I have been thinking on this idea for quite a some time now. It would be good to have this idea discussed over here.
The plan is to have the study material for management entrance exams (like CAT/GMAT) made available through some software, both online and offline. If we look at the candidates who take these exams, most of them come from the IT background and spend most of their time in front of computers. These candidates are always on lookout online for something to study . But they need to wade through the clutter of websites to reach the properly aligned study material. Other thing is even if the material is found online its really not put up in an user-friendly manner. They just get to read the problems and their answers. And for the candidates of GMAT having the study material on computers is very important thing as the exam that they finally take is on a computer.
For the success of this idea I think we need a few things mentioned below
1. Good study material in soft format
2. A software that is user-friendly, intuitive and can give the feeling of a virtual class-room. (e.g. a facility like scratch pad)
3. Pricing strategy that attracts most of the IT professional to go for the service.
I would be grateful to hear your suggestions, advices and doubts.
Suhas
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During the dot.com boom aka 1999-2001 egurucool.com worked on what you are talking about here. As far as I can recall
1) Internet access cost was too high in those days,
2) Not many students had access to computers,
3) Students didn’t look at Egurucool’s Online CAT Kit as a substitute for their coaching classes, not even an add-on.
I worked there as a student ambassador responsible for selling their kits at colleges and make some commission. As far as I can recalled we struggled. Later they changed their strategy and tried to hook on with local tution center. I think even that didn’t work.
One Mr. Vivek was the CEO, many of the management guys were from NIIT as far as I can recall. And I think they were really smart.
They say every idea has it’s time.
Its been sometime since I prepared for CAT but some perspectives – most people I know appreciated the coaching classes for the interaction opportunity that was available…. you learnt a lot of tricks by watching your peers…. testing might be a good option and all the offline guys post the results online. TIME, IMS etc give you an option of just taking tests each sunday and comparing scores….. so the online version will need to be very cost effective or build a mass which can give a good idea of the countrywide standing for a candidate….. This might involve a viral campaign which will allow you to build the mass of users very quickly. The message board needs to be built in a way that can generate interaction and allow users to get the benefit of actual classroom interaction.
Also, this cannot be a one time activity, every year once the CAT sunday is done, u need to start immediately to get a new set of users….. which means your setup needs to be very strong in getting these students before they reach out elsewhere.
Also, remember , Economic times may bandy out numbers like 3 lakh test takers but my experience has been about half of them are there just out of curiosity or for peer acceptance ( I am also preparing for CAT syndrome) – the actual serious guys are lot less…. the IT crowd will be lesser. Careful with your business model calculations.
For GMAT, there is enough material available for free, scattered across multiple sites which is more than any candidate will ever study for GMAT. Not sure about CAT since I never gave it. But I agree with Deepak , what I missed the most ( and ended up paying money for , to an online testing service) was a good enough test website. Would IT guys pay for online tests? I think they would provided you get the pricing right and content superior to other such services. The problem with the competitive coaching/testing landscape in India is that there is hardly any company which has good reputation in more than one type of tests. CL,IMS – CAT, FIITJEE,BRILLIANT- IIT-JEE,Aakash-PMT and so on. None of these companies have been able to create outstanding content and brand recall for more than one-two type of tests. Can an online testing service do it? Probably , but you would need content experts and advertising warchest ( You should see the amount of money these folks spend on ads).
I urge you not to look at this as a “software challenge”. The challenge in running the portal that you have in mind is from an operations point of view.
How do you manage content? What are the legal issues? Can you just copy and paste questions from text-books/other sites or do you need to make all originial questions? Do you have a team who would keep this content “relevant and lively”? A team who would classify the content (in case of questions) as difficult,easy,etc and whether they are meant for CAT or GMAT or whatever else.
If you think you can sort these issues out, then the next challenge would be for you to advertise this to reach the masses. Like Deepak pointed out, a tie-up with a Sify or Reliance Web may help. Check out education.indiatimes.com and see if you can work out a tie up with them.
And if you need a software product to handle the stuff (after you sorted out your other operational issues), you can email me back. 🙂
~raghu
Suhas – Few comments
1.) GMAT – My opinion is well organized. You get prep material both online and offline, even pirated online material for GMAT is in plenty. Check out Nehru Place in Delhi and I am sure for similar markets in other metros.
2) CAT – Offline is available in plenty. Online there can be a scope. However; two questions need to be worked
— How big is the market for CAT. Around 3 lakhs students appear for CAT every year
— Why offline players didn’t venture into online space – probably threat of piracy and loosing out IP. You’ll face the same issue if it exist
I buy the idea of Deepak. There is a play for india level benchmarking tests in some of the competitive testing areas.
-Mukul