Featured Startup Pitch: Detroit-area startup Sandhira.com is betting big on the need for a community portal for South Asian expats worldwide

By Dhimant Mehta, Sandhira.com co-founder and CEO

Elevator Pitch: We are a South Asian community portal that aims at reconnecting South Asians worldwide to their roots. We are helping South Asian merchants to create an online presence for their business by providing high-quality and cost-effective marketing options.

Product/Service Description

We are a common platform for all South Asians to share their valuable insights and views with an exclusive essence of culture and tradition.

We provide services in the following business areas:

Business listings, events, entertainment, news, South Asian leaders, sports, recipes, places of worship, articles, organizations, festivals and horoscopes. Sub-categories of each of these sections offer a variety of information.

Founders’ Story

In 2010, a terrible financial recession swept across United States, and the tremors of this financial disaster were felt all over the world. The impact of recession was especially severe on small business owners. And it was then that my wife and I came up with a plan to help small business owners by giving them a promotion and virtual platform which would boost their revenues in such trying times.

In 2012, the dream that took its initial steps in the doom-and-gloom of recession took a concrete form as we established Sandhira. And after establishing headquarters in Michigan and an operations center in Ahmedabad, India, and picking an elite team to fulfill our ambition and vision, we launched Sandhira.com on June 23, 2013.

Since then, Sandhira has continued its ambitious flight towards its objective ‘to establish a single platform to cater to the daily needs of the South Asian community.’ With more than a million visitors and a global rank below 25,000, Sandhira has achieved enviable success in a short time.

Marketing/Promotion Strategy

We use the following methods for marketing and promotion: Newsletter, merchant tie-ups, social media marketing, SEO, premium business listings, deals, and digital media partnerships in prominent Indian events.

Market Opportunity

We will launch Sandhira.com in the United Kingdom and India in the near future. Also, we will launch Sandhira.com in the following countries within a few years: Australia, New Zealand, UAE, Singapore, and many more, to connect all South Asians worldwide under a single platform.

How We Differentiate From the Competition

We are a South Asian community portal catering to a variety of day-to-day needs under one platform. We have an extensive city-wise list of places of worship, business listings and organizations. We are the fastest-growing South Asian community portal worldwide.

Business Model

Sandhira.com is a platform where a seller can create awareness about their products. We offer various referral services such as premium business listings, hot deals, classifieds, jobs, tickets (movie and events), the Sandhira Mall and online banner advertisements. These are the revenue-generation options.

Current Needs

For our current needs, we are looking for an energetic and efficient mid-management team for our operations. We are also looking to raise our first round of capital.

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Headquarters: Livonia, Michigan