About SMMEStart

SMMEstart is a chat-based business recovery service on WhatsApp providing micro, small and medium-sized businesses and entrepreneurs in South Africa with free, actionable information, guidance and resources to restart and grow in the Covid-19 recovery period – and beyond.

The service provides up-to-date, credible content and resources on Finance, Marketing, Legal, Tax, Business and Health, the latest News and inspirational stories, Free Business Resources and a Help-desk.

SMMEstart is a live service that will be updated and added to weekly. It is built using Turn.io technology, the Praekelt.org-incubated cloud-based application that integrates directly with the WhatsApp Business API to enable organisations to engage efficiently at scale with AI assistance.

SMMEstart has been developed in South Africa by Praekelt.org in partnership with Arifu and Jozihub and with funding support from Google.org.

All SMMEstart content and resources are free but the usual user WhatsApp data charges will apply.