DigiChefs is a digital marketing company based out of Mumbai, India. Founded in 2015 by Mr. Deep Mehta and Mr. Marmik Ajmera, DigiChefs has quickly made a name for itself in the crowded digital marketing space.

With a focus on creativity, innovation, and results, DigiChefs has helped numerous clients improve their online presence and grow their businesses.
Let us hear from Mr. Deep Mehta about the inspiration behind DigiChefs, the challenges they've faced along the way, and the secrets to their success.

Can you tell us about the founding story of your company?
At the cusp of digital marketing popularity in our country, back in 2015, Marmik and I would work in another e-commerce solutions company in Mumbai, where we got exposed to the exciting stuff brands do to bring their business online. It was that time, when businesses that were spending 80% in traditional/offline advertising & 20% in digital, were starting to understand the real value digital brings to the table.

It was that time when we realized that digital marketing truly democratizes the marketing eco-system for startups & established enterprises alike.

It hit us then, that this market is going to grow big, and sooner or later every single business out there will need experts in digital services which can drive results for them. And thus, we quit our jobs and set out to start "DigiChefs" - a high-performance creative agency.

The idea was clear, we didn't want to be another advertising agency that rides on just ideas, but we wanted to bring in technological expertise, optimization, and long-term sustainable marketing strategies for mid-sized & large businesses and enjoy the journey ourselves too. Of course, later, we also developed a huge clientele of smaller businesses & startups, and solving challenges for them is super fun too.

Today we're a 65 people team, located in our Mumbai HQ, offering full-stack digital marketing solutions with some new-age tools & tactics to keep clients a step above their competition.

Can you share a brief about the company & the services offered?
We offer full-suite digital marketing services, mainly in 3 verticals.
a. Branding & Creative Content
b. Marketing & Automation
c. Technology & UI/UX

This includes activities like - branding, web development, UI/UX for existing products, search engine optimization, social media marketing, performance marketing, email marketing, marketing automation, influencer marketing & more.

How did you get into the digital marketing industry and what inspired you to start your own company?
Engineering degrees have an interesting angle. During the 4 years of engineering, most of us realise that we didn't really want to do engineering but rather liked a certain another aspect of business that we'd like to contribute to. To be honest, that's the beauty of engineering!

That's what happened to me too. By the 2nd year of engineering, I realized that I am more interested in marketing & PR. I also went out to start the entrepreneurship cell in our college with a full panel of 10-12 of my friends, and of course, with the support of some faculties. Eventually, I lead the PR division for the same, and learnt that I truly enjoy understanding audiences, forming communication ideas, building an online footprint for my organization (then called "Bloombox - The E-Cell"), and this lead me to explore SEO.

Once I started learning about SEO, I was lost in all its glory!

I loved every bit of it. And thus, spent the next 2 years becoming an expert at it. That's how we (DigiChefs) rank between #1 - #5 for all keywords like "digital marketing agency in mumbai" and more.

What challenges have you faced along the entrepreneurial journey? How did you overcome them?
I have realized that running a business of your own is no easy feat. No matter how easy it is to secure funding, you should think about starting up only if YOU really want to do it. YOU believe in your business.

Largely because entrepreneurship is a lifestyle, to be honest. You're always worried, always working, always being judged upon, always solving problems you never thought existed, and more.

Some key challenges at DigiChefs include:

a. Building a pipeline of leads to work with - we solved them by doing SEO for ourselves
b. Cashflow management - we are very strategic in our finance planning
c. Culture building - we take many initiatives to re-iterate our culture over and over again

Can you give an example of a successful digital marketing campaign you have managed and the impact it had on your client's business?
One of my favourite campaigns is the one we did for FlexiLoans. They are in the space of providing collateral-free working capital loans for businesses. We helped them from a full 360-degree digital marketing POV.

We built their communication strategy, social media strategy & performance strategy to grow their overall traffic, leads & visibility. When we started working with them they were an 8-people team doing less than 10 cr worth of loan disbursements. After 3 years of working with them, they were a team of 150, doing hundreds of crores worth of loan disbursements.

How do you stay up-to-date with the latest digital marketing trends and technology?
I read ET (the newspaper), I know it's old school, but I like the way news is aggregated into a few pages, only the ones that have the most impact. I skip the pages which talk about politics though, too much drama.

Apart from that, I use apps like Pocket & Feedly to subscribe to a few newsletters of my choice.

Can you talk about a time when your company took a risk that paid off?
While there are so many risks that you end up taking when running a business, but 2 of them particularly always come up in our discussions.

There was an early time, we were a team of around 6 people when we felt that we wanted to improve our creative design unit and hence we hired a senior graphic designer whom we paid a salary more than what Marmik & I were taking out combined. We still remember that day on which we had to make a decision and how we made up our minds to do that, but it paid off really well. 5 years hence, that same person is our art director running a solid team of graphics & motion graphics.

Another incident was when we had to move to a new office since we'd grown to a team of 15. We could have chosen another gala in an industrial area, with less rent and shabby access. But we went ahead and chose a 30 people office in a glass facade building in the prime location of Mumbai. That's where we aspired to really work from, and we did it. Since then, we've grown significantly to a team of 65 people in a brand-new office.

Some Inspiring statistics of your company:

1. 400 clients serviced to date

2. 65-people team strength

3. 100 Cr in revenue generated for clients

4. 15K keywords ranked on the first page of Google

5. Hundreds of creative & social campaigns
One message from your journey for budding entrepreneurs
Just give it a good honest try, you'll most likely make it.