Tuesday, May 01, 2012
The Facebook Farmer and Rural Twitter
The Facebook Farmer
By Harish Bijoor
Q: Do you see social networking sites
spreading their applications and wings? If so, where is the opportunity?
-P Malik Krishna, New Delhi
A: Malik, social networking sites hold immense potential for a range of applications. These applications need not necessarily be for urban educated folk alone. The opportunity is ripe for the rural farmer as well.
Take the large agrarian community in India. Most live distanced from
physical market places. Facebook or Twitter or for that matter any other robust
social networking format that attracts eye-balls and visits that are robust (we
are told FB has 423 million daily visitors and users) can help bridge the gap
between the physical and the virtual. Staying far away from physical markets
can no longer be a disadvantage. In many ways, geography is history. If a
farmer is on FB, he can experience real-time prices, a real-time feel of the
market, and indeed a real-time interface with buyers and sellers alike. To that
extent, buying and selling and information facilitation is just but one of the many
applications that can be farmer-friendly.
On the other hand, for the Corporate, the social networking site does away with the one big issue most corporate organizations grapple with: access to market. Access to market today is defined not by physical product presence in the market, as much as the access to information about the product. Imagine a fertilizer or a seeds company that can network with the farmer online, offer prices on quantities, offer consulting and counseling services, and then finally sell. All this is today possible, thanks to the social networking site.
In the old days, a corporate entity would define for itself the urban market space as the space it could manage to cater to, due to distance. Today, every corporate can have an e-presence and an e-commerce and e-consulting and e-counseling plan in place. This means that no corporate is too far away or too close to the market. In many ways, the social networking site re-invents the model of Pure competition, where no player is too far or too close from the market. The potential is therefore pregnant.
Farmers can use these sites in several steps. Step one would be to garner information. This can relate to weather, cropping patterns, crop-volume-estimation across growing areas, rainfall patterns and more. In addition, farmers can network with brethren-farmers across the world and utilize the power of peer group influence in terms of buying and selling. Add to it the possibility of a more knowledge-enriched farmer, and you have the potential of a shift of power back to the farmer, from the current days where the power and margin largely rests with the middle-man. In many ways social networking sites can help dis-intermediate the market and help the farmer retain larger margins.
Q: Premium and luxury brands do not
advertise on radio as a medium. Why?
-Shephali B Raghavachar, Hyderabad
A: Shephali, yes, premium advertisers think radio as a non-premium medium. There is just too much of it, and there is ample research available that tells you that the premium-category shopper does not depend on awareness scores for luxury brands from radio. In fact radio tends to negate effort for luxury brands as of now. Proves counter-productive to effort. Radio is much too mass for luxury brands.
Premium luxury brands will still depend on niche mediums. Niche mediums such as niche print for instance. Airline in-flight magazines work beautifully here. Even for the small town traveler. In fact he carries away these in-flight magazines and salivates and shops. Works better than radio for sure.
Q: How big is the e-retail industry
today and how does its future potential look?
-Nalin Vaidyanathan, Chennai
A:
Nalin, e-retail is today growing differentially across categories. Since the
base is small, in some categories you witness a 600% growth and in some a 220
per cent growth. Today, we have 143 million Indians on the Web. Of these, we
have 49 million people who are the prime audience for e-retail mechanisms as of
now. My prognosis is that we will have 320 million Internet users by December
2014. As this happens, expect e-retail to boom.
Harish
Bijoor is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com
Labels: ADVERTISING, branding, Brands, City brands, Digital Marketing, Facebook, Rural brands, Twitter
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Recession-time Marketing
Learning from the Down-turn
By Harish Bijoor
Q: India is just going through an economic down-turn. What are the learnings from this? How do we educate ourselves from this experience?
-Pallav Gopal, Mumbai.
A: Pallav, the economic downturn is really a slow-down. A correction in the earning, stocking, spending and celebrating mindset of the Indian consumer at large.
While at the macro level, our GDP growth rates were at a more sobered down 5.3% overall, this signified a down-fall from the gung-ho years of successive 8.3% growth.
One fine point on this macro number is the fact that rural markets grew faster than urban markets. In the case of several categories such as auto, durables and cosmetic care items, urban markets saw a de-growth at large and rural markets showed growth. At the end of the day, when we aggregate volumes from both, there was some semblance of small growth overall.
