Business of Numerology: NaamVidya

Numerology and Name Numerology as a science has been around for more than 5000 years. NaamVidya offers this science to people in a modern and simpler way without any mysticism. The services are offered through the website www.naamvidya.com, where we assist people looking for balanced names for their new-born or for new companies/brand basis the science of NaamVidya numerology.

An exclusive interaction between SMEStreet and NaamVidya’s Founders highlighted some insightful trends around the name keeping business and it’s potential for a young group of qualified professionals.

The founders at NaamVidya come from a varied background having a deep interest in Numerology and also skills in technology and marketing helping them present this ancient science in a very modern and simple way.

Trishul Arora: Trishul comes 15 years of experience having worked with IT multinationals like Oracle, SAP etc. An ardent follower of Advaita philosophy, he comes with deep expertise in Numerology & has been regular at advising Numerology aspirants on the science. He heads the Philosophy at NaamVidya.

Nilesh Desai: Nilesh did his MBA in Sales and Marketing and worked with companies like Oracle, Symantec etc for 20 years before taking the entrepreneurial route and manages the Digital Marketing activities for NaamVidya.

Shalesh Trehan: Shalesh always loved numbers and with a Masters in Mathematics, the fondness to understand the role numbers play in our life came to him naturally. He has previously worked in organizations like Oracle, AMD. He manages Operations at NaamVidya.

Anil Nandalike: Anil heads the technical practice and is the CTO of NaamVidya. With over 24 years of experience in running a technology practice of his own, he and his team are responsible for incorporating all the advanced NaamVidya numerological algorithms into systems.

How did the idea of NaamVidya emerged as a business?

We started NaamVidya for 3 reasons.

1. Awareness: Not many are aware that there is a science that measures the direct correlation between the vibration of names and numbers. It is absolute mathematics and this intrigued us to dwell deep into it. In fact among the first few initiators of this science was Pythagoras, the great Greek philosopher and mathematician. However, this awareness is lacking and people tend to classify it with occult science such as Astrology, Tarot, Palmistry etc...Our goal here is to clear this misconception and spread awareness about the benefits of choosing a balanced name.
2. Mysticism: The second reason was the mysticism surrounding this wonderful science. Without understanding the origins, and with very limited knowledge of the subject, some practitioners commoditized this science and used it as a scare tactic to make money.
3. Availability: Numerology as a science is currently practiced by individuals from their home, most have very limited knowledge of the subject and charge a hefty sum. As such, people either had difficulty finding a genuine numerologist or found them too expensive to avail a service.

What are the initial investments made in the company?

Initial investments have been low since we managed to create everything in-house. Our development partner helped build the backend systems and all the content required for the website too has been written by us. The bulk of the marketing activity too has been managed internally.
How many startups or parents-to-be have approached you so far as customers?

This has been the most exciting part of the journey! While traffic is a function of marketing spend, in these initial months itself the website attracted a traffic of more than 15K visitors per month &  this is growing at the rate of 30% Month on Month. What is even more encouraging is the bounce rate that we have seen - which is around 2-3%, which is exceptionally low by industry standards. And this confirms that people are relating to our story and proposition. Of this traffic, parents of new-borns constitute approximately 50% of this traffic.

Kindly explain your business revenue module

NaamVidya has the following revenue streams

1. Baby Name services (Parents looking for names for new-borns)
   b. Name Correction services (Adults looking for corrections in their names or new names altogether (for eg. Women after marriage)
2. Business Name Services (Start-ups looking for names for their business ventures, brands, shops etc)
   d. Other Services (Miscellaneous name services, Gemstones, Lucky date/time, Compatibility between couples etc)

What is your marketing strategy and Go-to-market strategy?
We are primarily focusing on the Digital medium for marketing of NaamVidya. Our marketing effort has been to create awareness about this science and allow people to see the impact of this science by taking free name analysis on our website. We firmly believe that the proof of the pudding is in its eating and hence allow taking unlimited name analysis for people to see the science at work -all for free. Name analysis generally is a paid service on most websites.

What kind of reactions you have received
People have been amazed by the accuracy of our name analysis reports. The accuracy rate is as high as 80-85%. For the majority of people, it has been a revelation how names have played a significant role in shaping their personality.
The initial response has been very encouraging and we know it’s going to be long and arduous journey before we achieve scale with masses. The awareness of this science is extremely low & this is where all our focus & spend is. We are finding a lot traction with all our target customers. When people come to us initially, they are unsure of what to expect. However, as they dwell deep, they are pleasantly surprised with the simplicity with which we have brought to the science and the professionalism with which we deliver our service. In fact, we are already seeing a lot of referral traffic from existing customers and this stamps that people are opening up.

Are you looking at any size of investment?

We are currently bootstrapped & we understand that our challenge lies in the limited awareness of the science. We are currently focused only on India and know that the potential is global. Extensive marketing can only cover all this & this requires investments. In fact, there are a lot of additional avenues where this science can be applied and hence we have started to talk to people who can partner with us.