Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Indian Brand Trends 2008-2009

Brand 26Eleven and the trends that shaped 2008


By Harish Bijoor




The 26 November, 2008 terror attack and incursions into Indian sovereign civil space by a bunch of Pakistani youngsters with AK 47’s in their hands and terror-indoctrination in their hearts is going to make your Cappuccino more expensive. 26Eleven is going to give a big boost to the security product and security service industry at large. That’s obvious. The advertising you are approached by will change. The theme, tone, tenor and decibel of Indian marketing will change as well. That’s not obvious. Just wait. Just watch.

Everything impacts everything. Every event of our every day life impacts every marketing action there is going to be. I will flag 26Eleven as the one date that is the defining moment that epitomizes the loss of innocence of the Indian marketing man at large. This loss of innocence means a lot. It means that the hospitality sector in India will view everyone who enters its portals as a potential terror threat. If you live in a hotel, you will feel very secure inside from now on. So secure that you will love being viewed as a potential terror threat even. And this is not a temporary phenomenon. The security hackle and mantle, once up, is a forever mantle of cover. The Indian hospitality industry in 5-star space has lost its innocence. Watch this cascade. Watch the dominos push every sector there is. Close or distant, does not matter.

In a sense, you do not have to dig too deep into the gut of the Chaos theory, or even go up the path of the Domino effect and the several theories that abound in this terrain to understand that. Just peek into the trends that shaped our Marketing lives in 2008, and peek further into the crystal ball for 2009, and you have it all. Life changed in 2008. The Marketing man morphed his every appeal to the needs, wants, desires, aspirations and fantasies of Consumer 2008.

Let me then wear my annual trend-spotters hat and paint the picture of the year just gone by. Let me dig and go a little deeper than skin-depth marketing to draw the blood and gore of marketing the way it was in 2008. The trends that shaped Indian marketing.

Public Utility spaces got branded::


Public spaces in India have been typically under-utilized in an organized manner for branding. Gone are the days when companies could actually go berserk painting rocks and walls with their brand messages, at times covering entire mountains with advertising message for a Cola or Condom alike. 2008 saw the emergence of systematic play in the utilization of public utility space. Road stretches got branded inputs. Roads such as the ones that ply between a Chennai-Pondicherry, Mumbai-Pune, Delhi-UP, and more.

Branding opportunities arise in every nook of this space. Glow-signs, translates of every kind, branded restaurants, branded mile-stones (would the cigarette brand want to take that 555 Km milestone just outside of Bangalore that has Hyderabad and its distance listed out there?) Add to it the potential of building brand and brand romance in the roads of yore, such as the Grand trunk Road? Or the great Silk route?

Expect more of this in the years to come. Will a Hazrat Gunj station hold the potential of becoming a “Levi’s Ganj”? And Egmore station, a “Station More”?


Low cost bows out:

Strange but true. The highly visible aviation industry in India led the way. My friend Capt. Gopinath and his friend RK Laxman’s Common Man had to give way to the swish, short and very, very tight red skirts of a Kingfisher and the dreams of the King of Good times. Low-cost in many ways went out with the merger of Air Deccan with Kingfisher and the launch of the Kingfisher Red Service. 2008 saw the death of low-cost and the emergence of the high-value airline instead.

The space Air Deccan vacated is being filled in by a Go-Air and a Spice-Jet. One doesn’t know for how long though. The trend is clear. Low-cost models in aviation space just don’t seem to work. If one looks into the bottom-lines of the airline experiments in this space, one nearly baulks at what might have been termed predatory-pricing tactics in another country altogether.

Singh is King:

Though Mr .Manmohan Singh may not really be the king behind the kingdom that is India, Singh surely was king in many, many ways in 2008. The branding of movies took a new turn. Hindi cinema adopted the tone, tenor, mood, lingo, food, dress and everything else from Punjab. Punjabi cinema and Punjabi lingo went mainstream. The two big hits of the year were certainly “Singh is King” and “Rab De Banaa di Jodi”. While box office collections of the first grossed INR 48 Crores in the first ten days, the ‘Rab de’ option actually notched up INR 60 Crore in the same period. Punjabi lingo became the lingo to use in a Chennai and Kovilpatti alike. Many a discotheque floor across the country used music from every one of these movies to get their floors scorching. In many ways, Hindi cinema did yeoman service to the task of knitting this country together. Race no bar, language no bar, culture no bar, food no bar. At least for now.



IPL did it:

The year saw Lalit Modi’s dream-scape of IPL take off. Skeptics were left behind stunned. So was the rival ICL. Every trick was pulled out of the Pandora’s Box of marketing magic.

5-day cricket played in whites is boring today. For the oldies. One-day cricket played in colors is better, but still not the best. As the attention span of the new generation of Indians shortens, IPL is the best there is to savor in cricket. A short game of 20- overs each.

IPL did one more thing. It removed national jingoism and replaced it with city-jingoism. A Kolkata Knight Riders now vies for attention that is local in a unique manner. Never mind where you live, just as long as you are a Kolkata-fan, you will root for the KKRs.

IPL did one more thing. The multi-country composition of teams has erased International boundaries in one quick stroke of a set of matches of one IPL season. Today, an Australian will root for the Chennai Super Kings just as a person of British origin will root for the Rajasthan Royals. Their players play in it.

The nation kept breathing cricket. The game remained the lowest common denominator that unites the rich, the poor, the partisan and the political. If there is one thing that can pan out as a conversation point across income groups, religious divides, political divides, social divides and divides of every kind, it sure is cricket. And IPL is king!


