It's all about taking the plunge- Susmita DasGupta's Journey with Smart iDeAs

An extensive traveler and a dance enthusiast, Susmita Das Gupta also dons the hats of founder and Chief Ideator at Smart iDeAs – a market advisory organization. After over 16 years of experience in marketing, of which she spent 9 years heading the marketing team at Cookson Electronics, she founded Smart iDeAs in August 2008 along with Atrijit Das Gupta.

Susmita says, “Hailing from a business family and after working for quite some time, I decided it was time to do something on my own, particularly something which I am passionate about. I needed something where I can work at my own pace and follow my other passions like dancing and traveling as well.” And that is when they started up Smart iDeAs that combines marketing, research, branding, personal branding and corporate mentoring and aims to deliver customized services to serve the need of the future market place.

What motivated us was Greg's mention of how lack of money, employees, equipment -- even lack of product -- is actually a huge advantage, because it forces the bootstrapper to concentrate on selling to bring cash into the business. "Nothing Happens Until Someone Sells Something". You have to trust your smarts, and take a chance.

Talking about market research in India, Susmita says it is sad to see most companies, of all sizes, taking decisions based on ad-hoc understanding of market and customers and without any research in the space. About social media marketing and personal branding, she says that social media is a very effective way of marketing but is a confused space for Indian brands. Personal branding on the other hand is very nascent in India but people are slowly gearing up to the space.

The team of 5 has served clients like Frost & Sullivan, Cookson Electronics, DTDC etc. Bootstrapped till now, they work on different revenue models – project based fee for market research, annual contracts for social media marketing, hourly charge for personal branding and a customized pricing for corporate mentoring.

Website: Smart iDeAs