Here's a startup called 'Launched in February this year, this tutorial booking app is seeing 70% of its customers as repeat customers.The fact that it already has 25,000 members, 15,000 registered tutors, and 8000 downloads shows the tutor services segment is unorganized and new entrants like WONK are the need of the hour.
We spoke to
1. How did the idea of WONK come by?
WONK initially started with a personal experience. Being a parent myself, I was looking for a tutor for my own daughter. With a corporate job, usually social circle becomes very limited. So, when I wanted references for my own child's tutor, it could not go beyond one or two people I knew. Also, in the tutor booking process, there is so much ambiguity around it. I was compelled to think that people are going about choosing this professional service vaguely at a time when other professional services are quite based on a couple of filtering and qualifying criterion. For tutors, one needed to know about their education, qualification, background information and work experience.
I decided I wanted more than just basic information for the safety and security of my female child. This was followed by some research to see the potential of the industry, and these became my reasons for starting WONK.
2. What are the various services being offered by WONK?
WONK is the mirror image of the word KNOW. It's basically providing tuition services to children, both academic and non-academic (hobbies and languages) in nature.
There are four kinds of tuition services - Personal tuition at Student's residence, Personal tuition at Tutor's residence, Group tuition at Tutor's institute or it might also happen at one of the student's residence if the group of students have decided to hire a tutor, mock test series will be at tutor's venue.
3. Who do you see as your competitor? Is Urban Clap one of them?
When you talk about a specialized field like education, it's a long time association you are looking for rather than a one-time service like in the case of plumber, electrician, salon services. Tutorial booking, therefore, requires much more information about the person to be hired as a tutor than what Urban Clap offers. Parents may want to know more than just education and wok experience, and they may seek flexible booking and availing processes due to an ongoing association. Say, a tutor has gone back home and the child still wants to connect with him over a confusion. They can connect on a virtual classroom session online on our website myedge.in.
4. There are several other websites offering help to parents in search of online as well as private tutors like tutorcity, tutorindia, Myprivatetutor. How are you better placed compared to them?
So we have taken care of several concerns a parent or child availing the tuition services can face. 'Ease and convenience' is one very important factor in hooking people to WONK. A customer can book a tutor in a easy 3-step process and pay through the convenient payment options, unlike other portals. WONK also promises money back in case the customer wants to discontinue the classes for a genuine reason. A pro-rata of the classes not-attended is refunded back. Then there is Tutor Swap Facility in a case where a tutor is shifting a city or a customer is shifting a locality/city. The tutor swap facility ensures no time is lost in searching for a new tutor. There are Free Demo Class with the tutor of choice to judge the child’s comfort with pedagogy. Only once the student is satisfied, will the booking be made. We have Tutor Concierge Service – In case of metros and other big cities, sometimes a customer may not be able to find a tutor of a particular subject in their locality. In this case, they can give us a missed call on 8080805225 and our team will call them back. We help them find and book the right tutor.
5. How do you see the future of online discovery platforms at a time when more and more people are inclined towards online learning apps like BYJU's which are mushrooming and disrupting the education segment like never before?
Learning apps are doing a great job at teaching students, but I feel they cannot cater to the education requirements of the country all alone. Even today, most parents select tutors based on feedback and word of mouth, and physical tutoring is here to stay. Having said that, learning apps surely complement physical tutoring services in meeting the education demands of India.
Having covered Delhi and Mumbai, WONK is looking to expand to tier 1 and tier 2 cities. It aims to offer assessment tests and virtual library and will be looking at Asia pacific region for expansion in the coming years.