Security-services see a boom:

The events of 26Eleven got every Tom, Dick and Harish very, very awake. Every hotel of every star category reviewed its security arrangements. Every apartment owner’s association woke up to the threat possibility that looms large on soft-targets as well. IT companies invested in sniffer dogs. The dogs are happy. The demand is big in this space, I hear.

High-end hotels went back to every vendor who had offered superior technology. Sniffer room cards that find and report electronically of traces of petroleum or RDX alike were explored. The demand for electronic surveillance systems is up. Scanners are in short supply, I hear.

Employment booms in this category. Many a BPO cab driver in a Noida, Gurgaon and Bangalore is now getting trained to be a security guard. As BPOs lay off operators, they are forced to lay off out-sourced drivers as well. The driver now finds a new avenue.

Advertising morphed:

Advertising rose from an acute clutter of its own making in a remarkable manner. While most brands kept experimenting with theme, some brands went the way of the long-running story. The big idea that was campaignable with a story like format using the same set of anchor actors right through.

Advertising as we see it today can be divided into the tactical promotional pieces that talk of the latest price and the latest gifts that go with the brand. A superior form of this is the advertising that is theme centric. One product story brought to life with a 30 or 60-seconder that established the long term brand proposition. This year, advertisers went one step forward. Airtel experimented with the format of story-advertising. Madhavan and Vidya Balan did cameo roles of the couple on the move. This did Airtel a lot of good. Story replaced the boring single-theme led advertising of last year. Idea Cellular did similar good stuff with its “What an idea, sir-ji’ series. There is a new version every other month. Way to go.


Blank noise. Blank hoardings:

The year saw a lot of these all around. The Outdoor industry is a bell-weather industry. The first signs of recession typically translate themselves onto the visual displays on the hoardings of our cities and towns. The moment you see blank hoardings with messages that advertise numbers and names of the hoarding owners, be sure recession is here. The depth of such recession can be gauged by the width of such blank hoardings.

It works this way. The marketer who is on a cost-cutting spree as he watches his sales volumes and values touching lows such as never before, he chops the advertising budget. And the first one to face the axe is Outdoor. Next comes Point-of-purchase. Simultaneously with that is the cut on TV expenditure. Print falls next.

November saw loads of hoarding spaces looking blank. December has seen a deepening on that. Wonder how January will pan out.

With that point of wonder, let me close this piece. Remember, there are only two kinds of people in the world. The Marketing person, and the other is the Marketed-to person. Whichever you are, wish each one of you a Happy Marketing New year!


Harish Bijoor is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: ceo@harishbijoorconsults.com

Sunday, December 28, 2008

CSR and marketing in India

There is a little bit of CSR……..in my hair!



By Harish Bijoor


If I am to simplify all of life with a perspective that is distinctly marketing oriented, there are just two types of people in the world. A small set of marketing people on one side, and a whole large set of people being marketed-to at the other end!

Peek keenly at any person you know. Either she is a marketing person marketing a product, a service, a dream or even a desire to someone else, or is a person who is being marketed to all the time by the marketer at large!

Marketing is therefore a people-centric process. And just as long as it remains that, and just as long as man loves living in a society of his making, CSR is going to remain a big buzz-word for the future ahead! CSR remains a very relevant strategic marketing tool for the amorphous future ahead of us!


In these long years of being around in the great Indian marketplace, I have seen marketing morph in its ideals. In the beginning, there was the product and the service. Both had to be reached out to the customer in the marketplace. This was also a day and age when everything was in short supply. The demand was big. The marketer performed his role as a mere transporter of the goods to the arms length convenience of the hungry consumer. These were the days when you had to wait 6 years on a waiting list to buy a 'Vespa' scooter and in a longer still queue to possess that sturdy black telephone instrument in your drawing room!

Marketers in this day and age had a simple goal. Distribute. Distribute with equity where possible. Be fair. Appear to be fair as well!

Life changed dramatically. In enters the era of plenty. Plenty of products and services! Enough to come out of your ears and everywhere else! Competition is sharp! The marketer morphs from his old attitude in such an environment. He becomes consumer savvy. He offers not only the product, but a superior degree of service to go with it. He offers customer experience and delight that becomes the brand in itself!

We live in such a competitive marketing era. There are just too many marketing people around. Just too many with all the boring ideas around. Everyone has been to the same marketing school (if not the same type) and comes out with the same set of ideas to go to market! And everyone fails! Parri passu marketing does not work!

In such an environment of parri passu marketing, time to think different. Time to think of a new tool to use! CSR is a great one! If used sensibly and with the sensitivity it deserves!


Three Marketing Formats:

Let me offer a theory I propound extensively.

There are simply three marketing formats to follow in a society as it morphs. In the early stage, society is all about “I, me, myself”! At this stage in consumer societal evolution, the marketer gets away using the language of hedonism and pleasure. The “I, me, myself” kind of product and service works well. The ‘Axe’ effect works here!

And then there is the stage when the consumer has gone beyond that basic stage. He is now concerned about the people around him. His loved ones. His family of four. His extended family of four more, mother, father, father-in-law and mother-in-law, last to be included!

This kind of man likes brands to be inclusive in their language, tone and tenor. This kind of man wants products that are good for the entire family! Never mind the rest of society, just as long his close-knitted family is taken care of, he is fine! The 'Annapurna' atta story works here!

And then there is man who is more conscious of more people around him. This is the kind of guy who is bothered about the good of his immediate neighborhood and society! He wants his entire neighborhood to be happy! The ‘Lifebuoy’ “clean the neighborhood” story works here!

There is macro-man then. This is the kind of person who wants the good of his immediate society and his entire planet. This is the kind of guy who wants to use bio-based detergents that don’t hurt the eco-system! The ‘Surf Excel’ “Do bucket paani bachana hai” theme works here!

