![Cover of «Sabrina Castelli, Mujer Financiera | From SMB to Startup, and Financial Education for 500,000 Women [Ep. 78]»](/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Sabrina-Castelli-Mujer-Financiera-2.png)
The audio and video are in Spanish. These notes are a translation.
It is no secret that we Latin Americans lack financial education. It is very hard to learn finance in a context as theoretical as school or university. Today we spoke with Sabrina Castelli, CEO and cofounder of Mujer Financiera, an education platform that empowers the finances of women in Latin America.
To date, Mujer Financiera has had more than 100 thousand female students in the region, it has become a community with more than 500 thousand women, and it has raised more than 750 thousand dollars from investors such as Amplifica Capital, MGV Capital, Myelin VC, and 500 Startups.
Youtube Timestamps*
[1:12] - Financial Education for Women
- How did Sabrina arrive at the fascinating world of startups?
- How does Sabrina understand the problem of financial education, and why is it particularly important for women?
- Why does Sabrina believe that universities have not taken the role of financial education seriously?
- To what extent is Sabrina serving an existing need, or is she creating and educating the market?
- What role has the creation of content on social media played for Mujer Financiera?
- To what point does Sabrina play an “influencer” role in the value proposition of Mujer Financiera?
- How does Sabrina decide when she should get involved in communication at Mujer Financiera?
- Taking into account that the world of Venture Capital is predominantly male, what difficulties did Sabrina have in communicating the relevance of Mujer Financiera’s problem and, in that way, managing to raise capital?
[16:35] - Transition from SME to Startup
- How was Mujer Financiera born, what was its MVP, and how did Sabrina make the decision to quit your job in order to dedicate herself 100% to her startup?
- How did Sabrina change her mindset in order to go from an SME to a Startup?
- What did the plan consist of, and what lessons did Sabrina gain from the process of looking for a cofounder?
- For Sabrina, what was the hardest part of “entering” the startup world, and what strategies did she apply to build her network of contacts?
- Taking into account that Sabrina is a very methodical person in everything she does, how did she develop that skill?
[33:50] - Subscription Business Model
- What led Sabrina to choose a subscription business model over the individual sale of courses?
- How did Sabrina change her conception of her product when moving from selling individual courses to an educational subscription?
- What challenges did Mujer Financiera face when implementing a subscription model, and how has its customer retention evolved since then?
- What is Mujer Financiera’s vision for the future?
[45:25] - Tweet Round
- Book recommended by Sabrina
- Changes Sabrina would like to see in the startup ecosystem of Latin America
- Founder that Sabrina recommends interviewing
Episode Mentions
You can find Sabrina on LinkedIn, Instagram and Twitter
Recommended book: Zero to One by Piter Thiel and No Hay Vuelta Atrás by Melinda Gates
Founder to interview: Andrea Campos of Yana (listen to the episode with Andrea here)
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Follow Enzo Cavalie on X: @enzocavalie.