Hello readers! February at B schools is usually a month of celebration, fests, events and of course the precursor to spring and farewell. Amidst these merrymakings, we bring to you yet another edition which is full of wonderful insights from the world of marketing. The marketing club is organizing another edition of its social media competition “War of Brands” and Ulta Pulta under the umbrella of “JINGSTAD-Tantalizing Creativity”. The cover sotry is on “Price is right” which talks about pricing strategies. In our Vartalaap for this edition, we have interviewed Mr Kevin Lane Keller. He has served as a consultant and advisor to marketers for some of the world’s most successful brands. He teaches the elective Strategic Brand Management in E.B. Osborn at Tuck School of business at Dartmouth college. This month’s perspective has “Rising Concerns About Consumer Privacy and Data Security” by Mr Himanshu Khandelwal from IIM Calcutta, which talks about marketing strategies/tactics that can be adopted to respond to this contemporary issue. Another article is on “Development of Latest Trends in Marketing Arena” by Mehal Biswas
and Akash Kuamr Adlak from IIM Lucknow, which talks about all the latest trends and digital marketing strategies.In the catch and miss section, we bring to you the Asian Paints, “Home not showrooms” advertisement which highlights the essence of leading better lives at our homes by creating a space for self-expression with décor that gives the family an opportunity to create meaningful memories. On the other hand, Too Yumm chips, “Eat not, Fikar not” advertisement fails to create the impact and the concept is not new. The Eye to Eye section involves a debate on “What is more efficient today, advertisements in newspapers and magazines in physical or digital form?” with Mr Divyanshu Agarwal from Ajay Kumar Garg Enginneering College taking a for stand on the topic i.e. print is there to stay for long, while Mr Noel Ramchandani from IBS Hyderabad writing against. Our digital marketing section ‘Digigyaan’ talks about what things to keep in mind while creating an online advertisement. Also, the five must-reads and updates are there to keep you updated. We would like to thank all the entries of perspective and eye2eye. We would also like to thank our readers as they are the ones who push us to do better in every edition. We also look forward to your feedback and suggestions. Happy reading! Team Markathon
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Andar Ki Baat Perspective
01 05 Cover Story
08 The Price is Right! Anurag Pandey
Rising Concerns About Consumer Privacy and Data Security Himanshu Khandelwal | IIM Calcutta Development of Latest Trends in Marketing Arena Akash Kumar Adlak & Mehali Biswas | IIM Lucknow
| IIM Shillong
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What is more efficient today, advertisements in newspapers and magazines in physical or digital form?
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13 Divyanshu Agarwal Ajay Kumar Garg Engineering College
Noel Ramchandani IBS Hyderabad
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Mr Kevin Lane Keller
E. B. Osborn Professor of Marketing at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College
Interviewed By:
Yash Agarwal & Aishwarya Tiwari | IIM Shillong IIM Shillong
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Andar Ki Baat SpeciaLs
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AD-dicted
Catch & Miss advertisements of the month Anurag Pandey & Aishwarya Tiwari | IIM Shillong
Digi - Gyaan
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Creating an Online Advertisement
Nitin Nathani | IIM Shillong
Marketing Gyan
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Top 5 Reads
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Updates
Jab They Failed
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Nano, The People’s Car!
Apoorv Gupta | IIM Shillong
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To get the brain tickling Aishwarya Tiwari | IIM Shillong
Fresh from the Marketing World Aishwarya Tiwari | IIM Shillong IIM Shillong
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Rising Concerns about Consumer Privacy & Data By Security Himanshu Khandelwal IIM Calcutta
The biggest concern is the increment in the consumers’ perception about misuse of their information by organizations. Organizations and especially marketers are finding the need to modify their strategies to deal with the increase in consumer concerns and privacy protecting conducts.
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A lot of organizations today rely heavily on consumer-generated data for carrying out activities such as product development, strategic planning and targeted marketing campaigns. The effec
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tive use of this information is for the ultimate benefit of the consumers, as this data enable companies to enhance the customer experience by providing innovative solutions and services to consumers. Increasing accessibility to data obtained via the internet and the subsequent increased penetration of direct mail advertising renders enormous opportunities for marketers to get hold of their customers. Though consumers are willing to share their personal information to some extent when they see value for them, however, there has been a rising concern among consumers about sharing and protecting the information. Increased risks to the privacy of consumers pose significant challenges to the marketers. Some of the frequent consumer concerns include selling the data without their permission, unasked contact by businesses, the impression that companies know too much about their personal information, and the accuracy of data stored in companies’ databases. Moreover, consumers often do not have any idea the information companies have about them and how that is being used. The biggest concern among these challenges is the increment in the consumers’ perception about misuse of their information by organizations. Organizations and especially marketers are finding the need to modify their strategies to deal with the increase in consumer concerns and privacy protecting conducts.
Areas of consumer concern when personal information is being requested online are: •Extent of personal information– The lesser
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the sensitivity of personal information asked, the more willing the consumers are to provide their information. •Excessive information– Consumers would generally be unwilling to share information when too much of it is getting collected. •Other’s personal information– Consumers are unwilling to provide information about other important people such as their family or friends. Companies generally ask consumers about such information for referral programs. However, research reveals that apart from their own personal data privacy concerns, consumers are also highly worried and cautious of the privacy of the people important to them and do not feel comfortable in sharing such personal information. •Relevance– Consumers are unwilling to provide personal information to a marketer/brand online when they perceive the information to be irrelevant to the interaction/transaction. •Control– Consumers demand control of the personal data they release to marketers and feel that they should be able to access, view or edit the information as and when they desire.
Current & potential impact on the business world & marketing domain Customers are more and more unwilling to do business with companies they don’t trust with their data and are acting on these concerns – an evolution that may reduce the amount and quality of personal data that businesses have the access to use.
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perspective What implications does it hold for marketers? Data privacy issues will significantly affect the potential business goals and data utilization strategies of many companies. As more buyers lose confidence in the brands because of new privacy technologies that can be perceived as frightening, business growth of these brands will suffer and existing technology investments to create more meaningful customer engagements will not make the anticipated returns. Consumers don’t forgive and forget: While it is true that consumers are additionally ready to share information in the event that they see a few advantages, they won’t think much to take action against companies engaged in a data breach, regardless of whether they’ve personally encountered a breach or found out about it in the media.