And finally there is Cosmos man! Concerned about the cosmos, much of which he does not know even! We are yet to get there!


CSR works at every level. CSR is an inclusive process! A process that embraces the good of society in a very inclusive manner. This inclusiveness could start at the level of the immediate family and morph on to embrace the entire Cosmos.

CSR plays a vital role in taking commercial brands out into the commercial marketplace with a theme that is appealing to the sense and sensibility of the modern consumer. CSR is therefore a valuable tool that marketers can use to market their brand of soap, detergent, sugar and tea with equal panache and commercial effectiveness.

CSR is not at all about running public hospitals and schools alone. CSR is not about sending Tsunami relief material to the trouble spots of the world. That is old hat! It is much more! The modern consumer understands CSR that much more intimately when you touch his life, with a wee bit of CSR in your soap. A wee bit in your shampoo! In your kids diapers and feminine hygiene products as well!

The future of marketing is full of CSR! Of a different kind!


The author is a brand-domain specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

The Media Industry must not create Hara-kiri!

Media Must Not Commit Hara-kiri!

By Harish Bijoor

Media must not kill itself.

As I watch the evolution of media over the last several years, I worry for it. I worry hard as I watch the routes primary mediums seem to want to adopt in contemporary India today.

Let me trace this story of a worry that haunts me through an examination of what I peek at when I look at the trends in the evolution of the mediums I have loved and used to commercial brand advantage so much all these years. Televsion, Press, Radio and the unconventional medium included!

The Evolution:

Communication and the want to communicate is possibly one of the oldest of the desires of man. Food, clothing, shelter, sex and the desire to communicate…..in that order for a start! At least I would like to believe that!

In the very beginning, the best form of communication is seen to be the 1:1 form! The earliest form of it all, where one individual meets another. Adam meets Eve. Communicates. Communication in the earliest forms we know of could be visual, verbal, aural or can be of any form that straddles sensory communicative ability! Seeing, touching, smelling, tasting, feeling, talking and hearing are indeed all forms.

The 1:1 form of communication is possibly the strongest form we have in terms of delivery efficacy! It is direct and personal. It has the ability to establish an instant rapport between the communicator and the one being communicated to. It is two-way as well! It provides for the ability of the communicator to cogently understand the needs, wants and desires of the person being communicated to.

But 1:1 communication is difficult at times. When communication of this form gets difficult to maintain, man evolves the next best form. 1:Many! In this form, the communicator is one and the communiqué is dished out to thousands of people. The local Press and the avatar of FM Radio as we know it today are possibly good examples of this form. There is still some semblance of localization maintained in the process. There is still some customization of appeal. This is mostly one-way. The communicator, at best, can use the process of extrapolatative market research to arrive at what the consumer wants and desires.

1: Many then morphs into the 1: Very-Many form. This is the form best represented by National Network television. One message dished out to the entire country with little or no customization at all! This form of communication is that much more divorced from local needs as any. Communication is dished out keeping the masses in mind, and there is indeed a lowest-common denominator being appealed to!

And then there is the 1:Too Many type! Fox News dishing out its American fare to the entire world is possibly a great example!

The final frontier will be breached when we are able to advertise on the moon. The vision of 2020! You take a moonlit walk with your beloved, look up to the moon, and there is an advertising message staring back at you: “The moon, brought to you by Coca Cola”! This indeed would be the final form. 1: All!

Many of us will go through all these forms of communication in our very lifetime! The point: media morphs! When one form gets inefficient and unable to deliver, a new form appears. The new form is not necessarily the best in terms of efficacy, but is certainly the best in terms of reach! Not the best in terms of impact, but certainly the best in terms of reach!

The evolution of media has largely been reach-centric. Everything else has been sacrificed on the way!

Things Gone Wrong:

As we have traversed the evolutionary process of mediums, from 1: 1 to the mythical 1: All media-fantasizers dream of, there are several things that have gone wrong on the way! There is one big worry I will focus on in this piece.

The one big thing mediums have for themselves is the fact that they are trusted mediums that disseminate content.

Right in the beginning, the medium emerges as a completely content-oriented form. Look at the first newspapers that hit the stands. The idea is content. The newspaper is the purveyor of content.

The first set of readers adopt the publication of their choice based on content. Content that is presented cogently and content that is presented with integrity. It is indeed content that shapes the medium and its readership. As readership builds up, the publication is successful in literally building a community of people who would swear by the publication for what it carries. The publication represents community interest and becomes a representative of the collective aspirations, needs and wants of its readers. Many a time, this very content is crafted with care taking into consideration its set of captive readers. This truly is the newspaper that understands its customers and delivers to them what they want.

As circulation numbers climb, there is a direct correlation between the increase in advertising among publications of all types. As more and more readers franchise a paper, the advertising side of the paper tends to deepen. And rightly so. No complaints here.

The evolutionary trend here is however worrisome. Publications at times tend to show a trend to keep increasing the advertising side of the paper at the detriment of content. What started as a 100 per cent content publication metamorphoses into an 80 per cent content and 20 per cent advertising 'avatar'. The end point in this game is however reached when advertising tends to weigh equally in page numbers as content does. No complaints thus far as well!

The complaints start coming when the publication in question starts leveraging its content to stay in tune with the needs, wants and desires of its advertisers rather than the needs, wants and desires of its readers! Many a publication traverses this terrain. And this is the big worry!

The reader of the publication is the guinea pig. How long will this pig remain a pig? Not very long really!

Every medium, whether in the terrain of the medium of television, press or radio is guilty of this trend. Time to correct the trajectory before it is too late!

