Manik Ghawri and Lalit Sharma – Co-founders, Vowelor
Reading a book has its own fun, and more interesting is the discussion over the same among bibliophiles. Vowelor, which first came into being as a website and now an app, brings bibliophiles and authors together in a virtual book community. Launched by best friends and book lovers Manik Ghawri and Lalit Sharma, Vowelor lets people connect with like-minded book lovers and also solves their dilemma of finding a good read. The platform allows users to discuss the books on a real-time basis thus, helping them to pick the read in an informed manner. It also provides a platform for budding authors to showcase and market their publications. Ramesh Kumar Raja talked to both Ghawri and Sharma, the co-founders of Vowelor, to discuss more about the platform, its technicalities and relevance. Excerpts:
Vowelor has something new to offer in the era of social networking platforms. How did the idea strike you to come up with a website, and then an app?inclined towards reading and writing, we started a Facebook community for book lovers and writers in 2016 which is today one of the largest communities for book enthusiasts in India having more than 80,000+ members across the world.
After interacting with so many readers and writers, we analysed the problems
faced by them in today’s times, especially in India. Understanding these problems as well as the gap in this booming sector, we decided to bring a product for the community that is focused on solving the problems of readers and writers.
Vowelor’s concept of “Why Read Alone” works as an interactive solution to all the problems of the readers, while the upcoming “Vowelor Author Program” on app gives authors, especially the
passionate and talented ones, a powerful tool to reach more readers and eventually achieve more sales at an affordable cost.
Can you please elaborate about the features that distinguish it from other similar platforms such as Airtel Books? Airtel Books is a subscription-based ebook reading app. But, we are focusing more on building real-time communities. We are enabling people to set up micro-communities and
fandoms in the app, and talk to people in real time of similar interests.
Any idea about the collection of books Vowelor has and what is your target in the next one year or so? The readers on Vowelor have added nearly 12,000 books based on different genres in their Vowelor Profile Libraries. The number is increasing steadily with every user joining the platform and we expect this number would cross 5 lakh at the end of this year.
How has been the response so far, especially after coming up with its Android app? How many downloads the app has amassed till date? The response has been overwhelming and the app has crossed 5,000+ downloads on Google Play Store. Also, the users are engaging with the app and have created book clubs, as specific as ‘Potterhead’ and as broad as ‘Readathon: one book per week’.
When can we see Vowelor on the IOS? Why it’s so late on this platform? As a sole community for readers, we will first maximize our reach to every reader possible in the initial months and work on the feedbacks to provide the stable platform. Once we get threshold users, we will look for the development of
“Vowelor’s concept of “Why Read
Alone” works as an interactive solution to all the problems of the readers, while the upcoming “Vowelor Author Program” on app gives authors, especially the passionate and talented ones, a powerful tool to reach more readers and eventually achieve more sales at an affordable cost”
IOS Vowelor application.
Do you have any plan to add audiobooks (feature) on your platform similar to the Amazon’s Audible? No, we are not planning to add audiobooks or ebooks as of now. But if the users demand for such features, we will definitely think upon incorporating them.
What is the revenue model of Vowelor? Please tell us about the funds you have raised and partnerships? Our primary revenue comes from helping and promoting authors to reach maximum numbers of readers. We do this by utilizing our community and organic reach from our website. And in coming days, we are planning to automate the entire process via Vowelor app.
Moreover, in the near future, Vowelor will collaborate with publishers and book stores, opening new revenue streams as well as bringing the much-needed change in the book industry in India which is estimated to be worth Rs 739 billion by 2020.
We have recently raised funding of Rs 10 million in pre-series led by angel investor Dr. Sanjeev Juneja, an eminent Indian FMCG player and the man behind brands like Roop Mantra, Dr. Ortho and Pet Saffa. Since Vowelor already has an early-mover advantage to be a leader in this segment, what is your growth plan to deal with competition, which is very common in today’s digital world? As we have already mentioned, Vowelor is not only limited to the Indian origin and this particular thing will definitely help us to scale the business of bookish industry.
In current market, we don’t have any Indian bookish platform which will become the bridge between the western reading style and Indian reading style.
We will try to emphasize on this particular gap and will take the Indian publishing/reading industry to the global platform. ■