Exclusive: Investors Love For Services Marketplace Is Here To Stay; FindYahan Grabs Funding From The Phoenix Fund

Research shows that over 1200 Cr. searches are being done on daily basis by the people looking for service providers and over 6 Lakh service providers are being contacted everyday. But as an individual looking for a service provider its not that smooth to reach out the service provider which they are actually looking for. Though the platforms like JustDial, or Sulekha have tried to solve this problem to an extend, but while researching/using these platform, the person has to share contact details and later he/she is spammed with unwanted calls for a number of days.

This is where the concept of hyperlocal services marketplace comes in. This particular segment has started gaining a lot of attention in past few weeks. Just last week, there were back to back announcements about funding of startups that are working in this space. Today, yet another startup has disclosed that it just got funding.

Delhi-based, FindYahan, a hyperlocal services marketplace, that has created a platform that connects skilled individuals and home businesses to their target customers easily and effectively has raised its Pre Series A of funding from The Phoenix Fund, as told by Snehil Khanor, founder of FindYahan.

Launched back in October 2013 by Rachit Mathur & Snehil Khanor, and FindYahan, currently is operational in Delhi/NCR and has over 1,00,000 users, over 4,000 supplies.  The startup has launched a mobile app in February this year and has recently crossed 50,000+ downloads on the Google Play Store.

The FindYahan App has a simple and intuitive Request Submission Process where a user can ask a few quick questions about the service he/she is looking for and the budget he is comfortable with.

Then the lead is shared to the service providers without the contact information of the customer. Only those service providers buy the lead and are able to contact who know they can fulfil the exact requirement at a specified location and within the budget. Thus one don’t get spammed with un-necessary calls.

Another unique feature of our app is the messaging module, one can chose not to get any calls at all and can choose to have a text chat with the service providers. In our next version, the startup is also coming up with trial booking & appointment booking feature.

“But what really makes us different from others is the quality of our service providers. Think of it as we are building a mall with only the best shops. There maybe 10 malls in a locality.. but after 6 months which mall will you choose to go to? The one with most shops or the one with the best ones?,” said Snehil.

On the monetisation side, the team at Findyahan has decided to sell lead packages to the seller. Whenever a request is created, it appears on the seller dashboard of nearby service providers of that category. The contact details of the requester are not shared with the service provider until he buys the lead. When he buys the lead, lead balance is deducted from his wallet. This allows service provider to spend only on leads that he knows he can confidently fulfil and therefore have better chances of converting. But currently, the startup has kept the monetisation part on hold till and is letting, service providers to use it for free with the credits, that the startup has given to them. It plans to start charging service providers by mid of this year.

In past 3 months the startup has tripled the amount of request they use to get before. “With the latest funds coming in our core focus is further improving our product and consumer experience.  We are very happy that Amit and the Phoenix Team liked what we are building and wanted to back us in our journey of disrupting the service market in India.” Says Rachit Mathur, CEO & Co-Founder of FindYahan.com.

Funds raised will be used to further grow the team and strengthen operations and technology for enhancing customer service & experience.

The Phoenix Fund, a multi-asset class fund, is coming in as a sole Investor in this round of funding for FindYahan. Other ecommerce investments made by The Phoenix Fund include Hopscotch.in (2012), Overcart.com (2014), Net2travel (1999) to name a few.

“We are very excited to back the excellent promoters Rachit Mathur & Snehil Khanor and their team in this e-commerce segment which addresses a very real and ubiquitous customer need of finding a good service provider for various services in a micro market. FindYahan not only connects the customer and the service provider but also tracks the customer experience and feedback.” said Amit Khanna of The Phoenix Fund

FindYahan had earlier raised a seed round led by Karan Bajwa – MD Microsoft India, Sunjay Kapur – MD Sona Koyo Steering, Amanpreet Bajaj – India Head Airbnb.com and Parvesh Kumar – MD Helios Packaging Pvt Ltd. in February this year. Hitesh Dhingra of LetsBuy, Rajatish Mukherjee, SVP, Godaddy are also in the advisory board of FindYahan.