The very credibility of mediums is in doubt. Let us remember that the very primary franchise of mediums is based on content. The franchisee of the medium adopts the channel, the newspaper brand or his FM channel of choice based on content and what it offers. As the years go by, if the user actually senses a lack of commitment on the part of the medium, the vehicle will be distrusted.

The very goose that lays the golden eggs for media houses is up on judgment. The more individual mediums leverage on advertising and bring every form of it in the guise of creative advertising executions amidst the form of content and at times well within it even, the more is the damage being done!

I want to trust my television channel. I watch it for content! I believe it offers me content that packs in integrity! I believe it will not do me wrong! I believe in what is offered on it! I swear by it! I will speak about it to others and increase its viewership! I am the simple consumer!

As advertising makes its way on the channel of my favour, I will trust the advertising equally. I will vest onto the advertising the positive cues I reserve for the channel. I will trust the advertising. I will even believe that the channel of my favour will not carry advertising that lacks integrity. I am the simple consumer!

As days go by and as I watch a lack of discretion in allowing in intrusive advertising on to the medium, I will start wondering whether my channel has it all right! As I keep to the franchise and as I see a lot of advertising finding its way into the content part of the channel, subliminal and overt, I worry more! I am still the simple consumer!

I keep watching my favorite channel. Till one day I discover that my favorite channel dishes out content that is not entirely above-board in terms of mixing advertising with content. I worry and distrust seeps in. I am still the simple consumer. I become cynical. I distrust the channel. I distrust all advertising on it as well!

The channel has taken it a bit too far. The channel has traversed from a 100 per cent content integrity channel to a cusp of the content and advertising. I am at times unable to discern what drives the channel more. The advertising or the content? The viewer of the advertiser?

As mediums get more and more driven by the advertiser, we need to worry. Time to re-jig our act. Remember, content drives it all! Also remember, the consumer drives this movement. Not the advertiser! Lets re-jig it all!

We owe it to our collective future!

The author is a brand-domain specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, a private-label consulting firm with a presence in the markets of UK, Hong Kong and the Indian sub-continent.

Email responses to: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Sunday, September 14, 2008

The indian Economy and competitiveness

On Being Competitive

By Harish Bijoor

Marketing is too important to be left to marketing people!

Ouch! That hurts! But that is the reality of the future for sure.

Are you gearing up for change? Are you concerned about being competitive in the long term? Time to re-think the line. Marketing is too important to be left to marketing people.

Marketing is therefore the key concern of every Tom, Dick and Harish in your organization. It should be. From the CEO to the ‘chaprasi’ at the door, marketing is a ubiquitous fetish to adopt and cherish for the future ahead of us.

Firstly, marketing is all encompassing. It is about all of us in the business of life itself. Not a moment goes without the need of a marketing intervention. From the early morning cup of coffee to the late night tryst at the potty, marketing intervenes every moment of our lives. We can’t live without it. It is a part of our lives and indeed a part of our psyche at large.

Never mind then whether the man at hand is an entity urban or an entity rural, the needs are largely the same. The same set of bellies and bladders that crave for food and drink and the same set of teeth that crave that brush with hygiene early in the morning.

Marketing is therefore about every one of us. It is all encompassing. Marketing therefore needs to be inclusive. Inclusive about all our needs and inclusive about every one in the chain that contributes today and have the potential of contributing tomorrow.

Marketing is about competition then. The day of the early-mover-marketing is over. In comes the day and age of the mature market. The mature market where top-lines are under threat to the oldest marketed categories of them all. Consumers have live din these categories pretty loyally for long enough. There is a huge need and want to move to the better product and the better price. Marketers are hastening this process further.

As marketers cut prices, one in tandem with another, bottom-line profits become thinner and thinner. The vain quest for the top-line is hurting the bottom line no end. As all of this happens and the premium of the brand, built assiduously over all these years vanished, the concept of branding itself is in question.

The markets are therefore drying up. The early marketers of the day did his job pretty well. The marketer of the day is however finding it tough to go forward. The future is all about a competitive context that is different. A competitive context that needs to be understood carefully before planning a foray that is different.

As traditional markets dry up, time to look at the new. Look at the standard process the Indian marketer has adopted over the years. Step one was into the nascent urban market. Pluck the low hanging fruit of urban first. Pluck then the higher handing fruit of urban. Go then to the low hanging fruit of rural (43 million homes). And then into rural that is just about developing (90 million homes).

The only reality out there is competition. Marketers of the day face competition in one of the following four formats.

The competitive advantage of India in world markets is best assessed by taking a quick peek at the models of competition possible in markets of the present and the future.

If I am to look around the nations of the world and correlate models in current use, there are four distinct patterns that emerge. Four clusters that have whole sets of nations congregating in models those seem to work for each of them differently and with different levels of efficacy. Needless to say, the peculiarities of each nation in question dictate the distinct choice they have made for themselves. Let’s visit the clusters. And let’s call them all kinds of animal names.

1. The Earthworm Model:

The passive model of competitive reaction. The invitation theory that is best practiced by the earthworm. A rich worm really. It knows the basics best. It is in constant touch with the earth that it seeks nourishment from and nourishes back simultaneously. A fundamentally strong being.

Several problems in this model though. It is passive for one. Non-reactionary. A model in the self-fulfilling prophecy mode. The best example of the fatalistic theory in practice. When faced with danger, all it can do is continue its humble journey in the earth. Competition kills this model with ease. There is no reaction. The fatalistic model of competition at its best!

Is Indian marketing here?