Marketing strategies/tactics to respond to this contemporary issue The first and the foremost need for brand strategists and marketers to do is to keep up with the fast changing attitudes to privacy, and to acknowledge that these attitudes are neither uniform nor static. Brands that can succeed against these concerns will be the brands that will place maintaining trust at the core of their value proposition. Brands should be very clear in their communication – it is always better to be specific and say, “We would like to know your email address so that we can send you customized offerings based on your previous purchases” rather than saying generic things like “By clicking this, you are agreeing to share your personal data”.
vacy and trust as a competitive advantage and esteemed resource of any organization. Basically, privacy and trust have to be the two core pillars of a brand. It’s necessary that brands take a more proactive stance toward privacy – not reactive – by practicing privacy by design into the products and services that touch consumers. By doing so, brands can efficaciously deal with today’s rising privacy concerns. Companies should avoid asking for unnecessary personal data from customers, they should collect only the data that they need for a specific business purpose and should safely dispose of the data when that objective has been fulfilled. Maintaining customer data privacy and security should be amongst the top priorities for companies especially the ones which are employing the data to create purposeful experiences for customers. Organizations advocating a culture of security and having an inadvertent reaction plan in place can help pacify privacy, data security and ethics concerns. The ownership for assuring ethics and privacy should be with the entire organization. Key insights that can help marketers generate positive attitudes towards their brand: -Consumers prefer loyalty programs over freebies: As per SDL’s Data and Privacy Study 2014, 49% of the people surveyed stated that they would be willing to share personal information for a loyalty program, but only 41% would do that for free products and services.
- Consumers skip website privacy policies: Majority of customers rarely or To combat the negative repercussions in the long never read private policy statement before they run, the best approach is to embrace a business make a purchase. Hence there is an opportumentality that advocates for integrating both pri- nity for firms to make customers less coerced to
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perspective share their personal information by: being more transparent about how they intend to use the data shared by customers, giving their customers an easily accessible option to cop out of data sharing and providing brief and readily understandable privacy policies and agreements. - Culture of data exchange fit: The shifts in attitudes of consumers suggest that they are interested in a more forward-looking culture of data exchange and that brands have the opportunity to develop a culture of data exchange fit. Brands should take advantage of these positive tendencies and should take the lead by parenting the growing realism and helping create a culture of data exchange that have the potential to benefit both the company and the customers. - Pass control of data to the customer: As per a new global study by Admap Magazine, control over personal data is ranked third among the consumers’ need from the brands. Consumers today are cocreators and producers and hence brands need to respond with transparency, empathy and collaboration that allow consumers to control the data they share.
- Macquarie Group: Macquarie Group has started working on the pilot of its new open banking platform, boasted by the company as giving customers control over their banking data, including the ability to manage the way it is shared. Macquarie Group has opened up its APIs to 3rd party vendors, to grant other players an opportunity to use customers’ data to offer more competitive services, at the customers consent. How certain brands have not responded to this contemporary issue: -Uber’s data breach: Uber recently announced
How certain brands have well-responded to this contemporary issue: -Telefónica gives consumers control over mobile data: Telefónica, a Spanish multinational broadband and telecommunications provider, has declared a partnership in Germany with the U.K. firm People.io to create an application which will allow the Telefónica’s customers to control some of their data. The firm’s approach to giving over more data control to its customers, could actually serve well as a guide for what other telecom companies around the EU and other markets might do as rigorous GDPR rules come into picture in 2018 in the European Union. Telefónica poses formidable obstacles to datahoarding companies like Amazon, Facebook & Google, who consider the data about their consumers to be their property
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that announced that in 2016, the company went through an enormous data rupture, resulting in the theft of data of about 57 million users worldwide including the drivers. This is not bad only for Uber, but will have implications for all the digital service providing firms. It has given a new strength to those who are in favour of stricter privacy regulations. Uber also made a very improper decision by paying the hackers to destroy the data they stole – creating an incentive for criminals for the next potential data breach.
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THE BIG BANG THEORY OF MARKET TRENDS! By Akash Kumar Adlak & Mehali Vishwas, IIM Lucknow
“Creativity is intelligence having fun” - Albert Einstein Marketing has always been the area of creating, communication delivering and exchanging products and services that have value to customers. But in this century is marketing only about this? Then the answer is NO. Marketing is expanding at a rapid pace. Today it include the technology, media and consumer behaviour trends that keeps on changing with the advancement towards globalization. Other than the tradition segmentation, targeting and positioning, today marketing is about the artificial intelligence, blockchain and millennials! So tighten your seatbelt and let us go through some of the latest trend in marketing arena that took place in these recent years.
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Thus, rightly said by Noah Kagan, “the bar has been raised across the industry. The only way to stand out is to put out higher quality content than the rest.”
Exciting marketing trends in Social Media – The recent trends in social media that took marketing to a new era are as follows – •The right message to the right persona and at the right time- In the present scenario, we find that the latest trend in marketing arena is by using the potential of mobile communication and internet. Compared to the older method of broadcast media, mobile communication is an easy way to reach large numbers of customers all over the world. It gives an opportunity to connect one-on-one to customers based on their taste and interest. Nowadays, the power of mobile phone along with the reasonable cost of mobile data connections offers customer many choices and price points thus making them more powerful than before. Thus for marketers it give better campaigning option and at lower cost of marketing. •Owned land versus rented land- This refers
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to producing or using interface that a company may or may not own. This is a sort of symbiotic relation between two firms. For instance, our favourite game Candy Crush saga has no platform of its own. It uses the platform of Facebook. In this deal, Facebook generate revenue from people who joins and uses it and the game company gets the chance to use the platform to run its game for interested customers.
digital marketing method is used to attract more viewers to the site. It actually works to improve the present condition of websites and providing better experiences to viewers. •IOT (Internet of Things) – the meshed network of devices, vehicles, appliances and software, etc. with proper network connection that help in exchange of data and new marketing applications.
•Tapping the untapped customer network for better opportunities – This step means that it is a prime concern for any marketer to know where the budding customers are hanging out and then use those areas to give them better experience. This will also help in rapid business growth. This idea can be reinforced by the instance of Quora. Quora, a marketing channel presently with more than 100 million visitors and 400,000 topics became so prominent after a marketer found that people used Quora to ask about specific challenges or products that they faced. Marketers started answering such questions. When the answers started quenching the visitors’ thirst, the number of views also increased in leaps.
•Content marketing community – the strong
bond shared between content marketing, social media marketing and online communities forms this.This method led the rise of various social activities. Such marketing techniques are mainly used to write blogs and requires huge content of the work. They work on the principle of emotional appeal of marketing.
Digital Marketing toolkits – Below is the list of digital marketing techniques those, which are popular among people•Big Data – voluminous data that include insights and experiences from customer and market survey as well as analysis based on prediction of future market.
