We all love ‘Anna’! He seems to have united India and its youth. But is India really one, especially when it comes to business? This is one country where all the laws of marketing will fail, because it’s so diverse. If you have just one theory, then it will not take you anywhere. India changes every 200 km. Yes, a few basics remain the same across India, but a lot changes too. For starters, language changes (we have 192 official languages and dialects), culture changes, traditions and festivals change, food habits change. If this is not enough, think about it – even the geography and political views change. Yes, it is vast, but it is not an easy market. Only the hardy marketers will be able to survive and thrive here.

THOSE WHO MISUNDERSTOOD INDIA

A lot of multinationals have come into India but failed – not because their products were not good, but because they failed to understand India’s culture. Globalisation has been the new trend, but ‘standardisation’ will not work always. As a marketer, you need to be sensitive to each culture’s identities and its unique regional preferences and customise your product offerings.

Our local markets are not barren as many multinationals thought. There are very strong players in almost every local market. Take the case of Kellogg’s. Apart from the taste not really matching the Indian palette (we like to put warm milk with sugar in our cereals, unlike the west that has it with cold milk), it under estimated the presence of local competitors like Mohun cornflakes (priced lesser than Kellogg’s) and Champion (whose price is almost half as that of Kellogg’s). Retail chains may never be able to understand the bonhomie that people share with their local kirana shops or the Mom & Pop stores as they are popularly called in the West. They share a bond and enjoy a mutual level of trust (giving things even on credit to their favorite customers) that big retail chains will never be able to enjoy. CavinKare challenged the multinationals in various segments. Earlier, it was Clinic shampoo and Fair & Lovely fairness cream (both from HUL) that were touted as the only good options. But homegrown brands like CavinKare are giving them a tough fight. CavinKare used sachets to sell its shampoos. It understood that the consumer was not willing to buy a whole bottle. But a small sachet was a luxury she could indulge in. [Today, 40% of the shampoo market consists of sachet buyers.] It used India’s weakness for ayurvedic products and ensured that its fairness cream Fairever – with saffron and milk – promised not just fairness but also good skin, and quickly cornered a significant chunk of the market share from the giant HUL and its brand Fair & Lovely. So strong has been this positioning that it made Fair & Lovely change its positioning from “badle aap, badle zindagi” to “gorepan se kahi zyaada, saaf gorapan”, meaning “not just fairness but a clear skin too”. CavinKare understood the Indian consumer and her changing needs, and this homegrown brand has become a formidable competitor today.

Going the ayurveda way, Emami too has managed to keep the biggies out of the way with unique Indian brands like Boroplus, Navratan oil and Fair & Handsome cream, that command a significant market share today. Marico’s Parachute oil is way ahead of HUL’s Nihaar. Agreed. Products like hair oil are distinctly Indian and MNCs may not have an edge here, but even when it comes to products like toothpaste and hair color, our Indian brands are doing a pretty good job! Dabur toothpaste is giving Colgate and HUL a tough fight. In the hair color sector, Godrej still has the largest market share (more than 30%),with L’Oreal coming a distant second (a market share of 19%).

Just because a brand has a foreign tag is no guarantee that it will be perceived as superior. It needs to match the local sensibilities too. KFC entered India with its American menu of chicken wings and wraps in Bangalore. The Indian consumer did not identify with it and it had to pack its bags and leave. In 2004 when it did come back it had a vegetarian menu, rice meals and Indianised chicken recipes. It survived.      Read More....

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

IIPM ranked No 1 B-School in India
domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs
IIPM: Management Education India
Prof. Rajita Chaudhuri's Website

IIPM in sync with the best of the business world.......
Arindam Chaudhuri on Internet.....
Arindam Chaudhuri: We need Hazare's leadership
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri - A Man For The Society....
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management

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This is a brand that has made the world sit up and take notice, for not only is it worth millions, but it also teaches us important lessons in Brand Building. The day she changed her name from Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta and rebranded herself as Lady Gaga, a star was born, both for the music world and the business world. Single handedly, this ‘Lady’ has shown the world how to build a brand and how to do business in today’s crowded market place.

