When you are living overseas for a long time, you start adjusting to society and the mindset of the people surrounded you. These small changes and adoption of the culture, education and even the way people think get a positive effect on you and how you look at the world. In most part of the world when people face problems and issues with their daily lives, just small percentage of those will immediately try to look for a solution and solve or at least minimize the effect on their lives.
I was far from home for almost a decade and didn't feel the changes happening in my own city until I returned to the city of Tehran. It was already grown so big with problems from transportation, pollution and other problems we see in large cities around the world. According to the report from the World Population Review (2019), the population of the city of Tehran has increased to about 8.3 million people which is roughly is 10% of the population of IRAN today. With the increase in population and density of the city, issues like transportation and communication become bolder.
In the past couple of years with the increase in the use of internet and mobile technologies, the online services, and systems provided by the tech startups gained popularity between people as they've eased the daily struggles of people. Most of the startup companies began from solving small problems and over time, they turn it to a solution and profit which can sustain the business and keep growing to its limit. Vary on the business line and working area, most of these startup businesses can grow and scale while others remain small as their target audience is very specific and small.
Back in 2015 when I've traveled to Tehran and wanted to rent an office for one of my businesses, I have realized that finding a suitable property is not as easy when we have lived more than a decade overseas in a developed and advanced country. If you were looking to purchase or rent a property for your business or residence, you had to find the local real estate agencies in the desired area and contact them directly to check on the availability of the properties. To view the properties, you had to visit each location physically and check the facilities and the area before you can compare and decide. The problem with this method is that it would take so much time and you have to commute during working hours in the busy city of Tehran to visit the properties.
This incident made me think, what if we had an online system which would allow the people to find their desired properties whenever they want and wherever they are without any limitation and middlemen. After visiting a friend who was working in the real estate business and discussing the business plan and the idea of designing and developing such a system, we have decided to start working on a real estate startup. Finally, in February 2016 the development of the online system for real estate agencies, agents and people who are looking to rent or buy properties in IRAN. I've released and launched the first version of this comprehensive online system in April of 2016 with limited options and features. In the beginning, the system only allowed people to post property advertisements without registration and verification.
After a year with beta testing of the website and the services, In April 2017, we have finally launched the Jaamaa - the real estate startup in Tehran, IRAN. Jaamaa (Jaa Maa) in Persian (جاما) is constructed from two separate words "Jaa" (جا) and "Maa" (ما) which together could translate to "Our Place" or "Our Home" in casual conversations. The word "jaamaa" in Persian is the abbreviation of the Comprehensive Information System for Real Estate Agents and Agencies. Right after the launch of the new services, the monthly traffic increased by 500% with most of the traffic coming from Google's search engine. According to Alexa traffic statistics for jaamaa website, more than 40% of the monthly traffic for the website comes from Google's search engine alone. The role of search engines in gaining popularity and users is a well-known fact between internet companies and service; we are constantly optimizing the jaamaa website and its content to follow the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) standards. From the beginning of the design process and development phase, we always take advantage of the new technologies and web standards to boost the performance and efficiency of the website and the services.
In the coming months, we are expecting an increase in the website traffic as we are expanding the services in different regions and increasing the number of marketing campaigns.
