While development practitioners obsess over access to capital and business training, groundbreaking research from The Gambia reveals something far more powerful: how platforms like Facebook and WhatsApp connect women entrepreneurs and actually amplify the strength of their relationships in ways that transform businesses.
The concept is called “tie-strength amplification,” and it’s reshaping how we should approach digital development programming. Let me explain why this matters for your work.
The Network Effect We’ve Been Ignoring
Traditional social capital theory tells us that entrepreneurs need both strong ties (family, close friends) and weak ties (acquaintances, online followers). Strong ties provide emotional support and startup capital. Weak ties offer market access and novel opportunities. Simple enough, right?
Wrong. New research from Gambian women entrepreneurs reveals these aren’t separate buckets—they’re interconnected systems that digital platforms amplify exponentially.
When a fashion entrepreneur posts on Facebook, her sister’s encouraging comment doesn’t just provide emotional support; it becomes visible social proof that attracts new customers. When strangers share her content, they’re not just weak ties facilitating market expansion; they’re strengthening her family’s confidence in her business.
According to recent data, 75% of female entrepreneurs rely on mobile phones for business operations, with 45% using social media for direct sales. But these statistics miss the deeper story about how digital platforms transform the very nature of social relationships that drive entrepreneurial success.
How Amplification Actually Works
Here’s what tie-strength amplification looks like in practice.
A Gambian catering entrepreneur explained to researchers: “People comment and share my work; those likes build my confidence and attract new clients.” Notice what’s happening here—the same digital interaction simultaneously reinforces emotional support from existing relationships while generating new business opportunities.
This is about more than reach or better marketing. A cosmetics entrepreneur noted: “We built trust through consistent posts and responding quickly to questions. People see we are serious. They do not always need to walk in, Facebook is enough.”
Digital platforms are creating new forms of business legitimacy that substitute for formal institutional recognition. Critical in contexts where women face systemic barriers to accessing traditional business credentials.
Recent field experiments in Ghana demonstrate this power. Women entrepreneurs who gained access to WhatsApp networking groups were 33-36% more likely to introduce business innovations and showed significant improvements in marketing and financial planning practices.
The $15 Billion Opportunity
The scale of this phenomenon is staggering. Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest percentage of women entrepreneurs globally, with 25.9% of the female adult population—one in four women—starting or managing a business. Closing gender gaps in e-commerce alone could add nearly $15 billion to Africa’s digital economy between 2025-2030.
But here’s the critical insight: WhatsApp is currently one of the most popular social media platforms in Africa, yet most development programs treat it as just another communication tool. In Zimbabwe, WhatsApp accounts for about half of all internet data usage.
We’re sitting on a massive infrastructure for tie-strength amplification and barely scratching its potential.
What This Means for Development Practice
First, stop treating social media as a marketing add-on to entrepreneurship programs.
One entrepreneur told researchers: “100% of my sales come from Facebook—without it, I wouldn’t exist.” Digital platforms aren’t auxiliary tools; they’re core infrastructure for how modern entrepreneurs build and maintain the relationships that drive business success.
Second, redesign network-building interventions around amplification rather than simple connection.
The U.S. government’s Academy for Women Entrepreneurs recently brought together over 100 alumnae from Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and Zambia for WhatsApp-focused business training. Smart initiatives like this recognize that teaching women to leverage digital platforms for both emotional support and market expansion creates multiplier effects.
Third, measure what matters.
Traditional business training evaluates revenue growth and job creation. Tie-strength amplification suggests we should also track relationship quality, network expansion, and digital legitimacy indicators. Research shows that women entrepreneurs reduced collaborations with friends and family, choosing instead to work with business network members found through digital platforms.
The Practical Playbook
Start with WhatsApp Business training that goes beyond basic features.
Teach women how to use group functions for peer support, status updates for legitimacy building, and customer interaction features for relationship maintenance. As one entrepreneur discovered after losing control of her WhatsApp group to a hijacker, proper account management is crucial for protecting the networks that drive business success.
Create structured networking opportunities that blend online and offline interaction.
The Ghana experiment’s most successful approach paired women in small WhatsApp groups of eight entrepreneurs each, with weekly virtual meetings that strengthened both emotional support and business collaboration.
Integrate digital storytelling into all entrepreneurship programming.
Women entrepreneurs need to learn how to curate their online presence not just for marketing, but for building the kind of digital legitimacy that compensates for formal institutional barriers. A textile entrepreneur explained: “Without a physical store, my Facebook page is my shopfront; when people see regular posts and positive reviews, they feel confident buying from me.”
Beyond the Hype
I’m not suggesting digital platforms solve all barriers facing women entrepreneurs.
Recent African Development Bank research shows 87% of women entrepreneurs’ associations lack basic financial management skills. Infrastructure challenges persist. As one fashion entrepreneur noted: “We do not have constant electricity. So, we invested in solar to keep things running.”
But tie-strength amplification offers a framework for maximizing impact within existing constraints. While we work on systemic issues like access to capital and legal reform, we can immediately help women entrepreneurs leverage the digital infrastructure they already use to strengthen the relationships that drive business success.
The truth is more complex than our traditional approaches acknowledge.
Women entrepreneurs aren’t just network-constrained individuals who need more connections. They’re sophisticated relationship managers who can amplify social capital through strategic use of digital platforms—if we give them the right tools and training.
The research from The Gambia offers a roadmap. The question is whether development practitioners will embrace tie-strength amplification as the game-changing strategy it represents, or continue treating social media as an afterthought in entrepreneurship programming.
Women in Africa contribute around 13% of the continent’s total GDP and reinvest up to 90% of their income in family and community development. By understanding and supporting tie-strength amplification, we can unlock exponentially greater impact from our entrepreneurship investments.
The platforms are already there. The entrepreneurs are already using them. The question is whether we’re ready to catch up.