A BUSINESS MODEL OF THE FUTURE

Lady Gaga is not just a singer, she is the way of doing business in the future. If you want to ensure that your brand will survive in 2025, it’s time to learn some quick lessons from the Lady. She understands the system the best.

The business model of the future has some new rules now. However, some ground rules never change. For starters, your product has to be good. Everything depends on this. Like all good brands, she first ensured that her product is good. Yes, her music is good and she can sing. She works hard on her lyrics, writes them, conceptualizes the music, the video and the costumes. Working on her piano, she ensures that her “core product” i.e. her music is of great quality. We all know one simple fact; no amount of brand building will do you good if your product is not world class. Secondly, you need to understand your audience very well. You need to keep a finger on the pulse of the audience. No one has been able to understand the market the way she does.

She knows what excites them and what intrigues them. Many may find her costumes outlandish, but they work for her and her fans wait for her next appearance, just to see what it is that she would wear next. Whatever she does, she has them eating out of her hands. The third lesson one learns from this entertainer is the benefit of staying “in-the-news” all the time. This is not an option, but it’s a necessity of today.

In today’s market place, if you are ignored, you are doomed. That is one thing this Lady has mastered. She cannot be ignored. Every appearance of hers is well thought of and crafted. Be it a bird’s nest, a model of the solar system on her head, or be it her meat dress, she never fails to grab attention. In fact, she will go to any extent to grab attention. In one of her interviews, she recalled an incident where, during her early days of struggle, she was playing at a bar (in USA) filled with drunken NYU students and no one paid a hoot to what she was playing. She says, “I started playing in underwear at the piano,” and suddenly everyone was looking at her and listening to her song.

Just creating a buzz is not enough; you need to know the right places to create the buzz. The audience of the future will be spending a lot of time in cyberspace. Whenever Lady Gaga makes an appearance, she does it with one intention – to create the maximum buzz there. With over 145 million blogs in cyberspace, more than 50,000 new blogs being created everyday and over one million new blog posts being posted each day, the internet is a very crowded place today. To get noticed, to be written about by maximum people, requires a very sharp marketing mind. Gaga has her moves scripted so well, for she knows exactly how to get talked about. Just a great product will not get you noticed. You need to get the tongues wagging. Gaga cares not whether or not you like her, all she cares aboutis the degree of buzz that every act of hers will generate. While she works on her music, she meticulously works on how to make clips that would be lapped up by YouTube, how to dress and what to speak, so that the twitter world will start chattering! Brands too have to ensure that if they want to survive, they must have a strong presence in the cyber world, for the audience of the future is going to be here.

Her every act is a practiced, well prepared and well targeted marketing gimmick, to help build the Lady Gaga Brand. She obsesses about every little detail and it pays. Businesses of tomorrow have to remember, that if their products are not being talked about, they would disappear soon, however good their quality.     Read More....

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

IIPM ranked No 1 B-School in India
domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs
IIPM: Management Education India
Prof. Rajita Chaudhuri's Website

IIPM in sync with the best of the business world.......
Arindam Chaudhuri on Internet.....
Arindam Chaudhuri: We need Hazare's leadership
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri - A Man For The Society....
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management

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What makes this song so entertaining? Is it Salman or is it the lyrics or both? Probably both. The words were as important as Bhai’s unique style in making it such a big hit. Mind it, the language you speak can change the fortunes of your brand, your company and your movie!

MUNNI AND SHEILA, TO MCDONALD’S & SONY

Language has the power to attract and this new language has taken everyone in its grip & its here to stay. From Bollywood to the business world, from babes to brands, everybody is using it. Hinglish is the language of today. It’s trendy, young and happening and it’s keeping the cash registers ringing for all who use it. Today’s most popular songs – from “Munni darling” to “Pappu can’t dance saala” to “My name is Shiela” and the current craze “...Character dheela hai” – have Hinglish lyrics. It makes the songs catchy and very entertaining and the audiences love them.

