There is too much data, and nobody has time! Can technology be used to help decode this data and generate insights on the go? A micro insights platform- where you need it and when you need it.
Almost like an insights co-pilot!
These were the burning questions that Harsha Angeri and Nisha Dutt answered by founding decode’m.ai.
They were both driven by the passion to do something on their own and quit cushy jobs as CEOs to get started.
Harsha has a strong appreciation for technology with 6 patents granted. He also received the Gold category Edison Award™for Innovation in Eye Care, which is one of the highest accolades for innovation globally. While Nisha was featured as one of the Women Power Trail Blazers by Forbes India in 2018 and won the Social Entrepreneur of the Year at the Asian Awards in 2017.
And they came together to create decode’m.ai.
Decodem.ai, is a Bengaluru-based SaaS platform that helps individuals & employees unearth customized micro insights at the click of a button on consumer, market & tech trends/ landscapes. They see a world where micro insights are embedded everywhere and have set out to build that. You can access their current product here https://www.decodem.ai/custom-report
Decode’m.ai is also one of our clients at FlexiBees, having hired multiple part-time and remote-working professionals to assist their existing teams. So we recently caught up with Nisha Dutt, Founder of decode’m.ai to understand their business and to know what worked well for them and why they choose to hire flexible talent. What ensued was an interesting conversation about the richness of data available today and how it can be used to make meaningful decisions.
Some excerpts from our conversation:
Can you tell us what you do in simple terms?
We live in a digital age where any information you need is available at your fingertips. But when you look up something a lot of data is thrown your way. And no one has the time or the energy to wade through it to glean insights and make meaningful decisions based on it.
We tap into data sources to create meaning for individuals and organizations.
Imagine the number of searches one does in a day. And this is rich information. We can mine it to learn about many consumer behaviours - not just at the macro level but very specific micro behaviours too. Like, if you want to find out how sustainability is doing as a trend, or how the footwear sector is doing in India, or even if you want to find out how a particular brand of lipstick is doing, you can run your own report and get answers.
Decodem.ai is a market research company which offers quality market research reports, competitive intelligence and industry reports.
How did you figure out this need? How did it all start?
Harsha and I knew each other for a long time. In my previous advisory role as an employee, I first met Harsha as a client. And later we worked on many projects together. We kept in touch and were in each other’s orbits. Harsha quit his job after a while and took to coding and everything that was happening in the AI space.
He then bounced some ideas off of me and I was fascinated with the possibility of what we could do if we could meaningfully mine data from different sources, especially consumer-generated data, in terms of search trails and social media footprint. It could provide rich insights to organizations.
It was exciting! I was in an advisory role all my career and I was excited at the prospect of building something useful for my clients.
For example, if someone wanted to understand or study sustainability or sustainable products, at the most, we can do secondary research and give them a broad stroke on where the trend is headed.
But do people even understand what sustainability is? What are they looking for? Are they finding products that are sustainable? Or how they can live sustainably or want to invest in sustainable futuristic products? Did the pandemic change their perspective? Is that why sustainability is a thing now?
We are not reading a few papers or talking to a couple of experts to get these answers. We are getting them in real time.
It made me feel like this could’ve been really helpful information back when I did hold a job!
We launched our SaaS-based platform, the beta version about 7 months ago. This was built with regular inputs from clients and iterated based on their needs. We soon realised that 80% of needs are common across clients. So we thought, customers, should be able to do this on their own - and not need a consultant.
So far, 180 organizations have used our product. The more people use it, the more we learn and build better.
What is your differentiator?
There are a lot of companies that can do social media monitoring or trend spotting and the like. But a social media monitoring provider will do just that and nothing else. And even then, will be able to provide you with macro-insights.
But we provide our customers with data-driven reports from multiple sources and give them micro-insights. We are a multi-data platform that is automated and can give you a report within minutes. Most of our reports are generated in about 5 minutes! And you don't even need a consultant. You can run this by yourself.
For example, for a topic like sustainability, we can offer a plethora of insights from the market view, consumer view, competitor view, technology research and patents view. We don’t believe that there is a similar platform that can provide an integrated picture at a click of a button.
We have created about 15 or so drop-down categories you can choose from. You can choose to look up broad brush trends and landscapes, consumer interests, competitive insights, tech use case insights, sector maps and more!
And you don't have to leave your work environment to get your reports. Our plug-ins are compatible with Slack, Chrome, Telegram, etc where work today happens.
Can you share a recent success story?
We are still a young company and have been building the platform based on the consumers’ needs and requests.
But recently a customer used our platform in a way that we hadn’t envisioned as well! That was refreshing and really showed us the potential of what we are trying to build.
One of our customers who is the Head of Sales in North America was running a Tech Trends Report. And he was in the Aviation sector.
He took the tech report to understand who is interested in this particular technology and used it as a basis for his sales prospecting!
He was able to generate a list of people who published research papers in this sector, who had patents, who were emergent players and more!
Another story is of a customer who used to offer BlockChain Training. And he wanted to find out where he should deliver his next program. Now that is not an easy answer to find even with Google! But our platform could give him information about which states and cities in India had the most searches for BlockChain and he was able to narrow it down to a couple of places to explore.
This kind of novel use of our platform truly stunned us and reinforces the power and potential of rich, meaningful data to provide micro insights
So how does it work?
So the platform is mostly open to all. Most of the reports can be generated for free by just entering a keyword similar to google search. And the more people use it, the better it gets! But when clients have a specific ask that they cannot find what they want, after leveraging all the resources on the platform, they reach out to us.
For example, an Insurance firm might be interested in tracking only 3 of their competitors - maybe monthly, or have certain other parameters. So then we generate specific reports for them. We use the same tools on the platform to do it.
Or sometimes clients want us to design use cases for them. Anything specific warrants a subscription model.
Think of it like building blocks. We use the same blocks but assemble them differently.
What do you see for decode’m in the future?
We see Decodem as an embedded insights infrastructure in every application you use. You should be able to hover over a word and get instant insight into it.
We want to enable people to make data-driven decisions and really democratize the process.
What made you opt for flexible talent and FlexiBees and how has been your experience?
The talent market is tough, especially right now. And when I heard about FlexiBees, the concept really appealed to me. It is an untapped talent pool.I like the speed at which you are able to provide us with high-quality talent. And when you can’t, you were clear about it. I really appreciate that. While some organizations might still be on the fence about remote work, we at decode’m embrace it as we are a completely remote organization too! If people can do better in lesser time, then why should I hire someone full-time and have them sit at an office? I personally believe that everyone has peak energy hours and if that can be tapped, then they can create really productive outputs for everyone involved. So we manage people by deliverables and timelines and not by how many hours they spend doing something!
And in that light, I think the consultants from FlexiBees have been exemplary. They are responsive, experienced, timely, and have a great work ethic. We rely on their judgment. They are sharp and challenge us to think and do better. They are almost like an extended part of our team!
If you are looking to get deep insights and want to make data-driven decisions, do check out decode’m.ai.
