April 2018
History was made at the 2018 London Book Fair when our co-founder, Sukhi Jutla, became the World’s First #1 Bestselling ‘Blockchain’ Author!
Read more: https://coin5s.com/content/marketorders-produces-%C2%A0world’s-first-1-bestselling-‘blockchain’-author
Author: Ram Krishnna Rao
I have been following Tun Mahathir’s speech lately and I find it to be so inspirational in many ways. Leave the upcoming election aside. Let’s talk about lessons we can learn from him.
Lesson No 1. AGE
Age is just a number. Successful people do not worry about their age. It doesn’t define who they are, their ability to think and act. When you are passionate about something you can find all the energy and brain to pursue your purpose untill your last breath.
Lesson No 2. MASTER OF YOUR OWN DESTINY
Almost every other day, there is someone talking about Tun Mahathir’s age, his ability to think and decide, and the mistakes he made in the past. But nothing hinders him or slows him down. He knows exactly what he wants and ignores all the perception that won’t help him in achieving his goals. He teaches us, “be the master of your own destiny”, don’t let others decide your destiny.
Lesson No 3. WARRIOR MINDED
Warrior is someone who is ready to die in order to win. So, going not only the extra miles, but whatever distance it takes. You don’t stop. You don’t give excuses. You don’t run away from challenges. You take the bull by it’s horn. Indeed, we see in our own eyes how Tun M faces people, his arch critics and his preparedness to face anyone anytime. A true leader is a true warrior in every aspect.
Lesson No 4. LEADER IS READER
A reader is not necessarily a leader but a leader is certainly an ardent reader. Why even at age 93, he speaks so eloquently and impactfully? It’s because he reads a lot to keep himself abreast with all the necessary knowledge and information. Knowledge is power.
Lesson No 5. POWER TO PERSUADE
As leader your ability to persuade is extremely important. Just look at Tun M as how successfully he has brought people together who once not only critisized him but also abhorred him. They all have accepted him as their leader. The fact is a leader knows how to rise above the rest despite the differences because he has mastered the art of persuasion.
Lesson No 6. ONE VISION ONE GOAL
Strong decision followed by uncompromised action, Tun M wants to bring down the current Prime Minister. It is evident, Tun M has made his team so focused and has managed to gain public attention to what he says and does. His message is precise, clear and people centric, making his goal as the goal of the nation.
Lesson No 7. MANAGING EMOTIONS
This is arguably the most important quality a leader needs. “It is not the event that decides the outcome; it is how you respond to the event that decides the outcome” is the quote that I find becomes alive every time Tun M is put to test. We have witnessed him being in the centre of many challenging situations, some of which are very critical of him in nature. Despite all odds, he has shown his amazing skills and ability, managing his own emotions thereby controlling every situations so well. Not only that, he walks out as winner in such situations.
At 93 years old this man has so much yet to offer the country!
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
In this weeks blog post we have some great news to share. Our co-founder and COO, Sukhi Jutla, was featured in Around Ealing, where she shares tips on how she left a corporate job, started MarketOrders and wrote several books!
You can read the full post here: http://ealingnewsextra.co.uk/jobs-and-skills/win-a-book-and-maybe-start-a-new-career/
There is also a competition which you can enter and win a copy of Sukhi’s bestselling book, Escape The Cubicle: Quit The Job Yoo hate, so be sure to enter.
Asian Woman of Achievement Awards
Sukhi is also a finalist in the Asian Women of Achievement Awards where the winners will be announced at a special gala dinner on May 9th 2018.
We are thrilled to announce that Her Royal Highness The Countess of Wessex, the Global Ambassador for the Women of the Future Programme, will be joining us at the annual Asian Women of Achievement Awards on May 9th at the London Hilton on Park Lane.
The Countess has been a long-time supporter of the Women of the Future Programme, having attended the Women of the Future Awards and Summit in previous years.
Good luck Sukhi at the AWA Awards!
Remeber, don’t forgot to check out Suki’s post here and enter the competition: http://ealingnewsextra.co.uk/jobs-and-skills/win-a-book-and-maybe-start-a-new-career/
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
May 2018
“Desperate to start a new career, open a shop or start a business? A local entrepreneur and author tells us how she quit her job to begin a new life and then wrote a book about it – and how you could do the same. And, what is more, we have five copies of the book to give away in a competition.
