Smart investment, smart returns

Boasting of its vast range of specialties like low investment, CBSE approved product line, high margin sharing and area wise exclusivity, Smart School Education, an e-learning company is looking forward to become the largest e-learning company catering to K -12 segment. In a dialogue with Ekta Verma, Saurabh Bhardwaj, Director, Support and operations, talks about his brand’s growth plans.

Tell us something about Smart School. How did you develop the brand as a leading eLearning Company? How does it offer a smarter way to study?

We are an e-Learning company, primarily catering to K-12 segment. Developing as a K-12 brand was a gradual process from promoting ourselves from selling just NCERT solved solutions of a particular class, now to selling a huge basket of K-12 products right from standard k to 12. We have over 50,000 modules, comprising of animated modules, quizzes, key-points and NCERT solved problems and NCERT books. All these modules are strictly mapped to school curriculum, hence relevant to any school going student. Studying through animated modules helps in better visualisation and retention; as a result the student is able to remember the concept much better and is able to retain it for a longer period of time. This style of learning has been scientifically proven to be much better than the usual text based form of learning. Hence, it becomes a smarter and effective form of learning.

How did you land up taking the franchise road for your brand?

Our products are designed for school, coaching institutes and students; hence we are selling a product with mass acceptance and huge target audience. For catering that huge audience, the franchise way is always the natural choice. We strongly believe that our product USPs along with our robust support and training provides a favorable business opportunity for any entrepreneur, who is willing to start a business in K-12 education.

What kind of training is offered by you to the franchisees?

We have an extensive in-office training or online training for the franchisee. In the training, every possible detail of the product is explained along with complete sales training. Every franchise seeker is screened before he/she is inducted in our system, and is given a go-ahead only after he/she successfully undergoes the training process. A dedicated support manager along with a sales person is allocated to every franchisee, so that every possible hand holding can take place in the initial period of business.

What ensures a good future for prospective franchisees in the sector?

Apart from being recession proof, education sector is one of the largest sectors in terms of market size and people involved. India has over 30 crore K-12 students, which in turn can be our target audience. Since, this concept is new and very few companies are into it, we have a huge advantage in terms of first mover to capture the market.

How do you select a franchisee? What qualities should he possess to be your partner?

Since the franchise investment is not very high and the product is very attractive, many people look for our franchise, however we have a very stringent screening process for appointing the franchisee.  We are looking for energetic entrepreneurs, who share our vision for education. We are looking for people, who can work passionately with us towards our shared goals.

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