By Adetola Durojaiye
When a fintech product hits 300,000 active users in under 8 months, the first assumption is often: “You must’ve had a massive marketing budget.” But most times, that’s not the case.
In markets like Nigeria, where trust is earned slowly and lost quickly, it’s not flashy advertising or influencer marketing that drives growth. It’s clarity, relevance, and a product that people understand and can use. That’s what product marketing does. It’s the bridge between what you’ve built and the people it’s meant to serve.
For fintech and crypto startups, especially, here’s why product marketing matters.
1. Nigerians Buy Trust
The Nigerian market holds massive potential, but it’s also extremely unforgiving. People have seen it all: banking collapses, cloned fintechs that disappear overnight. So when a product touches their money, they’re not asking about features, they’re asking:
If your product doesn’t answer those questions upfront, they’re gone. Product marketing helps you build trust before your users take a risk. It communicates reliability in every word, screen, and interaction.
● Will my money be safe here?
● Will this work?
● Who else is using it?
If your product doesn’t answer those questions upfront, they’re gone. Product marketing helps you build trust before your users take a risk. It communicates reliability in every word, screen, and interaction.
2. You Can’t Rely on Good Tech Alone
Even if your product works perfectly, if users don’t understand it, it won’t scale.
This is especially true for startups built on Web3 infrastructure. Users don’t care about blockchain; what matters to them is whether they can receive and access their money fast. That’s what your messaging needs to reflect.
3. Focus on Clear Outcomes
Many startups try to impress users with all the things the product can do. But in reality, the user just wants to know what the product does for them right now. If your product is meant to help freelancers receive cross-border payments that should be the entire focus of your homepage, onboarding, and first experience. If a user can explain your product to a friend after one successful transaction, you’ve done it right.
In markets like Nigeria, where trust is earned slowly and lost quickly, it’s not flashy advertising or influencer marketing that drives growth. It’s clarity, relevance
4. Onboarding Is Product Marketing
The first few minutes inside your product determine whether a user stays or leaves. And in fintech or crypto, those minutes carry extra weight.
You need to design your own onboarding flow, not just to collect KYC, but to create confidence. Reduce unnecessary steps. Use language people already know. Show what’s happening in real time.
One small change, like grouping funding options under clear headers like “Fund with your bank” or “Use crypto,” can significantly increase completion rates. Every decision should help the user feel like, “This is so easy to use.”
5. Every Screen Is an Opportunity to Build or Lose Trust
It’s easy to think of product marketing as something that happens outside the product. But in reality, your most powerful marketing happens inside the app. Every tooltip, error message, confirmation pop-up, and even empty state is an opportunity to build trust or create doubt.
If users are stuck or confused at any point, support tickets will increase, and referrals won’t happen. But if you structure your flows clearly, guide users through friction points, and respond to feedback quickly, you create an experience they’ll talk about and return to.
6. Crypto Is Complex, But Product Marketing Makes It Feel Human
Web3 products carry an extra burden: the tech is complicated, and the market is already skeptical. If your product relies on crypto rails or stablecoins, you have to do the extra work of translating that experience into something local and familiar.
Users shouldn’t need to understand blockchain to use your product. They should feel like they’re simply sending, saving, or spending money, just more efficiently. The job of product marketing is to make advanced infrastructure feel like everyday banking.
7. Growth Doesn’t Start With Spend.
If you’re launching in Nigeria or any complex emerging market, don’t immediately start by thinking about ads. Start by thinking about how clearly your product speaks to its audience.
Many startups try to impress users with all the things the product can do. But in reality, the user just wants to know what the product does for them right now.
Done well, product marketing helps you:
● Build trust before you ask for commitment
● Reduce drop-offs through better flows and messaging
● Increase referrals through confidence and clarity
● And align your product and growth teams around real user needs
Scaling product users doesn’t require hype. It requires a product that works and marketing that helps people get it.
Fintech and crypto startups don’t fail because they’re technically weak. Most fail because people don’t understand them, don’t trust them, or don’t know why they should choose them over what already exists. Product marketing closes that gap. It makes your product make sense, and it earns you the right to grow.
If you’re entering a market like Nigeria, don’t wait until launch to figure this out. Make product marketing part of the build, part of the team, and part of the plan from day one. Because in a place where attention is scarce and skepticism is high, clarity isn’t optional; it’s your biggest advantage.
About the Author
Adetola Durojaiye is a product marketing specialist with experience scaling fintech and Web3 products across Nigeria, the UK, and Europe. He has led product growth initiatives that have impacted hundreds of thousands of users and helped startups gain traction in emerging markets
