Why Africa’s Next Wave of Tech Brands Will Win with AR, VR, and Storytelling — A Conversation with Solomon Akinsanya

Solomon Akinsanya has spent the last five years helping some of Africa’s fastest-growing tech companies reshape how digital brands connect with customers.

From leading the marketing and CX engine that drove Taeillo’s 510% revenue growth, to building RedCloud’s content strategy across Nigeria and South Africa with over 2,800% increases in reach, his work sits at the intersection of cultural storytelling, digital innovation, and community-led brand building.

In this conversation with Raphael Fabunmi, Solomon breaks down why AR, VR, and narrative-driven experiences will define the next chapter of Africa’s tech ecosystem, and what brands must do today to stay relevant tomorrow.

Q: Solomon, you’ve worked across some of Africa’s fastest-growing digital brands, Taeillo, RedCloud, BuyPower, CareerBuddy. When you look at the next wave of African tech companies, what do you think will separate the winners from everyone else?

Honestly? The brands that will win are the ones that can make people feel something, even inside a digital experience. Africa’s consumers are evolving fast; they want technology, yes, but they also want connection. They want to see themselves inside the products they use.

That’s where AR, VR, and storytelling come together. The companies that understand how to merge these three will build deeper trust, deeper loyalty, and much faster adoption than those who rely on traditional marketing.

A lot of people still see AR and VR as “future tech” fancy, expensive, or unnecessary. From your experience, are they really practical for African brands?

Absolutely, if you understand what they’re meant to do.

AR and VR aren’t toys. They’re clarity machines.

At Taeillo, for example, one of the biggest barriers was simple:

“What will this furniture look like in my space?”

AR solved that. Suddenly, a customer in Lagos, Nairobi, or Accra didn’t have to imagine. They could see it. In their room. In real time.

And when you remove imagination friction, you remove buying fear. That’s why you see global commerce shifting toward immersive experiences, and it’s why Africa’s tech brands can’t afford to sit this wave out.

The technology isn’t the blocker anymore. The mindset is.

You talk a lot about storytelling as a growth engine. How does storytelling tie into immersive tech?

 Think of storytelling as the heart, and AR/VR as the stage.

One gives emotion, the other gives experience.

When a customer tries a product in AR, they’ve already stepped into the story, your story.

When they explore a VR environment that shows your product’s journey, your mission, or your community impact, they’re not just buying a product… they’re buying meaning.

At Taeillo, that mix helped drive 510% revenue growth and community expansion from 21K to 75K, because people didn’t just see furniture. They saw culture. Identity. Innovation. Possibility.

Storytelling made AR not just “cool,” but commercially powerful.

From your time managing digital strategy at RedCloud across Nigeria and South Africa, what are you seeing on the ground that proves AR/VR is becoming more relevant?

The biggest indicator is how brands now measure success.

It’s shifting from “reach and impressions” to engagement, trial, and emotional connection.

We ran campaigns that had a 2,800% increase in reach and a 932% surge in content interaction, and it showed one thing clearly: people stay longer when the content feels alive. They click more. They explore more. They try more.

AR/VR gives brands that “stay longer” effect by default.

And in markets like Nigeria and South Africa, where competition is brutal, and customers make fast decisions, anything that buys you more time inside the customer’s mind is a growth advantage.

What do you think African brands get wrong when approaching AR and VR?

They treat it like a feature instead of a philosophy.

AR/VR shouldn’t just sit in an app somewhere, waiting for someone to tap it. It should be part of how the brand communicates, educates, and builds desire.

Most brands launch AR the same way they launch brochure PDFs: quietly and without a story.

But when you use AR with human narrative, showing users, communities, behind-the-scenes, real stories, it becomes sticky. It becomes memorable.

The biggest mistake is thinking immersive tech is about visuals alone.

It’s actually about emotion.

You’ve also worked with partnerships like the AR/VR Association, Social Media Week Lagos, Ingressive4Good, and AltSchool Africa. What did those experiences teach you?

Africa is ready. The creative ecosystem is hungry.

Students, designers, product teams, influencers, they’re all looking for ways to create deeper, more interactive experiences.

These partnerships showed me that we’re entering a phase where brand experience will matter more than brand messaging. If your experience isn’t memorable, someone else’s will be.

And immersive tech doesn’t remove the human element; it actually amplifies it, if you use it right.

So, what’s your prediction? What’s the “big shift” coming?

The next decade in African tech will be won by brands that do three things exceptionally well:

1. Use AR/VR to remove friction from the buying journey
   
   (no more guessing, no more uncertainty).
   
2. Tell human, relatable stories around their products
   
   (not generic marketing language, actual stories).
   
3. Build community experiences, not just customer bases
   
   (Community is the new distribution).
   

If a brand can combine all three, it will grow faster, spend less on ads, and build loyalty that can’t be copied.

If you had to give one final piece of advice to African founders or marketing leaders reading this, what would it be?

Don’t wait until AR and VR become mainstream before you adopt them.

The brands people call “innovative” tomorrow are the ones experimenting today.

And don’t think of immersive tech as technology.

Think of it as a new way to tell your story.

Because at the end of the day, people don’t remember products, they remember the experiences that made them feel seen.

Solomon Akinsanya is a content marketing and digital strategy professional with a track record of driving rapid growth across African tech brands. He led Taeillo’s 510% revenue surge and has driven digital strategy at RedCloud, BuyPower, and CareerBuddy.