Sukhi Jutla, who lives in Southall, has been shortlisted in the entrepreneur category of the Asian Women of Achievement Awards – which are being announced at a ceremony next week (9 May). …”
Read more: https://ealingnewsextra.co.uk/jobs-and-skills/win-a-book-and-maybe-start-a-new-career/
I walked into the newsagent to get some water and nibbles as I was driving a long way to visit one of my customers on the outskirts of London. It should have been an uneventful occurrence to grab a bottle of water when my eyes darted to what I thought was an ATM machine. But this was no ordinary ATM.
It said ‘BITCOIN ATM Machine’
I instantly looked at the shop owner and he smiled back and said,’ I know what your thinking’ as if he had read my mind!
I am a passionate advocate for blockchain technology and recently qualified as an IBM Foundation Blockchain Developer to quench my growing thirst for how this technology suddenly became more mainstream and the ways in which it is already disrupting traditional industries. (see my last post where my co-founder Sukhi Jutla, became the works, first author, to have a book published on the blockchain.
I continued to look at the Bitcoin ATM machine as I had heard about their existence but till now thought it was the myth. I didn’t realize people were using cryptocurrency to pay for their water bottles already!
Though blockchain tech is relatively new (it’s under a decade old), I am a newcomer to this industry but it’s changing so fast already. I have recently begun to get really inspired and excited about the way this technology can bring about huge changes especially in making things move more efficiently. In the gold industry, this means more transparency in the supply chain process as well as in confirming the origin of products.
So thought I was surprised to see my first Bitcoin vending machine, it certainly won’t be the last time I will see it. Perhaps next time, I may even pay for my bottle of water with a cryptocurrency!
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
In today’s post @WomenInTech interviewed our co-founder and COO, Sukhi Jutla.
Sukhi is passionate about helping more women get into tech and MarketOrders also aims to
promote and champion more women in tech.
Read on for the full interview in which Sukhi shares her views on:
- the changes in the FinTech space over the last few years
- how we can inspire more women into FinTech careers
- the importance of equality
- inspiring words for female founders
Has the gender landscape changed in the FinTech environment from what you have seen over the last few years? If so, in what way?
When I started out in banking over a decade ago I was usually the only women in the meeting room. Or one of only a handful when attending related conferences. But today, with the explosion of FinTech becoming more mainstream and more and more people entering entrepreneurship, I see more women entering the FinTech space.
This is also because FinTech has expanded out of the constraints of banking and is now spilling into other areas of our day to day lives, such as blockchain being used in the creative industries by authors and musicians. FinTech is no longer constrained to the big banking giants. It has now become more accessible and is being used in different ways. And this is great becomes it encourages more women to consider working in this area.
What can we do to inspire more women into Fintech?
FinTech from the outside does seem like a male-dominated industry as people tend to think its all about computing and coding. But the essence of this industry is all about how to be more creative using people and technology. And it is these skills precisely; people skills and creativity, that i think women have plenty of expertise and strengths in.
To inspire more women into FinTech, we need to highlight the key skills and aptitudes it takes to succeed in this field and let women know that they don’t have to be coders or programmers to do well in FinTech.
We need to show that FinTech is all-encompassing and welcomes all skills and backgrounds. And more importantly, that it is an industry open to anyone as long as you are creative and curious and have a desire to use technology for good.
Showcasing and highlighting women’s efforts and success in the world of FinTech is also a good way to show other women that FinTech is a viable career path for them. It’s important that we champion and support each other!
What does equality mean to you?
Equality means being given opportunities and awarded credit based on what you bring to the table regardless of your gender or background.
What would you like to see change in regards to equality in FinTech?
There should be more focus on showcasing all the industries that FinTech is shaking up. It’s no longer just the domain of finance. For example, blockchain is shaking things up in traditional industries such as fishing, shipping and even gold jewellery.
The more we can share about how FinTech is changing our lives, the more we can raise awareness that FinTech is not just for the banking elite, but open for anyone who is curious and creative enough to want to see how technology can be used to disrupt their industry.
For example, my company, MarketOrders is looking into how blockchain can be used in the traditional gold jewellery industry. From payments to verifying the source of the gold, there is a lot of scope for change and creating better processes and systems.
What inspirational words would you offer to other women?
