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CricHeroes - The Cricket Network

What is CricHeroes?

CricHeroes is an app for the local passionate cricketers of the world. It allows you to score your local cricket match and broadcast scores online just like an International match.

Tell us more about your team ?

Abhishek Desai:

- More than 25 years of experience playing amateur cricket!
- More than 12 years of experience building technology products.
- Computer Engineer, Product Manager and Co-Founder of DIGICORP
- Former College Cricket Captain and active cricketer for life.

Meet Shah:

- Professional Cricket Player
- Played for Gujarat Under-23
- CCO of CricHeroes
- Active cricketer for life

DIGICORP:

- Stakeholder and Technology Partner.
- Building technology products for startups and companies since 2004.
- Team of 75 people consisting of Developers, Designers, Product Managers, QAs.
- Offices in India and USA.

How did you come up with the idea ?​​

CricHeroes was born out of a personal struggle. We are a bunch of passionate cricketers, who play cricket every weekend. We call our little club SVCC i.e. Spring Valley Cricket Club. 

Now after finishing a day’s play, we sit together and discuss that day’s games. The discussions inevitably become very passionate. In Cricket, stats are everything. Without stats, most of the discussions are empty talks. Amazingly people do remember many stats but they possibly can’t remember it all. 

So one day, this idea struck, why don’t we start scoring our matches to identify real heroes of the game. When I thought over it more, I realised that this is a pain point for many such local cricketers like myself. That became a start of what is known as CricHeroes today.

What problem are you solving ?

- Most of the non-BCCI matches in India are still recorded on paper. There is an immense opportunity to create a digital platform to replace paper-based processes here.

- Since scores are kept on paper and in many cases not at all, large amount of data is lost every single day (and thus unrecognised talent) at amateur cricket level.

- Fame comes easily to International Cricketers but not to amateur cricketers (> 50m), who are the real heroes of the game.

- Hundreds of local cricket matches get played every single day all around the world and there are millions of local cricketers sharing same passion but there is not a single platform connecting them all.

How does it work ?

CricHeroes provide extremely powerful but very easy to use scorekeeping app for everyone on major mobile platforms.

App works for individual matches as well for tournaments. Each recorded match has a professional-grade scorecard with all the required graphs and stats.

It builds a network on top of all data (teams, players, matches, tournaments, scores, etc.).

It recognises heroes of the matches / tournaments and give them ability to share those achievements in their social settings.

It generates Cricket Profile of each cricketer automatically.

It provides updates / news of local cricket. Promote the culture of sport in society.

It allows cricketers to share photos, videos and updates about their matches to the world.

It allows teams to follow and arrange matches with other local teams.

What is your target market ?

Local cricketers and Local Cricket Tournaments of India and the world. 

What is your competitive advantage ?

- All competitive solutions are positioned as just Scorekeeping apps. Most of them have been created by individual developers for fun.

- None of them wants to leverage the data they have collected and build a large network of amateur cricketers i.e. no larger vision.

- Popular solutions like Chauka.in is having too much functional-debt now, which will be harder to overcome in foreseeable future.

- Platforms like CricBuzz and CricInfo are mainly for professional cricketers. Nobody is thinking of local amateur cricket which is far larger than professional cricket.

- It is an ideal platform for talent hunters for tournaments like IPL.

How much time did it take you from conceptualization of 'your venture' to actually launching it in the market ?

4 months

How do you plan to market your product? What are your customer acquisition strategies ?

Planning to cover as many tournaments as possible in Ahmedabad first. We have naturally grown to other cities like Surat, Jaipur, Mumbai and even Madurai.

We are relying heavily on word of mouth to acquire new customers (i.e. tournaments and players) as of now. Also doing touch base with our existing contacts in Mumbai and other cities. Would like to exploit these two strategies as much as possible before jumping on to costly alternatives.

What is the revenue model ?

- We are creating a large network of passionate cricketers. Contextual ads can be an obvious revenue stream.

