Author

Kanupriya Sindhu

Café Coffee Day: First Indian Brand on foursquare

February 23, 2011

While having a cup of coffee yesterday at CCD next to my work place, I got to notice this. So, foursquare is in alliance with Café Coffee Day now:

Cafe Coffee Day has launched this offer on 17th Feb 2011. Check in at foursquare and you can get a 15% discount on your 3rd check-in. If you are the Mayor, CCD will serve you a free coffee and 20% discount on every 3rd check-in. As of now this offer is only valid in Bangalore outlets, but they slowly plan to roll it out in other cities too. (via)

Finally foursquare has started tie ups with Indian brands too. With this offer, Cafe Coffee Day is the first Indian Brand on foursquare to have its own Brand Page – http://foursquare.com/CafeCoffeeDay! In fact it’s good to see this CCD offer, I had created an account on foursquare long back but have not been active there for some or other reason. Maybe it will influence users like me to finally be active with my check ins, after all who would not like to have a free coffee from an outlet where you end up going almost daily :).

Location based customer targeting has been there in India for quite some time now. CCD itself had tied up with Nokia last year for a two month long location based advertising campaign where it was targeting consumers based on their location and then driving them to the nearest CCD outlet. Nokia users with models like N97 and above were served CCD ads on the weather or events page. Clicking on the ad gave users two options – click2web which took them to CCD’s Facebook page and click2route which directed users to the nearest CCD. Now with sites like foursquare which are specifically meant to keep a tab on customer’s location, marketers can leverage these better to serve ads or promotional offers at any particular spot. Even though the user base is not huge as of now and audience type is quite niche but this definitely seems to be one of the interesting newer ways to reach out to the consumers on the move. And you never know, when this niche will actually become mass esp. with promotion triggers from brands and acceptability of more similar services like Facebook Places which may pick up momentum in India as well.

Would be interesting to observe the future trend for this medium, as of now I must check in to foursquare whenever I’m visiting the CCD outlet next :).

5 Twitter tools for your brand

January 21, 2011

You search for Twitter management tools and you get millions if not zillions of suggestions to try this or that. Though have been using few actively for my personal account for quite some time now but recently tried to look for some new ones for a project related to my company. Last when I had used these tools for brand tracking was for my earlier company but must say that with the phenomenal growth of twitter, this twitter tool and app market has also exploded quite vehemently. I mean you search for anything and there are hundreds of free utilities which can offer you any kind of solution in just one click. And when there are lots of good things around, it’s difficult to decide on the best :).

Based on my recent usage and experience, here’s a list of 5 tools which I think can be very helpful for keeping an eye on the following 5 aspects which you need to track about your brand.

  1. Tracking the brand mention: Social Mention – Though there are many alert and tracking options available but so far I liked Social Mention as the best one.  It’s been used by many and in one single dashboard it actually tells you the mention of your brand not only in Twitter but in almost all other social media channels. To add to that, statistics like sentiment, strength, reach and passion help you analyze some qualitative aspects of your mentions as well. You can further filter your search for different types of social media channels.
  2. Measure your influence & reach: Twitalyzer – Twitalyzer is a combination of free and paid services. Free offerings include basic understanding of your scores for influence, reach, impact, engagement and velocity. To have further more detailed insights, you can always subscribe to their paid services and get detailed customized reports as per your needs.
  3. Know other influencers in your industry: Klout – Apart from measuring your influence, Klout also allows you to measure other interesting aspects like who are you influenced by, who are the top influencers in your industry, how is your influence score vis-a-vis other influencers similar to you. You can use Klout not only for your Twitter score but also for other channels like Facebook & Linkedin.
  4. Mapping against competitors: Twitter Counter – By far the best tool which I could get my hands on for comparison of your brand against your competitors. Not that more do not exist, but quite many are buggy or not with updated statistics. This one gives you a quick snapshot on weekly, monthly, 3 monthly and 6 monthly basis.
  5. Managing your followers count: Friend or Follow – Well, don’t think anyone can zero on one such service, there are hundreds and thousands of follower management tools, right from some which alert you over email (Qwitter) when somebody stops following you, to some which tell you which tweet made people unfollow you at what point (Tweet Effect). But for basic follower management, I find Friend or Follow to serve my purpose both for the brand handle and my personal one. It gives a dashboard view for fans, following and friends at one place and can help you in managing the list quickly.

