Inspiring Biography of Sandeep Maheshwari

Sandeep Maheshwari is India’s biggest motivator.

Sandeep Maheshwari’s YouTube channel by his name, has more than 21 million subscribers.

Introduction-

Sandeep Maheshwari was born on September 28, 1980 into a middle class Baniya family in New Delhi.

He also has a younger sister.

Sandeep Maheshwari was a very introverted kid in school.

His father, Roop Kishore Maheshwari was a businessman and used to run an aluminium company (agency).

He was running this agency for 20 years by partnering with someone else.

Due to some issues, Sandeep Maheshwari’s father got suddenly exited from the business partnership even though the aluminium company was operational.

Struggles-

As Sandeep Maheshwari’s father left the aluminium business, their family struggled financially.

His father and mother, Shakuntala Rani Maheshwari tried their hands at many different businesses but nothing worked well.

Sandeep Maheshwari’s father started a conveyor belt business whereas his mother opened a STD PCO shop.

He used to help his mother in running the shop.

But both these businesses failed and during this time, Sandeep Maheshwari was in tenth grade.

Taking responsibility-

While studying 12^th grade, Sandeep Maheshwari understood the struggles of his family and was determined to help them financially.

His parents didn’t force him to work but he was determined to help them because during that time, Roop Kishore Maheshwari went into acute depression.

Joining NIS-

After passing 12^th grade, Sandeep Maheshwari wanted to pursue Master of Business Administration (MBA).

But he was impatient to study for a regular degree and then MBA.

So, Sandeep Maheshwari started searching for an equivalent of the MBA degree which could be done after passing out 12^th standard.

At that time, he came across a private institute by the name National Institute of Sales (NIS).

Sandeep Maheshwari thoroughly studied their curriculum and was attracted to it, so he enrolled to study from NIS.

At that time, he paid around ₹50,000 to enroll into this institute.

At NIS, Sandeep Maheshwari was offered an earning program by which he has to refer people to join NIS and in this process earn around 20% commission per person.

Starting helpline-

Thanks to this program, Sandeep Maheshwari got an idea of starting a helpline.

His business model was to guide students through his helpline to join NIS and in the process earn a commission.

Sandeep Maheshwari invested ₹2000 to print pamphlets and the title of the pamphlet was- What to do after 10+2? and in these pamphlets he provided his helpline number.

These pamphlets offered career guidance for the students who finished studying 12^th grade.

As Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t have a separate phone number for this business, he provided his home’s landline number.

Prior to this, he visited similar helpline centres and career counsellors in the city and extracted all the information from them and noted it down and then memorised it.

This made Sandeep Maheshwari confident and whenever someone used to call him for career guidance, he used to speak in a very confident tone.

Many callers were impressed by his good knowledge and at last when they enquired about his educational qualifications, they used to learn that he just completed studying 12^th class.

This made the callers angry and they used to scold Sandeep Maheshwari.

Improving his communication skills-

Thanks to the helpline, Sandeep Maheshwari got an opportunity to speak to many people.

And this improved his communication skills and made him more confident.

Out of many people, only one person joined NIS through Sandeep Maheshwari’s reference.

So, at 18, he earned a profit of ₹2000 through his first business.

Learning practically-

Since the beginning, Sandeep Maheshwari wanted to learn things practically rather than focusing on getting degrees.

NIS suited him the best because there he was educated in a practical way.

NIS conducted many role-plays, group discussion, presentations, etc.

All these things not only improved Sandeep Maheshwari’s soft skills but also made him more confident.

This education greatly helped him at the later phase when he started giving seminars and sessions.

Dropping out-

The course at NIS was for a full year.

But Sandeep Maheshwari dropped out of it at the eleventh month because that course no longer interested him.

Attending seminar-

Around this time, Sandeep Maheshwari also attended a seminar organised by a Multilevel marketing (MLM) company.

The seminar lasted for three hours but he couldn’t understand a bit of it.

At the end of the seminar, a 21 year old stated that he was earning around ₹1.5 lakh per month.

Sandeep Maheshwari was attracted to his earnings and thought that he can also earn like him.

So, he joined that MLM company by paying a fee of ₹5000.

Attracted to presentations-

In that company, Sandeep Maheshwari was attracted to the presentations on stages and developed a desire to deliver presentations.

At a later phase in his life, he was able to fulfill this desire of giving presentations in his motivational seminars.

At the MLM company, Sandeep Maheshwari met some people of his age making good money and this gave him confidence that he too can earn well.

Previously, earning ₹10-15,000 per month seemed big to him but after attending the meetings, he was confident of earning ₹1-1.5 lakh per month.

