Promoting Impact Technology | Spotlighting on We Voice Africa

Meet Angela Beily, a young woman from Mbeya who is using her voice to share untold stories through technology. Her digital platform, We Voice Africa, is an audio story streaming service that aims to promote wellness and empower youth to make a positive impact on their communities. The stories shared on the website and mobile application focus on the daily experiences of young people, entertaining and raising awareness among listeners.

We Voice Africa’s tagline, “Imagine your world at its best through storytelling,” captures the platform’s vision to become the number one-story streaming audio service in Africa, featuring stories in different languages from around the world. Located in Dar es Salaam’s Msasani area, the platform seeks to make a difference in the community through the power of storytelling. In a recent interview with Tech & Media Convergency (TMC), Angela Beily shared her inspiration behind We Voice Africa and the challenges and successes of the platform. With her passion for storytelling and dedication to empowering youth, Angela is making a positive impact through technology and giving voice to those whose stories have not been heard.

The inspiration behind

Angela Beily speaks on her journey before We voice became the product, “In my second year in university I came to realize I had talent with telling stories so once I had completed my degree, I ventured to writing scrips but one challenge I was facing was when I had to pitch to directors who at the end of the day wanted sexual bribery, as a fresh graduate who I was experiencing this pushed me to look at other older and younger girls like me who face sexual abuse and harassment in our communities. She adds that, “I then decided, to work around telling stories in audio mark formats that relate to gender based violence happening in our societies no sooner than that my audience grew and that’s when I made a decision to create a streaming platform that would carter of fellow Tanzanians.” By doing this We Voice was sure that it would help to fill the gap of local owned audio stories in a digital format and get the message straight and to the intended audience.

Starting up funds

She shared some insights into how she funded the platform’s initial development. As an employed person and an entrepreneur, she used a bootstrapping strategy to accumulate the capital needed to pay for the producers and voice over actors. While challenging, she had to juggle both roles to secure the necessary funds. Looking to the future,

Angela plans on expanding We Voice Africa’s reach by collecting funds and participating in competitions that offer grants to upcoming ventures. By doing so, she hopes to scale her platform’s services and bring it to even more people, promoting wellness and impacting the lives of young people across Africa through storytelling.

She recognizes that as her platform grows, she will need to be prepared to pitch her business to potential investors and showcase the potential for return on investment. To do this, she is actively working on improving her financial literacy and building a solid business plan that clearly articulates her goals and strategies. She is also seeking mentorship and guidance from experienced entrepreneurs and industry experts to help her navigate the fundraising process.

Pursuing on operating environment

As an innovator before launching your product you need to get accustomed with the right people who will set the path straight, “I remember consulting with COSOSTA from early on have the copyright of the works I was producing.” She adds, “It is important to understand the laws that align with the sector that you are in, having consents from the voice overs, if they align with the morals and norms of the country, the model of your product how to make it presentable so that potential partners can understand your product, the value, the benefits it will bring the investors and the impacts it will make to community, media and the government, it is hard to pitch an idea without people seeing the product and nor understand fruits it will bring.

We voice Africa has a list of junior writers who write stories that reflect to what is happening on a daily basis in our communities and once the stories are written they are then recorded through voice over actors with the assistant of the producer incorporating sound and music. We voice Africa is a free audio story streaming platform, one can visit their website https://wevoice.africa/ to see the dramas and categories of your choice one can click at the top right of the website, if one selects dramas then they will appear, if one selects categories then they have the choice to select the category that suits them best.

Here is the list of categories available

  1. Child Marriage
  2. Child pregnancy
  3. Gender Inequality
  4. Female Genital Mutilation
  5. Health Issues
  6. Poverty
  7. Gender Violence

We Voice targets youths whose stories surround them, We Voice stands as a voice for fellow youth who are afraid to speak up and address the challenges that they go through within their communities that are root caused by cultural norm in our societies. We voice targets the community at large, who hold the responsibility to be accountable of their actions and it also targets the gender ministry to ensure that there are policies that are being effectively implemented in our communities to protect children and youth rights.

Angela explains how they take pride in the exceptional quality of work on our platform, which is evident in the positive feedback we receive from our listeners. Our team of skilled developers has ensured that the platform is user-friendly, interactive, and has a unique and appealing design. These features set us apart from other similar platforms and contribute to the high level of engagement and connection we have with our customers. Our goal is to continue providing top-notch services and continuously improve our platform to meet the evolving needs of our users. “Our platform differentiates itself in terms the quality of our work which is exceptional based on the feedbacks from our listeners and the way it connects and resonates with our customers, a team of efficient developers who have made the design of the platform user friendly, interactive, unique and appealing”.

The Challenges

The platform is not financially stable, Angela also shares encountering sexual harassment in a male dominated industry as a young girl with a dream to impact her community, this has taught her setting boundaries and being a voice to others and creating a safe online space for women. When it comes to success, Angela says, “From recoding and sharing to other audio streaming platforms to creating one on my own is such an accomplishment, we have a team of people who understand the vision and value intended to create within our community. We Voice Africa has been nominated twice in the Tanzania Youth awards though THEY did not win, they still had the opportunity to pitch in about their platform earning more recognition to potential partners.

Angela says that “I would say if we were to have anything to enhance our operations it would be marketing our product in a way that it would get the recognition it needs, capable withstanding team of voice actors and producers” Angela envisions that We Voice Africa will evolve into a platform similar to Netflix in the next five years, with a global reach and accessibility to a diverse range of languages. She aspires to create a platform where people can submit their content, which will be verified and uploaded for listeners to enjoy. With this expansion plan, We Voice Africa will provide a platform for untold stories to be heard, connecting people from different regions and cultures through the power of storytelling.

Final thoughts

For anyone aspiring to become an innovator, Angela shares valuable advice. She emphasizes the importance of building a roadmap, conducting thorough research, and understanding the product you want to create. It’s also essential to take ownership of your project and get to know people in the same industry to create a network and build relationships. Angela encourages being bold and taking risks without fear, while trusting in your potential. These are all important steps to becoming a successful innovator and creating something that can make a difference in people’s lives.