Blogs

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A degree in business from Kingston University, London, a stint in consulting as well as in VC-backed startups were not enough to satisfy Guneet Chadha’s hunger to learn. His drive for constant learning led him to UpGrad’s Product Management Program, enabling him to discover his true calling. With a degree in business from London’s prestigious Kingston University, Guneet was well on his way to a bright career in traditional business and had joined one of the big 4 consulting firms, in an entry-level managerial role. He then moved on to working in some startups, where his roles were primarily data-driven. However, his drive for continuous learning and getting ahead in his career did not let him settle at that. There came a time when Guneet felt the need to acquire skills that could not be replaced by automation. His desire was to learn about all the new things in the market today, specifically the changes that emerging technologies are bringing about. He also wanted to bring his managerial skills to the table, as he thought that would give him a professional edge. Youtube video to watch! Guneet researched roles that are a blend of technology and management and that’s when he came across Product Management as a career choice – it seemed perfect for him. The most traditional route to Product Management, especially in the Indian context, is to consider an MBA from a reputed B-school. Guneet, however, rightly recognized that this route would not only involve an investment of anywhere up to 5 years (notwithstanding the fact that a full-time program would also require him to quit his job and not have an income for about 2 years), but also the fact that an MBA would only teach him overall management skills and not specifically product. Hence, it might not guarantee his transition into a Product Management career – a superior and new-age technology role. He eliminated the option of quitting his job and pursuing an MBA, and began to research online courses that focused on teaching Product Management. Guneet’s search led him to UpGrad’s Product Management Program. He says,   “What stood out about this program was its application-driven curriculum where the instructor does not tell you exactly what to do in given situations, but you get guidelines, general rules and tricks that you only obtain through years of experience.”   What also appealed to Guneet was the program’s hands-on and unique learning methodology, which allowed students to build their own product portfolio. They got to learn through industry projects and real business case studies under the mentorship of seasoned product managers like Anish Tripathi from Bookmyshow and Anshumani Ruddra from Cuemath. upGrad’s Exclusive Product Management Webinar for you – How to craft GTM Strategy for a Product? document.createElement('video'); https://cdn.upgrad.com/blog/panel-discussion-on-crafting-gtm-strategy-for-a-product.mp4   “They don’t just leave you there – they also teach you how to apply for PM jobs, how to position yourself as a PM, and help you prepare for interviews” – Guneet adds and says that he isn’t leaving this thoroughly engaging community anytime soon. The Product Management program at UpGrad helped Guneet to get a job at Scootsy in a Product Manager’s role and he is thrilled with the fact that he was able to make this switch in just 6 months. With his newly acquired skills at UpGrad, Guneet is definitely bound to go places and we wish him the very best in this journey! Study Product Management Courses online from the World’s top Universities. Earn Masters, Executive PGP, or Advanced Certificate Programs to fast-track your career. Featured Program for you: Design Thinking Certification Program from Duke CE