2. The Snail model:

The common competitive model in practice by a whole host of nations. This model is reactively proactive. A clear cocoon orientation. When faced with competition and danger, there is a regression into the shell. The withdrawn marketer at play. The philosopher marketer even! The marketer who revels in the safety-static nexus. Waiting for the competition to just go away, so that normal life may resume again!

Is Indian marketing here?

3. The Porcupine Model:

This model tells the competitor clearly of the array of weapons that are available for retributive action. There is a clear emphasis on the display of the arsenal. It believes in the overt display. A clear détente model of competition. Avoids a lot of speculative action and is ready for the real battle

Is Indian marketing here?

4. The Everyone Else Model:

This is the model of the real-time player in competitive markets of the present and certainly the future. This is the real-time marketer. Reactive when necessary. Proactive when necessary. Guerilla in tactics when necessary as well!

This is a constant-change oriented model that believes in watching the scenario carefully and reacting accordingly. Making forays into proactive territory on a speculative basis. Never mind if even only one of those sixteen forays actually click! Life in the fast track of competitive marketing is pretty un-predictable and speculative. Change here is absolutely discontinuous. Making a decision on a point of competitive strategy based on happenings of the past and the present could be disastrous. The future never ever happens the way the past decided.

Change here is so discontinuous that it is aptly illustrated by the example of the baby-arrival process in the house. The first child in this baby-boomers house is born out of a Caesarian section, gone in for by an over-zealous gynecologist. The second baby of the house is therefore predictably to be one out of a similar process. Caesarian section! No! It isn’t. Change is discontinuous. The second baby is a natural birth! The third child is due to happen then. This time round, its Caesarian section as well! Oops!

The fourth child of this baby-happy home is due. Change is indeed discontinuous. There is no predictability here. Guess what! This time round, the baby is actually conceived, carried and delivered by the father of the baby! Oops! Again! Change is indeed that discontinuous!

Shouldn’t Indian marketing be here?

The British left India as a nation of shopkeepers. Our retail universe that covers a nano-fraction of super-markets, large numbers of small and medium sized shops and cubby holes of retail commerce in remote inaccessible corners of the country, is the biggest you can find in any of the 182 countries that comprise the world and its consuming markets. A population of 12 million retail outlets to service the needs and requirements of the world’s second biggest consuming mass of people!

The one big strength that less than one other nation in the world can stake its claim to, is the size of the population that rests within the boundaries of our country. A huge weakness of gigantic proportions when viewed from the many development-oriented periscopes of the past. Not so when you view it with the future in mind. A future that is energized by these very large masses of people who have been the biggest liability for the nation of a billion plus!

The past viewed people as a liability. Not enough physical work to go round, not enough food to eat and of course not enough education to ventilate around. Every bit of progress that development achieved was sacrificed very, very quickly (possibly even before the economist was able to record and publish the feat), at the altar of population and its rather robust pace of growth.

While every sector of the economy did reasonably well in bits and patches over the last hundred years, so did the sector of population growth. Stretched food resources, stressed out finances, a pathetic situation on the physical infrastructure front and a complete lack of positive momentum represented the development of the last hundred years in India. People were therefore the biggest liability.

Not so anymore. Not in the hundred years ahead of us. One of the biggest assets of marketing-based India is its numbers in the very many homes that dot the countryside of ‘sunny-side-up’ India! Lots of existing people and a robust yen to propagate more of the kind, only means a lot more stomachs to feed and a lot more bladders to fill. Lots more bodies to clothe and a lot more minds to educate.

Think of a product. Think of a service. Think of a want. Think of a need. The biggest and the best of them will linger in the land that is India! The marketing future of India is therefore made. Ready at the take-off stage which will have many a Schumpeter stumped!

But then, people are not the only need of a consumer market. Consumption is certainly not the only key to unlock the riches of a marketing man’s Pandora’s box. Money somehow seems to be the real key. More money in these many hands, more the consumption. But then, is the money around?

While the pessimists answer to the question will say that men without money or men without the means to make the money, are of no use to marketing and its future, the fact remains that there is a value in the market that has a huge potential. A potential that can well nigh break open huge values in the times to come.

Let’s just remember one thing. India has been a poor country for a long, long while now. People below the poverty line have numbered a strong platoon of people. And despite it all, the population has grown, survived and continues to thrive in its sheer numbers. People have found a way to survive. The fittest have survived on high value brands, the less fit than that have thrived on brands of a lesser caliber in the country. Those even lower in the hierarchy have survived on the fringe of the commodity in every category of want and need. Consumption needs have always found answers. Consumption solutions for all!

There is therefore a pyramid of consumption that lies all over the slopes of Maslowe’s hierarchy of needs. But then, everybody, rich or poor, has fallen within the confines of this pyramid. And just as long as they do, there is indeed potential for a robust market for commodities, quasi-brands, brands, super-brands and of course at the ultimate level of the self-actualizing folk, no brands at all!

Every one of these segments has a value though. And in value rests the potential for the marketer. The one big true-blue competitive advantage for India of the present and India of the future, is indeed its large population base articulating every basic need in consumption of products, services and utilities.

Time to change the paradigm of India’s population then! Every marketer of whatever origin, be it from within India or outside, will queue up in the consumer markets of the country, trying to woo the wallet of the willing. As traditional source markets reach a plateau in their consumption, nascent markets like the one in India will hold a great deal of allure to the marketing man in his Western strait-jacket.

The author is a brand-domain specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc., a private-label thought-leadership outfit with a presence in the markets of UK, Hong-Kong and the Indian sub-continent. Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Saturday, July 05, 2008

The All-new Models of competition

Earthworm, Snail, Porcupine and Co.

