As most of you know I was involved in local search @ Yahoo! and now am spending some of the time at Live Search on Live Maps as well. During this time @ Yahoo! I met and worked with Salim Mitha who was Senior Director Search for Europe at the time and now is CEO of Wahanda.

Thus I’m really excited to see a “local” start up run by someone I know evolving in the way Wahanda does. And all topics local are getting sexier by the hour – as location aware mobile devices are a reality now.

Could you briefly describe what Wahanda is?

Wahanda is a health, beauty and wellness resource that connects consumers, wellness businesses and professionals through content, community and commerce. We launched the Wahanda website in April 2008, and our goal is to do for wellbeing what Amazon did for online retailing – provide an intuitive and easy-to-use website to learn about treatments (everything from acupuncture, facials and massages to pilates, botox and personal training), share (and read) ratings and reviews, and ultimately book & purchase from the widest selection of deals, gifts and offers from the most comprehensive global listing of spas, salons, clinics, studios and fitness centres, all with the simple click of a mouse Ultimately we want to bring more consumers to the industry and to help wellness businesses and professionals better market their services online. As it relates to locallytype, we want to be the destination resource for businesses and professionals who want to be listed and for consumers who want to learn more, connect and buy.

How was the idea to Wahanda born?

Wellness is a massive industry – bigger than the film and music markets combined — and yet when you looked at the resources that were available online we felt it was a completely under-served market.

Essentially for a consumer there are three “pain” points in the spa, beauty & wellness space:

1. Comprehensive, well-organised wellness business & professional listings information is difficult to find online: Whether a consumer is searching for a “personal trainer in London”, or a “massage in Madrid”, typing these queries into Google or Yell.com does not provide comprehensive, easily consumable results. Additionally, the depth of the result is poor – typically there are no pictures, information on what services are offered, prices, etc. What we provide at Wahanda is an easy to consume, comprehensive, deep and informative result that puts the power in the hand of the user. (Acupuncture in London)

 

2. Once you have the information, it is difficult to determine where to go, or what to have done: Going to a spa, or choosing a therapist or wellness practitioner is a high-involvement purchase – it can be expensive (in fact, per hour is one of the more expensive investments you can make), and its quite personal (many times you are entrusting your body to someone who you probably have never met before, not to mention that you may have no clothes one!) So, once users have the business listing, they have to randomly choose where to go, or conduct multiple other background searches to find reviews from other sites, read professional writeups and other articles, call friends for recommendations, etc. What we try to do at Wahanda is collate user generated and professional reviews (e.g. reviews from Time Out, Elle, the TimesOnline, etc) in one place so that the user can make an informed decision about where to go, how much it will cost, what the venue looks like and what to expect, all in one place

 

3. Purchasing spa, beauty & wellness appointments and gifts online: Once a consumer finds places and decides where to go, it is very difficult to purchase appointments or find deals online in this space. At Wahanda we are putting together a marketplace where consumers can find the best deals, compare offers and purchase directly online.

 

What does Wahanda mean?

We wanted a name that did not pigeon-hole us and could travel globally, so we searched high & low for a name that meant something and sounded good. After reading pages and pages of everything from Norse mythology to Asian religions and fountain of you tales, we came across the name ‘Wahanda’ which means “The Great Creator Spirit” and comes from Native American Indian plains tribes. It takes a few times to stick, but once it does, we think it works ☺

How is Wahanda adding value for wellness businesses and professionals?

More and more businesses are learning the importance of the Internet in marketing their services and growing their businesses. The airline, hotel, and restaurant industries all have Internet marketing partners that can help them market online to fill seats, rooms and tables and to maximise their profitability. Unfortunately, until now, the wellness industry did not have the same online resources.

Wellness businesses around the world have big periods of low utilization when treatment rooms are empty, classes are unfilled and staff unused. Especially as we go into what will be a difficult recession, this drags down profit and limits the ability to service customers. We think it’s time for the wellness industry to have access to quality marketing partners like the airlines, hotels and restaurants enjoy, which is why we created Wahanda. And it seems to be working because consumers are finding us in increasing numbers every day, and businesses email us at hello@wahanda.com or on our site.
We saw a consumer and business need that was not being met. As wellness consumers we were frustrated by what we could do online and as we spoke to business owners and professionals we saw that they were frustrated by the tools they had to market themselves. At Wahanda we are harnessing the power of the Internet to provide a great resource for users and businesses alike.

Can you tell me what you do at Wahanda?

As a startup, I find myself doing a lot at Wahanda – from paying bills and making sales calls to QA testing, product strategy and answering customer phone calls (and loving every minute of it!), but officially I am the Chief Operating Officer. I founded Wahanda with my business partner Lopo Champalimaud, who is our CEO (our investors forced us to not have a co-CEO role, which I think was a very pragmatic and informed piece of advice!). Lopo is fantastic, but more importantly we have built a great team of developers, salespeople and copywriters who give Wahanda the special tone of voice and fantastic usability.

What separates Wahanda from other sites?

We didn’t really see any other resource online that provides the value proposition to consumers, businesses and professionals that Wahanda is building. There are some websites who do small parts of what we do (and we have recently seen some sites in the US who are also attempting similar sites), but Wahanda is different than anything out there through:

1. Our name: Unlike other “spa” sites or travel sites we get compared to, Wahanda is more than just spas – it’s about health and wellbeing too, so we feature information and services from businesses that range from fitness centres, salons, yoga and pilates studios to dental, cosmetic and eye clinics, nutritionists, etc.

 

2. Individuals matter: Unlike our competitors, Wahanda is not just about businesses, we also provide a place for the professionals who work in these industries, including independent therapists, trainers and wellness professionals, to share their knowledge and connect with their peers, as well as with new clients and customers.