by Vineeta Hazra

10 May 2017

Blogs

5212

The publishing industry has seen a massive upheaval over the course of the last few years and the entire industry has had to adjust to the stark and sudden change. Isha Khanolkar Ostwal was faced with the consequences of this change when Healthcare Executive, a 5-year-old healthcare magazine for which she managed marketing and communication, decided to go digital. Isha’s extent of knowledge about digital magazines involved converting the print magazine into a PDF format. She soon realized that her issues were not just limited to developing the magazine for digital audiences. Everything had to be realigned, including the fact that now they did not have email IDs of customers to send the e-Magazine to Her team had started to call customers to ask them for their email IDs to be able to build a new database. All these new complexities led Isha to thinking that she needed to arm herself with new knowledge relevant to the challenges she was facing. Her search for the right solution led her to the UpGrad Digital Marketing Certification Program. On what got her interest, Isha says – “The modules covered exactly the problems that the magazine was facing – social media, email marketing, SEO, SCM. It was almost like it was tailor-made for our problems.” Once the program set sail, Isha found many highlights in her learning experience. The ‘time-bound’ nature of the program ensured that she met her assignment deadlines despite having her hands full with managing work and looking after her daughter. Amidst such a demanding schedule, it’s only natural for one to re-prioritise learning. Despite this, the Program renders flexibility to learning as it is entirely conducted online. But what held Isha’s interest throughout the program were the real-life examples that the experts cited in their lectures. Finally, the ‘mentorship calls’ really stood out for Isha, where she connected with subject matter experts, who helped her with solutions to specific problems she was facing with the magazine – all in all, creating an inspiring learning experience. 17 Essential Digital Marketing Skills which will help you Rock! With the essential learnings obtained from the program, Isha was all set to go back to the drawing board and rework, not only the presentation of the magazine on a digital platfor but also develop the app. With the fundamental changes made on acquiring and converting traffic, Best Online Digital Marketing Courses Advanced Certificate in Brand Communication Management - MICA Advanced Certificate in Digital Marketing and Communication - MICA Performance Marketing Bootcamp - Google Ads from upGrad To explore all our certification courses on Digital Marketing, kindly visit our page below. Digital Marketing Certification The readership of the magazine has already increased by 30% …and the team is currently in the process of changing the way they deliver content. “So we are hopefully excited to see a lot more readers in terms of the way that we engage with them.” A true achievement for Team UpGrad was converting Isha into a believer where online education is concerned, as she was previously skeptical about how the classroom learning experience could be delivered to someone in the comfort of their home. However, Isha was amazed at the flexibility and quality of the learning platform, which made the lectures, assignments and discussion forum available at one place and helped Isha become a ‘certified holistic marketer.’ Top Digital Marketing Skills Online Advertising Courses Influencer Marketing Programs SEO Optimisation Courses Performance Marketing Certification Search Engine Marketing Course Email Marketing Strategy Content Marketing Strategy Social Media Advertising Digital Marketing Analytics Website Analytics Online Display Advertising Best Affiliate Programs Learn digital marketing courses online from the World’s top Universities. Earn Masters, Executive PGP, or Advanced Certificate Programs to fast-track your career. Featured Programs for you – Advanced Certificate in Digital Branding & Advertising from MICA upGrad’s Exclusive Digital Marketing Webinar for you – What’s new in Marketing? document.createElement('video'); https://cdn.upgrad.com/blog/rumi-ambastha.mp4 Digital Marketing Free courses to Learn Influencer marketing free course Introduction to advertising free course Influencer marketing right free course SEO basics free course SEM basics free course Email marketing free course Social media marketing introduction free course How to leverage user generated content free course Content marketing free course Fundamentals of marketing free course Brand marketing masterclass free course Popular Digital Marketing Blogs Beginners Guide to YouTube Marketing : Complete List How to Monetize Your YouTube Channel? Top 5 Actionable Steps The Complete Guide on setting up a LinkedIn Company Page Everything You Need To Know About Digital Marketing A Complete Guide to Digital Marketing Strategy: What it is and How to create it? Digital Marketing Tutorial: A Step-by-Step Guide To Become an Expert Future of Digital Marketing: How It Goes From Here Importance of Digital Marketing: Top 10 Reasons Your Business Needs it Digital Marketing Challenges: How to Win Amidst the Challenges in Digital Marketing

