Introduction
Everyone interested in investing, startups, business, financial planning, or just anything related to professional life must have heard of Ankur Warikoo. He is a very talented entrepreneur, an angel investor, a YouTuber, and a motivational speaker. He has 5,15,000 subscribers on his Youtube channel and, he makes videos about everything, from financial literacy to his life stories.
Let us look at his life story
Every successful person has a story to tell. An incident that changed their lives and made them who they are today. An incident that gave them the courage and push to achieve their goals in life. Here’s what Ankur Warikoo’s success story is.
Ankur Warikoo was born on 25 August, 1980. He never belonged to a very rich family. He always lived his life with the bare minimum resources. But he always knew what he wanted to do in life, which turned out to be nowhere near what he is doing today. Although he wanted to work in NASA and go on Mars, life had different plans for him. He completed his Masters in Physics from Michigan State University and went to complete his MBA degree from ISB (Indian School of Business). He dropped out of his Ph.D. because he was not happy with what he was doing. He always knew that something was missing. He suppressed his feelings for many years before finally realizing that this is not the path for him.
He worked at Kearney for 3 years after completing his MBA and finally went out to start his own company in 2010. He was the CEO of Groupon and led the business for 4 years, after which he started nearby, which was funded by Sequoia, and was the CEO up until 2019, after which he became a board member. Nearbuy did an amazing job of rebranding Groupon and experienced 5 times the growth they were seeing earlier.
Ankur believed that the key to running a successful startup is the team and engaging with customers, followed by gradual rebranding. The secret to his immediate success was that around 2009-2010, the concept of funding and investing in startups was just coming to India, which was influenced by the West.
Nearby was an innovative concept. They not only offered discount coupons to people, but they also informed shops when customers are nearby and told them the best price they should offer to attract them.
However, Ankur Warikoo stepped down from the position as CEO but continued to be a part of the company as a shareholder and a board member.
He says that he has no idea as to what he wants to do next, but his successful YouTube channel, mentoring, and investments are helping him live a very prosperous and comfortable life. He was afraid to experiment, which is how he was able to switch his life plans two times, and he didn’t fail. Whenever he hits a bump, he gets back up and works harder. He believes that living a life without any plans is a privilege that he can experience.
Ankur Warikoo likes to tell young people, who are in their 20s and 30s, to go out and try things and make mistakes and learn from those mistakes. The three things that helped him live a life without a plan are spending time with people who are nothing like us. We need to discover the world that’s outside our comfort zone, the small world we usually trap ourselves in.
Understand your privilege and your luck. Be grateful, and don’t live your life being an entitled person.
Since everything around us is made to make our lives comfortable, we are tricked into believing that that is the main purpose in life. But it’s not true. If you look up to people whom you admire, you will notice that they live each day of their lives full of resistance. That is how you become truly successful. When you challenge yourself every day, that is when the best comes out of you.
: By – Ria Prasad
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