Buy Test Series is an e-commerce portal for sale and purchase of test series for various competitive exams like GRE, GMAT, CAT, Bank PO, CS, CA-CPT and many more. Buy Test Series allows you to search a test series, purchase a test series, compare and review coaching classes and attempt test series online. It's a product of Talentick IT Solutions, a Pune startup started by Shirish Bhatt, Himanshu Jain and Gaurav Golwalkar. They hit upon the idea of Buy Test Series in 2014 when they realized that there was no product to streamline the placement process for rural students.
The name Talentic comes from what the startup does, testing the talent of talented students. The founders left their comfortable corporate jobs and 7 figure salaries to work on something of their own and help the community at large. "Our savings initially helped us bootstrap the company but we ran short of funds soon," says Shirish. They have been in the top 8% of NASSCOM's 10k start up initiative.
[caption id="attachment_94531" align="aligncenter" width="700"]
Team Pic (L-R) - Rameshwar Kakade, Pravin Gadge, Gaurav Golwalkar, Aarif Desai, Shirish Bhatt[/caption]"On the face of it, we may seem similar to Flipkart or Snapdeal but when we did a SWOT (of our competition) we figured out we were better (even we were surprised). To begin with, we have a very direct connect with our end customers - i.e. students. We give lectures in colleges, guide them and people know who we are - we talk with them and know what their concerns are and address them," says Himanshu. Their online presence is aided by a very strong physical connect. They also have marketing folks visiting Coaching Classes and talking with them regularly. “This is a market segment that has heard a lot about internet but quite a few of them have used it. May sound unrealistic but that's the first challenge we have to work with and that's where our partnership begins," adds Gaurav.
We asked them about their journey and they said, "It has been a roller coaster. It began with trying to convince people to come on board initially - then it moved onto setting up processes and systems. Different customers had different issues and above all, our reps on phone did not have an idea of the reply. So we even had to streamline that. It took sometime till we figured out ourselves of the issues that could come up."
The platform is capable of taking on board all types of test providers. Right from engineering courses to exams for CA CPT. They partner regularly with test providers to host test series for them and even foraying into partnering with course providers. This 14 member team based out of Pune. They offer discounted prices on online test series and also offers free mock test series from various test providers.
They aim to be the largest platform for test series in India. By the end of this month, they will also be adding features like Admissions. "No competitor is offering such a service, making us a niche player. We are fulfilling a need with a value added proposition which benefits students," says Shirish. They are currently based out of Maharashtra. “Our prime focus in the coming months is to capture the western region followed by rest of India. Rate of expansion will be driven primarily by inflow," adds Himanshu.
As a message for future entrepreneurs, Gaurav say, "It's a tough road and a humbling experience - you have extreme lows and majestic highs. This road is not for the fainthearted. But at the end of the day, job satisfaction is guaranteed." Shirish added, "A technically great product but a functionally unhelpful product does not help at all. Other way round works like knife through butter. Make sure you remember this while making a product."
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