- On 29th April, Akshaya Tritiya, we had gone from stealth to public mode, taking Lucira Jewelry live
- And the very next day, Facebook restricted our account without any warning, or reasons
This was the worst possible thing that could have happened to us at that time.
Thus, we obviously went into a panicky huddle mode.
And we kept raising all our complaints to Facebook’s team for ten straight days, requesting help and support. But nothing worked.
And finally, 10 days later, they came back with an answer.
It was what?
“We suggest you create a new account.”
Why? Because the local teams could not help, as all such moderation is operated out of the US.
Thus, what else could we do?
Out of options, we ended up building a new account from scratch, repeating the entire process and work.
It was disappointing. I wish we could have planned such events on an Excel sheet, like most other things.
But, this is how the life of a D2C founder looks like anywhere - many things which are not planned become a part of our day-to-day journeys.
More so, when you are building in India, because much of your brand building is on social media platforms that are totally beyond your control, and offer minimal to no grievance redressal, when needed the most.
And this is not just my plight or bad experience. The internet is full of such experiences from founders of all stages.
Thus, as impossible as it seems, I always yearn for this country of 150cr people to see a home-grown social media giant.
Surely, ShareChat/Moj has shown some promise. But, it’s vernacular mainly, and also relatively in early stages when compared to global giants.
There is Medial, which appeared on Shark Tank some time back. It too has started on a good note, but is in even earlier stages.
We need these companies to work. And not just them, but India needs even more options which can, over time, grow to become truly global success stories, like China has seen TikTok evolve.
Or else, Indian brands and businesses, D2C or otherwise, shall remain dependent on the whims of Western corporations.
And that’s quite not a great position to be in.
..
PS: After exiting from Candere to Kalyan Jewellers, I silently started building Lucira Jewelry - a new age lab-grown diamond jewellery brand. Do check out our collections at www.lucirajewelry.com and share your thoughts, feedback and more :)
Best,
Rupesh
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