With entry in 2018, we saw the release of Google Home, Apple’s iPhone X and so more. Digital marketing is bestowed with more gains as compared to older versions of marketing like television advertisements.
•CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization) – this
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january 2018 ing techniques depend on the new generation marketers like us. Big FMCG players like Unilever and Kraft are now shifting their interest from soft skills towards technical world by building new teams of data-scientists to work simultaneously with the marketers. This method will gain more significance in the coming years as those firms which focuses on data will find it easy to grow in the fierce competitive market.
New year with new marketing trends -
•Voice-optimized content will gain power – marketers have already optimised content for the web 2.0 and the mobile generation, now gradually they also need to optimize content for voice search. The reason for gaining interest in the voice search is simply because it is easier than typing, have more long-tailed content. Moreover, last year more than 20 percent searches over internet were carried out through voice-search. Market researchers expect that this percentage will increase to 50 percent by 2020.
This year will see some new and burgeoning trends that assures remarkable impacts on goto-market strategy. Let us have a look on them. •Being Artificially Intelligent -Natural intelligence is now outdated and have no impact on the new approaches of modern marketing. All that is needed is artificial intelligence for analysing everything. now marketers have the ease to use AI powered live-chat tools to communicate their message to customers. This technique include already developed tools like Drift and Intercom. For proving better service to website visitors gradually all brands will shift to AI powered live chat and tools.
•Nothing more matters other than Blockchain – in 2018, the firm has to be in the top of blockchain to be above other competitors. It is the most tricky challenge of this year. With vows of smart contacts, universal and more secure payment technology, transparency in record keeping and •Being Virtually Real – it is prime time for mar- token involved communities, blockchains are keters to step out of reality and make sure their the latest trend in marketing arena. This is the marketing programs are centred on virtual real- structure behind bitcoins and is going to be one ity. It is equally important to connect Virtual Re- of the revolutionary change in this era. ality to Artificial Intelligence to improve marketing exponentially. Recently e-bay came up with Thus, it can be concluded that marketing trends VR glasses and headset for customers to enjoy will change with the continuous change in techthe best choice of video, audio, etc. without con- nology and expectation of consumers. There are many new and unknown surprises awaiting for necting to any device. marketers in 2018 and years after. Many of the •Taking Personalization to the next new level trends will go mainstream like augmented real– this can be achieved with the aid of account- ity or in-car ads. Some of the trends discussed based marketing (ABM). It highlights the content above may fail to give the fruits expected out personalization. Specific contents is provided to of them. Nevertheless, most of them sketched customers with software like Adobe. It works in above will pass to provide according to the dethe same way like Netflix, which suggest mov- mands of the customers. ies and shows to registered viewers as per their Based on current scenario, studies sugtaste.
gest that marketing will become more an•Quantitative marketing gets the limelight – alytical, more digitalised through social the development of quantitative based market- media, organic search and voice search. MARKATHON
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The Price is Right!
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“T
he Price is Right,” a very popular American Game Show provides a glimpse to the marketers about one of the MARKETING most challenging jobs in Marketing- Setting the right price. BUDGET The game has a number of competitions where participants have to guess the prices of different products. Some of the products are common and known to the contestants, but some of the products are not very common. This is where things get interesting as contestants try and make intelligent guesses. For a marketer, this would be an opportunity to observe how a regular consumer might think about the pricing of a product. The consumers are not aware of the costs involved, and they think from their perspective thus the price is often a reflection of how they value the product. Since Price is the most flexible P among the four P’s, it is very easy for marketers to fall into the trap of increasing sales by lowering prices. More often than not in the era of intense competition, this often leads to price wars. In 2004 price war broke out between Indian FMCG companies with P&G slashing the prices of Ariel and Tide by up to 50%. HLL reacted with similar price reductions in the rates of Surf Excel and Excel Blue. The price wars often lead to all the companies in the industry operating on lower margins. In 2016 price war broke out in the Indian Aviation Industry with no-frills carriers slashing their prices. The companies were able to do so because of lower
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oil prices. However, this reduction in prices will cost the companies when the prices of oil start rising because rates are known to be sticky. These examples prove that pricing is very complicated and most misunderstood of the four P’s. With the technological changes that the industry is seeing things are becoming more complex. Even after so many years pricing remains an inexact science and understanding these complexities will help marketers price their products better.
means that they are much more composed and their stability makes it difficult for agencies to identify such scenarios.
b) Online vs Offine
It’s 2018, and almost everything that you need is available online. From groceries to refrigerators, one can buy anything online. This has been a blessing for the customer however it is a headache for most companies which operate through retailers as well. The big ques2018 Perspective tion for them is how the price should differ between an ona) Pricing Bots line store and its brick and mortar store. It is crucial for Things are being priced difowners of brick and mortar ferently today. Many products are moving to dystores to gain clarity on this problem so that it namic pricing and pricing algorithms will play a can compete in both the markets. Currently, the significant role in the foreseeable future. Whethretailers can add more and more value to the er these Pricing Algorithms backed by Artificial product so that the customer keeps visiting the Intelligence will help in reducing competition store and it can open stores in areas where the or it will help companies form cartels which are density of population is high enough that the much harder to identify and punish. India has store can survive. established a proper system of identifying collusions and cartels and taking legal action against Another problem today for retail stores is the them. In 2003 a new competition law The Comreach of online stores mainly Amazon and Flippetition Act, 2002 was enacted. This meant the kart. There is a possibility that customers won’t end of Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Pracbuy from the official online stores of companies tices Act (MRTP). The Competition Commission if the prices on their of India is the quasionline stores are not judicial body that was competitive against established to enforce the prices on Amathe Competition Act zon or Flipkart. The of 2002. However, it company can decide would be challengto match the prices of ing for these agencies their online store to to identify collusion that on Amazon, but if it is very subtle. Big then there would be a Data, sophisticated difference in the price algorithms, and Artiof the product online ficial Intelligence can and in store. If e-comhave both a positive or merce websites are a negative impact based on how they are used. eating up large chunks of your online and offline Many fear that these tools can lead to the cresales, then it is a good idea to match the prices. ation of cartels which are not easy to identify. Otherwise, it is better to accept the minor losses Machines are not prone to human shortcomings and continue with the business. Another aplike inherent biases and computers do not fear proach is to set different rates in different stores. action and punishment by the agencies. This
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Target already follows this policy. The prices of products in different target stores is an outcome of prices of its competitors in that neighborhood. So, a similar strategy can be applied by the retailers while deciding the online prices. If the competition is high, keep the online prices low. To survive in today’s world, the owners of brick and mortar stores need to embrace the presence of the online stores, and they must cater to the sensitivities of the customers. People will keep buying in the brick and mortar stores as long as they keep getting added value through quality service. The customer will also pay a premium for such experiences.
