Great Companies: How did you get your idea or concept for the business?
Gaayathri Iyeer: The concept of building a community of authors and thought leaders originated in the mind of our founder, Murali Sundaram, in 2018. I joined this journey with him in 2020. Since then, it has been an amazing experience, evolving with our strategies.
Great Companies: What are the various services provided by Teachers Are Leaders?
Gaayathri Iyeer: We provide services to business owners, coaches, and trainers to scale up their business by building their personal branding. Book writing is one of the most cost-effective ways to build personal branding. Our residential program for 3.5 days helps participants finish writing their book with the support of our coaches. We organize this program every quarter in various cities.
Great Companies: What makes Teachers Are Leaders different from hundreds of other similar service providers?
Gaayathri Iyeer: Our community, TLC (Teachers Are Leaders), has a unique sales proposition. We offer a structured scaling-up program for business owners, coaches, and trainers. Our residential program provides a structured approach to book writing, and we offer ongoing support to help participants build their business around the book. This support is provided for life. Our community also offers new marketing strategies and insights into transforming a business from good to great.
Great Companies: What were the struggles and challenges you faced and how did you overcome them?
Gaayathri Iyeer: Many business owners build strategies for growth but lack support in evaluating and refining them. At certain stages, they get stuck and can’t scale further. TLC addresses this by helping them design scalable business models, build authority, and introduce them to new marketing techniques. We also provide a community for discussing strategies and overcoming challenges together.
Great Companies: How do you plan to grow in the future? What does 5 years down the line look like for Teachers Are Leaders?
Gaayathri Iyeer: As a business owner, I need to build my authority and position myself for a brighter future. At TLC, with more than 10 heads across India, we have set a targeted goal of creating over 5,000 authors who can demonstrate their authority, generate revenue, and scale up their businesses.
Great Companies: If you had one piece of advice to someone just starting out, what would it be?
Gaayathri Iyeer: The future of business lies in building a community of buyers. Once you build trust, you can sell them various products over time. Most businesses grow by repeatedly selling to the same customers. So, if you want to grow your business, create a buyers' community and keep nurturing it. This will lead to repeated sales and long-term growth.