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Saturday Startup Review I - Bandhan.com
(2 votes, average: 3 out of 5)
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Well this saturday we have two startups to review. Both from the web space but looking at very diverse audiences. So we have divided our reviews in two parts. Lets look at the first startup.
One Sentence Description: Vertical Search Engine focussed on Matrimony
About the startup: This a pune based startup and is owned by a company by the name of Discrete Technologies.
About the founder: Shashikant Kore is the founder who is an ex IITian from Kanpur and was earlier the Principal Software Engineer at Webaroo.
WAT’s HOT: Well its the approach thats hot! The best part about the site is that it reflects the search engine look. The reason I say this is because this isn’t the first matrimony search engine we are reviewing. We have reviewed Sapne.com but one look at sapne and one look at bandhan and you know that bandhan is way more serious about being a ‘real’ search engine for matrimony.
Also Matrimony is a fast growing space and even in the downturn it is likely to be one space that remains unaffected as far as the online classified space is concerned. The reason? Well people dont stop getting married in India! or around the world as a matter of fact.
On the search front Bandhan does a phenomenal job with the volume of results that have been indexed. It does seem that the relevant matrimony sites were contacted and proper tie up has been established to form this kind of data. Also the refine search option on the left is amazing for users to filter their search results.
WAT’s NOT: Well a few things that are challenging for a platform like bandhan is the relevancy of search results that show up on the first page. Google which is in general search ranks pages according to profiles. It would be great if the profiles are listed according to their last visit to the original matrimony site (which means that the users are active). Im not sure this is how Bandhan is currently listing its profiles.
Also the revenue model is big question mark if you ask me. The only two models i see is advertising and maybe matrimony sites paying to be listed but that will kick in only when it gets sizable traction. The other possible model could be that matrimony sites pay them for each paid user that is created due to a redirect from their search engine but again thats dependant upon the negotiation with the matrimony guys.
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Rajiv,
Thanks for writing about Bandhan! We are glad you liked our service. We will address your feedback on relevancy of results.
A correction: The other co-founder of the company is Sachin Doshi (IIT Madras and DE Shaw.)
–shashi
Co-founder,
Discrete Log Technologies, Pune