dynamic pricing, and indirect-spend management and control—important factors
even for sophisticated procurement functions. Perhaps most important, they can
free procurement teams from time-consuming, often repetitive, transactional
work that fails to take full advantage of their more advanced capabilities.
When part of a broader procurement system that includes such elements as shared
services or digitized sourcing, marketplaces free up procurement teams to place
more focus on value-adding activities, such as strategic purchase categories,
innovation, and sustainability.
As a relatively new phenomenon, howmarketplaces like SkillPatron will evolve—and their impact and
implications—remains to be seen. What purchasing executives need to understand
now is their potential effect on the procurement function and the role of the CPO—and,
more broadly, on the supply chain and spot markets. In this early stage,
leaders may have fewer answers to guide them, but knowing which questions to
ask can help better prepare them to capture maximum strategic advantage.
Albert Keronye, Country Manager for
SkillPatron in Kenya says: “After the success of launching SkillPatron in
Lagos, Nigeria in 2018, we’re delighted to be offering services to even more
customers across the African continent. We take pride in helping local
communities by ensuring service
providers share their skills with corporate procurement departments who need
their offerings.”
SkillPatron was incorporated by Jake Adebayo in April 2018 and since then,
has continued with its mission to make everyday life easier for everyday people
and corporate procurement departments . With service offering pricing starting from just $3, SkillPatron
provides affordable options for people and corporate procurement departments
seeking help with projects of all sizes. Services can be booked with both
in-store and online purchases at: https://skillpatron.com/services/.
With a growing portfolio of over 3 million
users, the startup, headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria, has transformed corporate
procurement service bookings by using proprietary digital cloud-based solutions
to create a singular platform enabling comprehensive access to every specialty
providers.
The zeal to create a transforming
experience for online corporate procurement access across its existing
footprint and new markets has always concerned SkillPatron.
SkillPatron already arms more than 500 of
the world’s most forward-thinking brands and agencies with the creative
insights they need to make transformative business decisions.
Since SkillPatron first launched, we’ve
been honoured and impressed by the level of positive response from people using
SkillPatron’s project management network to get help with their everyday
business and personal procurement tasks - says Yukiko Ugboaja.
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