c) Internet The access to the internet is not new but its growing leaps and bounds in India. Based on a report by Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), the number of internet users was set to cross 420 million by June 2017. Urban India has 51% penetration, and it will soon reach its saturation point. The rural part of India currently stands at 17% internet penetration, and it is growing very fast. With Governments push of Digital India and the competitive pricing of Reliance Jio, the internet access and usage are set to rise very fast this year. The monthly bills of mobile users from urban area reveal that the internet usage in proportion to the total monthly bill has increased considerably and stands at 65% of total bill. Well, what does this mean for companies and its pricing strategies? It means that the customer is getting more aware and now they have access to various resources through which they can compare the prices for different products. Also, now the customers have multiple options or platforms for buying the product. The e-commerce
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industry in India today is worth $14.5 billion in revenue. The growth is now being driven by users in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. In the previous part, we discussed how the brick and mortar stores could use pricing to survive the competition by various e-commerce websites. But imagine a situation where the retailer decides to keep different prices online and in store. The customer might enter the store and ask the price of a particular product on its official online store, or the customer might just check the various rates of that product online while standing at that store. However, the retailers must not shy away from differential pricing as the customers might pay a premium for in-store services. If the customers demand the online prices, then it is best to match the prices and consider it incremental profit and hope that the customer ends up buying more product from the store.
Proactive Pricing The pricing dynamics are changing fast and despite all the developments pricing remains an inexact science. Although the pricing decision is one of the most important decision in any business, it is often the most misunderstood. Its flexibility can help any business but because of its flexibility pricing changes are often misused. Many companies set the prices reflexively based on standard criteria- recover cost, gain market share or match the competitors. However, some companies have started reaping the advantages of proactive pricing. The rewards of carefully studying pertinent information about customers, competitors, and industry economics and by applying particular techniques marketers can finally grasp control over pricing.
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a) Pricing to reflect perceived value The best way to price a product is to understand how a consumer values that product. The example of Price is Right is useful here because the cases where the price of the product is unknown to the contestants, they judge it on the basis of how they value it. The marketer must also consider the additional costs and the risks that a consumer puts in to buy the product.
b) Targeting the Purchasing Decision Maker Another important thing is to consider the sensitivities and requirements of the purchasing decision maker. Thus, the perceived value pricing must be focussed on the purchasing decision MARKETING makers rather than all customers at large. BUDGET Price wars often break out because companies want to show that their product is more economical than the competitors. They think that this will increase the perceived value of the product. All companies -luxury companies aside- would want to be considered more economical than its competitors. A store having the same prices as its competitors would want to be perceived as more economical by its customers. A retailer with average rates higher than 10% of its competitors would wish to its product to be viewed as only 5% more expensive than the key compet-
itors. Thus, most companies would try and create a perception in the minds of the customers that they are more economical. Companies have four options to do that: offer lower prices, make these prices more prominent or ensure that the customers know that the company’s prices are lower, giving great deals and lastly by offering discounts. Some of the typical examples include
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Price Point policy (Pricing the products so that they end at 9), coupons and creating a better assortment mix.
Conclusion The reaction of people on Twitter and other social media websites to the launch of Apple products in 2012 might give us a glimpse of how important the people consider pricing. The number of tweets per minute increased rapidly (the number of tweets per minute went well over 10000) when the price of the iPad was announced. A similar response was not seen when the product features were announced. This tells us how important pricing is to customers. Another important aspect that this example brings out is the fact that people are now a lot more vocal about how they perceive prices of different product on social media. This can be a nightmare for companies because any pricing changes or moves to exploit the customers can backfire. Bank of America found this out when in September 2011 it announced that it would start charging $5 monthly debit card fee. The public outcry was so fierce that the Bank had to revert its decision. However, the damage was already done, 20% more accounts were closed in the closing months of 2011 compared to the closing months of 2010. Thus, it is imperative for companies to understand that it has to embrace the technological changes to survive and the focus must be on creating shared value with the customer through pricing. The general notion in the industry is that the company has the right to extract maximum value from the product. However, such moves can backfire on the companies as we have seen with several examples. The customers today are not only rejecting unfair prices, but they are also questioning the way companies price their products. Now the companies can treat this as a threat, but I believe that this is an opportunity for companies to gain the trust of the customers by shared value pricing.
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VARTALAAP An Interview with Mr. Kevin Lane Keller Kevin Lane Keller is the E. B. Osborn Professor of Marketing at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. He has degrees from Cornell University, Mellon University, and Duke University. He is the author of some of the most definitive books in the domain of marketing, which includes Strategic Brand Management, which is known as “the bible of branding” and Marketing Management which he co-authored with Dr. Philip Kotler. Beyond academics, he has also worked as a consultant, advisor and trainer to marketers for some of the world’s most successful brands. International leader in branding, consultant and advisor to the biggest brands like Ford, P&G, Samsung, Disney, author of genre defining books in the field of marketing and a teacher. Professor Kevin Lane Keller has donned many hats in his career and did justice to them all.
Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College
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E. B. Osborn Professor of Marketing
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I think the whole idea of availability and making sure your product is at the right place and at the right time and everything else is really important now.
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Markathon: Sir, please tell us about your journey. How you reached where you are today? What is your motivation to keep working everyday? I mean the interesting thing is I did not start out with marketing I was a mathematics economics undergraduate and in MBA went to study finance then I took a marketing course and loved the human aspect of it. You know, apart from marketing I think it’s the air that is just constantly changing so many new developments. So, there is so much to study and learn and think about, so you know I always want to keep learning and learn more. Markathon: You have such a deep connection with India. So, any specific Indian brand that you specially like, or one whose marketing strategy has caught your eye? That’s a good question. I can’t name a brand in particular. I think I’ve seen strategies differ and a lot of them are classic strategies that they use in different ways. So sometimes you have celebrities, cricket players -which you might not get in other parts of the world, Bollywood etc., but you know there’s not one brand that comes to my mind. Whenever I go back I always watch- I watch a lot of sports on TV anyways- and I like going to India to see what’s most advertised and not just one brand.
teers and which one are becoming irrelevant? What will you recommend to future marketeer? I think it is a great time to go into marketing. I think it’s really exciting, there’s just so many changes. I actually was on the phone yesterday with CMO of Adobe Ann Lewnes with whom I worked with literally 25 years ago at Intel and we were talking about how things have changed in so many different ways. But I think there are certain things that haven’t changed as much and one is the basic strategy concepts. So, really clear positioning, value proposition and all those kinds of considerations are still really valuable. What’s changed is the tactics – kind of how you go to market and obviously digital being a part of that. So one of things that she talked about was, in their case, the importance of events any chance to talk to customers directly in addition to other parts of their strategy. It’s that kind of combination I think - realizing the importance of digital and non-digital – that’s important now. Markathon: With the increasing use of digital media and social marketing in every segment, brands and products are now more affordable, accessible and available. So are people and consumers becoming product centric because every brand is now easily available or are there still really strong values that a brand holds?
