By Mohamed Bah · Kolonell, a digital agency in Dakar
Your online store open for business, with 20 products, mobile money payments and your first orders tracked
75,000 FCFA · 115 €
Programme
and 1 more module
Wave / Orange Money payment, access within 24 business hours
A small, well-run online store in West Africa commonly handles 20 to 60 orders a month after 3 to 6 months, which means 400,000 to 2,000,000 FCFA (about $670 to $3,300) in revenue depending on the average order value. A freelancer who builds and manages stores charges 150,000 to 400,000 FCFA (about $250 to $670) for the setup and 30,000 to 75,000 FCFA (about $50 to $125) a month for management (2026 estimates for Dakar and Abidjan, with no guarantee of results).
Indicative estimate, depending on your market, pace and work. No income is guaranteed.
Your instructor
Founder of Kolonell, a digital agency in Dakar. He designs online stores, websites and business applications for SMEs in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire and Dubai, and supports merchants as they move from over-the-counter sales to selling online.
See Kolonell’s work →No. Shopify, WooCommerce and Wix are configured through menus, and the course contains no code. When a need goes beyond what you can do yourself (a custom feature, a connection to point-of-sale software), the lesson tells you when to bring in an agency and which questions to ask.
Between 60,000 and 250,000 FCFA (about $100 to $420) in the first year for a store on a platform (subscription, domain name, extensions), not counting photos and advertising. A custom store built by an agency starts at around 1,000,000 FCFA (about $1,670). Module 1 has you calculate the cost for your own situation.
Yes, through a payment gateway that brings them together (PayDunya, CinetPay or PayTech, for example). Module 4 compares their fees, their payout times and the documents they require, and keeps cash on delivery available for your first orders.
It becomes worthwhile when you spend more time giving out prices than selling, when you want to be found on Google, or when diaspora customers want to pay by card. Lesson 1 gives you the numbers that justify the move, and your store stays connected to your WhatsApp.
About 20 hours in total, hands-on workshops and projects included, that is 4 to 5 hours a week for 4 to 5 weeks. Building the store mostly requires two or three focused evenings during modules 2 and 3.
Level 2 teaches you to sell online with WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram. This level 3 course builds and runs a complete online store. Level 4 trains you for the role of e-commerce manager: inventory, purchasing, logistics and customer service at a larger scale.
Via Wave or Orange Money. After enrolling you receive a pro forma invoice by email with the number to pay. Send the proof on WhatsApp: your access is activated within 24 business hours.
For life, updates included. Learn at your own pace and revisit lessons as often as you need.
Complete the lessons, pass each module quiz with at least 70% and submit your final project: an instructor reviews and approves it (feedback within 5 working days). The certificate is then generated, with a unique number and a public verification page.
You sell on WhatsApp or Instagram and you are hitting the ceiling: too many messages just to quote a price, no catalog Google can find, diaspora customers who want to pay by card. This course shows you how to build an online store of your own, on your own domain name, and keep it running without being a developer.
You choose between Shopify, WooCommerce, Wix and a custom build based on their real 12-month cost, then build a mobile-friendly store with legal pages that comply with Senegal's data protection law 2008-12. You publish at least 20 products and connect mobile money, cash on delivery and your delivery zones. Finally, you bring in buyers through Google and Meta and set up the weekly routine that keeps the store running.
What you get: 6 modules, 20 hours and 96 corrected exercises, with a hands-on workshop, a PDF guide and a quiz in every module. Two projects are graded: your pre-launch store with 20 products, then your store open to the public with its first orders. Your Kolonell certificate can be verified online.
By the end, you have a well-structured store with 20 products, tested payments and delivery, a product feed on Merchant Center or Meta and a 4-week dashboard. A small, well-run online store in West Africa commonly handles 20 to 60 orders a month after 3 to 6 months, which means 400,000 to 2,000,000 FCFA in revenue depending on the average order value. As a freelancer, building a store is billed at 150,000 to 400,000 FCFA, then 30,000 to 75,000 FCFA a month for management. These are 2026 estimates for Dakar and Abidjan, with no guarantee of results.
This is level 3 of the E-commerce and online selling track: it follows "E-commerce: selling online in Senegal" (level 2) and comes before "E-commerce manager: inventory, logistics and customer service" (level 4), which teaches you to run daily operations.
Who it is for: Merchants and brands already selling on WhatsApp or Instagram who want an online store of their own, SME staff in charge of their company's store, and freelancers who want to build and manage stores for clients in Dakar, Abidjan, Bamako, Cotonou or for the diaspora.
A module-by-module path: lessons, exercises, quizzes and projects to submit.
Module 1· 16 exercises
Decide whether an online store pays off for you right now, choose your platform and calculate what it really costs over 12 months.
Module 2· 16 exercises
Set up a structure customers understand in three clicks, a theme that inspires trust on a phone, and the pages without which nobody pays.
Module 3· 16 exercises
Publish product pages that sell without you, in the right format, and add 50 products in one hour with file import.
Module 4· 16 exercises
Let customers pay the way they want, know what you keep after fees, and show fair delivery charges before they abandon their cart.
Module 5· 16 exercises
Make your products easy to find on Google and Meta, and bring your WhatsApp customers back to the store.
Module 6· 16 exercises
Handle orders day to day, recover abandoned carts, read the numbers and keep your store in good health.
Certificate included
A numbered certificate with your validated skills, a public page and a verification QR code. Add it to LinkedIn in one click.
Certificate of skills
Your name
has completed and validated the course
Online store: build it, stock it and keep it running
Skills developed
Number KOL-CERT-2026-XXXXX
Mohamed Bah
Founder, Kolonell Academy
After the course
Each certificate has a number anyone can verify online, and you can add it to your LinkedIn profile in one click.
Upload your CV from your profile: our team reviews it and helps you make it clearer and more convincing.
Learners who complete the course can join the Kolonell talent pool. Entry is earned: course completed, exercises submitted. Kolonell also draws on it for its own hiring.
Optional services, free for learners. This is not a promise of employment.
Download the poster to print it, send it to your employer or share it with colleagues. The full programme details every module.
This course is part of the track
Level 3 of 5 · Advanced
See the 5 track levelsNext level · 4/5 Career
The full job, with a portfolio
The complete e-commerce manager job, with an operations portfolio you can show at a job interview or to a client
100,000 FCFA 30 h
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