Hardik Sojitra’s Case Studies – Google Drive

Collection of all the case studies

Executive Committee Member, GIM Alumni Association

Feb 2022 - Present | Goa

For 6000+ B-school alumni, driving engagement through expert sessions, alumni meets & portal and 13 city (WhatsApp) groups.


Strategy & New Initiatives, ProjectHero

May 2022 - Feb 2024 | Bengaluru

ProjectHero is construction tech members-only platform helping contractors hire construction workers, get business leads and procure material at wholesale rate.

Heading the new initiatives,
- Led membership program and conceptualised in-person networking events for contractors.
- Developed and implemented a comprehensive communication strategy for membership sales across all funnel touch points.
- Launched worker hiring platform helping contractors hire workers across India
- Piloted bulk worker dispatch, one-click wage payments, bank account & health insurance for workers, and ratings & review platform for contractors


Co-Founder, 91x Logistics

Feb 2021 - Mar 2022 | Pune

91x was India’s first part-truck-load logistics platform delivering e-commerce like shipping experience to MSMEs.

Our pitch: With our full-service platform for online order booking and management, MSMEs get higher transparency on pricing, guaranteed doorstep pickup & delivery and visibility on shipment in real time.

Used to take care of product, experience and finance and fundraising.

Sold the business to logistics enterprise.


Co-Founder & COO, ScaleFactor Consulting Labs

Apr 2016 - Sep 2020 | Pune

A strategic design firm enables brands and organizations to start, grow, and transform via crafting desirable, viable, and feasible solutions through cross-disciplinary problem-solving.

Managing operations and finance,
- Grew to 14 members team comprising business analysts, experience designers, and product & service strategists and managed 20+ interns from business and design schools across 3 locations
- Client portfolio of 20+ companies across startup and enterprise lifecycle
- Launched SF Labs (under parent firm) to build and grow 4 "non-linear" revenue ventures
- Ideated and launched "deal discovery under 60 seconds" platform, offrd.me, for credit card-linked offers in 8 weeks (part of SF Labs)
- Instrumental in joint venture formation of lifestyle retail brand, TheFlora.in and managing overall transition from promoters to new management

Advised early-stage ventures across fintech, lifestyle, FMCG, hospitality, logistics & social development sectors on :
- Product market fitment, go-to-market, and cash flow management
- Strategy definition: product & business roadmap
- Fundraise readiness: business pitch and financial projections


COO, TheFlora

Apr 2016 - Sep 2020 | Bengaluru

Bangalore-based flower company, The Flora delivers the best of cut flowers and beautifully designed bouquets to customers and businesses in form of one-time orders and/or monthly subscriptions.

Heading the business,
- Achieved 20% m-o-m growth on revenue, breaking even in 16th month of operations to build strong PnL outlook
- Collaborated with product and marketing teams to launch seasonal offerings and campaigns
- Customer communication: gauged the market needs and pain-points while defining and improving operational SoPs
- Field operation: sourcing and inventory management, vendor management, quality and delivery protocol definition


Founder, offrd

Dec 2017 - Sep 2019 | Pune

Offrd was a deal discovery platform, conceptualised with the aim to help people save money.

It was built as side project under SF Labs.

Our differentiation was "offers that work" and "deal discovery under 60 seconds".
While everyone focussed on milking the visitor by showing only partial information to make affiliate revenues, offrd focused on easing that pain.


Founder, WowMe

Jan 2015 - Feb 2016 | Surat

WowMe was a Fashion & Lifestyle Meta-Search Platform.

As a founder,
- Conceptualised the idea of "Tinder for Fashion" for personalised shopping
- Business model generation
- Go-to-market strategy & execution
- Product management (android app)
- Category management (shoes)

Thesis:
In a world where customers are spoilt for choices, the shopping experience for fashion and lifestyle has to be different than shopping for groceries. Customers definitely deserved better than the endless scrolling. Wanted to build something which was more personalized and customised. The aim was to show only those products which increase the likelihood of purchase.

Business model:
Do not hold inventory or be a marketplace. But to aggregate and curate the best from what was already available from other marketplaces & brands, and earn via affiliate commission.

Product:
- UI/UX: The famous Tinder UI with only one product on the screen helps in taking a call w/o thinking much
- Recommendation engine: think of Spotify doing the magic: the system will start learning the 'likes' of the customer, colour, pattern, type and so on. Also, the profiling will help show products which were liked by similar profile in other parts of the country.
- Wishlist: the right-swiped products will be saved to wishlist and whenever there was a price drop, we will notify the customer


Management Trainee, Tata Capital

May 2014 - Nov 2014 | Mumbai

As an NBFC, Tata Capital (part of TATA group) operates across: Commercial & Infrastructure Finance, Consumer Loans, and co-branded credit card

As a trainee,
designed the customer journey and advised spec & design requirement for the launch of an online application platform for "Auto Loans"


Summer Intern, YourStory Media

Mar 2013 - May 2013 | Bengaluru

YourStory covers stories on entrepreneurs, changemakers, and India's emerging startup ecosystem.

As a summer trainee,
- Contributed to Indian startups directory, YSProfiles
- Converted 27 potential leads into final applicants for Microsoft BizSpark 2013 competition
- Managed logistics for flagship event's Kochi city-meetup


Business Manager, Sojitra Textiles

Nov 2010 - Apr 2012 | Surat

Surat-based textiles family business into weaving saree material from yarn.

- Managed operations & finance
- Launched retail division of dyed saree fabric by forward integration


Co-founder, The Mango World

Sep 2009 - Apr 2010 | Surat

A retail business (b2b and b2c) selling high-grade mangoes (Kesar, Alphanso, Langdo, and Dasheri) sourced from farms in Vapi, Gujarat.

Did field sales in the local markets of Surat and managed the last-mile shipping for orders.