Sandeep Maheshwari worked for this company and succeeded to join only one person under him.

So, he failed and his parents also stopped supporting him to continue doing this work.

B.com-

Around this same time, Sandeep Maheshwari enrolled into Kirori Mal College to study B.Com.

He chose Kirori Mal College because it had no strict rules for attendance which means, he can simultaneously work and study.

Here, Sandeep Maheshwari earned decent marks.

In the first year he got 65% and in second year 62%.

Modelling-

While studying B.com, Sandeep Maheshwari was also doing modelling and appeared in some fashion shows as a model.

As a model, he visited many modelling agencies and experienced difficulties there.

Later, Sandeep Maheshwari realised that the vast majority of the modelling agencies were fraud.

So, he wanted to do something to help the models and save them from the bogus modelling agencies.

Dropping out-

In his third year, Sandeep Maheshwari dropped out from the Kirori Mal College when he felt that the course is no longer significant to him.

Getting rejected for job–

After dropping out from college, Sandeep Maheshwari attended an interview for a job along with his friend.

The interview was for a business process outsourcing (BPO) job at call centres at the Radisson Hotel located on the Delhi-Gurugram road.

The whole interview consisted of six rounds but he couldn’t clear beyond the third round.

After this, Sandeep Maheshwari never attended another job interview.

When he later became very successful at business, he said that being rejected for that job was the best thing to happen to him.

Because if he had been selected for the job, he would have become very comfortable with the monthly paychecks and would have never tried businesses.

Liquid soap-

Sandeep Maheshwari exited from the MLM company when he was 18.

While working at the MLM company, he was familiar with a liquid soap product.

It was priced at ₹500.

After leaving the company Sandeep Maheshwari thought of producing the liquid soap and pricing it less than ₹500.

He produced the liquid soap by mixing some chemical powders with water and this produced a liquid soap of good quality.

Sandeep Maheshwari used to purchase these powders from Ghantaghar, Delhi.

Also, he conducted research and various tests to ascertain his products’ efficacy.

Sandeep Maheshwari used to manufacture liquid soap for ₹5 and sell it for around ₹15.

His multi purpose liquid soap was not only cheaper than that sold by the MLM company but was also very affordable.

Sandeep Maheshwari started selling this to his neighbours, friends and relatives.

Even after many efforts, his business couldn’t succeed.

Due to this failure many of his friends and relatives made fun of Sandeep Maheshwari but he learnt many business lessons here.

Photography-

Around this time, Sandeep Maheshwari came across a portfolio of photographs of his college friend who was a model.

At that time, digital cameras didn’t exist and only film cameras were present.

Even then, his friend’s photos looked very good due to cross processing.

Due to this, Sandeep Maheshwari developed a passion to learn photography.

So, he visited many labs to learn photography but none of them could teach him well.

Finally, Sandeep Maheshwari enrolled for a two week photography course in South Delhi.

Just a day later, he purchased a camera and began shooting with it.

Sandeep Maheshwari used to shoot extensively and did free photo shoots of all his friends and relatives.

He did their photo sessions in various locations like rooftop, park, etc.

Later, Sandeep Maheshwari started Mash Audio Visuals Pvt. Ltd. for creating portfolios.

Helping models-

In order to help the struggling models, Sandeep Maheshwari made lists of genuine and fraud modelling agencies.

He used to distribute these pamphlets to models to save them from the fraud agencies.

Free photo shoot-

Then, Sandeep Maheshwari created an ad announcing free photo shoots for models.

Here, the condition was that he would shoot the models free of cost but they should pay only for rolls and prints.

Sandeep Maheshwari believed that these photo shoots will make him a professional photographer and he can also showcase this experience in his visiting cards.

He received a good response for this advertisement because the models needed to pay only ₹3000 here whereas other photographers used to charge around ₹40,000.

This idea became successful and Sandeep Maheshwari earned ₹25,000 in this process.

At that time, he used his bedroom for set up and rent a studio by paying ₹400 per day.

Sandeep Maheshwari conducted photo shoots in the studio and thanks to this, he was making around ₹25-30,000 per month.

DIX 2000-

While Sandeep Maheshwari was conducting photo shoots, a person approached him as a model but instead offered him to do events together.

He agreed to his proposal because he was earning limited money through photo shoots.

So, they became partners and planned to conduct an event by the name DIX 2000.

Sandeep Maheshwari toiled hard for this event continuously for two months.

The deal between the partners was that Sandeep Maheshwari should do all the work whereas the other partner will invest money.

Four days prior to the main event, the partner requested him to pay for the event because he didn’t have the money.

He promised to later repay Sandeep Maheshwari.

But Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t have that money.

So, he took loans from his friends and invested ₹40,000 for the event.

Sandeep Maheshwari conducted DIX 2000 by renting a small banquet hall and arranged a party for 800 people.

Getting cheated-

After this event, Sandeep Maheshwari went to discuss the finances with his partner.

But the partner refused to pay him anything.

Even worse, he took the remaining money and escaped with his friends.

This incident happened on 31^st December and this was Sandeep Maheshwari’s life’s biggest failure.

Thinking positively–

Instead of feeling dejected, Sandeep Maheshwari saw the silver lining.

Thanks to the seminars he already attended and the books he read, he was able to think positively about the failure.

They taught Sandeep Maheshwari that everything is easy, everything in life happens for one’s own good and success comes from experiences and experiences come from bad experiences.

These thoughts made him feel happy.

So, Sandeep Maheshwari went home and turned on the music and started dancing.

Joining Japan Life-

After this failure, Sandeep Maheshwari abandoned photography.

And at that point of time, one of his friends introduced him to another MLM company by the name, Japan Life.

This company is non operational now.

Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t have the fee for joining this company, so he took loan from his friend and sold his camera for arranging for the fee.

Finally, he joined Japan Life by paying a fee of ₹70,000.

Within eleven months, Sandeep Maheshwari was promoted to the position of direct distributor.

He made a network of 125 people and was making around ₹1.25 lakh per month.

So, at 20, Sandeep Maheshwari was making very good money and his parents were very happy for him.

Resigning-

Even though Sandeep Maheshwari was making good money here, he wasn’t at all satisfied with his job.

The main reason for this is that he observed that the majority of people, around 99% couldn’t earn anything from this company even after investing heavily.

So, Sandeep Maheshwari thought of starting a genuine MLM company and to launch products like televisions, etc. through it.

His parents were worried with his decision to resign from Japan Life.

They wanted Sandeep Maheshwari to continue doing that job for a few months and earn even more and then resign.

But as he couldn’t stand that job, he immediately resigned from it.

Starting a new company-

Sandeep Maheshwari along with three persons in his downline at Japan Life planned to start a new company in partnership.

So, four of them began a new MLM company by investing one lakh rupees each.

Sandeep Maheshwari used to work on the software products of this company.

This company was making a good turnover and within six months, three offices were opened and approximately 1100 people joined.

But the company was closed down due to differences in partnership and Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t earn anything from the company.

Due to this failure, many people called him incompetent but he didn’t lose confidence in himself.

Writing a book-

After his company was shut down, Sandeep Maheshwari planned to write a book and share his experience of network marketing.

So, when he was 21, he wrote a book and it was also a flop.

Almost all publishers rejected publishing his book.

Then, Sandeep Maheshwari approached a printer and printed the book but those couldn’t be sold even after marketing.

Even though the book was a failure, it made him very knowledgeable.

Sandeep Maheshwari referred many books while writing this book and gained vast knowledge of various topics and this later helped him while delivering motivational speeches.

Working on his passion-

At that time, Sandeep Maheshwari came across a portfolio of one of his friends.

Thanks to this, he once again thought of becoming a photographer.

And this thought gave Sandeep Maheshwari relief from all the previous worries.

So, he started a new journey by purchasing a camera and lights.

Sandeep Maheshwari converted his room on the top floor of his house to a studio by removing the furniture and adding all the necessary photography equipment to it.

Thankfully, Sandeep Maheshwari began earning ₹30-40,000 a month.

Branding problems-

In 2003, Sandeep Maheshwari was struck in photography.

At that time, he used to create portfolios and earn around ₹40,000 monthly.

As Sandeep Maheshwari had not established himself as a brand, he didn’t have a good recognition.

So, sometimes even when the photographs were good, some agencies used to reject them.

This made Sandeep Maheshwari think of brand building.

Thinking of World Record-

During that time, Sandeep Maheshwari thought of creating a World Record in photography and thereby establish his brand.

At that time, he was doing 3-4 photo shoots per day, so he thought that doing 10-15 of them wouldn’t be a problem.

Sandeep Maheshwari’s friends discouraged him and told as his setup is small and he is based out of his home, it is impossible for him to create a World Record.

He met Vijaya Ghose, then managing director (MD) of the Limca Book of Records to discuss this topic.

Vijaya Ghose opined that Sandeep Maheshwari needs to do something big to create a World Record.

And he suggested him to create a record on India level as it’s easy but Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t agree with him and wanted to create a World Record.

Requirements for World Record-

Vijaya Ghose told Sandeep Maheshwari the requirements for creating a World Record in photography.