This is a list of tools which I have found useful and have performed consistently, otherwise there are instances where many such free services close down without even sending any notification email (e.g., Qwitter – this service is really inconsistent when it comes to performance). Many of you must have been using different other tools for your brands, so in case you have suggestion for  any better tool, please drop in a comment to this post.

A quick take on 2010 & wish you a happy new year!

December 31, 2010

Well, a lot has happened in 2010 for Indian Marketing and Media industry. While I will come back with detailed posts on some of the brand case studies which created impact this year, but as of now here goes a quick take on my “likes” & “dislikes” for marketing incidents that occurred in 2010

  1. A rebranding which I liked : Indian Rupee Symbol
  2. A rebranding which I disliked: Airtel
  3. A marketing trend which I liked: Social Media becoming mainstream, few predicted this but not many were sure or convinced about it till last year.
  4. A brand which completely wowed me: Flipkart
  5. A brand which always delivered what it committed to me: Indigo
  6. A new product /service which I started using in 2010: Online luxury shopping portals and totally addicted to FashionAndYou.com
  7. A old category coming out with newer marketing techniques: Books, wow what innovative marketing stories in Indian Literature Industry.
  8. An ad which really created a buzz: Volkswagen Vento talking newspaper ads
  9. An ad which I hated : IBIBO, JK Cement Swimming Pool ad
  10. Ad which I liked for its social messaging: ”’Tata Tea Choti & Badi Patti’ and ‘Tum Chalo Toh Hindustand Chale by TOI‘

I may update this list later if some more related points come to my mind, till then do drop in comments about the stories which you liked or brands which you hated in 2010.

With this last post for 2010, here’s wishing all my readers a very happy and prosperous new year! May you have a rocking & great 2011!

Quick Bytes: A “Don’t” in Social Media

December 29, 2010

Dear Brands,
It just does not make any sense to put an icon for Facebook or Twitter in print ad without giving your URLs or official page titles for readers to find you quickly. I saw this big ad in TOI today with one of the call for actions being “Follow us on Twitter and Facebook”, despite the space being available to mention the URLs or official handles, there was just no mention of the same. To add to that the name is common enough to generate enough pages if you go ahead and search for it.

I recently observed even a television commercial doing the same – a prominent chocolate company ad on television stated “participate in our contest on Facebook and win prizes”, well the screen with this message lasts for few seconds, but all it mentions about the location to participate in contest is a plain “F” icon for Facebook. No mention of the page URL at all. And if you go ahead and search for that brand on Facebook, there are enough pages with that brand name to get you confused about the identity of the official page.

Please remember it’s not a web or interactive digital ad in front of your customers where they can click the icons and land up on your page. Won’t harm (esp. when you have space to utilize) to mention something like @yourname or /yourname near those icons. Easier for your customers to reach the right location quicker!

Micromax fastest rising query after IRCTC : Google Zeitgeist 2010

December 13, 2010

Micromax is the 2nd fastest rising query in India! Wow, the brand definitely seems to be on a roll. At first I was surprised but hey wait, isn’t it the most buzzed brand in Indian Telecom Industry these days? Google has released its Zeitgeist 2010 report for most searched words in India. While IRCTC retains its position of being at the top like earlier, this year there were definitely some newer surprises in the list. Here goes the complete list for Indian market:


Micromax is gaining market share in India by making cheap phones with long battery life and targeting the needs of mass Indian consumers. Recently it announced the launch of its android phones too at a cost of Rs. 6,999/-. Not only is this brand selling more than a million phone every month, in last two years it has also become the third-largest GSM mobile phone vendor in India after Nokia and Samsung, with a market share of 6%.

Well, mass targeted products definitely sell in India. Google’s this report further substantiates it, check out the section for raising people. Sonakshi Sinha scores higher than Katrina, mass appeal of Dabbangg once again?

Indian Product Management Association announces its launch

November 24, 2010

Finally there is something exclusively for the Indian product management community :-). PMs in India would be glad to know that IPMA (India Product Management Association) has now formally announced its launch. This association will be inaugurated on Sun Nov 28th 2010 in Bangalore by  Ramkumar Narayanan, Vice President of Product Management, Marketing and User Experience at Yahoo. Ram will also be the first speaker of IPMA’s monthly speaker series and in this event he would be expressing his thoughts on – “How to build killer products for global markets from India.”