 

3. Comprehensiveness: We are creating the most comprehensive global resource, which means every business, and professional can easily set up a free listing on Wahanda. This has already made us one of the leading online resources for wellness businesses and professionals across the globe, and we keep growing literally every day. We don’t limit who can be found on Wahanda – which is very different from our competitors. Whether you are a small nail bar or a leading 7-star hotel spa, a therapist just starting out or a personal trainer to the stars, you can be a part of Wahanda.

 

4. Community: This is a very important part of Wahanda. The community provides independent ratings and reviews (vs more editorial sites who write the reviews themselves, and limit the consideration set). Therapists are also an integral part of helping to provide consumers the best information to make decisions.

 

5. Transactions: We not only sell our Wahanda Gift Voucher (which is now accepted at over 150 locations across the UK), we also offer the widest selection of deals, vouchers and offers from businesses listed on our site through our Wahanda Shop. So whether consumers want the flexibility of the Wahanda voucher or the ability to compare and purchase exclusive offers from their favourite spa, salon, studio or fitness centre, they can find it on Wahanda.

 

6. Usability and Tone of Voice: We want Wahanda to be the easiest and most practical site to use for health and wellness out there. So whether it’s providing a great deal, the most comprehensive business and therapist listings or treatment descriptions, we are improving the site every day. You can even create your own scrapbook of favourite treatments and spas or businesses you want to try by creating your own online repository.

 

It’s a fact that one of the biggest challenges of sites with a focus on local businesses is quality, freshness and depth of data. How are you addressing these challenges?

We do not buy in any data like other local sites, and as I mentioned earlier, we focus on the depth of quality data for all of our listings. While we play a hand in uploading and verifying all of our business listings, and we have a Community Manager to assist therapists, trainers and professionals when they set up their profiles, we are building a self-service extranet to allow businesses and professionals to manage their own listings.

What do you do to market your site and why do you use which form of marketing? SEM/SEO/Display?

We concentrate heavily on optimising for SEO, and have dabbled in SEM, but are also very active in the social media outlets available online including Facebook, Twitter, etc. We also made sure we were listed in directories like yours on locallytype, qype, etc, but ultimately we feel that satisfied customers and great service, a great product and being flexible to continue to improve will generate fantastic word of mouth, and this will be our best (and most effective) form of marketing and advertising.

What is the business model behind your offering?

We generate revenues through transaction and listing fees, but have a number of packages designed to fit any partner, including a package which is completely free. Ultimately, however, we create real revenues by driving incremental sales for businesses and independent professionals (trainers, therapists, etc), and everywhere we do this, there is an opportunity to share in this upside. We share in the success we create for businesses, and we provide a real valued service to consumers.

What can we expect to see in the next months – what will be your focus regarding product features?

We are really focusing on rolling out better community features to help therapists and businesses better connect with consumers, display their knowledge and begin developing a reputation that can translate into more business. We also will continue to improve the usability of the site, and also focus on seasonal events. We just rolled out our Wahanda Mother’s Day Spa Gift Special, and we will launch other seasonal specific shops.

What was the biggest surprise for you so far running Wahanda?

Every day is important, and with limited resources we need to focus on the daily details that add up every day to make a difference over months, and eventually years. Additionally, we all learn every day and we always have to try to make a difference with the time that’s available. Building a culture, a brand and a company requires a lot of effort, and so trying to keep a healthy balance in order to bring enthusiasm and energy every day is an amazingly rewarding challenge every day.

How do you expect to be affected by the economic downturn? Any strategies that you planning to implement to minimise negative impact?

The downturn will affect everyone but we believe that businesses can mitigate the impact by focusing on how they market online. We think that health and beauty remains an area where consumers will continue to spend. Men and women want to be sure that they remain healthy and well groomed, and since they are not travelling as much they will look to pamper themselves closer to home.

What is changing is that consumers are becoming more discerning and are going online to find the best place to go for the best value (this does not necessarily mean price). That is why we continue to see tremendous growth in the traffic to our site, and in under a year we are already the most comprehensive wellness resource in Europe. Any health, beauty or wellness business can easily email us as hello@wahanda.com or find us at www.wahanda.com

Lovely Thanks Salim and best of luck for the future of Wahanda!

this is a blog post as originally posted on locallytype

Interview: Salim Mitha CEO of Wahanda.com

this is a blog post as originally posted on locallytype

Congrats to Qype!

reach in the last 6 month – alexa

There are a couple of fairly new players in the social local sector. Besides the “old” trusted places that was launched in mid 2006, there is welovelocal since mid 2007, and later in the year qype launched the UK site as their second market after Germany and are launching France later this year. Last but not least tipped.co.uk who launched late last month.

I do know qype quite well as I’ve been following them since they launched and have even written quite some reviews, for the others its more that I’ve heard about them and did have a look at some point but never dug any further into the pages.

Now we all know alexa is not the most reliable source of usage data – as its just too easily gamed – but it usually is a good indicator to get a feel for the volumes.

Looking at the traffic volumes of the players mentioned above reported by alexa they all seem to be head to head with no clear winner yet.
Whats interesting so is what you can see on the next chart – the reported numbers of page views for the same websites.

page views last 6 month – alexa

The number of page views usually is a good indicator of the level of engagement. And here you find a leader of the pack that is welovelocal and a strongly catching up second with qype.

Now whats different for welovelocal and qype to tipped and trusted places? Not a lot if you just take a quick look – and thats fair enough as they all cater very similar audiences and needs. But the most obvious difference seems to be the existence of groups in qype and welovelocal.

And this would make sense – users that are using a site not just because of its features and good content but because of the social aspect of being member of a group – are more likely to return and spend more time on the site.

this is a blog post as originally posted on locallytype

The Social Local Website Race – Engaging Groups