I think the whole idea of availability and Markathon: Which skills are becoming making sure your product is at the right relevant in the next decade for marke- place and at the right time and every-
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thing else is really important now. But I definitely think that good brands and strong brands go beyond that. It’s just their actual product and their ability to create more meaning to their brands - I see that whether its emotional or whether it’s their purpose, the causes they align with. I think they have to link up their basic product with value proposition, their basic strategy. So that’s what it comes to creating richer stronger brands and that makes sense. It’s how you build relationships with customers - make sure that you satisfy their needs both functionally and rationally and maybe more you know emotionally. And this is what some of the really strong brand like IKEAs and Apple and even Google and like Facebook are trying to think of – the intangible sides of marketing.
digital. What is your opinion on the increasing importance given to millennials? Is this segment overrated?
Markathon: Everything is changing, and nothing is constant. Everything today is dynamic. Business models fail marketing strategies also fail so in such changing times what do you think is the future of marketing as a domain?
Markathon: In our classroom we had a very engaging discussion about whether marketeers create needs for products that did not exist before. What are your opinions on that?
Well that’s a great question. There are lot of angles to that. I think part of it depends on little bit on brand how old audience is but even kind of regardless you got an existing customer base that you don’t want to ignore and take for granted. While bringing younger customer base aligning things with their values. A lot of it depends on how different you can be and how you can handle both of them you need to find the balance and trade of. Like in finance you need to trade of between risk and return, marketing is no different I have got cost then I have to figure out where I am comfortable with, how much I want to focus on young and how much on conservative.
The challenge for introducing such prodMarketing is really important because ucts is somehow provide the world a of what it does and frame of referits’s the part of busi- There are some categories and some seg- ence to interpret ness and enterprise and understand that really tries to ments in the market who just love brands and put that in involve the custom- but there’s always going to be a segment that perspective; and ers. It’s interesting that’s the tricky doesn’t care as much about brand. I actually think in question - how some ways, because they’re different of digital, companies know more about from everything else similar to yet differcustomers and also about what they ent. That’s one of the great opportunity think and what they feel how they act but also a challenge because consumers and their expectations. They are going sometimes may not understand what to be the ones who will provide direc- this type of product is. For example, one tion to sales and all these other aspects of the really smart things that Intel did of the company. a long time ago is just really create their brand. They talked about their microMarkathon: Brands across almost all processors as the brains of the computer categories have been trying to woo the which I thought was smart because it was millennials. Because of this increased a metaphor - people could understand all emphasis, there seems to be an obses- the technical aspects of how exactly a sion with everything social, young and microprocessor works in a computer but
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they got the idea of the brains. So that’s the thing you have got to be smart about how you tell your story and help people understand what makes you unique and important at the same time.
a good value proposition?
The thing about product is that you really can’t, in any category, transcend the product and add value around the product, whatever it Markathon: These What strong brands are doing is figur- is. The solution is days there’s an in- ing out how to collaborate with custom- to give customers information, give creasing anger toers and companies are creating expethem things that wards corporates in the world. Also, riences for their customers that they help them use the product or know there’s a rising really couldn’t before. more about what trend of unbrandthey could use the product for providing ing. In such scenarios what should the solutions and creating experiences. Like future marketeer do? I said it’s really important to keep in There are a lot of different angles I think mind in the reality now - in digital world are. There are some categories and some with lots of collaborations with different segments in the market who just love companies - is that you can create expebrands but there’s always going to be a riences for your customers that couldn’t segment that doesn’t care as much about have been done maybe 10-20 years ago. brand. The value proposition is critical And that’s great I think that’s some– it’s really important to remember you thing really smart. What strong brands are not selling a product, you’re selling are doing is figuring out how to collaboa set of benefits, satisfying some needs rate with customers and companies are its much broader than that and I think creating experiences for their customwhere companies get in trouble is if they ers that they really couldn’t before. And get so focused on the product. That’s a that’s the kind of thing to keep in mind big problem with technology and compa- is that in terms of the 4Ps that product nies sometimes and engineers sometimes is so important and its so important that that they sometimes get so wrapped we get that right, but we also have to around product - and product’s really think about it in a broad way. important - but you’ve got to remember that the product consumers want to sat- Markathon: According to you what is the isfy certain needs and derive some ben- scope of use of use of AI in marketing? Is efits and there’s a lot of ways to do that it the new big thing in the field of maroutside the product. That’s one of the keting? things that came up yesterday when I was talking to CMO of Adobe she real- I think it is a big and a new thing and ly emphasized that that’s the business I think that it’ll be really helpful. But they’re in. They’ve got a lot of products its not just gonna substitute marketeer’s but they have to create experience to dif- judgement or their creativity and the way they see things. So its really imporferentiate - which makes total sense. tant to remember that, I think although Markathon: When we look at the market- some people see it as sort of solution, it ing mix, the 4Ps, and if we have some- will help but it’s not going to do the job thing like an oil company for example of a marketeer. You have to make sure where we cannot change the product, you’ve got your instincts and philosophy the price, the place or promotion. So and creativity and really know what to how does a company approach to make do with that and take advantage of AI.