More details on the speaker session: There are growing number of software (consumer, enterprise, mobile) products that are made in India and marketed globally, including emerging markets. Mr. Narayanan will talk about what is different about building products in India and how to come up with successful Go-To-Market strategies for emerging and mature markets. More interestingly, Mr. Narayanan will also share some of the insights and best practices behind creating killer products that wow the customers.

About IPMA: India Product Management Association (IPMA) is a not for profit, grassroots organization. IPMA’s mission is to Foster product design and innovation and Catalyze product management talent in India. IPMA organizes monthly speaker series, workshops and more for professionals interested in product management and marketing. For more information about upcoming events, visit indiapma.org

In case you’re interested to attend this launch event, you can register  for it here.

India leads ad spend growth in Asia-Pacific

November 17, 2010

Indian consumers are spending more and so it does not come as a surprise if Neilsen’s recent report states that India is leading the ad spend market in overall Asia. Indian consumers have now the pocket to spend and the willingness to upgrade; be it any class of the society there is this inner need and aspiration to move up to the next level of lifestyle amongst most Indians. They are aware of the global trends and are looking at mediums to garner more info about latest products & fads. Lots of Indian & global Brands do recognize this ambitious consumerism in India and are not hesitant now on spending their bucks at the right place. They know that as long as they are able to create that appeal, fulfill their needs and cater to their aspirations, they will get the results on their spends. Here are some interesting facts from the report which further highlights the increasing statistics of ad spend in India:

According to this survey, India saw a 28 % year-on-year growth and a 32 % growth in the second quarter of 2010 as compared to last year in ad spend on mainstream media (via). Overall, across the 12 markets in Asia Pacific the Q2 ad spends showed a 15 % lift over Q2 2009, and a 17 % lift in the first half of 2010 over the same period in 2009. Of significance, is the fact that after the first half of 2009 which saw a minimal 3 % lift over 2008, the first half of 2010 recorded an impressive 20 % increase over the ‘pre- global financial crisis’ period of 2008. India recorded a 33 % increase in the first half of 2010 over the same period in 2009.

Across the region, advertising spends are highest on television, but the largest proportion of India’s media spend was garnered by newspapers. Newspapers are also the highest ad spend growth drivers in India, growing at 32 % year on year; the highest percentage growth for newspaper ad spends across all 12 markets covered in the Nielsen survey. Overall, newspaper ad spends grew by 17 % year on year in the region.

Television followed newspapers in spend growth and grew at 24 % in India and 16 % regionally. Amongst mainstream media, magazines saw an 8 % Y-O-Y increase in ad spends in India and a 9 % growth across the 12 markets in the Asia-Pacific region.

Volkswagen Vento – From “WHAT!” to “WOW!” to “WTH!”

September 21, 2010

So, my morning started today by updating my Facebook & Twitter pages about the new Volkswagen Vento audio ad and my day is actually ending up by writing a post on the same. The first experience was shocker or eerie enough as a consumer for me, resulting in immediate reaction on social media and the whole day analysis of the buzz on the ad is reflective enough to do a complete post 🙂

Needless to say the ad has managed to create enough hum-drum all across. Undoubtedly it was a media innovation and disruptive advertising at least for the Indian market. I don’t think I had ever come across anything like this earlier. In fact my reaction was exactly from a “WHAT” to “WOW” to “WTH”. When I suddenly heard my newspaper talking, for a second I was totally confused, rather shocked. I had to rummage through newspapers to realize what actually it was. And when I realized that it’s actually an ad presented in the form of an audio chip attached with TOI today, I was totally awed. Wow, what an idea! But then after some point when the voice went on repeating the same content in loop it became irritating. To add to that there was no option to switch it off; the only option left was to either fold the newspaper back or just throw that damn thing out. For those who missed (wait, did anyone actually miss to notice it) to see this ad, can check the video (by TejasNair) embedded at the bottom of the post.

