Local Business Discovery Platform Design for Rwanda
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Direct Rwanda - Local Business Discovery Platform / Product Design / Rwanda
Hero
The homepage for Rwanda's first local business discovery platform. Personalised to the user from the first screen. Type what you are looking for and the platform finds it.
Discovery
542 clothing businesses, filterable by category, rating, distance, and opening hours. Grid view, list view, map view. Every piece of information a user needs to make a decision before they leave the house.
User Dashboard
The user dashboard. Recently viewed businesses, saved listings, and reviews all in one place. The platform remembers what the user has been looking at so they never have to start from scratch.
Direct Rwanda — Local Business Discovery Platform
PROJECT OVERVIEW
About the Client
Direct Rwanda is a local business discovery platform for Rwanda, where customers have no reliable way to find nearby businesses and no rating or review infrastructure exists for local operators. Businesses lack digital visibility and tools to manage their presence. Direct Rwanda solves both sides of that problem. Founded by Anu, a Product Manager at Yamify, based in Kigali.
Goal
Build the first structured local discovery platform for Rwanda — covering consumer discovery, AI-powered filtering, a verified review system, and a full business management layer for owners.
Challenges
Global platforms like Google Maps and Yelp have partial coverage at best. The businesses that appear often have outdated information, no reviews, and no way for owners to manage their presence. A discovery platform designed for a low-review-volume market at launch needs to compensate with higher quality per review and a simpler onboarding for business owners than a mature SaaS product would assume.
Solution
Blueprint benchmarked Yelp as the primary global reference, studied how it operates across different countries, and designed for the specific Rwandan context. The full platform was designed in eight weeks across four interconnected layers: consumer discovery, AI-powered filters, reviews and ratings, and a business presence and management layer.
Deliverables
Consumer discovery experience
AI-powered filter and search design
Reviews and ratings system
Business presence layer
Business management dashboard
Full design system
Outcomes
Full platform designed in 8 weeks
4 interconnected layers designed — consumer and business-facing
First structured local discovery platform designed for Rwanda
Blueprint scope: Full product design, UX strategy, platform architecture
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Posted May 26, 2026
Designed a local business discovery platform for Rwanda in 8 weeks.
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