India or should we say India aspiring to become Digital India is changing and so are the citizens of this country. Be it an urban Indian (living in Tier-1/Tier-2 city) or a rural Indian (living in the villages), one thing that has changed the lives of millions of Indians is The Internet.
According a NASSCOM report titled ‘The Future of India*’ launched in association with Akamai Technologies, India’s Internet user base is the second largest after China. As per the report, India is expected to have around 730 million Internet users by the year 2020 (up from 230 million in 2016). Globally, the number of Internet users is expected to touch 4170 million by 2020. Internet has created a massive impact across all the sectors and it has changed the way we work and interact socially with our friends! [*Source]
Increasing mobile penetration, reduction in data rates, introduction of 4G etc. are expected to develop this market further! Along with the changing habits of the consumers, it became critical for brands to change the way they interact with their customers. Gone are the days when brands could blast a TVC and expect better engagement (and ROI). Brands have become more conscious about their ad-spends and increasing internet penetration has enabled many of them to capitalise on the growth of Digital Marketing & Social Media Marketing. When was the last time, you purchased a product by watching the TVC (without doing a thorough online review) 🙂 The evident NO answers why Digital is such a crucial medium!
Off late, this sector has attracted large investments and there is a sky-rocketing growth in the field of Digital Marketing & Social Media Marketing. In fact, Digital is the new Mainstream communication & engagement medium!! Engagement, Social Reach and Visitor Growth Rate are the key social media metrics tracked by social media savvy brands these days.
The massive growth in the Digital Marketing sector has not only attracted investments but has also led to rise of entrepreneurs who have ventured in digital marketing sector. Months before 1st July, 2015 when PM Mr. Narendra Modi set the foundation of Digital India, two common lads (Vikalp Kumar and Gaurav Sharma) from modest backgrounds residing in non-metropolitan cities were bitten by the Entrepreneurship Bug. They foresaw the upcoming boom that was to happen in the country on Digital Front and so RippleDME was founded!
For Vikalp & Gaurav, there were tons of challenges lying ahead, with new agencies mushrooming in the metros, having a market foot-hold among the giants of the game was a task. To provide cost effective digital marketing solutions seemed a distant dream when even breaking even looked like a farfetched goal. However, entrepreneurs never give up and they looked for strength within.
RippledMe : Humble Beginning
They set up RippledMe’s pilot office in their hometown in Allahabad the first of its kind, at a time when people didn’t even have any clue about digital marketing. Getting the right people to work for them was a herculean task. But they believed and they trained those people, developed the required skills in them and polished their talent till it was up to the mark for the job in hand.
RippledMe : Up-hill task of Ob-boarding
Though getting like-minded people on-board, training them & involving them in the eco-system was a tough task, they had a tougher task at hands. In order to sustain and grow their business they required Clients. They had to first sell their vision to on-board employees and now they had to repeat that task to signing up new Clients.
Clients in the metros wouldn’t believe that a new agency, with the team size in single digits and no prior experience could deliver, that too when the agency wasn’t even located in their city. So the RippledMe team took a bottom-up approach in their execution. Providing services to small business and startups with meagre budgets and yet they delivered, against all the odds around them and all the inexperience around them. Slowly, with time a corner turned. They associated with a startup with initial level of VC funding. With some money in the kitty, they were able to put the client on the map and even beat some of the established players with bigger budgets.
RippledMe : Perseverance pays off, ENDOCON2016 milestone
With experience, a lucrative portfolio and positive references, they started to climb up the ladder and latched on to bigger projects. With time, the clients realized that distance wouldn’t be a factor as far as spotless delivery and honest consultation is concerned. With bigger projects, came the opportunity to set industry benchmarks.
One such benchmark was ENDOCON2016. A top rated, annual, medical conference of Gastroenterologists. Usually there isn’t much noise about such events but RippledMe added the needed bling to it and gave it an online viewership of over 1 million. The first time any medical conference, held on Indian soil, was able to achieve that number [Source]
Along the way they accomplished distinguished tasks such as getting 5000 registered app for a client through integrated Offline and Online activities with CPA half of industry average. Also, proving a new business model for a client, right from the start of its marketing and channelising those efforts to transactions, thereby proving the complete working and functioning of a business idea.