- Create various marketplaces like selling and buying cricket equipments, customised t-shirts, booking grounds, etc.

- By selling the white label package to schools, colleges, clubs, tournament organisers and associations. They get their special page on the CricHeroes platform and additional features such as download scores, manage matches etc. 

What do you want to achieve from this? What is your larger goal or vision ?

We want to recognise the real HEROES of the game of Cricket, who according to us are the Local Cricketers. They don’t play cricket for any money or fame but for the love of the game and they play with equal if not more passion. I believe it is our duty to recognise and reward them.

We also want to create a “culture of sports” in India around local sports and cricket is just a start.  

What sort of support and feedback are you looking from the community ?

I really want eChai community to help me spread the word. As CricHeroes is free for players and tournament organisers, there is no reason for them to not use it.

I also want the community to give me feedback to improvise the product. Please visit www.cricheroes.in or download apps to know more.

Share feedback Or Ask questions Or Discuss
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Jatin Chaudhary
Salesman @eChaiVentures l Good at managing WhatsApp groups n organizing high quality, large gatherings at low cost :-) l Observer l Fmr Global Shaper @WEF

@Abhishek - How you were able to get early traction for CricHeroes?

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

Hey Guys,
Sorry for delayed replies. Somehow didn't get email notifications.

@Jatin10 - We scored Gujarat Inter College Tournament in Oct 2016 and word started spreading from there onwards. We scored the tournament for free so there was nothing to lose for the organisers. We incurred some cost but it was worth to get that initial traction and validation of product. So far most of the growth is via word of mouth only.

Neel Shah
Gujju (Foodie), IIM Grad (Strategist), Entrepreneur (Story Teller, Dream Seller)

While it's an in-house product, what would be the estimated cost of developing the same..?

Free scoring for now means zero revenue... What's the burn rate and what keeps you afloat?

Do you plan to develop a similar product for other sports? The same name might not apply...

Available across India or in specific cities?

Like school erp models, the difficulty is to get users to use a new medium and technology... How do you ensure that?

What if one creates a profile and keeps uploading score every Sunday? Is it all gully matches or only specific tournaments that can be scored on the app...

To share my stats, does one need to have the app or there's a website too?

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

@neelnshah Let me answer one by one :)

Q. While it's an in-house product, what would be the estimated cost of developing the same..?

A. Well, it is not an inhouse product. CricHeroes was a separate venture from day one and paid Digicorp for its services! The development is a continuous process and can't attach cost to any particular module. So far we have spent > INR 50L in development.

Q. Free scoring for now means zero revenue... What's the burn rate and what keeps you afloat?

A. Average burn rate is around 5-6L a month as of now not considering the marketing cost. We have private investment to keep us afloat for some more time and now looking for more.

Q. Do you plan to develop a similar product for other sports? The same name might not apply...

A. Not in near future.

Q. Available across India or in specific cities?

A. Across India and some other countries too.

Q. Like school erp models, the difficulty is to get users to use a new medium and technology... How do you ensure that?

A. The inherent value of the product is very strong. Not only it has multiple benefits over paper-based scorekeeping but it is 10x easier to use as well. So early adoption is slightly easier for us.

I have explained this in some detail in following article.

https://medium.com/@abhishekdesai/from-0-to-100-000-users-in-7-5-months-the-only-strategy-you-need-af8a82496c9a

Q. What if one creates a profile and keeps uploading score every Sunday? Is it all gully matches or only specific tournaments that can be scored on the app...

A. More than 95% of all our matches are tournament matches. That means they are legitimate matches done with proper scoring. Apart from private tournaments, we have GCA (Gujarat), BCA (Baroda), SCA (Saurashtra) and MCA (Maharashtra) official matches as well now on our platform.