By Harish Bijoor

Competition is a reality. None of us can ignore competition. There is competition in the home, in the school, in college, in office and most certainly in the great Indian market-place as a whole.

If there is life, there is competition. The baby in the house competes for your attention, just as that brand new hair gel on the shelf is seeking out your attention amidst a clutter of competition weighing down the super-market shelf.

How does one really compete? Let me paint four models.

If I am to look around the nations of the world and correlate competitive models in current use, there are four distinct patterns that emerge. Four clusters that have whole sets of nations congregating in models those seem to work for each of them differently and with different levels of efficacy. Needless to say, the peculiarities of each nation in question dictate the distinct choice they have made for themselves. Let’s visit the clusters. And let’s call them all kinds of animal names.

1. The Earthworm Model:

The passive model of competitive reaction. The invitation theory that is best practiced by the earthworm. A rich worm really. It knows the basics best. It is in constant touch with the earth that it seeks nourishment from and nourishes back simultaneously. A fundamentally strong being.

Several problems in this model though. It is passive for one. Non-reactionary. A model in the self-fulfilling prophecy mode. The best example of the fatalistic theory of the East in practice. When faced with danger, all it can do is continue its humble journey in the earth. Competition kills this model with ease. There is no reaction. The fatalistic model of competition at its best!

Is the Indian marketer here? I

2.The Snail model:

The common competitive model in practice by a whole host of nations. This model is reactively proactive. A clear cocoon orientation. When faced with competition and danger, there is a regression into the shell. The withdrawn marketer at play. The philosopher marketer even! The marketer who revels in the safety-static nexus. Waiting for the competition to just go away, so that normal life may resume again!

Is India here?

3. The Porcupine Model:

This model tells the competitor clearly of the array of weapons that are available for retributive action. There is a clear emphasis on the display of the arsenal. It believes in the overt display. A clear détente model of competition. Avoids a lot of speculative action and is ready for the real battle

Many marketers seem here.

4. The Everyone Else Model:

This is the model of the real-time player in competitive markets of the present and certainly the future. This is the real-time marketer. Reactive when necessary. Proactive when necessary. Guerilla in tactics when necessary as well!

This is a constant-change oriented model that believes in watching the scenario carefully and reacting accordingly. Making forays into proactive territory on a speculative basis. Never mind if even only one of those sixteen forays actually click! Life in the fast track of competitive marketing is pretty un-predictable and speculative. Change here is absolutely discontinuous. Making a decision on a point of competitive strategy based on happenings of the past and the present could be disastrous. The future never ever happens the way the past decided.

Change here is so discontinuous that it is aptly illustrated by the example of the baby-arrival process in the house. The first child in this baby-boomers house is born out of a Caesarian section, gone in for by an over-zealous gynecologist. The second baby of the house is therefore predictably to be one out of a similar process. Caesarian section! No! It isn’t. Change is discontinuous. The second baby is a natural birth! The third child is due to happen then. This time round, its Caesarian section as well! Oops!

The fourth child of this baby-happy home is due. Change is indeed discontinuous. There is no predictability here. Guess what! This time round, the baby is actually conceived, carried and delivered by the father of the baby! Oops! Again! Change is indeed that discontinuous!

Shouldn’t India be here?

The author is a brand-strategy specialist & CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Thursday, July 03, 2008

The Salesman is Dead!

gog

Death of a Salesman

By Harish Bijoor

Who is a salesperson?

The typical definition points squarely at that one entity that runs out there in the field. That one entity that does the sales prospecting first. That very entity that makes the cold call. That entity that does the sales pitch. And most certainly that one entity that closes the sale and brings in the ‘moolah’ into the kitty of the company he represents or the individual purpose he touts.

The year is 2005. This rather antediluvian definition of a salesperson is changing at a rapid pace. The narrow spotlight that fell on the front-ended salesperson as the sales entity of the organization, focused in his revenue tapping activity, is gradually spreading wider and wider in organization.

The salesperson prospects. And so do a host of back-end operators today. Whole departments that sit behind computer data-bases and whole departments that still pore through directories of people who fit the profile of the company in question are becoming critical sales-lead points for the man in the field to follow. Is this a sales-person as well? But of course!

The salesperson tele-calls. And so do a host of call-center operatives set up to generate the hot leads from a whole fuzzy and amorphous list of prospects. Companies in the market for the aggressive sale boast of deep-seated call centers that work 24X7 to pass the lead on to the man or woman on the front. Is this a sales-person as well? Most certainly yes.

The sales-person plants the seed of an awareness in the minds of consumers. Your range of superior toilet-cleaner needs to be planted as a thought in the minds of prospective consumers. While the sales-person on the field does this physically one on one, advertising of both the mass media and specific kind does it all the while. Is the advertising creative person in his pony-tail, the media-person in his breeches and the peppy client servicing 'types' sales entities as well? Most vehemently yes.

The sales-person is therefore not one. The salesperson is many! Many entities that make for the end purpose of creating the awareness, stoking it on into an interest in the potty-cleaner, causing for a flaming desire for the same and of course clinching it into an action of a sale.

And is that the end of the road? Not at all. The post-sale process is equally important. Is the post sale service person an important entity in the chain of causing the sale and keeping it as such? Yes again. The service person is a sales person as well. Every service person is a salesperson at large, with the very big potential of making that sale happen for a second time and most certainly a very positive entity working to create a positive appeal for the company that has done the selling –in for a repeat purchase at some time in the near or distant future.

The focus of the narrow beam therefore widens. And there’s more.

I enter the realm of your sales office. There sits a guard at the door. Is he a salesperson? Yes, he is. Your office receptionist who is painting her nails as she responds to a call is a salesperson as well. Everyone is.

