Designing a multi-sided platform that connects customers with local businesses, enables service enquiries and bookings, and helps diaspora users get trusted tasks completed in Nigeria.
YBLocal began with a straightforward problem: finding a reliable local business in Nigeria can still involve searching across Google, Instagram, WhatsApp, social recommendations and multiple websites before a customer has enough information to make a decision.
We designed and developed YBLocal as a more structured way to connect customers with businesses and service providers around them.
At its core, YBLocal combines business discovery, detailed listings, reviews, enquiries, quote requests, bookings and protected transactions within one connected marketplace.
The platform also extends beyond traditional local discovery. Nigerians living abroad can use YBLocal Diaspora Tasks to hire verified providers for work that needs to be completed physically in Nigeria, while Taskure provides a structured payment-protection workflow.
Local business discovery often becomes fragmented.
A customer may find a business through social media but struggle to confirm its location. Another provider may appear in search results but have no useful service information. Reviews might exist somewhere else entirely, while pricing and availability require yet another conversation.
The challenge was therefore larger than creating a searchable directory.
YBLocal needed to answer several questions within one experience:
This became the foundation of the product architecture.
YBLocal starts with two pieces of customer intent:
What are you looking for? and Where do you need it?
Customers can search by service or category and narrow results by state or city.
Instead of forcing users through long category trees, the platform is designed to move quickly from intent to relevant businesses.
A common problem with traditional directories is that the listing itself provides very little information.
YBLocal was designed differently.
Important business information appears directly within discovery so customers can compare options without repeatedly opening and closing profiles.
Businesses can display their category, location, availability, customer reviews, verification status and relevant service information.
Direct actions such as calling, emailing, viewing directions or opening the full profile shorten the path between discovery and contact.
Trust was treated as part of the product experience rather than simply as a badge.
Throughout YBLocal, customers can encounter signals such as:
Together, these signals help customers understand more about a provider before deciding to engage.
Discovery is only the beginning of the customer journey.
Once a customer begins saving businesses, requesting quotes, making bookings or sending enquiries, they need somewhere to manage those interactions.
We therefore designed a dedicated YBLocal customer workspace.
Customers frequently discover a business before they are ready to buy.
YBLocal's Following system allows users to save businesses and return later instead of repeating the discovery process from the beginning.
Customers can also distinguish between verified providers and other followed businesses and manage the businesses they want to keep track of.
Business information changes.
Addresses move. Contact details change. Services are updated.
Rather than treating business profiles as completely static, YBLocal includes a contribution workflow that allows customers to suggest improvements to business information.
Submitted changes can move through moderation states such as pending, approved or rejected.
A local-services marketplace must support situations where a simple “Buy Now” button does not make sense.
Many services require the customer and business to discuss requirements first.
YBLocal therefore supports direct enquiries and structured quote requests, giving customers different ways to start a business conversation depending on what they need.
Some customers know the service they need but want to compare providers before choosing one.
The quote marketplace allows them to define the requirement and receive responses from suitable businesses.
This creates a structured workflow between discovery and hiring without forcing every service category into fixed ecommerce-style pricing.
Where appropriate, YBLocal also supports booking-based interactions.
This enables participating businesses to move customers from discovery into scheduled service delivery without sending them through a disconnected third-party experience.
One of the biggest product challenges in service marketplaces is what happens after a customer agrees to pay.
YBLocal's Taskure system introduces a structured protected-payment lifecycle for eligible transactions.
Instead of treating payment as the end of the journey, Taskure tracks it through several stages:
Started → Protected → Review → Approved → Completed
The business completes the work, the customer reviews the outcome, and the transaction progresses according to the platform's protected workflow.
The same marketplace infrastructure also created an opportunity to solve a different problem.
Many Nigerians living abroad still need work completed physically in Nigeria.
This might include checking a property, verifying land, following up on documents, inspecting ongoing construction or handling an errand for a family member.
Normally these tasks depend heavily on informal trust networks.
YBLocal Diaspora Tasks turns that process into a structured marketplace workflow.
Instead of sending an informal message to someone in Nigeria, customers can create a task around a defined requirement.
Examples include:
The platform can then match the task with relevant providers.
YBLocal demonstrates how a directory can evolve into a multi-sided marketplace.
Customers gain a structured way to find and engage businesses.
Businesses gain another channel for customer acquisition.
Service interactions can progress from discovery into quotes, bookings and protected transactions.
And diaspora customers can use the same ecosystem to coordinate work on the ground in Nigeria from abroad.
The result is a platform designed around the full relationship between finding a business and actually getting something done.
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