Not just Bollywood, smart businessmen the world over have realized that it’s this “street English” that works like magic to attract the consumers, so much so that even foreign brands are speaking it. Pepsi now says “Youngistaan ka wow!” Cadbury says it is not just a chocolate but “meetha” to be had after meals (a typical Indian custom). Domino’s for years has been asking “Hungry kya.” Lehar says “Control nahi hota,” and they all have successfully managed to connect to their customers! The verdict: The one who speaks the language the customer loves, rules.

HINGLISH – FOR SURVIVAL

“Kitne aadmi ko text karna hai?” Wondering which company’s tagline this is? Not Airtel, Aircell, Vodafone or even Idea. It’s the tagline of Rogers, Canada’s leading telecommunications company. Foreign brands too are using Hinglish to reach out to the Indian consumer in foreign lands. Bell Canada called on its consumers to “Put some bang in your Bhangra” as it celebrated Baisakhi with them in Canada. Across the border in America, McDonald’s sent small cards to various Indian households asking them to taste its ice-creams and shakes, with a tagline, “Taste ki baat hai.” And the Indian- American population loved it.

Wells Fargo used Hinglish too, on its hoardings in America to reach out. “Safalta aapki, solutions hamare” was the tagline plastered on various billboards.

Hinglish today is a global language and even the Brits have accepted it. Demos, an influential British think-tank, came out with a report stating language blends like Hinglish were the way forward, adding, “With non-native English speakers set to top two billion in as little as five years, Britain’s influence, relationships and access to markets across the globe are at risk unless we change our outmoded attitude to language.” It’s no more the Queen’s English; rather, to survive, one needs to master “The Queen’s Hinglish,” the new language of the new culture. This is the new law of survival. This is the way to reach out to your customers.      Read More....

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

IIPM ranked No 1 B-School in India
domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs
IIPM: Management Education India
Prof. Rajita Chaudhuri's Website

IIPM in sync with the best of the business world.......
Arindam Chaudhuri on Internet.....
Arindam Chaudhuri: We need Hazare's leadership
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri - A Man For The Society....
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management

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I’s summer once again and time to enjoy nimboo pani, mangoes, long summer holidays, trips to cool places to beat the heat. But it seems the one thing that people love the world over is going out for a good movie. Yet, in 2009, the number of films released in theaters in USA dropped by 12%... Then came the biggest hit of all times – Avatar. Ticket sales zoomed. The number of people rushing to theaters increased to crazy levels. Reason? Well everyone wanted the catch the 3D version. Despite tickets of the 3D version being priced higher, 75% of Avatar’s revenues came from them. After all, it was the only 3D movie running at that time and people just couldn’t get enough. Avatar grossed $760 million, and Fox Studios, made all other production houses sit up and rethink. Fox had shown how to revive a business.

Movie theaters are today are filled with 3D versions of films. From ‘Cars 2’, to ‘Happy Feat 2’, to Steven Spielberg’s much awaited ‘The Adventures of Tintin’, all are getting ready with their 3D versions this year for your increased viewing pleasure, and also for increased box-office collections (hopefully!)It takes 3 to increase profits!

AVATAR – A SAVIOR!

An ‘Avatar’, according to the Hindu mythology, is a descent of a deity from heaven to earth with the specific purpose of bringing back righteousness (dharma) to the social and cosmic order. Avatar, the movie, couldn’t have been more appropriately named. It’s helping a lot of businesses survive, and proving to be an ‘Avatar’ for them.

The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is the most awaited gadget exhibition of the world. This year, almost every big brand had – yes, you guessed it – a 3D version of its gadget! Chris Yewdall, the CEO of DDD Group, which is the 3D consumer technology licensing group, said “...the market for 3D devices is rapidly expanding into other segments including PCs, tablets, and smart phones.” According to research, a growth of 132% is expected in 2012 with more than 100 million 3D TVs selling in 2014. Not surprising that from Samsung to Lenovo to HP, all have entered into partnerships with DDD. Toshiba is ready with its 3D laptop, Sony and Samsung with their 3D TVs, Nintendo with its 3DS video game. From 3D photo frames to 3D cameras, to 3D mobile phones, there seems to be a sudden boom in 3D devices. The best part is that most of them do not require you to wear the bulky 3D glasses to enjoy the 3D effects.