Q. To share my stats, does one need to have the app or there's a website too?

A. There is a website www.cricheroes.in and you can see and share your cricket profile from there. Here is one as an example.

www.cricheroes.in/player-profile/2785/Vivek-Desai-

Mihir Parmar
Lead eChai USA. We have eChai individual city chapters in more than 10+ cities across the USA, and we enable cross-border collaborations via events across the globe.

How you ensure that the data in profile of user on CricHeroes is not fake?

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

@Mihir3009 Most of the matches scored on CricHeroes are tournament matches scored by an authorised scorer. That provides them credibility.

Individual Matches - we keep scanning them every single day every hour to make sure they are not practice matches. We have also created some algorithms to help us find fake matches quickly.

Hanuj Tilwani
Founder's Office at DemandFarm | Ex-Founder at Miho (B2B SaaS)

How are you promoting yourself in the market these days?
Which would be the best marketing medium for your product according to you?

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

@hanuj_t Trying following traction channels for the same

Viral Marketing - Building some inherent viral features to get organic growth.

Social Ads / SEM - Spending some amount every month on Google, FB, Twitter and Instagram for paid acquisitions.

Search Engine Optimization - The website is extremely SEO friendly and getting us good traction organically.

Business Development - Tie ups with associations like GCA, BCA, MCA and SCA are helping us a lot to increase credibility in the market.

Sales - Approaching tournament organisers directly in various regions by cold calling.

Still figuring out the core channel based on data we gather from above channels!

I recommend reading the book "Traction" for understanding above better.

Aditya Dave
Soil testing for farmers

If Cricbuzz enters the same market segment in short time than what USP would you have to excel in the competition

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

We are working on the engagement features now as scoring part if pretty much mature. The strong network effect in next 3-4 months will be our moat against the competition.

nitin tyagi

Hi Abhishek,

First of all thank you so much for providing us( On behalf of all Cricketers) a platform to showcase our talent, specially to our parents (Pun Intended).

I was just curious and wanted to know more about Cric heroes as few years back, I was also thinking to start my own app related to sports but due to some personal challenges was not able to proceed further. I Tried connecting you over LinkedIn & Twitter and also searched you on Insta :D.

So my question
1. How cricheroes is generating revenue as most of modules are free for users?
2. Which are the best performing region and your future plan to promote CricHeroes?

Regards
Nitin

Abhishek Desai
Founder of @CricHeroes and co-founder @digicorp.

Hey Nitin, so sorry for the delay in getting back. I didn't get notification for this comment.

You can connect to me over twitter @abhishekdesai or [email protected]

We are generating revenue from tournament organisers and players right now. It's a freemium model so we give bunch of features for free and charge for certain advanced features. Visiting our website may give you some idea about those features.

Let me know if I can be of any more help.

Jatin Chaudhary
Salesman @eChaiVentures l Good at managing WhatsApp groups n organizing high quality, large gatherings at low cost :-) l Observer l Fmr Global Shaper @WEF

How did you get the early customer for your startup?

Krishna Shah
Entrepreneur | Foodie | Read |Travel | Adventure

Have you changed any strategies during Covid-19 pandemic?

Law Fleeter Adv Shivangi

Plz contact me if you want fund 8850373717

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for fund raising and expanding business into UAE, GCC and UK.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for fund raising and expanding business into UAE, GCC and UK.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for fund raising and expanding business into UAE, GCC and UK.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for fund raising and expanding business into UAE, GCC and UK.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for the fund raising and strategic advisory services in pan India and UAE.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for the fund raising and strategic advisory services in pan India and UAE.

Kashi Financial
CA Bharatkumar Koshti : He is the Qualified Chartered Accountant from India , having an extensive experience in the field of Auditing , Accounting and Financial Services. He had worked for the many corporate (Public and Private) based in India and Dubai for the Auditing Services during his career, after considering the vast experience with various corporate services at domestic and globally he started his own advisory and consultancy services firm of Kashi Financial Services.

Feel free to contact us for the fund raising and strategic advisory services in pan India and UAE.