Perfect Match

"Love comes after the marriage," says Murugavel Janakiraman, the owner and arch senior manager of a of India's largest matrimonial website companies, BharatMatrimony.

The investor believes it is a truth inbred in Indian enlightenment and a of the reasons Indians place more significance on relating other "various criteria" before restraining the tangle - "religion, language... relating the community, you need to moreover tie in the sub-community, then there's horoscope matching".

The long list of factors that must be in fixing can appear daunting when it comes to probing for a prospective spouse. But Mr Janakiraman says that care has done the internet increasingly renouned in India as a apparatus for probing for prospective partners.

"Online provides the soothe and selection - the selection of millions of prospects... [and] ample more data about a prospect," he says.

Mr Janakiraman says he has tied together more than two million people by BharatMatrimony and offshoot sites directed at not similar communities and in not similar languages.

He met his own spouse by the service he had created, after he responded to a form of her posted by his future father-in-law.

"We got tied together in 3 weeks," he says.

The 'new' organised wedding

Mr Janakiraman says the way people wed in India has altered significantly.

"It is not similar to 20 years ago where the parents chose the husband is to girl," he says. "Today the parents know that it won't work anymore."

Instead he believes that nonetheless getting intent is still really ample a family affair, parents are "more cozy nowadays" with their young kids selecting their own associate "as long as they wed inside of the community".

To this extent, the investor regards online matchmaking as a new way of marrying couples that accommodates both the spouses and their families.

Mr Janakiraman says the operation of selection on the web allows people to "identify the prospects" before "they... obtain parents involved".

"At the finish of the day, the singles have the soothe of the parents moreover being in the matchmaking process. The parents are cozy that the singles are involving them in the matchmaking process," he says.

He says of his own experience: "My primary review was with my father-in-law... then we came to India, we met the girl."

Tackling problems

Mr Janakiraman says he could not have likely the success of online matchmaking in India.

In the late 1990s he was working in the USA as a technology consultant. In his free time, he proposed a web portal directed at the Tamil community. The website enclosed a couple of pages of matrimonial advertisements - and Mr Janakiraman beheld that these drew a considerable amount of traffic.

This gave him the thought for rising a matrimonial website with not similar sections directed at all the principal communities and groups in India.

He launched BharatMatrimony in 2000 - but he says that a lot of people told him that they doubted it would succeed. One of the many familiar criticisms he listened was: "Indians won't be cozy using online sites to find a life partner, because they are really conservative."

Mr Janakiraman attempted to plunge into the complaint by introducing assorted privacy features to give reassurance. Now, as people have turn more in the habit of to interacting with others online, a few of these features have been phased out.

Another big dare was how to take payments from customers. In many tools of the world, the many familiar way to pay for products or services on the internet is by credit card - but in India, credit card use is still in its infancy.

Mr Janakiraman's answer was simple: "We had to go to the doorstep and gather the money."

It is an draw close the firm has polished over time. "Today, wherever in India, inside of 3 hours we can... go to the doorstep and gather the payment," he says.

"More than 60% of the income is forthcoming from this doorstep gathering resource in India," he adds.

Forced to variegate

Somewhat surprisingly, Mr Janakiraman says he did not spread his business since a request to produce more profits.

He says he had to variegate the business model when expansion began to slow down. In 2008 "our firm was losing allowance so all of a unexpected the marketplace outlook... changed", he says.

"We had to do something not similar and if we are to turn effective we... only cannot only concentration on BharatMatrimony. We have to emanate new income channels."

The firm began to dilate its operation of services - for example, customers peaceful to pay aloft prices were offering the option of help from a attribute manager.

Mr Janakiraman says that this diversification has paid off, and the firm has increased its marketplace share. He says it has given him the expostulate to attain serve and look at general expansion.

He is moreover examining the probability of entering the wedding industry, that he says is a sizeable market.

"Marriage in India is something - it's a once in a lifetime event... the many costly event," he says.

Mr Janakiraman says every investor must be driven by role and passion. But he believes the key to success is perseverance.

"It's really critical because many times you strike the thoroughfare block," he says. "You've got to realise, 'OK, it's not the finish of the road... it's starting a new path'.

"It's not about the money," he says. "It's about formulating success, formulating the name, formulating the establishment that can live forever."