With so many achievements in such a short span of time, RippledMe is a story of how average-joe entrepreneur(s) defeated all odds to create a brand in RippledMe. We caught up with Vikalp Kumar, Co-founder of RippledMe to share his insightful story to our readers. Let’s have a chat with him about RippledMe, their foray into Digital, future plans etc.
Q. How did you come up with idea of RippledMe ?
A. We realized that internet penetration in India stands at around 10%. With the oncoming of the entrepreneur boom, there are new businesses, ventures, prospects, etc grooming up across the whole landscape of India. Marketing is an expensive thing. It can’t be expected that each of these new ventures would have sufficient funds to undertake high-end marketing measures like TV ads, or Radio Ads or Print Ads.
Digital Marketing is the cheapest and the most effective way of marketing as it allows you to reach a very targeted audience and you can measure results for every penny you spent. The entrepreneur generation is teach savvy and digitally educated, hence to make them understand its benefits is easier and it also suits well to their budgets providing instant returns, which is basically the dream for any new business venture.
Q. Brief us about yourself and other founders ?
A. Company is founded by Vikalp Kumar and Gaurav Sharma. Both engineering graduates and classmates till their final day of education. After college, both went separate ways. Vikalp set up a new venture in software development. Gaurav turned towards job in mechanical sector. Both had their own mind sets at the time. Vikalp wanted a better market understanding, so according to him, the best way to do that was by being in the market.
Gaurav on the other hand wanted to learn more about actual work flow in industry. After about 18 months, with different experiences under their belly, they teamed up again for a new venture, bringing their unpolished expertise and little experience in a joint team effort. Vikalp having been in business knew better what mistakes to avoid for the new venture and the way forward. Gaurav having been in service knew how to manage the operations and build a composite, self-sustaining teams.
Q. What has RippledMe set out to become ?
A. We want to be the go to name for Digital Marketing In India.
Q. Have you received any institutional funding ?
A. The company is bootstrapped. No outside investment or bank loan has been availed. We might look into external funding at later point in time. Our priority is growth, growth & growth 🙂
Q. How has been the overall response to RippledMe
A. The response has been encouraging. We believe that if we provide exceptional service, our clients will become our promoters and advertisers themselves. They’ll recommend us to others and word-of-mouth, no matter how small, but is still the most influential and believable source of marketing. Google employed it, so did One Plus One.
We are trying to be on the similar guidelines. First year was tough but no business is easy from the word go. We streamlined our processes, eradicated bottlenecks, trained unpolished talents and now are more hungry than ever.
Q. Can you guide our readers to some good resources on Online Marketing, Social Media?
Well, there is tons of information available freely on the internet. We, at RippledMe have an up-to-date blog on Social Media, Mobile Advertising, Online Marketing etc. They can refer & subscribe to RippledMe Blog here
Q. What is future road-map of RippledMe
A. With base built on new ventures, businesses and medium scaled prospects, we want to reach out to the already established brands and show it to them how they are being conned by digital marketing big shots.
Also, we want to develop a bigger base of trained talent pool. People who are apt in creative designing, eye-popping campaigns, analytics, research, communications etc. For this we plan to start short digital marketing courses in tier II and tier III cities so that youth can take advantage of this boom and can make Digital India a reality.
Q. Your thoughts on Digital India, Startup India and other initiatives taken by the government?
A. To keep it very simple, these are the best initiatives announced by the government. Driving License, PAN Card and other documents can now be safely stored on the DigiLocker Cloud. Startup India is an excellent initiative by PM Modi to boost entrepreneurship in India since entrepreneurs are the one’s that would shape India’s future 🙂
RippledMe’s story is indeed a story of Blood, Sweat & Perseverance which is what startup is all about !! If you are a startup looking for Digital Marketing services, do have a look at RippledMe a shot.
If you have any questions about RippledMe or have any questions for Vikalp, please leave them in the comments section…