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Markathon: How did the band “The gy of any really big brands which will be Church” happen and how different is fairly standardized across markets but managing a band and a brand? not that much of the entire marketing plan. I really think its more about the The Church came out and I was a big fan adaptations. I’ve worked with Coke, with and they were a great band and one of Nike, with Starbucks and I think with the Australian bands who came into the these different brands what’s made them US and were very successful. They were really successful is that they know what commercially successful at one time but works in India is different than that in they weren’t really a commercial band. Australia or in Germany or Brazil. So So I knew that they probably needed they create content and get support from some help in their marketing and I talk local marketeers which makes the brand about being a patron of the arts so I de- come alive. cided to help them. It’s just one of those things where you know I love rock n roll Technology product and some very funcmusic, touring and things like that. tional products where culture might be Without some less imporsupport betant because I always tell people that the three most popuing able to do culture isn’t lar sports in India is cricket, cricket and cricket. what they do in play that So cricket’s really popular and I love cricket it’s now you know much. Some of make albums something I learnt I spent a year in Australia and those brands and go on fortunate my wife’s from India and I learnt to appreciate are tours is amazfairly uniform cricket. So if you’re a brand and you want cus- because the ing- that’s why I jumped in to tomers to care about you and operating in India culture do not help out and matter but in, for example, sports category, then cricket is its been a huge there are so really important for you. part of my life. many where it does matter. I Markathon: Inalways think dia is a high of the exports cultural context and US and Germany markets - its really big for brands like on the other hand are low cultural con- Coke, Nike. About India, for example, I text. So the marketing communication always tell people that the three most in India imbeds a lot of cultural mo- popular sports in India is cricket, cricktifs. But what we’ve been seeing in the et and cricket. So cricket’s really poppast couple of decades is that the im- ular and I love cricket it’s something I portance of these cultural motifs in the learnt I spent a year in Australia and my marketing communication has reduced wife’s from India and I learnt to appreover time and the marketing communi- ciate cricket. So if you’re a brand and cation itself has become globalized. So you want customers to care about you what do you think the future’s going and operating in India in, for example, to be and are we going to move to low sports category, then cricket is really imcultural context or are we going to see portant for you. more of cultural elements being embedded in the communication which was Markathon: As we know that world has the norm a couple of decades ago? moved from customer centric marketing to human centric marketing as a part of I think its going to be the combination marketing 3.0 and slowly we’re moving - there will be parts in marketing strate- into marketing 4.0. SO how do you think
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the market dynamics would change as we finally reach that point and do you know of any brands that have already set out on the path of marketing 4.0 or are almost there? I think that some properly approach that especially some of the newer brands that have come out. Like in the US there’s a brand which is basically for eyeglasses and that’s a market that very traditional and the product is generally very expensive. They have great value proposition - one of the things that they do is that they sell glasses online and make
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them very affordable and at the same time quality’s good styling is good and you buy glasses from them they’ll make sure that they’ll send another glasses to a part of the world where people couldn’t really afford glasses whether its Africa or someplace like that. So your purpose and what you’re doing to the community is really important and e-marketing highlights that - what they do and what they sell. Their value proposition is integrated into this big whole and more holistic and I think that’s where they get their most mileage moving forward and really a lot of brands are doing that.
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eye2eye
january 2018
What is more efficient today, advertisements in newspapers and magazines in physical form or digital form?
Divyanshu Agarwal Ajay Kumar Garg Enginneering College
Noel Ramchandanii IBS Hyderabad
Despite what naysayers might say Print Advertising is here to stay. According to a report by GroupM. Print Ad expenditure grew by 4% YoY in 2016, and it was pegged to grow by 4.5% in 2017 from INR 17,472 Crore in 2016 to INR 18,258 Crore in 2017. The print media expenditure is only second to Television advertising. The primary print media advertisers include automobile companies, e-wallets, and BFSI companies. The report also said that the vernacular newspapers would get more advertisers then English dailies.
Imagine you are a tech freak and you are sitting in your room reading about a new laptop on your smartphone reading the digital edition of your favourite technology magazine and after you have read about its details you want to check out its video trailer or its reviews. You look at the next page. There is an advertisement of the same, and it contains the link to its video trailer, reviews and the platform where you can buy this product. You click on the link and you are transferred to Amazon, you simply add the product to the cart and place the order. This one instance can help us understand the advantages of adverAll this information proves that the days of print adver- tisements in magazines and newspapers in digital format. tising are not over. In fact, advertising through print media in physical form has several advantages. Firstly, print Ads in digital form can be made very attractive and interadvertising is more engaging than internet, radio and active. They help in enabling and engaging the customers. other mediums. Many companies have researched this Thus, these ads can be made more memorable. Also, ads topic and found the print ads in newspapers and maga- in magazines and newspapers in digital form have more zine to be more engaging. Secondly, the print medium is accountability than ads in physical form. We can measure considered more reliable and trusted. Thus, the impact the number of people who click on the links, people who and effectiveness of the ad is greater. The brand value purchase the product through the links provided. Thus, of trusted newspapers and magazine will help the com- we can measure the success of our ad campaigns and panies who advertise using the print medium. Thirdly, it evaluate the campaign. Ads can be made specific to the has been found that print advertising is often found to target audience. For example, if you are advertising for a be less annoying for customers than advertisements on car you might choose an automobile magazine to reach online forms. specific customers. Lastly, various studies have found that Print ads are more memorable than ads on digital forms. According to a study, only 44% of the people who saw a brand through digital mediums were able to recall the brand compared to 75% of the people who saw the ad through print mediums. Imagine a newspaper lying on your table for the entire day; you might glance through it at some point of the day. The above prove that there are multiple advantages in advertising through print media in physical form.
Finally, one of the biggest advantage advertisements in magazines and newspapers have a very short lead time. A company can plan out the campaign and run it the very next day in the digital editions of newspapers. Advertisement in the physical editions of newspapers and magazine take more time as it has to be printed and then be supplied to readers. The following reasons make the advertisements in digital editions of magazines and newspapers is better than in physical form.
Topic for the next issue: “Are millenials the hardest target market to engage?� Your opinion (view/counterview) is invited. Word limit is 250-300. Last date of sending entries is 3rd March 2018. Include your picture (JPEG format) with the entry. Winners will receive a prize money of Rs. 500 each!
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AD-dicted AD-dicted
PRODUCT: Asian Paints
december january 2013 2018 By Anurag Pandey IIM Shillong PRODUCT: Too Yumm chips
POSITIONING: #HomesNotShowrooms CREATIVE AGENCY: Ogilvy & Mather
POSITIONING: “Eat Lot, Fikar Not!”
CATCH
CREATIVE AGENCY: Mullen Lintas
R
YouTube Link: https://goo.gl/K4eisu
YouTube Link: https://goo.gl/y4VVm6
CONCEPT: The ad starts with an old man trying to measure the height of his grandson. The scene takes place in a modern urban home which has very good decoration. The walls have been painted using expensive paints. The old man tries to use a pencil to mark the current height of his grandson but before he can do so his son stops him. The son requests his father not to do so because the walls will get dirty. There are multiple instances where the old man is not able to follow his old lifestyle as his son stops his certain actions citing the cleanliness of the walls. Later, the son discovers some old photos, and he becomes nostalgic about his old home where they could behave freely without any such restrictions. He remembers his father (the old man) asking his son to become comfortable and lose his inhibitions as it is their home it doesn’t matter if it gets dirty. The son realises his mistake and the next day he hands over a pen to his father to mark the height of the child. VERDICT: Catch Markathon believes that this ad highlights the essence of leading better lives at our homes by creating a space for self-expression with décor that gives the family an opportunity to create meaningful memories. This will give the family members the liberty to express themselves and relationships will flourish. The ad is targeting urban families, and it is a sweet reminder for them to stick to their humble roots and enjoy the small moments in life. The ad presents an essential fact that memories are the most important commodity that is why this ad is a catch.
