E-matchmaking Industry Is Still In Nascent Stage And Accounts For Approx 6% Of Marriages In India
Murugavel Janakiraman has redefined the matchmaking experience of finding the right partner in the Indian Internet space. As the founder of Matrimony.com, he tells us how he is working with the new players to tap this highly fragmented market and highlights the big and interesting aspects that dominate the wedding scene in India.
Murugavel Janakiraman, Founder & Managing Director, Matrimony.com had his humble beginning as a programmer and used spare time to build a Tamil community site to connect NRIs in the US, back in 1997. He added a matrimony section and, to his surprise, it was an instant hit and attracted a sizeable traffic. Quick to realize the opportunity, he decided to foray into an exclusive matrimony service in 2000. And the rest is history.
The growth in free registrations of the company from 2.65 M in FY16 to 3.21 M in FY17, and the recent filing for an IPO, Matrimony.com has come a long way after it came into existence in 2000. The company aims to add more customers by offering customized products based on the consumer’s linguistic, religious, caste and community preferences.
For Janakiraman, wedding industry is flourishing in India. As per KPMG reports, the matchmaking and wedding industry has been growing steadily, 25% - 30% every year. With only 6% of the market going online, the matchmaking services remains untapped, presenting a huge opportunity. “We understand the essence of what happiness means when couples begin their journey towards a better tomorrow. As India’s leading matrimonial e-commerce search engine, we have pioneered in this field for 20 years. The company has successfully brought 2.65 million active profiles to the platform. While re-defining the way of finding the right partner in the Indian Internet space, we have created a unique platform which offers a matchmaking experience and gratification to people,” says Janakiraman.
The team at Matrimony.com is equipped with a brigade of 150 experts who are adept at blending the latest technology with tradition, especially in the Indian culture, thus providing eclectic solutions backed by real-time experience to the customer. Matrimony.com also earned a place in the Limca Book of Records for a record number of documented marriages online in 2007. Here, Janakiraman highlights the interesting aspects that dominate the wedding scene in India.
New age technological innovations
Big Data platforms like Hadoop/Spark and HP Vertica (analytical database) to process large data, R/Python for analytics and a self-learning algorithm which was developed in house called MIMA (Matrimony.com’s Intelligent Matchmaking Algorithm), is a real-time recommendation engine that uses mathematical rules and machine learning systems to recommend appropriate profiles to members based on their relevance thereby enhancing an excellent user experience.
Unorganised & Highly Fragmented Sector
Since a majority of the players in the wedding industry are unorganised and highly fragmented, an organised player in this sector is required to provide all the necessity-wedding services. Approximately 65% of Indian population is under 35 years, so within the next two decades the wedding industry will witness 11 to 13 million weddings per year until 2021. The cost estimated for wedding market is $56 billion and it is going to grow gradually at 25% to 30% every year.
Convenience matters
Indian weddings are becoming more expensive, elaborated and personalised with the limited number of guests, destination weddings, unique wedding themes, music and personalised photography for the couple. Therefore, in order to reduce the expenses, the family members should take more effort to find a medium, which is more convenient and comfortable in order to cut down the expenses. Now-a-days people are just not finding the right matches online but also finding a platform to arrange all their wedding related services like photography, make up, jewellery, apparel, planning, music and much more. Further, they are looking for trusted brands to choose the services where they can get best deals. That is when Matrimony.com emerged as an organised player providing services like MatrimonyPhotography, MatrimonyMandaps, and MatrimonyBazaar, comes handy with professional services, variety of vendor options and amazing deals that customers cannot get anywhere else. However, the online matchmaking industry is still in its nascent stage and accounts for approximately 6% of marriages in India.
Key drivers
According to KPMG reports, IAMAI and TRAI, the Internet and mobile penetration in India has grown massively in the last decade and will continue to grow exponentially in the next five years. The mobile internet penetration is going to be a key driver for the wedding industry.
• Increasing mobility of individuals in Indian society
Increasing number of Indians are leaving their native places and moving out of India in search of a job or a better lifestyle. However, when it comes to marriage, most of the Indians prefer to get married with people from their own communities with similar background in terms of caste, religion, linguistic and regional features. In fact, one of the primary drivers of online matchmaking sites initially was the non-resident Indian segment, where potential non-resident Indian bridegrooms started using these online services extensively in search of Indian brides.
• Rising disposable incomes
Marriages are the biggest event in India as they are the crucial part of Indian tradition and culture. Indians spend a large part of their income and savings on the wedding of their children. As the disposable income rises, it is expected that wedding expenses will also increase when time comes. The GDP per capita for the wedding industry is expected to reach $1,869.34 by 2018. In addition, Indian professionals get raise in salary between 10% - 15% every year and bonuses between 5% - 10%. According to the KPMG report (2016), the marriage industry in India was estimated to be worth of Rs. 3,681 Billion, which includes catering, decoration, venue, gifts and photography that accounts 61% of marriage expenses.
