Name of your website?FAT - Find A Teacher in Sri Lanka
Your name?
Thushara P C S Perera
Your Location (city, etc)
Colombo
Please give us a short summary of your website?
Our website is dedicated for Students and Teachers. The site is called FAT (FAT = Find A Teacher). You can search for teachers, students, universities, colleges and educational institutes in Sri Lanka via www.FAT.lk. Also if you are looking for a teacher then you can post WANTED advertisements. If you are selling services to teachers and students (e.g. you sell books, or class room space for tuition classes) then you can list your details. All these services are offered free of charge.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
At the moment internet market is booming in Sri Lanka. People are getting use to internet. There are many websites available in Sri Lanka for trades like real-estate, automobiles, newspapers but there isn't one for Teachers and Students. So I decided to create this site.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
www.FAT.lk is my first website.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
I wanted to have a simple, easy to remember and meaningful name. So I decided to name it FAT where FAT stands for Find A Teacher.
What makes your website different from other, similar offerings?
At the moment I don't see any other similar website in Sri Lanka. i.e. site allows teachers to post their details online free of charge and students can view those online free of charge.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
I would like to keep it. Ofcourse I like to earn some money from it. At the moment what ever I earn I spend for advertising.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
I think FAT.lk has a long way to go. At the moment daily basis we get about 300 visitors. I spend about 3 hours daily on this project and my other partners also spend similar amount of time. There are altogether 6 of us involved in this project.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
I will use the budget for advertising.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Yes. But will have to hire more staff. At the moment 6 people (including myslef) work on the project.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Advertising cost is very high. We want to advertise on local newspapers but it is very expensive.
What has been your biggest challenge?
Wanted to get a good PageRank. At the moment it is 4.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
Search engines. especially Google and Yahoo.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
I expected very few visits during the 1st few months but it was not the case.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
Have already run the site for 9 months and hoping to run it for ever.
What is your website address?
FAT - Find A Teacher in Sri Lanka
