African creators go global on day one. Their money doesn’t. Why a creator in Lagos can have followers in Europe and the United States from day one, but the money struggles to make the same trip.
African creators can build a global audience from their first post, but getting that audience to pay them, reliably and across borders, is still hard.
Payment infrastructure that works every time would fix it, the founders of Selar, Mainstack and Raenest said on a panel at Moonshot by TechCabal.
The panel focused on everyday creators, far from the top tier with millions of followers, and most of them earn little.
The Nigerian Creator Economy Report 2025 found that 56.45% of Nigerian creators earn less than $100 a month from their work. Ayobami Oyaleke, founder and CEO of Mainstack, which he described as a “commerce platform and financial back office for creators” operating in about 150 countries, said an audience is revenue waiting to be collected. “As much as you have the audience, there’s a revenue path for you,” he said. The trouble is that most creators don’t know how to turn a following into income, or they hit a wall when they try to collect it.
MSEApp News is publishing an original rewrite of this tip for readers, based on reporting associated with TechCabal.