Book Review: The Mouse Charmers by Anuradha Goyal

One fine day, my door bell rang and the courier boy handed me a yellow packet. The package was delivered to myself. I was pleasantly surprised a book inside - The Mouse Charmers. Honestly, I had no idea the source of book. Anyways, any book is always welcome at my adobe, thus I placed the book on my side table.
It was after few days that I recalled signing up for a free copy of this book to be reviewed from Indiblogger.
Thank you Indiblogger for sending me this book. Hope to have many more books in the future.

Coming back to the review:

About the author:
Anuradha Goyal 18+ years of experience spanning across the various facets of IT industry. She has published multiple papers in various forums and journals and is an active blogger.
Head over to her website - http://www.anuradhagoyal.com/ and let her speak for herself.


BOOK REVIEW ★★★★

Book Cover
Being the technology book, I liked the cover page. It depicted the complexity of web portals with small graphic images.

The Blurb
The advent of internet has been a significant game changer of our generation. Mouse charmers are a new breed of entrepreneurs in emerging India powered by the internet and the opportunities that it offers to create new markets and to cater to old markets in new ways. Some of them have already achieved success where they can be called iconic and inspiring while others have powerful ideas that put them on the same path. Anuradha Goyal tells the stories of digital pioneers like Flipkart, Zomato, MakeMyTrip, ImagesBazaar, ImdiBlogger; how they started out, the innovations and technologies involved, their business models, and unique marketing strategies. Inspiring and useful, the mouse charmers is an essential guide for aspiring entrepreneurs.

What I Felt About The Book
I am sure no internet user is unaware of Make My Trip, flipkart. Even if most of non internet users are aware of shaadi.com. What can be the better treat for upcoming entrepreneurs than deep through knowledge of these well established brands.
Honestly, I am not a non-fiction reader. Every-time I pick such books, I am really scared if I would be able to finish it or not. I am proud to say that 'The Mouse Charmers' forced me to finish it till last page.

Author has divided the book in three parts:
1. eCommerce: Flipkart, Make My Trip, Big Basket and Caratlane
2. Content Platforms: Zomato, Games2Win , ImagesBazar and Chai With Lakshmi
3. Connectors: Shaadi.com Commonfloor, Rang De and Indiblogger

The book covers case studies of each portal in detail along with their planning, strategies and special features to capture the market. The way information is utilized and displayed in the book, starting from the very establishment of companies, to their innovations and technologies involved, their business models, and unique marketing strategies: one is bound to be inspired.

What I liked about the book:
1. Tabular format of vital informations at the end of each case
2. Choice of portals - author has tried to cover each and every possible aspect of internet usage

What I did not like about the book:
1. The book could also have listed few of the failures experienced by the portals. That would have shown the real picture and also the readers would have understood the hard work that went behind glorious hits.


Title:          The Mouse Charmers
Author:      Anuradha Goyal
Publisher:  Random House India
ISBN:         978-8-184-00492-2

This review is written in response to the copy received by Indiblogger.