Lets have a look at the startups that got funded in the hyperlocal services category recently:

TaskBob

The Mumbai-based mobile-only home services startup, TaskBob offers instant home services by sending pre-screened, verified, skilled professional serviceman at the customer doorstep to fix household appliances such as AC, washing machine, computer and refrigerator.

Services In:  Powai (suburb of Mumbai)

Funding: Raised funding of $1.2 Mn from Orios, Mayfield.

Founders: Aseem Khare

Founded In: 2014

UrbanClap

The platform connects service professional like a plumber, a wedding photographer, a yoga teacher, or an interior designer. UrbanClap’s ambition is to connect people with the best professional who can do exactly what they want at a price you are comfortable paying.

Services In: Delhi/NCR

Founders: Varun Khaitan (IIT Kanpur, BCG), Abhiraj Bhal (IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Kanpur, BCG) and Raghav Chandra (Ex-Twitter engineer)

Founded In: October 2014

Funding: Raised INR 10 Cr. in funding from SAIF Partners, Accel Partners and the founders of Snapdeal, Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal.

LocalOye

Mobile marketplace for hiring local service professionals, LocalOye team does screening and personal verification of each service professional to ensure quality, assurance and fair pricing. A merchant can look at details of the customer like budget, location, timings, preferences etc. and choose to accept the connection. This ensures very high reliability and trust for both the customers and merchants.

Services In: Mumbai

Founders: Aditya Rao

Founded In: 2013

Funding: $5 Mn Series A funding from Tiger Global Management and Lightspeed Venture Partners; undisclosed amount in seed funding from Sidharth Rao (Co-founder Webchutney), Haresh Chawla (ex-Group CEO Network 18 and India Value Fund partner), and Sachin Bhatia (co-founder, MakeMyTrip).

Qyk

Qyk allows users to find local service providers including tutors, coaches, event organisers, interior designers, architect and photographers. The team at Qyk collaborates local data and competitive quotes from the most relevant service providers to allow customer to compare and hire quality service providers saving time and money.

Services In: Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Kolkata

Founders: 4 IIT graduates viz Deepak Singhal, Sangharsh Boudhh, Shobhit Singhal, and Anubhav Sahoo.

Founded In: November 2014

Funding: Undisclosed amount of angel funding from Zishaan Hayath, co-founder of Toppr and Powai Lake Ventures, Abhishek Goyal CEO and co-founder of Tracxn.com and ex-Accel partner and Sahil Barua, CEO and co-founder of Delhivery.

Near.in

Near.in allow users to discover service providers in their vicnity. The startup covers over 100 categories including health, home needs and wellness, among others. The site claims to offer curated list of service providers based on the feedback from social media websites like Facebook and consumer forums among others, who are than sorted by Near.in’s in-house team via calls, visits to stores, etc.

Services In: Gurgaon

Founders:  Sunil Goyal, Lomesh Dutta and Akshay Khanna

Founded In: 2014

Funding: INR 1.8 Cr. Anupam Mittal of Shaadi.com, and Manish Vij SVG Media, Healthkart CEO Prashant Tandon and CTO Gaurav Agarwal, Akash Agarwal, global vice-president of the mobile division of enterprise software maker SAP Labs, Aspiring Minds CEO Himanshu Aggarwal and Kevin Parikh of consulting firm Avasant

Doormint

On demand utility service startup Doormint provides services from electricians, laundry, plumbers, carpenters, pest control and appliance repair. The company also does background, criminal and police verifications before they take professionals on board.

Services In: Powai, Chandivali, Andheri, Ghatkopar, Vikhroli, Bhandup, and Mulund in Mumbai.

Founders:  Three IITians, Naman Lahoty (IITB), Abhinav Agarwal (IITB) and Piyush Ranjan (IITK)

Founded In: January 2015

Funding: Undisclosed amount of funding from Powai Lake Ventures.

Local services is a $100 Bn market, Housejoy is yet another player in this space.