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By Aishwarya Tiwari IIM Shillong
CONCEPT: The entire advertisement revolves around the Indian skipper munching “Too Yumm” chips. People around him are wondering about two things – How does he manage to stay yum even after consuming snacks like he is consuming; and why in the first place he is eating like there’s no tomorrow (which is an actual line from the advertisement and a very genuine question indeed). Binge eating Virat amuses people at various locations, like the swimming pool, shootings and at his friend’s place. It ends with Virat telling people to eat “Too Yumm” because it is baked and is filled with goodness.
MISS
VERDICT: Miss Markathon believes that this advertisement fails to create an impact. One of the biggest problems with this advertisement is that though it claims to be healthy throughout its duration, it does not explain as to how. The only reason because of which we are supposed to believe the argument is that the snack is baked, not fried. But then again, this concept is neither new nor unique. The market is full of baked snacks products for the past few years. Hence, the advertisement is unable to differentiate itself as “the healthy and tasty snack” no matter how hard the current Indian skipper tries by continuously munching it. For an advertisement which is trying to promote healthy eating, it rather ends up encouraging the audience to go on a binge eating snacks session, regardless of what you’re doing. Also, in one scene the ad mocks people who are consuming healthy stuff. This gives out a negative message to the audience. One need not mock a good practice just to prove their point. Thus, this ad is a miss.
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jab they failed
january 2018
Jab They Failed APOORV GUPTA IIM Shillong
Nano, The People’s Car
On a rainy day in November 2003, a family of four was riding on a scooter with the father driving it and a young kid standing in the front. The wife was sitting behind him with another child on her lap. Tata Sons chairman Ratan Tata saw this and was deeply moved by this incident. He asked himself if one could conceive of a safe, affordable, allweather transport for such a family. And after four years, he turned his dream into reality with the launch of Nano, the people’s car in Delhi. Initially, the car was launched at a price of Rs.1 lac – an amount affordable to the Indian middle class. Still, Nano sales have been dwindling since 2011 and are below 10,000 per year now. The Nano project has suffered a loss of above Rs. 1,000 crores. There are multiple reasons for the failure of the people’s car:
1) Marketing Marketing is, without a doubt, the most important reason for the fall of Nano. Despite the fact that Nano is considered an engineering masterpiece, it failed horribly due to wrong positioning. Due to this very reason, the Nano project is often made part of case studies to teach students ‘How not to do branding’. In a country where the car is considered a status quotient, Nano was tagged as “Cheap”. This was a most important factor for Indian audiences to be repelled by the car.
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2) Accidents Only a year after the launch, images of Nanos catching fire flooded the media and became as popular as the car itself. The target group of the car, first-time buyers, clearly started having apprehensions about buying a Nano. What made matters worse was the poor PR management by Tata Motors.
3) Waiting Period Several customers had to wait for months to get Nano after placing their orders which irked them. Another lost opportunity was the population that went away empty handed due to the huge backlog.
4) Attitude Historically, Tata has been an SUV & HCV manufacturer and most of their cars were low volume, high margin. The sales team was therefore not aligned to push for the desired number of vehicles for a high volume, low margin product.
5) Pricing While the car was correctly priced to capture its target audience during its launch, the price went up drastically in the subsequent years. This car then became too expensive for the lower middle class, the original target group, and too shabby for the upper middle class. Of the 4Ps of the marketing mix, Tata Nano excelled with the ‘Product’, lagged in ‘Price’ and ‘Place’ and the ‘Promotion’ was a complete disaster. The failure was thus inevitable!
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digi-gyaan
Creating an Online Advertisement! By Nitin Nathani IIM Shillong All businesses need promotion and the basic mode of promotion is advertising. Making an advertisement may seem a trivial job, but it isn’t so. There have been millions of rupees wasted on poor or outright bad advertisements. A good advertisement begins with a great idea. The basics of writing should also be understood well before writing a good advertisement. There are some principles of how to produce a proper advertisement. They can be applied practically to online advertising as well. The ad making process isn’t a non-stop process in a single direction. It requires a bit of trial and error to build a campaign that really works. Following are some of the principles which can be used.
a clear USP:
quires skill to make an ad which they could recall at a later stage. What will make your potential customers buy your company’s product or service versus going with one of your competitors? That’s what you have to figure out and focus on with your advertisement.
line, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.”
Head & Shoulders: “You get rid of dandruff” Anacin “Fast pain relief” FedEx: “When your package absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.” Develop your USP and show it clearly.
Make yourself stand out from your competition
There are so many advertisements nowadays that people don’t get enough time to read everyone and they scan them quickly. Thus, with an Make yourself stand out from your com- effective headline, you make sure that your adpetition vertisement actually grabs and keeps their attention. David Ogilvy said “On average, five times People come in contact with advertisements as many people read the headline as read the from all types of businesses all the time. It re- body copy. When you have written your head-
Thus, the analysis needs to be done on the target audience and how can you gain their attention. Ogilvy even remarked that “I would write an advertisement in three hours and then take three Here are some good examples of products with weeks to come up with the headline”.
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digi-gyaan
Make them an Offer
Create an Advertorial
We all know how much customers love to bargain. So, present an offer to them in such a way that they’ll come back to you time and time again. Not only discounts on the main product, but benefits such as a free trial, free shipping or a bundled package will help you be successful. Make sure that you advertise it proudly. You can think of the overall Client Lifetime Value (CLV), the amount a client will benefit a company over time, for your firm to determine which offer suits the best and know your limits. Maybe an initial loss of Rs. 500 in profit for an intro service to acquire a new client can have a CLV of Rs. 10,000.
An “advertorial” is “an advertisement that imitates editorial format.” In other words, it’s an ad that looks like a news article! Here is why this is important. People come in contact with regular ads all day long. There is really no incentive for them to read your ad if you don’t offer them more than what everyone else is offering.
Talk about what’s in it for them! Explaining the benefits for the customer is really what it’s all about. After all, people are more interested in what they get from your services than what you do.
