Today, I had the opportunity to interview a young Nigerian Publisher via zoom, Mr. Ajayi Olubiyi, who is based in Nigeria has influenced the publishing industry globally despite his late entry in that field. Below is the conversation that we had:
Princess: Hello Sir, Good morning. How are you?
Can you kindly tell our readers/listeners who you are?
Ajayi: I am Ajayi Olubiyi, the Executive Director of Commune Writers International that is one of the foremost online writing and publishing platform for writers and authors. I am a reader, a writer and I love making an impact in the publishing industry. Thank you very much.
Princess: Thank you very much Sir. So we then plunged into the interview.
Princess: How would you describe your childhood?
Ajayi: My childhood, I would say was fascinating, it actually paved the way to what I am today. My childhood was… Although there were lots of challenges, it actually laid a good foundation for the career I am on to, that is the writing and publishing platform I am on to at the moment. But I would say that my childhood was great, filled with exciting memories and all.
Princess: How did your career journey all begin? What motivated you to launch into the publishing sector?
Ajayi: Yes! Yes exactly. My childhood has always…. Due to the fact that I have been a writer from day one. The challenges I came across was the fact that….because I wrote my first book at the age of fourteen but I could not get it published, due to the fact that there were no self-publishing companies at that time. So I was kind of restricted because I could not find such publishing companies that were affordable enough to publish my books, I had written over hundred write-ups and articles but there were no platform to showcase my talent. So these were the challenges I went through in my childhood which I had to overcome by starting Commune Writers International to help writers and prospective authors to make it easy in their publishing and writing endevours.
Princess: Can you tell us the Services Commune Writers offers to its customers?
Ajayi: Okay, Commune Writers offers writing services, publishing, author branding, search engine optimization for writers and authors. We are actually exploring into much more services, but at the moment we are helping writers, connecting authors to a much bigger audience than we ever have.
Princess: Have you encounter any obstacles so far in this pursuit?
Ajayi: Ahmm, Yes! Yes! Affordability is still part of an obstacle. No matter how affordable we try to make our publishing packages as cheap, there are so many people that would not be able to afford, So I would say it is a challenge on our path because we are always trying to make sure we produce the best quality service at an affordable cost so that at least every one would be able to pertain of this industry, so that everyone who has a book would be able to publish.
Princess: I am sure there have been some success stories; would you like to share some with us?
Ajayi: Yes! Yes! I would say that commune writers now…. we are globally recognized which is a good thing. We’ve received a few awards and recognitions from organizations outside Nigeria. So in as much as …… it is a great achievement to us. We have helped published over hundred writers and since we started Commune Writers, we have helped published over sixteen authors which is a good thing so far. It is an achievement for us.
Princess: Thank you very much. This is with the background you gave about how difficult is it to give an affordable service to people. I just want to follow up with that by asking, how easy it is for African youth to start their own project or businesses in Africa?
Ajayi: Yeh! I would say that due to the fact that there are lots of challenges, there is no business that you would start that you would not encounter challenges in one way or the other. I would say that it is not easy for an African youth to venture into business but I would say that dedication has a lot to do with it. Once you are dedicated, you start small. You should know what you want to make out of it. There would be challenges, but I believe consistency and staying true to what you would want to do as African youth would make you sail through in a ground breaking business.
Princess: What are the keys that inspired your success? If you would want to share to motivate youth who want to venture into their personal project.
Ajayi: The success key to me, I would say hard work. Before starting this work, you need standards, hard work; you need to do a lot of research so that when you start, you actually become an authority also. So I would say hard work, consistency and lastly honesty and transparency. In every service or business, you try to bring these key values. So hard work, consistency and transparency is core for me.
Princess: So do you have any advice for the youth who want to venture into their own business?
Ajayi: Yes! My advice to the youth out there is they should stay true to whatever they want to do because once you have an idea and you write it down, it just continue to be there until you make an effort and start something. To the youth out there, you know what you want to do, start it! Have a set goal for yourself, be dedicated to whatever you want to do because when starting out, you would meet quiet a lot of people who would not believe in your dreams, they won’t believe in what you do, there will be lots of people who would write you off and ask you ‘why you are doing this’ but with dreams, dedication, you would be able to overcome these challenges. So my advice to the youth is that they should stay true to what they want to do. Dream Big, but start small. It is very important.
Princess: Any writer who wants to get in touch with you, can you tell us where aspiring writers can locate you? Is it limited to those in Nigeria or it is a global space for all those who want to publish their book?
Ajayi: Commune Writers is a global enterprise to be, for content writing and book publishing services. We operate and publish books from authors all over the world. We publish articles for free, this is the only platform that publishes articles and write ups for free and would be available to readers all over the world. You can get your articles and write ups to us via our active email address, communewriterspublishing@gmail.com we are also available online, on twitter, instagram, facebook: "@ commune writers" and also for easy navigation, just go on Google and search commune writers. There are lots of our products, services and live presence.
Princess: That is great. So for authors out there who are desperate and do not know where to turn to, Commune writers has opened its arms to you , they would make publishing easy for you. Thank you very much for your time.
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