The battle between competitors now seems to have shifted to the 3rd dimension! 3D is now being marketed as the “novel” additional feature to lure customers away from competitors. Future growth in market share depends on the 3!

“IT’S 3D ALL THE WAY”

If marketers are there, advertises cannot be far behind. On May 27, 2011, Arla Foods-owned brand ‘Anchor’ decided to celebrate its 125th birthday with the launch of the first ever 3D cinema ad. It knew this was a sure shot way of grabbing headlines! When it comes to special occasions, 3D seems to fit the bill, for another company too went 3D to celebrate its 125th birthday.

On May 11, 2011, Coca Cola too completed its 125 years; and to mark the occasion, it covered its head quarters, a 26-story high building (402 ft) with canvass and projected 3D images showcasing its 125 years in the business. It ‘opened happiness’ in 3D!

This is not the first time that advertisers have experimented with 3D. In 2010, in June, the Sun newspaper became the first newspaper in UK to publish in 3D. It had a 3D page 3, a 3D editorial, and even 3D ads. It asked its readers to keep their 3D glasses (provided free with the edition) handy for viewing future editions with amazing 3D pictures of the Football World Cup. Last year, again in June, Shiyan Evening News brought out China’s first 3D Newspaper. Not to be left behind, in June last year too, India experimented with 3D too, with Mid Day launching special editions with 3D ads, followed by Rajasthan Patrika and Dainik Bhaskar. An expensive but interesting innovation; if used intelligently, it can be the tool for brands to help break the clutter and stand distinctly apart from competitors.

One medium that has been doing this very successfully is the billboard. Recently, Vodafone captured the attention of the passers-by with its adorable Zoozoos bursting out of billboards (in 3D) announcing the launch of its 3G services. For years, numerous 3D innovations on hoardings have attracted consumers and helped brands break the clutter. But the question is, for the other mediums too, is 3 their route to success?

For the manufacturing industry, it seems things will never be the same again, thanks to 3D. Soon, printers will be available that will print in 3D – or in other words, will allow you to manufacture and create things in the comfort of your home. From jewelry, to customized football shoes , to mobile phone covers to almost anything. This new technology is going to transform the whole business of manufacturing. Earlier, these printers were used to make prototypes. Today, more than 20% of the output of 3D printers is the final product. The future, as many see it, would have consumers downloading a design the same way as they download music, customizing it to suit their tastes and pressing “” to get the product of their own choice right in their homes! Who needs a factory now, to manufacture – just a printer will do!

THE MAGIC OF TRIANGLES

‘3’ seems to have a mystical magic attached to it. Be it movies or real life, having 3 people in a relationship makes for the most intriguing of stories. Be it the royal triangle of Prince Charles, Princess Diana and Camilla or be it some of our greatest romantic films. If there is a triangle, the effect is magical.

Hollywood (with its ‘Gone With The Wind’ and ‘Casablanca’) to Bollywood (with its ‘Silsila’ and ‘Saagar’) viewers have been glued to the screens on the promise of 3. Triangles have an irresistible and mysterious charm.

Be it love triangles or the Bermuda Triangle, which for years became the source of supernatural stories, with popular folklore blaming paranormal activity to be responsible for the alleged disappearing of several aircraft and ships in that part of the North Atlantic Ocean. The Bermuda Triangle mystery was one story everyone wanted to believe. It was as fictitious as the love triangle of the movie Titanic, yet they both succeeded in intriguing the viewers and making lots of money.     Read More....

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.

IIPM ranked No 1 B-School in India
domain-b.com : IIPM ranked ahead of IIMs
IIPM: Management Education India
Prof. Rajita Chaudhuri's Website

IIPM in sync with the best of the business world.......
Arindam Chaudhuri on Internet.....
Arindam Chaudhuri: We need Hazare's leadership
Professor Arindam Chaudhuri - A Man For The Society....
IIPM: Indian Institute of Planning and Management

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