Kishore Kani – Managing Director, SKST Chit Funds Pvt. Ltd.
‘SKST Chit Funds Pvt. Ltd.’ is a prominent name in the financial services sector in Coimbatore. The financial services company has been flourishing since worthy 32 years and has built an enormous customer base today. Mr. Kishore Kani, the Managing Director of the company had successfully taken over the family business in 2016. Kishore, an Information Technology graduate from a reputed institution, had always possessed an affinity for financial services with a strong desire to make it big in the financial services business.
“People from all walks of life are in need of financial assistance to fulfill their educational, business and personal objectives”, says Kishore.
With an annual turnover of Rs. 45 lacs and a client base of around 350, he has scaled his business up to a larger customer base of more than 3000 people today, and has eventually turned it into a revenue stream of Rs. 50 crores.
Kishore puts forward the success story of his business and recalls, “Since 32 years, we have been in this business and I have been watching my dad working hard, but in his limited business circle. From a very young age, I was passionate about doing business but I knew that starting from square one would not be a fruitful alternative as I already had the opportunity to take our 28 year old business to the next level. Learning from my father’s experiences and considering the strategies for expanding our customer base, I was motivated enough to step in and put my best foot forward”.
He further adds, “At times when we ourselves are in financially challenging situations, we manage to keep aside our problems and prioritize our focus according to our customer’s needs. This has contributed drastically to our ever expanding clientele”.
When Kishore was operating from Mettupalayam- a place in Coimbatore district, he used to keenly observe the marketing tactics of big players in the competition, who were already generating revenues in crores. He learnt about the incentive scheme which they were following to acquire new customers. Quickly adopting the same, he opened up a small office and hired adept marketing executives on incentive basis in the next year, thereby, gradually increasing the sales which required them to set-up an even larger office-space to cater to their growing number of customers.
From ‘10 lacs chit group’ in 2016, he along with his father risked it a lot to start two ‘30 lacs groups’ with 40 members in each.
“It’s one of the major risks we undertook, which has not only elevated our confidence but also lead us to commence our ‘1 Crore chit group’- the largest one in our company till date”, he shares with a smile.
Adding further, he explains that even if they can manage to serve just 1% of the district population – around 20,000 customers, they can set-up any business with monopoly and turn it into a profitable one.
Relating his journey as an entrepreneur to that of Reliance group’s Mukesh Ambani, he exclaims “I am immensely inspired by him for taking his father’s business to an incredible level, and I aspire to be like him in the future”.
Kishore believes “Most companies today lack trust as they don’t educate their customers enough or provide them with substantial financial solutions to their needs. But we always strive for educating our customers about the chit funds industry, closely analyzing their requirements and guiding them with the best of our services”.
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