In real terms, even though there has been no real recession in macro terms in the country as a whole, in urban markets there has been a real recession, which I call a cautionary recession. This simply means that people had money in hand, but postponed the decision to buy, not knowing how the future would pan out in terms of holding on to jobs, securing increments, securing bonuses, and in many cases even retaining the same salary as last year. Being laid-off was a big worry as well.
In rural markets, growth remained and spending remained at the level it was.
Brands learnt many things from this down-turn. The top 10 learnings from my perspective:
1. It is important to have a strong rural foot-print in the country. It is important not to depend too heavily on the urban sales skew. Rural-sales is a good hedge when the chips are down in urban.
2. Re-define value. Don't get carried away by value that is defined by slick advertising and even slicker retail appeal. Get to the basics and focus on basic brand appeal. Brand appeal needs to go in sync with value-pricing.
3. Reduce obscene margins that are typically made and taken for granted in categories. Brands must not distance themselves from consumers by building walls of unfair prices. Mass consumer appeal is important. Don't sacrifice width of appeal and use for depth of margins.
4. Being in contact with consumers is important. Marketers need to get off the pedestal of television advertising and walk into markets and feel the alien sweat of the sadly alien consumer.
5. Demand-generation is a task that cannot be forgotten and taken for granted. Even older categories of consumer goods and services need to indulge in demand creation games at the ground level. Demand generation is always fashionable.
6. Dependence on Above the line (ATL) needs to be questioned. There is plenty to be done Below the line (BTL) if markets are to be made.
7. God is in the details of branding. Mass branding does not necessarily work. The answer lies in 1:1 branding formats.
8. Small retail cannot be ignored. It needs to be nurtured if brands have to succeed in India.
9. The point-of-purchase is a point of advertising. A point of branding. A point of selling. A point of consumer activation. A point of market-research. Indeed it is the point of everything!
10. Intermediation in the selling and marketing process needs to be re-visited. Distributors do not do enough in the market. One needs to get into the act as a company on its own as well to stay in touch. To stay relevant, original and innovative. Outsourcing of distribution has gone a bit too far.
Q: Is Digital marketing the next new thing really? Why?
-Sampath KK, Chennai
A: Sampath, I do believe digital is next. Digital is really broad-based. It manifests itself through every electronic medium there is to use. It is all about a nation morphing to be a nation of screen-besotted individuals. And the biggest of them is the smallest screen of them all: the mobile phone.
Even as I write this reply, we have a total telecom connectivity of 490 million phones. Growth per month stands at an average of 14 million phones. This is a dramatic shift in medium-access.
The mobile phone is going to be the biggest digital device there is ever to be. It is ubiquitous in every hand. In some hands there are two. It is on 24 X 7. It is kept closest to the heart and it is a device around which a lot of lives revolve.
Add to this digital device of ubiquity, every screen there is. The laptop, the desktop, the Outdoor LCDs and more. Digital is personal, very intrusive and is visual oriented in its messaging possibility. This is big stuff. A revolution to watch out for.
Q: How do brands work in rural markets? What is the brand rationale at play?
-Shalini Patra, Bhubaneswar
A: Shalini, rural folk are very brand conscious. Rural folk trust brands as friends. Most purchases in their purchase basket tend to be un-branded. But when they actually buy brands, they buy with gusto. The brand is seen as a reliable mate. An entity that promises and delivers. The higher price is considered a safety net that assures longevity and performance.
Brands are trusted friends. Brands in many ways are a guarantee of quality.
Rural folk do not necessarily have "limited " monies in their hands. Rural folk are really folk with a higher disposal income portion in whatever they have in hand. Rural incomes, largely, are crop incomes. These crop incomes are tax free.
A person in Urban India in the salaried class could fork out as much as Rs.22 out of a Rs. 100 income as tax. The rural person has this additional Rs.22 in hand that moves into disposable income. Brands are therefore entities that attract the interest of rural folk.
Harish Bijoor is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com
By Harish Bijoor
Q: India is just going through an economic down-turn. What are the learnings from this? How do we educate ourselves from this experience?
-Pallav Gopal, Mumbai.
A: Pallav, the economic downturn is really a slow-down. A correction in the earning, stocking, spending and celebrating mindset of the Indian consumer at large.
While at the macro level, our GDP growth rates were at a more sobered down 5.3% overall, this signified a down-fall from the gung-ho years of successive 8.3% growth.
