Startup Spotlight #202: SkillBank
SkillBank is a 1:1 mentorship and training platform for entry-level marketing roles.
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I got the chance to speak with Mehak Vohra, founder and CEO of SkillBank, about what she’s working on at her startup, and any advice she has for emerging entrepreneurs.
Vohra is the founder and CEO of SkillBank, a 1:1 mentorship and training platform for entry-level marketing roles. Before starting SkillBank, Mehak was a growth marketing consultant for startups and investors. With 70k+ followers across her socials, she receives millions of views on her social content every year. Mehak has been featured in Marie Claire Magazine, Forbes, AdWeek, AwesomenessTV, Huffington Post, and more.
Startup Spotlight: SkillBank
Problem: Marketing agencies are struggling to find a reliable source of entry-level marketing talent. On the flip side, service workers in the United States need help up-skilling for more sustainable career options.
Market: There are 107.8M service workers and 10k+ marketing agencies offering 100k+ entry-level jobs. For us to become a $100M business we'd have to have 12k people through our program every year.
Solution: We invented a new online training program called "RTPs" or rapid training programs to offer marketing training programs. This is a hybrid experience between self-paced programs and cohort-based bootcamps to efficiently train entry-level workers.
Team: Our team has extensive experience in the online bootcamp and marketing world. Our core team comes from General Assembly, Coding Dojo, NY Data Science Academy, and other educational companies.
Recent Success:
Vohra: We built our curriculum with our marketing agency partners in mind. They gave us feedback on our curriculum and have helped us refine it so that our fellows are learning relevant marketing skills. If someone is entering our program with no prior marketing experience, we've been able to take them from nothing to landing a marketing agency job in 12 weeks using our curriculum. As part of the new RTP model, we professionally recorded all of our lectures so that our fellows could review the curriculum on their own time instead of sitting in a Zoom room.
Recent Struggle:
Vohra: When we first started SkillBank, we struggled with figuring out a payment structure for the program. We believe in access to education regardless of your economic background so we didn't want to be like our competitors and make our fellows pay upfront for the program. We tried the income share agreement option (free upfront for % of your salary for some time after), but we ultimately moved away from that too because we found people didn't take the program as seriously if it was free for them upfront. We have now figured out three payment models that will fit anyone regardless of their financial background.
Founder Advice:
Vohra: Have a clear idea of who your target audience is, and expand from that point later on. A common trap I see founders fall into is trying to offer their product for everyone, and the fact is that your product will not be a solution for everyone. You can scale faster if you can identify what archetype would most benefit from your program and go after them. It can hurt your business if you try to make your product too many things at once. You can always expand later, but don't spread yourself too thin when you start.
Three Cool Founders You Should Know About:
Vohra: Here are three founders you should check out next!
Rachel Woods, Founder and CEO Vinebase: A marketplace helping wine lovers discover & buy directly from wineries, all in one place.
Alexandra Griffon, Founder and CEO of BlueCargo: A real-time single platform to track container empty return information.
Capri Wheaton, Founder and CEO of Dressd: A peer-to-peer clothing rental app where users can rent out items from their closets.
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