Identify the types of skills and work you enjoy doing and that brings out the best in you. Then find work that will use those unique abilities you have. I call this your ‘Unfair Advantage’ and talk about it in my book ‘Escape The Cubicle: Quit The Job You Hate, Create A Life You Love’.
For example, if you are great at organising and getting things done, then you can look into working for a FinTech startup that needs those types of skills.
FinTech is not only for coders and programmers. Every successful company needs a balance of skills and abilities and you need to see what you are good at and how you can best contribute. And the added bonus is when you do work you, love, you never have to work a day in your life!
FinTech is going to continue to be a growing part of our lives and there has never been a more exciting time to jump in and shape this exciting future. So I welcome you to join this growing industry and put your stamp on it!
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
History was made at the 2018 London Book Fair when our co-founder, Sukhi Jutla, became the World’s First #1 Bestselling ‘Blockchain’ Author!
As well as being the co-founder and COO of MarketOrders, Sukhi is also an author and an advocate of the blockchain.
This week at the London Book Fair, Sukhi spoke on a panel about how the publishing industry would be shaken up with the introduction of blockchain tech. She also talked about the opportunities this would offer authors and why it was important to take part in this discussion now. Because blockchain is not disrupting industries tomorrow…its happening now.
Sukh is also the co-author of the official Blockchain For Books White-paper that talks in more detail about how blockchain will disrupt the traditional publishing arena and was launched at The London Book Fair which is attended by over 5,000 people from 60 + countries.
The London Book Fair is the global marketplace for rights negotiation and the sale and distribution of content across print, audio, TV, film and digital channels.
We are very excited and proud of Sukhi whose book, Escape The Cubicle: Quit The Job You Hate, Create A Life You Love, is the first book to be published on the blockchain. This means you can purchase the book with cryptocurrency.
Blockchain removes the need of a middleman…and that is also what MarketOrders advocates! Our platform allows gold jewellery retailers to purchase the products they need directly from the manufacturers and suppliers.
Being able to purchase directly from the source means you can get better prices and access to more products. The middleman no longer can inflate the market price or control what products can go to the market.
Watch this space as MarketOrders will also be releasing some exciting news about how we are going to use blockchain to better serve our customers.
You can read more about Sukhi’s coverage on being the World’s First #1 Bestselling ‘Blockchain’ Author in the article covered by the prestigious Publishers Weekly where she made the front page during the London Book Fair:
You can check out Sukhi’s book here: https://amzn.to/2GX3nWJ
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
Today’s blog is a quick fire Q&A with the Founders, Ram and Sukhi. They talk about what MarketOrders does, how they came up with the idea of digitising the gold trade industry and the defining moment that changed it all.
Tell us what your business does in fewer than 25 words:
MarketOrders in an online marketplace helping to connect independent jewellery brands directly to manufacturer’s around the world to source the best products at the best price.
How did you come up with the idea?
The founders have been in the gold jewellery market for over 15 years and saw how inefficient and archaic the processes and systems are in the gold industry where it is still run in a very traditional manner and only 4% of transactions occur on-line.
We found in our previous business that we were still taking orders manually and found there was no online or curated destination for jewellery retailers to be able to source the products they needed. So we decided to help the retailers by accepting multiple small orders from many retailers and aggregating their orders. This aggregated order was then sent to the manufacturer who could accept larger orders and give us bulk discount savings. These savings are then passed back to the jewellery retailers.
Without MarketOrders, small retailers cannot access the products and prices the large manufacturer reserves for larger orders and clients. And the manufacturers also benefit by getting more orders from more customers. MarketOrders allows a more efficient way to manage the supply/demand issues that many small retailers and SMEs face.
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/dropshipping-oberlo-shopify-3264486/
What makes your business different from the competition?
MarketOrders is the only online curated destination for the gold jewellery industry where every step of the process is online. Our customers, the retailers, can order products online, pay online and the products are delivered to their door.
All our competitors are still working in a hybrid version where only some of the processes are on-line and the rest is very manual and hence time-consuming which can lead to a lot of delays.
By bringing the entire supply chain online MarketOrders is able to bring greater visibility to the supply and demand of gold jewellery products. We can also collate data and use those insights to help our customers. For example, retailers can track which products sell the most at certain times throughout the year and we can even use this data to do predictive orders.
Who are your clients/customers? How many do you have?
