Google, the Alphabet Inc’s leading subsidiary on Monday said it has partnered with Sheroes, the Women-only Social Network with communities, chat-based helpline, opportunities, resources and conversations, to support 500 rural women entrepreneurs by connecting them with experts and enabling access to resources, guidance and mentorship. Last year, Google India had started a small pilot for an accelerator programme for 10 women entrepreneurs in rural India across its Internet Saathi network. The programme is centered on solving for basic business issues like customer acquisition, selling and marketing, digital presence, management and self-confidence.
“Within three months, we saw a rise in confidence among the participants and the women went back and applied the learning to their businesses. 80 per cent of them started working on their digital presence and one of the participants had a working website within months,” Google India said in a statement. By joining hands with Sheroes, Google now aims to scale this to 500 rural women entrepreneurs by connecting them with experts, urban women entrepreneurs in the same or adjacent industries and enabling access to the right resources, guidance and mentorship over a six-month period.
In 2015, the Internet Saathi programme was initiated in collaboration with Tata Trusts to bring basic digital literacy skills to women in Indian villages and have them become informal teachers for other women in their communities. Since then, the programme has touched over 30 million women across the country.
In August this year, Google had partnered with FICCI towards up-skilling Travel MSMEs (Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises) on digital, sharing insights on changing consumer trends, and providing a roadmap to help the travel and tourism sector digitize their business. In addition to the Travel Insights tools, the website will also be a one-stop destination for other Google resources, including skills training courses through Grow with Google, Digital Garage and Google for Small Business, and our tourism Acceleration Programme with the UN World Tourism Organization.