One fine point on this macro number is the fact that rural markets grew faster than urban markets. In the case of several categories such as auto, durables and cosmetic care items, urban markets saw a de-growth at large and rural markets showed growth. At the end of the day, when we aggregate volumes from both, there was some semblance of small growth overall.
In real terms, even though there has been no real recession in macro terms in the country as a whole, in urban markets there has been a real recession, which I call a cautionary recession. This simply means that people had money in hand, but postponed the decision to buy, not knowing how the future would pan out in terms of holding on to jobs, securing increments, securing bonuses, and in many cases even retaining the same salary as last year. Being laid-off was a big worry as well.
In rural markets, growth remained and spending remained at the level it was.
Brands learnt many things from this down-turn. The top 10 learnings from my perspective:
1. It is important to have a strong rural foot-print in the country. It is important not to depend too heavily on the urban sales skew. Rural-sales is a good hedge when the chips are down in urban.
2. Re-define value. Don't get carried away by value that is defined by slick advertising and even slicker retail appeal. Get to the basics and focus on basic brand appeal. Brand appeal needs to go in sync with value-pricing.
3. Reduce obscene margins that are typically made and taken for granted in categories. Brands must not distance themselves from consumers by building walls of unfair prices. Mass consumer appeal is important. Don't sacrifice width of appeal and use for depth of margins.
4. Being in contact with consumers is important. Marketers need to get off the pedestal of television advertising and walk into markets and feel the alien sweat of the sadly alien consumer.
5. Demand-generation is a task that cannot be forgotten and taken for granted. Even older categories of consumer goods and services need to indulge in demand creation games at the ground level. Demand generation is always fashionable.
6. Dependence on Above the line (ATL) needs to be questioned. There is plenty to be done Below the line (BTL) if markets are to be made.
7. God is in the details of branding. Mass branding does not necessarily work. The answer lies in 1:1 branding formats.
8. Small retail cannot be ignored. It needs to be nurtured if brands have to succeed in India.
9. The point-of-purchase is a point of advertising. A point of branding. A point of selling. A point of consumer activation. A point of market-research. Indeed it is the point of everything!
10. Intermediation in the selling and marketing process needs to be re-visited. Distributors do not do enough in the market. One needs to get into the act as a company on its own as well to stay in touch. To stay relevant, original and innovative. Outsourcing of distribution has gone a bit too far.
Q: Is Digital marketing the next new thing really? Why?
-Sampath KK, Chennai
A: Sampath, I do believe digital is next. Digital is really broad-based. It manifests itself through every electronic medium there is to use. It is all about a nation morphing to be a nation of screen-besotted individuals. And the biggest of them is the smallest screen of them all: the mobile phone.
Even as I write this reply, we have a total telecom connectivity of 490 million phones. Growth per month stands at an average of 14 million phones. This is a dramatic shift in medium-access.
The mobile phone is going to be the biggest digital device there is ever to be. It is ubiquitous in every hand. In some hands there are two. It is on 24 X 7. It is kept closest to the heart and it is a device around which a lot of lives revolve.
Add to this digital device of ubiquity, every screen there is. The laptop, the desktop, the Outdoor LCDs and more. Digital is personal, very intrusive and is visual oriented in its messaging possibility. This is big stuff. A revolution to watch out for.
Q: How do brands work in rural markets? What is the brand rationale at play?
-Shalini Patra, Bhubaneswar
A: Shalini, rural folk are very brand conscious. Rural folk trust brands as friends. Most purchases in their purchase basket tend to be un-branded. But when they actually buy brands, they buy with gusto. The brand is seen as a reliable mate. An entity that promises and delivers. The higher price is considered a safety net that assures longevity and performance.
Brands are trusted friends. Brands in many ways are a guarantee of quality.
Rural folk do not necessarily have "limited " monies in their hands. Rural folk are really folk with a higher disposal income portion in whatever they have in hand. Rural incomes, largely, are crop incomes. These crop incomes are tax free.
A person in Urban India in the salaried class could fork out as much as Rs.22 out of a Rs. 100 income as tax. The rural person has this additional Rs.22 in hand that moves into disposable income. Brands are therefore entities that attract the interest of rural folk.
Harish Bijoor is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com
Labels: Digital Marketing, Recession, Rural brands
