Hi All!

Though I will share my experiences from the workshop..read on and let us know your thoughts as comments

On 31st August Google Business Group (GBG), Mumbai chapter organized a workshop on the topic ‘What gets measured, gets managed’, it was held at GBG Mumbai’s strategic partner venue – HMFIJ.

The speakers included Redcom’s Pareen Lathia and Vibhas Sen from Virtual Snipers. The organizing committee members are Rushabh Vasa, Manan Shah, Kaushal Raj, and Hardik Shah, who are the core members of GBG Mumbai.

Following is the description of the seminar held.

The seminar was hallowed with good number of participants. I had never foreseen that the crowd would be so active. All the credit should go to the organizers of the event for their fabulous hospitality. They fed us, encouraged us and sheltered us from the college commotion outside. No jokes. This was actually what they did. At around 4:50 all the participants were given some snacks, giving them some time to network with all the other attendees. The free snacks consisted of sandwiches of two types and hot beverages of two types. The attendees, whom turned up were hungry and arranging the snacks was a relishing and refreshing decision.

Before we entered into the seminar hall, all the groundwork was organized properly. The projector was set, the sound was set, laptops; on and connected, projector; up and running efficiently and the crowd enthusiastic. The organizers then smartly maneuvered everyone slowly into the seminar hall; where it all began.

The seminar started with an introductory presentation from a tall guy with a loud voice. He was interacting very easily with the attendees. I soon learnt that the guy speaking is the manager of Mumbai Chapter for Google Business Group, Sreeraman Thiagarajan. Sreeraman encouraged all of us to give a short professional/personal introduction about them. Now these 30 seconds of fame worked out some magic, as it was mandatory for everyone to speak something about himself or herself also keeping in mind, that your voice should also be audible to everyone. So some were enthusiastically introducing while some appeared a bit nervous during the introduction. Most of the people turned out to be internet entrepreneurs, web developers, app developers, etc.

Before the commencement of the program an elderly gentleman seated next to me quoted a slogans from one of the KBC ad campaigns “ Dekho bhai ‘Seekhna bandh toh Jeetna Bandh’ hum toh yah seekhne ke liye aaye hay’. The gentleman was true. You should keep learning as it engages your mental faculties and channelizes our energy into thinking and execution. Sadly the gentleman found me not so interesting .So he changed his seats and sat beside a man of his own age (networking huh!!!).

Sreeraman explained to us about the background of Google Business Group. The last seminar was held at National Stock Exchange with the sole aim of empowering women entrepreneurs. Sreeraman went ahead and explained the basic difference between GDG, GSA and GBG. He also introduced the central theme of the seminar. This keynote from Sreeraman very well served as a show starter, in essence, he outlined the need for measuring, a case in point is that ‘we often make poor business decision not because of lack of alternatives, but due to lack of clear insights’ he added & concluded how Google’s tools can help you measure and gain insights for taking business decisions, after which Pareen Lathia started with his part, ‘The Workshop’

Pareen is a tall & young guy, who can be easily mistaken for a college graduate; the subject was ‘Google Analytics and Google Webmaster tool’. In my views these concepts always scared the wits out of me, the same way Physics did in Junior College. I always considered these tools as a thing far from the understanding of a mortal man! So Pareen walks up to the mike, introduces him respectfully and then starts with the workshop. It was this moment, when I thought I would get bored, but here comes the first joke from Pareen. The whole seminar busted into giggles and laughter, that was, because the jokes were anecdotes from business life. Pareen carried forward explaining each concept into minute details also giving a practical example of each concept. Pareen Lathia is the Founder and CEO of Redcom. He explained to all of us the nitty-gritties of the Internet industry, how clients behave, how do people work, etc. With the help of the presentation the speaker wonderfully explained concepts like visit, unique visitors, pages per visits, bounce rates, A/B testing, etc. With Pareen speaking, Google Analytics seemed like a child’s play.

Complete understanding of Google Analytics can help you measure the effectiveness of your internet assets and help take better business decisions. The attendees were interacting with the speaker frequently asking him an array of questions about the concepts Pareen was explaining. All the numbers and the graph mentioned on the dashboard made much more sense when Pareen told everyone how they are linked and the correct way of analyzing them. Pareen helped us to understand better by giving live demonstrations. This demo helped me to gain a firsthand knowledge of how Google Analytics work. Pareen had so many concepts to cover but had very little time. So he had to wrap up his part to hand over the rest of the session to Vibhas Sen.

Sampath Igyengar, a seasoned entrepreneur who also runs JamwithSam, was the man behind lens; he truly has the power to capture moments in time.

Vibhas Sen is founding member at Virtual Snipers. Vibhas is a man who is aiming for National Paralympic Swimmer; Vibhas displayed a rich store of practical knowledge about the synergy between Google Analytics & Google Adwords. Vibhas directly turned towards the applicatory part of Adwords after giving an overview of the same. There were many questions in the minds of the participants, which they openly debated with him. Vibhas skillfully handled the wide variety of questions. Some of them were very tricky. Even the participants were sharing their bit of information with other fellow participants and other delegates. Vibhas acted like an inspiration to me. One can keep your body in crutches but not your mind

Towards the end the participants were very actively debating with the speakers. After answering a few question, Vibahs handed over the proceedings back to Sreeraman. While most of were still basking in the knowledge seized from this event, an eminent revelation was made. It was about GdayX at Mumbai. This event is a daylong event co-created and organized by GDG & GBG.

Signing off, he requested people to fill up the feedback form, which will aid in improving this community. He promised the presentation deck will be shared with all attendees. Later, all the attendees and the participants were invited for a group photo. When I left the hall, people were networking with the delegates, core members, fellow participants feeling satisfied for the knowledge they had gained. Overall a top-notch job executed by the GBG Mumbai, see you all at GdayX. Three Cheers for the Fellas!

Abhijeet. Z

Team GBG Mumbai