GreenMango was built to act as the bridge between these two worlds – the offline small business owner and the middle class, online professional.

-Yasmina McCarty, GreenMango.co.in

We think it’s the easiest task to find a plumber, electrician when we face some problem in our kitchen, bathroom, bedroom….but gradually it turns out to be a nail biting task.

It is difficult for a plumber, electrician to get the business…as they don’t have any marketing tool, they have to depend on reference.

“Are you searching for Plumber, Electrician?” The best way is to go out and ask some panwala or general storewala who can refer some good plumber.

These were some of the initial thoughts Nandini P. Narula and M. Yasmina McCarty, Founder of GreenMango, which offers the largest database of small, informal service providers in India. GreenMango is the online platform which connects small, informal businesses with their local customers.  Now you can search for plumber on web J

The idea of GreenMango emerged after Nandini and Yasmina saw a gap between small business owners (like plumbers, tailors, electricians etc) who were struggling to grow their businesses and unable to locate the customers…on the other hand young professionals and middle class households in urban areas face difficulty in finding the basic services they need on a daily basis.

And thus GreenMango has born in February 2008. In last 18 months the company has grown multifold with setups in Hyderabad and Bangalore and total head count of 25. Further the GreenMango concept has been recognized as a business making a social impact with the receipt of the 2007 Cartier Women’s Initiative Asian Laureate and the prestigious Echoing Green Fellowship 2008.

In an exclusive interview with Yasmina, one of the founders of GreenMango shared more information about this concept, the entrepreneurial journey, the future plans and much more.

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Founder (s) detail:

Name: Nandini Narula

Age: 32

Qualification: Nandini is the co-founder of GreenMango and leads the company’s technology development and innovation. Nandini graduated with an MSc degree in Economic Development from the London School of Economics and a B.Sc. in Computer Science from the University of Michigan.

Work experience : Before designing and launching GreenMango, Nandini led the development of a technology-based financial management product for micro-entrepreneurs at Women’s World Banking in collaboration with a social enterprise team at Stanford’s Digital Vision Program. She also created and delivered multilingual workshops and e-learning courses on financial management for microfinance institutions globally. Prior to her time at WWB, Nandini managed web development projects at Fortune 500 companies including Starwood Hotels, AIG, and Avaya coordinating remote development teams based all over the US as well as in India.  She served as an advisor to Kiva.org, a start-up in the online microfinance investment space.

Strength area: Technology development

Name: Yasmina McCarty

Age: 31

Qualification: Yasmina is the co-founder of GreenMango and runs the company’s marketing and operations. Yasmina graduated cum laude from Northwestern University and holds a MBA from Columbia Business School and London Business School.

Work experience: Before creating and launching GreenMango, Yasmina was a Senior Associate at Women’s World Banking where she designed and led the company’s program to apply traditional marketing practices to the nonprofit sector. She conducted customer research, developed marketing strategies and improved customer service with microfinance organizations around the world, including India, Pakistan, Kenya, Colombia, Brazil, Jordan, Mexico and Bosnia and Herzegovina. She has spoken at prestigious industry events, conducted trainings for senior executives and has authored a publication on her work. Yasmina’s first foray in microfinance was with ACCION USA, where she served as an AmeriCorps Volunteer in Service to America (VISTA). Before entering the field of microfinance, she was an Account Manager at a top advertising agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, developing campaigns and corporate brands for clients such as eBay.

Strength area: Marketing

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Website Detail:

Website Name: www.greenmango.co.in

The tag line or punch line of your site: The Trusted Marketplace

Business Launch date: February 2008

Short information about the business : GreenMango brings hard-to-find, valuable local business information to your fingertips. With more than 30,000 small businesses listed on our platform representing more than 50 categories of service businesses such as tailoring, carpentry, electricians, plumbing, photography, etc., GreenMango offers the largest database of small, informal service providers in India.

GreenMango offers 2 key products to customers searching for local service providers:

• Free Access - Customers can search www.greenmango.co.in and/or call the GreenMango local call center to find information local service providers who meet their requirements for free.
• Premium Service Access – Customers can request GreenMango’s end-to-end service to place service providers on jobs and to ensure their jobs requirements are met. Subscription fee applies.

The GreenMango concept has been recognized as a business making a social impact with the receipt of the 2007 Cartier Women’s Initiative Asian Laureate and the prestigious Echoing Green Fellowship 2008.

Target audience: GreenMango addresses the needs of two distinct market segments in India:  1) the low-income service vendor who does not have access to affordable business services, struggles to find new customers, and is not fairly compensated for his/her skills due to lack of market visibility and 2) the middle-to-high income shopper who requires home services like carpenters, plumbers, tailors, mechanics, etc. and is frustrated with the lack of information on local businesses. GreenMango is the bridge between small businesses and their customers

Future/Expansion plans: Over the next couple of years we will continue to expand to the top metros in India, building a national presence for GreenMango. As we continue to grow, our site will also become increasingly interactive, allowing business owners to own their profile pages and truly use them as their virtual storefronts. The possibilities are enormous once have millions of small businesses across India on our platform. There is great potential to be tapped in the future.

