IIPM Admission Detail SANJEEV BIKHCHANDANI, MD & CEO, INFO EDGE (INDIA) LTD.
naukri.com has been the cash cow for Info Edge (India) Ltd. Here is the man who began it all, talking what his prime focus and targets are, pan-sectors, pan-globe!How has been the journey of Info Edge since inception?
The journey has been wonderful. It had witnessed its own ups and downs. We have a very successful job and matrimony business and we are in the process of creating one in the real estate also. Even our gulf operations are also doing well. Thus, overall we are satisfied with the growth of the business.
Has the global economic slowdown affected your online portals business? Yes it has affected us, as in this quarter we grew at just 24% compared to a fantastic 60% in the same quarter a year ago. So undoubtedly, the slowdown has affected us. But a major reason behind this fall in growth was a negative externality. It was because of the slump in hiring due to global economic slowdown.
Out of all the portals which one is the most profitable one and why? The largest in terms of revenue is naukri.com, followed by Jeevansathi.com. But undoubtedly, naukri.com is the most profitable one. Although in Q2 of this financial year we saw a slump in growth, but the overall profitability of the portal has remained high. And as I mentioned about the major reason behind this drop in growth, it is all to blame on the discouraging yet true global turmoil. The reason for naukri.com being the cash cow is that we have the first mover advantage till date.
What are the challenges that you face in your business of online portals? There are a lot of challenges and the recent one is the maintenance of strong growth amid the present slowdown. Moreover, managing your employees and curtailing expenditures are the other challenges. As we presently have a total of nine businesses, maintaining all their health is a challenge.
What’s your take on the competition in the industry? You see, we expect that our competition will be more affected by the slowdown than us. Thus we expect that we would come out strongest from the slowdown in every manner.
How much revenue is earned from advertising? Much advertising comes from job related sites and things. Non-job related sites contribute only 3%-4% of our total revenues. Which are your main target market cities in India, and what are the factors that you consider before moving to a city? Our main target markets are Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Pune, but we also have presence in Tier I and Tier II cities. But before moving to a new city, we look at the local market and consider factors such as internet penetration and the web traffic.
How do you plan to market your portals in India? For different portals, different marketing strategies are followed by us. Like for instance, for naukri.com, we sponsor HR events and do direct marketing. For Jeevansathi.com, we do a lot of advertising including online and television advertising along with telemarketing. However for Shiksha.com, we don’t do much of telemarketing but do online and sales force marketing.
How has the real estate slowdown impacted you? It’s in our interest. Builders need buyers and we are the most efficient way of bringing buyers to builders, and therefore we are used a lot more. So it has affected us adversly.
Do you have any major tie-up at the moment? Yes, we do have some tie-ups with media publications in the job space. However given a choice we prefer to operate alone.
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Source :
IIPM Editorial, 2008
An Initiative of
IIPM,
Malay Chaudhuri and
Arindam chaudhuri (
Renowned Management Guru and
Economist).
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