Entrepreneur Ricky Ahuja on Affiliate Venture Group’s entry to Indian market

Tell us about Affiliate Venture Group.

Affiliate Venture Group(AVG) is one of the fastest growing private performance network/agency. We are based out of Richmond, VA – it comprises of a very experienced team of professionals with over 12 years experience in the online marketing industry. We pride ourselves in providing the most attentive and professional services to our advertisers and publishers.

How is Affiliate Venture Group different from its competitors?

There are numerous players in the industry however, where we differ is in our ability to truly understand the needs of our clients and providing complete transparency in the process. We do not provide a blanket solution to everyone but rather a most consultative approach in helping them meet their objectives.

How did the idea for Affiliate Venture Group come about?

The company was primarily started as a lead generation business for some of our in house sub-prime offers but slowly evolved in to providing a more holistic collection of services to compliment what we had.

What do you intend to achieve with this venture of yours?

Having launched this primarily as a platform for our US partners, we found out very quickly that a significant portion of our traffic originates from India and as a result we are in the early stages of looking to tap the Indian performance marketing arena.

Tell us about your background.

I am originally from New Delhi, India but have been in the States for well over 35 years. I am probably the oldest individual in this industry (44) but loving every minute of it.  I have been in this space for over 13 years now, dating back to 1998.

Where is your user base?

We truly have a very international user base with partners in US, India, Canada, UK, Australia, you name it.

Which countries are you operating in? Where does most of your business come from?Our main offices are in the USA with our development teams are in Indian and the UK. As far as where our business comes from, it is mainly the following countries: USA, India, Canada, UK and Australia.

Let us know about the tie-ups that you have (if any).

We have several strategic alliances many of whom we promote exclusively through our network. We are and have been in talks with a few partners in India that may provide us an inroad to facilitate our strategy implementation and growth initiatives.

Where do you see Affiliate Venture Group and your industry five years from now?

This is such a dynamic industry changing very rapidly so it is difficult for me to see where we will be a few months from now let alone 5 years. I do however believe if you provide a superior service and quick to move, you will be around and successful weather it is 1 year, 5 year or 10 years down the road.

What is Affiliate Venture Group’s revenue model?

There are two sides to our business: agency and performance. On the agency side we provide a complete end to end branding solution enabling companies to have a presence online and on the performance side, our advertisers only pay when a specific action occurs, whether it is a lead, a sale, a download, etc.

As an entrepreneur, what are your joys? What are the challenges?

The joys and challenges can both be summed up in one word: Change. This industry is so dynamic and constantly forcing you to stay ahead of the curve and the “next big thing” so gets rather tough at times to understand all that is happening. That same challenge also leads to the biggest joy when you are able to have that “Eureka” moment.

How big is the Affiliate Venture Group team? Give us some info on team composition. Are you looking at hiring?

The core team consists of 4 people here in the US and the rest dev team’s abroad. We are always seeking good qualified partners but it is such a niche industry that it is a challenge to find someone of high caliber.

What are your plans for India?

A very significant portion of our traffic is from India and that has led to us exploring expansion into the Indian market. Though we have seen a few competitors in the space, nothing in our minds poses a significant threat to how we prefer to do business. It is such an evolving market and as such – we would like to position ourselves ahead of this curve.

Who have you partnered with in India?

A significant number of our publishers are based out of India however, when we are formally ready to launch there – we will most certainly be seeking partners in the advertising, technology, VC space to say the least.

How do you see India as a target group?

India is such amazing target market for us as there are a lot of synergies in what we as a business attempt to do. The availability of qualified resources makes it that much easier for us to explore further.

How are you funded?

We are privately funded here in the US and actively seeking capital for the Indian market.

Anything else that you want to tell us?

The largest and most glaring internal statistic for us is that nearly 40% of our traffic comes from India and when you throw in the following four major expansions taking shape in India right now ( Mobile broadband, Social Media, E-commerce and Digital Advertising) you have to stop and think of how best to take advantage of this.

We at YourStory wish Ricky and team good luck as they plan to enter the Indian market. Meanwhile, you check out http://www.affiliateventuregroup.com/