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Company Detail:

Company’s Name: GreenMango

Source of funding : Sources of funding included owner’s equity, angel investors and grants

Company Blog  :There is fan page on Facebook-www.facebook.com/greenmango.in

Green Mango is also on Twitter: Greenmango_Hyd

Number of employees: 25

Number of branches: Two – Hyderabad and Bangalore

Phone:+91 40 2330 0338

Office Address:402, Dega Tower, 4^th FloorRaj Bhavan RdSomajiguda Hyderabad, AP 500082 India

Email ID:feedback@greenmango.co.in

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Interview(Q & A Round):

Q: How did you start your business? What made you to think to enter into a business?

Prior to launching GreenMango, we worked together in nearly a dozen countries meeting countless small business owners who were struggling to grow their businesses. These business owners can not afford traditional marketing channels such as advertising, and as a result, are essentially invisible to customers located just a few kilometers away. On the flip side, we saw an increasing number of young professionals and middle class households in urban areas throughout India struggling to find the basic services they need on a daily basis. They are frustrated by how difficult it can be to find a reliable plumber to fix a leaky sink in hurry or a good tailor who can do a quality stitch or a tutor who has good experience in a specific subject matter.

GreenMango was built to act as the bridge between these two worlds – the offline small business owner and the middle class, online professional.  Our multi-access model leverages IT (SMS, internet, phone) and in-person contact to connect the carpenter with his customer, the tailor with her customer, and the bike mechanic with his customer.

Q: Tell us in detail about your business, your idea and how it can benefit others?

Established in early 2008, GreenMango (www.greenmango.co.in) is the largest online platform in India for small, informal businesses to connect with their local customers. How does the plumber living in a slum neighborhood promote his work and find new clients in more affluent neighborhoods? How does a busy professional find a good quality plumber? GreenMango closes the gap between online middle class shoppers and offline low-income service providers.

While addressing a clear market gap, GreenMango is also driven by a strong social mission. GreenMango offers an online marketplace that provides unprecedented access to low-income entrepreneurs in India operating in the informal sector, giving them an affordable and accessible means to advertise their businesses online in order to find new customers.  Our platform offers business information on more than 30,000 low-income businesses in Hyderabad such as plumbers, carpenters, henna designers, tailors, electricians, tutors, mechanics, etc.  Without ever touching a computer, these entrepreneurs can use GreenMango’s unique website to create a business profile and promote their work to the growing middle class of young professionals in Hyderabad and in our new location in Bangalore.  By bringing these small businesses online and giving them the power to market and promote themselves, GreenMango makes real and valuable local business information available to the masses.

Q: What are the important things which differentiate your business from other? What is your USP?

There are four components to the GreenMango model and strategy that make it unique:

• Unique Customer Segment, Unique Database – GreenMango offers information on informal/unregistered businesses rather than the formal/registered businesses offered by most other local search sites.  In fact, the most entrepreneurial segment of any developing country resides in the informal economy, making the GreenMango database vital to any community in India.
• Actionable Information – GreenMango does not just offer data but rather seeks to provide rich actionable information about each business.  In addition to the basic contact details, each listing includes information about services offered, specialty areas, years of experience, business hours, pictures of past work, video commercials, and reviews from past customers.

• Multi-Access Points – GreenMango offers multiple access points (web, phone, SMS and in person) which makes GreenMango accessible to offline and online populations, rich and poor, illiterate and literate.

• Smart Search - Shoppers can search by neighborhood, by business category (plumber), or by a specific service (bore well, pipe fitting, clogged drain, etc.) to find exactly the right business.  Shoppers are also able to review and rate each business that they use.  This gives shoppers a level of information and transparency they have never had before.

Q: What is your revenue or business model?

GreenMango generates revenue through list fees from the small businesses on our platform, online advertising, and through the Premium Services product discussed above.

Q: What are your expansion plans and where do you see your business 5 years down the line?

When we set out to build GreenMango, it was our goal to create an efficient and scalable model that could be quickly and easily rolled out to all of the major metropolitan cities across India and then to other emerging markets, primarily in Southeast Asia. In our first 18 months of operations we have refined our model based on our experiences in Hyderabad and we are now starting to execute on our expansion plan.  With our second office in Bangalore now fully operational we anticipate quickly moving into other Indian cities next year.

Q: What were the biggest challenge(s) you faced in your journey as entrepreneur till now?

Setting up a new business always involves challenges and our experience with GreenMango was no different. Our first challenge was in understanding the real needs of our customers – both the vendors who are listed on our site and the shoppers who come to our site to find these vendors. We have spent the last 1.5 years continually refining our products and services in response to customer feedback in order to make sure that the GreenMango platform provides value to anyone who uses it. We are very happy with what we have achieved and customer demand for our services indicates that we are, in fact, serving their needs in a meaningful way.

Q: What you want to say to the new entrepreneurs or the one who wants to start his/her own business?

We hope more young professionals in India take the risk and jump into an entrepreneurial venture.  It is absolutely the greatest learning experience you could ever have – no matter whether the business fails or succeeds. Of course, it is risky and it is hard to give up a stable, comfortable salary and take on something of your own where nothing is guaranteed. But if you are passionate about creating something of your own, about building a business from the ground up…and if you are willing to face the obstacles and challenges that inevitably come with being an entrepreneur, then it’s definitely a risk worth taking.

Q: Who is your business idol and why?

Our idols are the small business owners on our site. They are hard-working, business savvy, and incredibly resourceful. Against all odds, they find ways to leverage their limited resources in order to grow their businesses and support their families.

Q: What’s your ultimate business and life goal?

To build a successful business that generates both financial and social returns to its clients and investors.

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