MarketOrders is a 2-sided marketplace so we work with both the jewellery retailers (SMEs) and the manufacturers.
Currently we serve retailers based in the UK and work with manufacturers abroad (Hong Kong, Singapore & Dubai).
Our focus is on serving the gold, diamond and precious metals jewellers in the B2B space.
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/jewelry-necklace-diamond-ring-3213722/
Key moments
What’s been the most challenging thing about starting your business so far?
The gold industry is extremely traditional and operates largely off-line. The only way to break into this market is by trust. It took us years to build solid relationships with manufactures and retailers. This took a lot of time and effort to develop but was worth it. Because this is the only way to really understand the problems your customers are facing.
Gold is an emotional product; people use it to look beautiful or use it as an investment for their security, so there is a huge amount of trust involved in every transaction. You need to prove that you are providing gold of a premium quality, be very clear and open as to where it is sourced from and to be able to deliver the products on time. So building that deep trust with each one of our customers had to be done in person and was challenging as it took many years to do.
What was your breakthrough moment?
When we realised we could aggregate multiple small orders from multiple retailers and aggregate them to a larger singular order so the manufacturer could accept the orders and give us bulk discount savings. This solved 2 problems; allowing smaller retailers to access these large manufacturers and get more designs and products at a lower price and also allow manufacturers to increase their capacity utilisation as their machinery was often left idle as they needed minimum orders to produce the products. For the first time, the gold industry was now on-line and had an on-line presence.
What is your goal for your business?
To create the largest and most trusted marketplace for the supply and provision of gold and associated products and take it to an IPO.
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
Mobile technology and the Internet have empowered consumers in a way that they are now more informed about market offers than the retailers trying to sell to them. Changing their minds or switching providers is now as easy as clicking a mouse.
The combination of commoditization and the empowered customer makes it even more important to have a Consumer Centric Culture where the experience of purchasing is just as important as the product that has been purchased. (Check out the last post to learn more about the Consumer Centric Culture).
Therefore, business owners must be able to buy the products they need in order to customise their customer’s requirement and be able to compete effectively in todays ‘experience economy’.
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/computer-laptop-business-office-3246121/
From B2C to C2B
Today’s era is no longer B2C but C2B. The consumer drives the transaction. Therefore, the B2B concept of “Make, Ship, Sell” is no longer applicable and is instead replaced by the B4B concept which allows retailers to buy “On Demand”.
The B4B model encourages manufacturers to stop thinking about how they can sell more products and start thinking about understanding and actively working with retailers to arrive at a specific end result. Manufactures should be working for retailers, not the other way around.
Applying the B4B concept, MarketOrders built the platform to bring “visibility of supply and Demand” for both retailers and manufacturers by “Digitization” of the entire gold jewellery industry by centralisation. A central network platform will successfully help to map out customer needs and desires which will help retailers to practice and implement a customer centric culture in return.
MarketOrders will help retailers to discover what their customers want, create greater density with designs and selection, a transparent system and increase the ability to tap into global sellers directly and faster, which will allow speed to market.
Now, using the B4B concept, business owners will be surrounded with a customer-inspired culture. In today’s digital customer era, creating a customer centric culture is and should be a top priority for all businesses, especially independent small retailers, in order to thrive in today’s customer first world.
The future is centralisation
Centralisation allows data and insights to be collected from every transaction. These insights can help grow the business of the participant on the platform with greater engagement to their customer closer. The building of technology embedded on the MarketOrders platform is focused on customer experience and the customer focus is at the heart of the snowball effect.
When you add the B4B concept with a centralised network, we will help small businesses to be in better control of their success at scale.
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/jewelry-manufacturing-manufacturing-1381501/
Why does the gold jewellery industry need centralization?
By centralizing the supply chain in the gold jewelry industry, it gives both retailers and suppliers a greater level of visibility in terms of where to source the best products they need.
The B4B model allows the technology to be built around the customer and helps small business owners understand their customer needs. For once, there will be the ability to see buying trends within the gold markets and this data can be used to generate deep insights for retailers to help drive their business success through better decisions making. These data based insights will drive greater adoption for more business growth and ultimately lead in helping achieve targeted business outcomes.
What do you think of the rise of the B4B economy? Post your comments below.
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/agreement-beard-beverage-2548140/
MarketOrders is focused on helping off-line retailers to source the best gold products they need directly from the suppliers. And in order to do that we help retailers adopt the 3 C’s; A Consumer Centric Culture.
