BlueLearn - The Power Of Community

I have previously built a platform in the student space called UnivConnect, and I understand the trials and tribulations. My Co-Founder, Kevin D’Souza, and I fell in love with the start-up space through this short-lived experience of 16 months. Coming from Mumbai, we had heard of the legend story of Bangalore, the “Start-up City” of India.

Last December, we decided to make a short trip and see it for ourselves. While there, we had the opportunity to meet two really cool co-founders; Harish Uthayakumar and Shreyans Sancheti. Today we will be talking about their start-up: Blue Learn.

A pic with the BlueLearn Co-Founders from our trip to Bangalore. Order of people in the picture On the Left, Kevin D’Souza followed by me and then we have Shreyans and Harish (BlueLearns Co-Founders).

About Their Company

Harish was initially a budding Youtuber while a student at Birla Institute of Technology and Science in India. His goal was to generate closer communication with his audience. His solution was starting a telegram group which he advertised through a link in the bio of his videos. Here began the journey of BlueLearn, and “the community” is still a crucial part of their DNA. Since then, they have grown to 150,000+ community members with groups and events initially across WhatsApp, Discord, and now their app. They have recently raised $3.5 million in seed funding, led by Elevation Capital and Lightspeed to build this company further.

In my opinion, the thesis on which this company is built is that, individuals, especially those of university age, learn the most through interactions with one another. Several universities in India do not have the community-like feel created through active societies, entrepreneurship cells, hackathons, networking sessions or even events like parties or socials on campus. BlueLearn has filled that gap for India, allowing students and young people nationwide to interact and learn from each other. Previously, there was lost potential due to lacking interaction or sharing of ideas. BlueLearn’s bet is that they can create the most significant online platform (or an informal university) in India where individuals can learn and find opportunities to earn in the long run.

What is the platform like?

Once you download the BlueLearn app, users can join several clubs to interact with like-minded people e.g., the finance club, coding club, meme club, web 3 club etc. This is a way of creating inclusivity and togetherness on the platform and allowing interactions based on shared interests without significant barriers to entry.

Now you might say, Aaryan, most of the universities in Tier 1 category/Tier 1 cities already have these societies, and these kinds of ‘clubs’ exist even exist on Reddit as subreddits. To that, I will say, what about Tier 2, Tier 3 and Tier 4? Students in smaller towns and colleges also deserve the opportunity to build networks, break out of their shells and build their perspectives. Assuming that Redditt already exists is naïve, as it is a platform used majorly by individuals in Tier 1 cities. Nothing in this realm has been built for India especially catering to this niche in particular. BlueLearn is aiming to lead the industry in this particular niche.

Inside the application, the tabs are divided into clubs, building a network and finding work. To those who read my previous article on Airbnb about how they take their users through a journey, from what I can see BlueLearn is trying to do the same thing.

A journey that I highly recommend is one where the user curates the platform according to their personal goals/aims.

For instance, an individual joins the platform knowing that coding is their passion. They can be taken through this experience: first, they are introduced to other individuals with a similar interest; second, they can join the Coding Club and interact with developers on the platform across India; finally, they can be shown potential freelancing or job opportunities in this industry. To BlueLearn’s benefit, they have already included many of these features. For instance, the work tab on the application allows one to find jobs and take advantage of the gig economy/freelancing economy.

What is left is to create a UI , that allows the individual to be taken on this journey; and help define a path for them in the platform, making BlueLearn a guide to young people across India.

If I had to break it down into steps:

1.     Join the platform.

2.     Interact, network, and join clubs.

3.     Find your niche and build skills and knowledge around it.

4.     Teach others your skills and knowledge by even creating your own club (this is not offered on the app at the moment).

5.     Collaborate with other users by building projects or enabling leverage to get a job/freelancing projects through BlueLearn’s in-app work platform.

Business opportunities I can see for BlueLearn:

· I believe a significant opportunity for BlueLearn will be to create a reward system to incentivise collaboration on its platform. Thereby allowing individuals who are participating the most in clubs or other programmes/events with rewards. Thus creating an incentive system for students to interact more with each other.

· There is an opportunity to allow individuals to create their own clubs/societies on the platform. This will increase initiative and mimic international in-person universities. These clubs can be monitored by BlueLearn, but can be created by anyone about anything.

An add-on monetization model can further be created, by allowing the user to create paywalls/tests to allow individuals to enter clubs. This allows BlueLearns users to become content creators and monetize it with a paywall if individuals are willing to pay for their content. Users will have to be very aware of the fact that if their membership fees is too high then it will drive away potential student members.

BlueLearn will make money by charging them a standard fee per taken membership. It is up to the user if they believe it is worth paying for. This club doesn’t need only to be one for discussion and networking, it could be for learning to justify a paywall.

· These interest groups and clubs will allow for users to opt-in on whether they would like to receive advertisements of products and services based on their interests. This creates a new revenue stream. Advertisers looking to sell their products to this niche will absolutely love BlueLearn, as their target market is the same as the users of BlueLearn, and they will be able to reach them directly.

In conclusion,

I think BlueLearn is a kickass start-up with great founders, these are my opinions, views and ideas, and I am definitely no expert. They are building a great community, leveraging India's massive freelancing/gig economy to provide opportunities. Overall, they are helping out their users to a great extent. Excited to see what you guys do next!