Why I stopped selling to individual farmers and started with groups

This really resonates. In my data literacy workshops we do the same thing, teaching inside existing community groups instead of chasing individual learners. Peer trust does a lot of the heavy lifting. Did the group demos also give you better feedback on what features they actually needed?

Smart observation. We see the same thing with apps, people trust a recommendation from their chama more than any advert. Did the group demos also change how you explain the device, like making it simpler so the whole group gets it at once?

Thanks for sharing this. It's inspiring to see how aligning with the existing chama meetings lifted your sales. Next step: capture the top three feature requests people raised during the demo and pass them to your product team for a quick iteration.

Love this. The chama structure is gold, they already trust each other, so you just plug into that trust network. On your question about simplifying: I found that demoing with one phone and having the group pass it around worked better than handing each person a device. Less confusion, more “let me show my neighbour” moments. What’s the most unexpected question farmers have asked during those group demos?

That’s such a practical lesson, and it reminds me of how we handle things in schools too - when we only have one tablet, we gather learners in small groups and rotate. It sounds like the chama model works the same way: one device, shared learning, and the group discussions actually help everyone understand better. Did you notice any difference in how quickly the groups started using the data from the sensor compared to a single farmer?

That’s a really smart move, tapping into the chama meetings saves you time and builds trust fast. I wonder, did you find that groups needed a different payment approach, like a shared deposit or staggered contributions, compared to selling to single farmers?