Fast Money from Fairmoney?

It’s a fair deal overall. But too many promises spoil the offer. Dilution is what happens when you mix your USPs with a basket of me-too claims. Whatever happened to the single, parity breaking proposition?

Reading through Punch online this morning I found it irresistible to pay some attention to the current Fairmoney advertising campaign. Loan ads are notorious in Nigeria. Sometimes, judging by the number of companies offering loans without collateral,  loans without documentation and all in five minutes, you’d think the government of far away China, full of pity for poor Nigerian folks, has decided to dash us loads of free capital. That is, until you try out one of them. That’s when you realize that khaki no be leather. That is not to say many of them did not get their fingers burnt. Borrowing and paying back on time is not the best attribute of the typical Nigerian on the street. But many of the so called loan apps also proved to be fake and unscrupulous.

The CBN, going by its recent interventions, appears to be awake to this. But I digress. Fairmoney gets my attention because they did something which I find exciting: How about giving you additional money when you are having difficulty paying what you already owe, or you want an extension even? Nigerian financial institutions seem to have a cardinal rule against that, except of course when they are dealing with the super rich. Fairmoney is not just keeping it as an option for when things go wrong, they are telling you, “hey, we got your back, so walk with confidence”. For a small company I think this is good. It demonstrates confidence in a good customer and does not assume, without reason, that the customer has gone rogue. That’s a good number one.

I don’t like the no 2. This seems to be like a company with poor attention to details. How do you advertise an obvious errata on the second page of the ad? Does it mean no one in the entire organization has read that ad in a relaxed moment even if the copywriter made a mistake? Highlighting You’re loan is here(sic) is totally unpalatable. I am also not too sure about promising competitive interest rates. In fact the ad goes so far as to make this rather ambitions claim:

If you are looking for a loan with the best interest rates in the market, you have arrived at the right place!

Yet they charge up to 30% for a 90 day loan. What would be the worst interest rates? All the others apps promise more or less the same. So how are your rates the best? Maybe I need an education. By the way it is actually against the rules for you to claim “best” without empirical data to support same. Meanwhile they are not giving enough hype to what I consider a great value: the willingness to offer loans for up to 24months while they go on a me too offensive with the five minute loan promise. Isn’t that promise getting tiring? Yes maybe we want loans in a hurry, but five minutes?

The ad suffers from the desire to promise too many things when you can win with just one or two unique promises. Overall I think this is a good ad, aesthetically cool. Attention grabbing if you are not yet tired of the motley of loan offers.

Rating: GOOD