by Vineeta Hazra

27 Mar 2017

Blogs

5172

While the number of women entrepreneurs in the country, still falls short of ideal, their perspectives from the entrepreneurs’ lens are crucial to consider. They bring diversity of experiences and challenges to the table, that one can learn from. We spoke to Richa Kar, founder of Zivame.com, Shraddha Sharma, founder of YourStory.com and Radhika Aggarwal, co-founder of ShopClues.com to understand their take on what it is like to be successful entrepreneurs in today’s competitive business landscape, which is not always fair to women. (Also Read: How To Avoid 17 Mistakes Entrepreneur’s Make While Pitching To Investors) Eureka! Said the ladies, in good time. A common thread across experiences seems to be that none of them identified the idea from the start but evolved them based on their experiences. Richa began to think of her business while working on a project with a lingerie giant. She realized that in India the knowledge about lingerie, as a category, was depressingly low. “As a consumer, I definitely know what and which brand of Jeans I’m wearing, which brand of apparel, watch, glasses I’m wearing… but I don’t know anything about my lingerie and why is that so?” On her mission with setting up Zivame, Richa says: “We definitely want to be the largest, the most preferred and the most loved destination for women in lingerie.” Learn MBA Courses from the World’s top Universities. Earn Masters, Executive PGP, or Advanced Certificate Programs to fast-track your career. This theme echoed in the experience of Shraddha Sharma, founder of YourStory.com. While working with CNBC she realized that several entrepreneurs fail to have their story told only because someone felt that their story was not good enough. She wanted a platform free from interpretation. “I started writing about these entrepreneurs that nobody in the media was writing about because they thought they were not successful or big enough or funded enough. I thought – such doubt in discrimination! Let’s listen to stories.” Shraddha wants YourStory to be a companion in the long and lonely journey that is entrepreneurship. “In the next 1 year, we should have stories of millions of people – peek into their experiences, share with the, learn with them and talk to them.”  To set up shop was a prodigious affair Setting up a business from scratch, however, was not easy and each of our leading ladies faced several difficulties on the way. Richa’s parents had an issue with what she was setting out to do. “What am I going to tell my friends that my engineer-MBA daughter is selling bras and panties?” Not only did she face challenges with explaining her line of business to her landlord, but also to the payment gateway they were having integrated onto the Zivame platform. Radhika (Shopclues) insists that in today’s scenario one cannot simply have a me-too model where, by changing the color of the logo, you believe you have a competitive differentiation, especially in the e-commerce marketplace. Knowing that a significantly large proportion of the Indian population continues to shop offline in local markets “our goal was to be able to build a marketplace which will replicate the actual offline buying behavior/experience of the customers,” says Radhika. (Also Read: The Start-Up Guide: What Do Investors Look For?)   And the 3 wise ladies said… Image source: Denver Library Derived from their personal experiences, each one of them is fairly vociferous in what they recommend as advice. Richa believes that passion is required in droves, as that is the only thing that  differentiates running a start-up, full time, from something that is just a hobby. However, she is quick to add, “Resilience is a very important quality in an entrepreneur, because the business will see highs and lows.” Richa believes that the only way to be able to shield yourself from these swings is to be resilient and persevere with the original vision that you had set out to achieve. Watch Richa Kar share her story of building Zivame from scratch (Also Read: Can Entrepreneurship Be Taught? Yes, And Here’s What It Takes) Shraddha believes that, by nature, women tend to be emotional and as a result, everything becomes personal. However, when you are running a business, you have to try and slightly detach yourself and think like an entrepreneur. She also can’t stop stressing upon the importance of documentation. Once scale sets in, the only way to keep running the business is processes and documentation. Watch how Shraddha Sharma is giving voice to so many entrepreneurs Radhika has two pieces of advice to give – one is specific to women entrepreneurs, where she says: “You need to have a very strong support system and sometimes, you just need to dig your heels in and say that this is what I want to do and this is what I am going to do.” She also says that mistakes are just lessons well learnt – “Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. If you do make mistakes change the path that you are walking on and walk with the right people.” Watch: Radhika Aggarwal’s take on building a startup These accounts are clear evidence that the new generation of women have overcome all sorts of notions that work against them, and proved themselves beyond doubt in all spheres of life, including in one of the most demanding and cumbersome – entrepreneurship. While, India has its pool of such bold and ambitious women who have made a mark for themselves, there are surely many more in the making. Some, that just need a nudge to spread their wings. Take the plunge into entrepreneurship with Leadership & Management program, where you learn with the help of structured frameworks, insights from India’s leading entrepreneurs, real life case studies, and opportunities for networking and collaborating with like-minded entrepreneurs. If you want to learn more about marketing and entrepreneurship, Liverpool Business School & upGrad offers Master of Business Administration (MBA) Liverpool Business School which helps you to transform your career. The program provides 1-on-1 mentorship from industry leaders, 1-week immersion program at University campus, dual credentials (MBA from LBS & PGPM from IMT), network with peers at offline basecamps and more.

by Vineeta Hazra

11 Jan 2017