Well, no doubt the ad was damn interesting and managed to grab the attention of almost everybody. Twenty two lakh chips were specially sourced for the one time exercise and the ad was targeted at the readers in 5 cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai & Pune. Total media spend estimated towards this 5 city campaign is close to INR 5 crores! Definitely a daring stand to spend this kind of money in just one day and that too only in 5 cities. But so what if it was only 5 cities, after all the consumers in these 5 cities have ensured to share their reaction with other consumers not only nationally but also globally.
Idea was great, so was the operational implementation but when it comes to execution of the idea, I do think that it was not properly thought through. Here is my feedback as far as the execution is concerned:

  • The content was really boring considering it was an audio ad. Come on, you can’t just have the written content run word by word in the form of an audio clipping. There was definitely scope for a better tone, better sound quality & better content.

  • Why O why there was no switch off button in that box? The loop presentation with repetitive content was the biggest reason for putting people off.

  • Don’t you think there was an opportunity to brand that box with Volkswagen Vento? When you have spent so much, maybe a little bit extra could have added more zing.

  • But this branding would have made sense if the device came with a switch on & off button and people would have liked to keep it. In its current state, many people decided to throw it off to shut it down! Bad call for action, no?

BTW was there any call for action in that clipping? Or Volkswagen Vento just wanted to create the stir amongst consumers by spending this amount of money? Whether this kind of spend is justified for such buzz is debatable. The ad definitely managed to be the talk of town everywhere, though it could have been executed better to serve other purposes of any campaign too. Overall good to observe this innovation coming from Indian market.

Aside: Wondering if this ad will give ideas to other money spenders to do something similar? OMG what will happen if say our politicians get inspired by all this and decide to take similar route? Will we have to hear their election speeches every morning along with our newspapers during political campaigns? Anyways they love to talk, don’t they???  Or say some Mr. Mahajan & Ms. Sawant decide to furthermore promote their swayamvars in their most happening voices through these talking newspapers? Eeeekkks!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXGYPUBrmmo]

Bollywood Online Anti Piracy Partners: Marketing Initiatives to Reality

September 14, 2010

When I watched Dabangg last weekend, the first thing which caught my attention was a new category of opening credit – “Online Anti Piracy Partner”. Oh yes I do notice the opening credits and brand mentions :), blame it on my previous job which was actually into entertainment industry and as a part of my role I also used to look after brand alliances there. So coming down to this online anti piracy partner, I’ve been observing the increased usage of this term with every movie now and so when I saw a brand mentioned in the opening credit for this, it looked like a positive change. Indeed great to realize that Bollywood is now taking smarter technological routes to deal with piracy and there are branding efforts to give due credits to the partners who are supporting the industry in this cause.

But then I read this article today about Dabangg’s piracy, so Dabangg not only broke records in terms of BO collection in its opening two days, it also broke records of pirated distribution in the first two days. Within 15 hours of its release in India, over 50 websites were showing the entire movie of Dabangg. In 24 hours the numbers were over 200. Within 72 hours of the movie release, over 150,000 downloads were done in high-conservative assessment. In terms of dollar value at a 10 dollars ticket price, it is 1.5 million dollars (US) in the first 72 hours that has been lost. In Indian Rupees it comes to approximately – 6.8 Crores, an amount that could easily finance a couple of movies. With figures like this, it actually becomes the largest value of piracy in the first three days of a Hindi movie’s release. Those were the details of just online downloads, how about pirated DVDs? Even DNA reported availability of pirated DVDs of this movie within first two days at all prominent markets in just Rs. 50. In Bangalore, in fact the pirated copies are available for as low as Rs. 30.

Well, seems like regardless of all the marketing initiatives and consumer awareness programs to educate people about piracy, the problem remains as grave as earlier. In fact with digital distribution and increased internet usage by consumers in India, the access to online pirated content is getting easier by the day. At one hand internet is a boon to this industry when it comes to movie marketing or celebrity PR but on the other it’s a bane as well when it comes to illegitimate distribution of the content. Despite embracing technology and adopting software solutions to combat the piracy, till now nothing seems to be working for Bollywood to deal with this issue. Wondering what could be the bigger reason for this – lack of strong legal policies against piracy of content in India, strict bodies to enforce the existing laws, no strict action against the caught cyber criminals or the general attitude of ‘why pay when it’s available for free‘ of Indian consumers who are ok to compromise with quality if something is available for free?