Why is it then that everyone in the enterprise of a sale does not really think he or she is a salesperson? And why is it that everyone listed out here does not really participate in the enterprise of selling with the vigor and zest that the front-ended salesperson of the organization displays?

These are indeed key issues that worry many a man, woman and child in the realm of selling. Trouble touch-points, if when corrected can actually result in cascaded quantum value for the selling organization.

Look keenly at the organization of sales in your company then. Peek keenly at the nomenclature in vogue. Call everyone in your organization a sales entity then. Bring in the S word with pride into the designation and job profiles of everyone in your organization. Call them all together and celebrate your sales successes. Remember, each of them, starting with the office peon to the guy who mans the kitchen has been equally responsible in creating the cascade of sale.

And don’t stop at that. Incentivise everyone in the organization based on the sale volume or value your organization commands every quarter. The sales-person in the front will of course garner the most of this incentive, but as the distance to the selling process increases, the incentive will decrease. Nevertheless, everyone earns a part of what the enterprise makes on its sale. Money talks and money helps weave purpose here.

The CEO sitting right atop the pyramid of organization needs to be a salesperson as well. She is indeed the ultimate salesperson of organization. Sales must be a part of the designation description of your CEO. It helps vest the S word with the dignity it demands and deserves.

At the end of it all, sales is the one activity that is the purpose of organization. Sales brings in the cash flow. Never mind whether you are a temple-trust, a modern multi-specialty hospital, a school at large or a company that sells dentures or dog biscuits. The purpose of the organization is the sale.

Get your corporate organization centric to the purpose of the sale. Get the S word going with gusto and reap the rewards that will follow.

The author is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Monday, June 30, 2008

Marketing in the Days ahead..............

The Future of the Future: Two Pointers….

By Harish Bijoor

The future is not for you to see.

Well almost. The future of marketing lies in the future of branding. Two pointers then to the future of the future……..

1. The Amoeba and I

Human beings are not static state entities. We change. Our minds change. The thoughts in our minds change. We are change animals. We actually morph all the while. Our bodies change. Our minds change as well. Our bodies change with time. Right upto the age of 18 we are on the growth path. From then on we are on the death path. Our cells grow all the while and then start dying all the while. The body is therefore all about change.

The mind similarly is all about change. Change that is even more dynamic. While the body and its changes are all about a relationship with time, the mind and its change is not about time at all. It is about the diverse sets of experiences we go through. It is all about experience and exposure.

When our minds (where thoughts live) are forever on a morph mode, how dare brands remain static and expect to thrive?

Brands need to reinvent themselves on the format of an amoeba that is forever changing. Amoebic Branding is it! Change with dominant sets of consumers. A brand can’t be static anymore. Brands need to have avatars that change all the while. And for this, for a start, brands need to know the minds of their consumers the way they are and the way they will be next month. Brands need to Scenario plan all the way ahead.

Brand appeal needs to be inconsistent. Consistency is old hat. Consistency is the old paradigm of the branding process. One needs to break through the walls of this very rigid edifice brand folks have built over the last several decades. A brand needs to be inconsistent. Inconsistent in sync with the consumer.

Consumers are changing faster than brands. And that possibly is one of the reasons brands are being left behind and consumers are sprinting ahead. Running away from brands! Amoebic branding is all about keeping pace with the mind and mood of the consumer and morphing brand offerings both in terms of imagery and more radically so, in terms of product as well! The product can’t be static anymore as well! Wake up to new branding! Wake up to the new DNA of a brand!

2. Watch out! Inclusive branding ahead!

The very base paradigm of branding is exclusivity. In the beginning, there was the commodity. The commodity was pretty much unrecognizable one from the other. Brand folk caused for distinction. The commodity morphed to a quasi-brand status of some recognition. Brand folk kept getting exclusive in their approach. The quasi-brand moved on to become a brand. The brand was exclusive space. And then came the super-brand! Very exclusive space!

If the brand is exclusive space, it excludes a whole lot of society from it.

As society evolves, the language of the day will move on to get more and more inclusive. Do brands today include the masses or do they exclude them? Do brands in India include the needs, wants, aspirations, desires and affordability parameters of the have-nots?

If they don’t, and if all they cause is a hunger for higher end products that just can’t be satisfied, time then to get going and get onto the bandwagon of what I call Inclusive Branding. Branding that involves every segment of the masses there is to please, feed, clothe and shelter!

Inclusive branding is therefore all about an offering that embraces all. In some way or the other. In an extreme manner of speaking, brands will aspire not to alienate but embrace. Brands will cause hunger amongst only the relevant groups of people they aspire to satisfy. Mass advertising will therefore need to get very sensitive. If you are a Skoda Auto, you will get very sensitive and stop using mass media altogether that reaches the recesses of the dispossessed in your country. You will remember that even people below the poverty line in your country watch television, and you will not want to create unnecessary hunger and saliva appeal amongst those who can’t afford what you peddle.

And this is not about being benign. It is all about avoiding social discontent. All about avoiding those negative cues and strokes your brand gives to a whole set of people who can’t afford to be within its consumption set.

One step further then. Brands just might have other offers for those who can’t afford what you advertise to the masses. A branded tea that retails at Rs.300 a Kilogram just might have a variant that retails at Rs.2 per 5 grams! The quality of the offering will of course be different, but the brand name might be the same!

Can a brand with the same name swim upstream and downstream in an economy at the same time? The paradigm might just have to be broken!

Inclusive branding will be about embracing all whom you advertise to. The strategies of Inclusive branding are many, but the goal is the same. Newer and newer routes will be discovered! Inclusive branding is the new DNA of a truly successful brand ahead!