Creating an effective ad that grabs attention and provides plenty of information isn’t always easy. But an advertorial can achieve this as it is far more likely to be clicked on and read. It not only gets readers interested but also includes more information. For example, the ad can provide them with lots of advice, tips, and information and how your company and products can help them.
The “Call To Action” usage
*List out all your services (or products).
Don’t just tell your potential customers about what your company has to offer. Encourage *For each one, list out everything that service them to take action. Tell them directly to click on (feature) does. your ad, order your product, pay for your service, etc. *Then, next list out what the result of each feature is – the benefit for the client. For example, your “call to action” can encourage
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people to email you for more information, to fill out a form to find out more about your services, to join your weekly or monthly email newsletter or to purchase your product or service. It could even direct users to click on your ad to take them to your website rather than just looking at the advertisement.
Make It Seem Urgent You want people to move forward and do something about your offer NOW. When people see an ad and think about giving a company a try later, most often they move on with their lives and forget all about the ad and the product that they might have been interested in. Therefore, you have to encourage people to act now rather than later. You can make your irresistible offer time-limited. If people see that they only have a set amount of time, such as a few hours or days, to snag an unforgettable deal that they’re already pretty excited about, they will be more likely to make a move now than later. You can also bring in an upcoming season or event when your product will come in handy to make people buy now.
Use Testimonials Developing trust is a critical aspect and one of the most important parts of creating an effective
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advertisement. People have a lot of concerns these days, particularly when they’re online. You can build trust by showing that others in the past have been pleased with their decision to buy from or work with you. Adding a testimonial or two to your ads from those who are satisfied with your company and its products can be a great option. People trust other consumers and want to know what they have to say about a company. You can’t make people look for online reviews about your business, but you can give them the same peace of mind by adding a testimonial from a current client who is pleased with what you have to offer. Seeing that other consumer who are just like them, are happy with your product can encourage potential clients to give you a try.
Use Exciting Graphics People are visual. You can appeal to their interest by adding exciting graphics to your advertisements. You can post a picture of what you have to offer, or you can post something that is going to grab attention. Advertising is important and good advertising is what will help your company succeed. These were some of the tips useful for creating content. We’ll be talking about the further process of how to make an advertisement using this content in the next edition of Markathon.
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1)How Facebook’s Latest Changes Impact Influencers, Businesses
& the Future of Social Media Marketing
To stop the spread of fake content, Facebook has decided to show you less business and media content, and more “people content” . But if businesses execute even more influencer marketing through these individuals that are Influencers, where will they draw the line? Link:- https://goo.gl/ihKEor
2)Welcome to B2B AI – boring, but effective Predicting which contacts are most likely to convert throughout the consideration and purchase journey, and serving them the content and comms best suited to tickle them along the buying funnel is a process that is quickly tending towards automation-plus. Link:- https://goo.gl/YMcnWV
3)Homegrown and growing Today’s homegrown brands seem to be of a different ilk. As we drew the curtain on 2017, the closing numbers saw the emergence of homegrown brands stronger and bigger than ever. Link :- https://goo.gl/UqFQn9
4)Mastering the digital advantage in transforming customer experience Digital services and operations are raising the competitive bar in every sector. To capture the opportunity, incumbents should embrace a new operating model that dramatically improves the digital customer experience Link :-https://goo.gl/JnxUPY
5)Five milestones content marketers should cross in 2018
The digital world is not consuming content the way it used to – even a few years ago. In 2018, there will be a much stronger case made for it; from the growing dependence of marketing automation to the emergence of newer interaction channels and smarter devices Link :- https://goo.gl/HFizXC
By AISHWARYA TIWARI | IIM Shillong Samsung readies new online series to race past Xiaomi in smartphone sales The war between Samsung and Xiaomi will spill over to India’s e-commerce space this year as the South Korean giant seeks to wrest leadership in online sales. Samsung India has decided to launch a new series of smartphones this year exclusively for online. This series will focus on the price bracket Rs. 5,000-15,000, appealing the youth. Both Samsung and Xiaomi enjoyed leadership in India’s smartphone market with a 23.5% share each during the July-September quarter, according to International Data Corporation. The top three smartphones sold during the quarter were from Xiaomi. DANONE, the €22 billion French foods giant, has decided to exit the dairy business in India. The company is working towards rationalising its product portfolio and has discontinued SKUs which have been making a minor contribution to its overall business in India, which include the UHT (ultra high treatment) and fresh dairy products. The company remains committed to investing and growing its Indian presence through well-established brands such as Protinex, Aptamil, Farex, Dexolac, and Neocate. Danone’s exit from the Indian dairy market reflects its third failed attempt to make a mark in the Indian FMCG market.
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Patanjali goes online, aims over Rs 1,000 crore sales in 2018 Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali has announced the launch of its e-commerce platform www. patanjaliayurved.net which according to the company helped it to make sales of more than Rs 10 crores in December during the trial phase of the portal. The homegrown FMCG company will also start selling its products online through leading online retailers like Amazon, Flipkart, Bigbasket, Grofers and Paytm Mall.
Huawei to take India first approach to become world’s third-largest smartphone brand The company has decided to take the “India first approach” to bring new smartphones ahead of any other global market, which will help it achieve 10% market share by March 2018. Huawei, despite its global success where it is closing the gap with Samsung and Apple, hasn’t had much success in India. In India, Chinese handset makers such as Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo have rapidly garnered a majority share. Xiaomi, in fact, joined Samsung as the No 1 smartphone company in India for the quarter through September.
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digi-tally
january 2018
https://www.facebook.com/markathon.iims/
https://twitter.com/Markathon
https://in.linkedin.com/in/markathon
http://iims-markathon.blogspot.in/
www.issuu.com/markathon
Articles are invited
“Best Article”: Himanshu Khandelwal | IIM Calcutta He receives a cash prize of Rs.1000 & a letter of appreciation We are inviting articles from all the B-schools of India. The articles can be absolutely anything related to the world of marketing but it should be an original work that is not published elsewhere. The articles can be specific to the regular sections of Markathon which includes: •Perspective: Articles related to development of latest trends in marketing arena. •Productolysis: Analysis of a product from the point of view of marketing. •Strategic Analysis: A complete analysis of marketing strategy of any company or an event. Apart from above, out of the box views related to marketing are also welcome. The best entry will receive a letter of appreciation and a cash prize of Rs 1000/-. The format of the file should be MS Word doc/docx. The last date of receiving all entries is 3rd March , 2018. Please send your entries marked as <ARTICLE NAME>_<SENDERS’ NAME(S)>_<INSTITUTE> to markathon.iims@gmail.com.
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