Our platform allows our customers to buy the products they need by creating a B4B model. This is known as Business-For-Business. This model works best when both players in the marketplace benefit from each transaction.
And this is exactly what happens with MarketOrders. Our retailer’s benefit from being able to access thousands of products online (when usually they only have access to 20-30 designs and products that the walk in sales man has on him at the time).
And the supplier’s benefit by now being able to service and supply smaller retailers who previously they could not serve due to the minimum order quantities they needed.
MarketOrders bypasses this problem by encouraging smaller orders from retailers and our unique software aggregates these orders into larger orders and routes them to the right supplier who can then accept the large order and provide us with a bulk discount cost. In the B4B model, it’s a win-win situation for all market players.
How do you achieve a Consumer Centric Culture?
A B4B model helps buyers to align with the consumer centric culture.
In order to achieve a consumer centric culture, the B4B model works backward towards a consumer centric culture. This amplifies the needs and wants of the customer coming into the store.
The availability of faster internet penetration and mobile devices allows the B4B concept to become more important because consumers now also have access to more products and have greater visibility of price, Consumers are walking into your shops knowing what they want. The question to retailers is, are you ready to serve your customers with what they are asking for?
We are working hard on creating the MarketOrders platform which can bring greater connections between retailers and manufacturers or suppliers in real time for the first time in a saleable and affordable manner.
A Consumer Centric Culture [3C’s] is one in which retail owners and employees are collectively working to fulfil customer’s needs as their ultimate goal. Everyone is aware of the direct and indirect impact his or her work has on the overall customers experience at every point of interaction within the customer journey.
If you are a retailer, how are you ensuring you create a consumer centric culture in your business? Please post in the comments below with your thoughts.
Why B4B model are so important in today’s digital consumer world?
photo credit: https://pixabay.com/en/hand-business-human-africa-african-3230679/
Because mobile technology and the Internet have empowered consumers in a way that they are now more informed about market offers than the retailers trying to sell to them. Changing their minds or switching providers is now as easy as clicking a mouse. The combination of commoditization and the empowered customer is taking the fight to acquire and retain customers down to Consumer Centric Culture in today’s experience economy. Therefore business owners must be able to buy what the need in order to customise their customer’s requirement.
Today’s era is no longer B2C but C2B. Therefore B2B concept of “Make, Ship, Sell” no longer applicable and replace by B4B concept where allows retailers to buy “On Demand”.
B4B model encourages manufacturers to stop thinking about how they can sell more products and start thinking about understanding and actively working with retailers to arrive at a specific end result.
Applying B4B concept, market orders built the platform to bring “visibility of supply and Demand” for both retailers and manufacturers by “Digitization” the entire gold jewellery industry by Centralisation. Central network platform will successfully mapping out customer needs and desire, which will help retailer to practice customer centric culture in return.
Marketorders will help retailers to discover what their customer want, create great density with design and selection, transparent system and increase ability to tap to global sellers directly and faster, which will allow speed to market.
Now, using B4B concept, business owners will surround with customer-inspired culture. In today’s digital customer era, creating customer centric culture is top priority for all businesses especially independent small retailers to thrive in today’s customer first world.
Centralization allows data collection of every trade on the platform, that able to provide the insight and help grow the business of the participant on the platform with greater engagement to their customer closer. The building of technology embedded on MarketOrders platform are around customer experience and customer focus at the heart of the snowball effect.
The B4B concept with centralization network will help and built the ability of small business to be in control and success at scale.
By centralization of entire gold jewelry industry, it gives lens of visibility to participant of the platform to drive desired outcomes and creates opportunity to research and experiment using the collected data from marketorders platform. This process will give valued insight and able to re-create for each and every users to succeed at scale.
B4B concept model and technology built around customer experience and customer focus on Marketorders platform, help small business understand the customer needs and use the data available to drive the decision for their business success. The data can help participant traders to quantify the equation of the business and help them to operate efficiently and better.
Every facet of marketorders platform, architected to adopt at capturing and analyzing interaction and transaction of every trade data then turn those insight into actions that add-value to the participant of the platform collectively which will drive adoption for more business growth and ultimately lead in helping achieve targeted business outcome.
Written by CEO & Founder, Ram Krishnna Rao