The author is a Brand domain specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, a private-label consulting outfit with a presence in the markets of Hong Kong, London, Dubai and the Indian sub-continent

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Marketing Models for India

Earthworm, Snail, Porcupine and Co.

By Harish Bijoor

Competition is a reality. None of us can ignore competition. There is competition in the home, in the school, in college, in office and most certainly in the great Indian market-place as a whole.

If there is life, there is competition. The baby in the house competes for your attention, just as that brand new hair gel on the shelf is seeking out your attention amidst a clutter of competition weighing down the super-market shelf.

How does one really compete? Let me paint four models.

If I am to look around the nations of the world and correlate competitive models in current use, there are four distinct patterns that emerge. Four clusters that have whole sets of nations congregating in models those seem to work for each of them differently and with different levels of efficacy. Needless to say, the peculiarities of each nation in question dictate the distinct choice they have made for themselves. Let’s visit the clusters. And let’s call them all kinds of animal names.

1. The Earthworm Model:

The passive model of competitive reaction. The invitation theory that is best practiced by the earthworm. A rich worm really. It knows the basics best. It is in constant touch with the earth that it seeks nourishment from and nourishes back simultaneously. A fundamentally strong being.

Several problems in this model though. It is passive for one. Non-reactionary. A model in the self-fulfilling prophecy mode. The best example of the fatalistic theory of the East in practice. When faced with danger, all it can do is continue its humble journey in the earth. Competition kills this model with ease. There is no reaction. The fatalistic model of competition at its best!

Is the Indian marketer here? I

2.The Snail model:

The common competitive model in practice by a whole host of nations. This model is reactively proactive. A clear cocoon orientation. When faced with competition and danger, there is a regression into the shell. The withdrawn marketer at play. The philosopher marketer even! The marketer who revels in the safety-static nexus. Waiting for the competition to just go away, so that normal life may resume again!

Is India here?

3. The Porcupine Model:

This model tells the competitor clearly of the array of weapons that are available for retributive action. There is a clear emphasis on the display of the arsenal. It believes in the overt display. A clear détente model of competition. Avoids a lot of speculative action and is ready for the real battle

Many marketers seem here.

4. The Everyone Else Model:

This is the model of the real-time player in competitive markets of the present and certainly the future. This is the real-time marketer. Reactive when necessary. Proactive when necessary. Guerilla in tactics when necessary as well!

This is a constant-change oriented model that believes in watching the scenario carefully and reacting accordingly. Making forays into proactive territory on a speculative basis. Never mind if even only one of those sixteen forays actually click! Life in the fast track of competitive marketing is pretty un-predictable and speculative. Change here is absolutely discontinuous. Making a decision on a point of competitive strategy based on happenings of the past and the present could be disastrous. The future never ever happens the way the past decided.

Change here is so discontinuous that it is aptly illustrated by the example of the baby-arrival process in the house. The first child in this baby-boomers house is born out of a Caesarian section, gone in for by an over-zealous gynecologist. The second baby of the house is therefore predictably to be one out of a similar process. Caesarian section! No! It isn’t. Change is discontinuous. The second baby is a natural birth! The third child is due to happen then. This time round, its Caesarian section as well! Oops!

The fourth child of this baby-happy home is due. Change is indeed discontinuous. There is no predictability here. Guess what! This time round, the baby is actually conceived, carried and delivered by the father of the baby! Oops! Again! Change is indeed that discontinuous!

Shouldn’t India be here?

The author is a brand-strategy specialist & CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com

Thursday, June 12, 2008

The Indian Consumer of the Future

Networking Working

By Harish Bijoor

The FMCG industry is back on the growth path in India. With a bang! After a big series of lulls seen in the industry with slackening rates of consumer interest, the FY 2008 promises a record growth rate of 17 % for the best FMCG brands in the country.

As one peels the Marketing Onion that is India, one finds successes that are bigger still in FMCG space. Bigger than the recorded growth rate of 17% even, as will be seen by majors in the space such as HUL, Marico and a P&G.

To get a hint of the real heroes of FMCG space in the last several years, peek keenly at the top-line numbers recorded by MLM (Multi-level marketing) companies. In the lead is just one company: Amway.

Top-line growth numbers of the company far out-strip the achievements of the oldest FMCG majors that have dominated the marketing environment that is India.

I theorize on this now. A theory I have built and evangelize across corporate organizations in the space of FMCG in India.

My theory then.

I do believe there are three dominant types of consumers in any marketing economy.

Indian Consumer Ver.1.1: The first is what I call a Pure consumer. This consumer buys for himself and his family. This consumer lives in the big cities of India. This consumer is a fourth or fifth generation branded FMCG buyer even. Marketers have traditionally focused on selling to such a consumer in India thus far.

Indian Consumer Ver.1.2: The second consumer is the one who is part consumer and part re-seller. He buys products and at times services not for himself alone. Whatever he buys, he will use a part for himself and his family, and the rest he will re-sell, often at a profit. Marketers in MLM companies typically sell to such folk. The success of the FY 2008 has been this Indian consumer Ver. 1.2. Amway reaped the wind here.

Indian Consumer Ver. 1.3: The third consumer is the one, who in the future, will actually buy only to re-sell. This consumer will emerge in the smaller towns of India. In the 6, 42,700 villages of India. This consumer will challenge the might of the distributor who was the re-seller in the old days. True blue democratization of the selling process, where the consumer is really not a consumer at all. He is only a Pure re-seller. There are marketers exploring this space. Taking baby steps here.

Harish Bijoor is a brand-specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.