He said that he should hire at least 100 models and click at least 10,000 photographs on the film rolls within 12 hours and should take no breaks in between.

And all those 10,000 photographs should be unique.

The moderators of the Limca Book of Records would be present to oversee the process.

Sandeep Maheshwari agreed to all these terms and fixed a date for this program.

Thanks DIX 2000-

Vijaya Ghose suggested Sandeep Maheshwari to hire an event management company to manage the event.

But Sandeep Maheshwari already had a good experience of managing an event, thanks to DIX 2000 and so he thought of managing this event by himself.

At DIX 2000, he managed 800 people, so the thought of managing 100 models for the World Record didn’t overwhelm him.

Previously, Sandeep Maheshwari thought of DIX 2000 as the biggest failure of his life but now the dots connected and this failure is going to contribute to his life’s biggest success.

If he hadn’t conducted DIX 2000, he would have never even thought of creating a World Record.

That event gave Sandeep Maheshwari the required experience and confidence to proceed with creating a World Record.

Jugaad-

Sandeep Maheshwari and his friends calculated that for this event they would require ₹10 lakh.

But he didn’t have that money, so he came up with an intelligent idea to reduce the costs.

The major expense would be to hire models but upon observing Sandeep Maheshwari realised that many models weren’t in a position to afford for photo shoots.

So, he thought of reducing the price of photo shoots to bare minimum and advertise this to the models.

By this, instead of spending money to hire models, Sandeep Maheshwari can earn a little money and reduce the overall cost of the event.

So, he executed this idea and priced the photo shoots for each model at ₹500 and the models queued up to avail this offer.

Creating World Record-

Sandeep Maheshwari was able to gather 122 models and shot three rolls for each model.

He created a World Record in just 10 hours and 45 minutes by clicking more than 10,000 shots of models.

This made Sandeep Maheshwari an overnight sensation and his story was widely covered by the media.

Thanks to this World Record, he succeeded in establishing himself as a world class brand.

And this made Sandeep Maheshwari the busiest photographer in the city and subsequently his modelling agency started growing rapidly.

Honesty is the best policy-

Eventually, Sandeep Maheshwari’s modelling agency became the top most agency in Delhi and then, in the whole country, all thanks to the honest practices.

While other agencies lied to the models about job opportunities, his agency was truthful and used to state upfront that the majority of the models wouldn’t get work.

Even though the modelling agency made Sandeep Maheshwari very rich, he wasn’t happy because most of the models weren’t getting any work.

So, to help the models, he launched a magazine, website (modellingindia.com) and approached other agencies.

modellingindia.com was later redirected to modelsguru.com.

But all of them couldn’t help much.

Getting married-

Sandeep Maheshwari married his school friend, Ruchi Maheswari.

He wrote many amazing books like How to Control your Mind, Small is the new big and Multiple Names of THE ONE that cannot be named.

You can download all of them from here.

Taking the opportunity-

Once a person from another agency was in a hurry and quickly wanted a photo of a model from Sandeep Maheshwari’s agency for an ad.

That person didn’t have the time for conducting a photo shoot, so he requested a photo of a model to scan and use it directly for the ad.

Thanks to this, Sandeep Maheshwari was paid some money and out of it a portion was paid to the model.

This made all the three parties happy.

The client was happy because he quickly got photos, Sandeep Maheshwari and the model too were happy because they earned through this.

Starting ImagesBazaar-

The above incident sparked an idea in Sandeep Maheshwari to start a new company offering stock images.

So, in 2005, he started ImagesBazaar and its main motto was to pay the models instead of charging from them.

Sandeep Maheshwari immediately closed his modelling agency to completely focus on ImagesBazaar.

As his modelling agency was operating very profitably, many people were shocked by his decision to close them.

At ImagesBazaar, Sandeep Maheshwari didn’t focus on making portfolios but only focused on stock shoots.

The website of ImagesBazaar was launched in 2006, but it was a big disaster for a few months because he lacked the knowledge of information technology (IT).

Then, Sandeep Maheshwari took the time to understand every aspect of the website and completely revamped it.

During this time the knowledge that he gained from creating software products for his previous MLM company was of great help.

Huge success-

From that time, ImagesBazaar never looked back and became a huge success.

Now, ImagesBazaar offers the world’s largest collection of Indian images and videos and has clients from many countries all over the world.

Like this, Sandeep Maheshwari became a very successful entrepreneur.

Also, he received several awards and has been widely featured in the media.

Infographic-

So, how did the story of Sandeep Maheshwari inspire you?

Please tell me in the comment section below.

I hope that his life story gives you the required motivation to achieve all your dreams.

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