South Africa, Aug. 11 -- That is one of the lessons Refilwe Xaba has learnt while building Glolooks, the African hair care brand she started after struggling to find affordable, plant-based products gentle enough for children and adults with sensitive, eczema-prone skin.

What began as a very personal problem has since become a bigger exercise in brand building: getting the packaging right for a retail environment, understanding what customers actually want, using social media as more than an awareness channel, and learning when a founder needs to stop doing everything herself and start building the business around her.

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For Xaba, that evolution has meant moving beyond the question of whet...