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professional if he was doing justice to his job, he would say yes and when asked why, he would say because he can sell. Sales and marketing is not the same thing. Having said that, I see that the country has managed to clearly different the two functions and those involved are doing it in a professional manner while keeping up with the trends.
Q: Looking at the SA region, could you state a few marketing successes that are noteworthy?
A: There are many success stories in the region that I feel that the West can learn from South Asia. It ranges from a socially relevant product to a very commercial product. Taking an extreme case of a socially relevant product is the services disbursed by Aravind Eye Hospital in Madurai, India where they are recognised to have conducted the maximum number of lens transplant, per day, per doctor. Although 60% of the surgeries are done free, they still manage to reach their targeted profit levels. The reasons for their success are many, but what made them stand out is the fact that they used an assembly line process for the surgeries where each desk is highly specialised and productive in their work. This greatly reduced the time per case and the number of patients attended increased. There is a success story in Sri Lanka, which is mentioned in the book ‘Marketing Management: A South Asian Perspective’. Dilmah’s white tea is a classic example of how the company successfully promotes this expensive product to international markets. The simple yet creative story that they use for marketing is that the tea is shielded throughout from direct sunlight.
If you look at what is appropriate to the South Asian market, the examples I mentioned are just a few. It is about getting about a business model that is appropriate to countries like India and Sri Lanka.
Q: With digitisation being a new trend, how well do you think the region is adapting to this?
A: If you look at the South Asian Region, the youngsters of today are a different breed of people. They are not interested in a fixed line or anything that is stationary. Actually mobile digital media is a trend now. Therefore, if you do not have an app for your brand, you literally do not exist. Nevertheless, I see that many companies have taken into this. Secondly, social network plays a significant role as well. If you take buying behaviour of the youngsters, before they even plan on going to a restaurant, they will automatically do a check-up, but the older generation, like me, we do not. It is much more in terms of informed decisions, even to spend an evening, because now the mentality is that, no one wants to waste, be it money or even time. In other words, the younger generation of consumers wants to know if they are taking a calculated risk, whereas the older generation takes a blind risk. The digital media is influencing the way youngsters are choosing their products, and they make a significant proportion of the buying market.
Companies are extremely conscious with this regard and are looking for measures to tackle this. This is also a medium where predictions are very difficult; therefore, the only way to get about is to experiment. You should experiment with 10 ways, one or two might work, and the rest might fail. Learn from these mistakes and do better the next time. Companies are moving from a certainty assessment to an uncertainty-bearing period due to this unpredictability.
Q: So are companies actually willing to spend on digital media if the results are unpredictable?
A: Digitisation is embraced well, but when it comes to allocation of budgets, there is reluctance shown by the management. They find it difficult to budget for this since they simply cannot predict the results that would come out of this medium. They do not want to put their money into something where they cannot predict the results. Big names have made their place online since they took the risk, may have failed a couple of times, but managed to secure their market position using different e-avenues. Smaller companies also have to understand this and take a step forward. As I mentioned previously, if you are not online, you simply do not exist.
Companies should focus on online marketing because the medium is bringing success for many products. An excellent example is flipcart.com in India. It is a virtual mall where you can shop online, pay on delivery. They recently revealed that from their orders, 40% is from small-unknown towns. This was something that was not predicted; who knew? The penetration is increasing now. However, retail enterprisers have not understood that the market behaviour has changed, and its time they realise this and move along with the trend. Another thing is that many companies think that just because they are on Facebook or have an app, they have embraced digitisation. It is not the case since digitisation is so much more.
Q: So turn to new media, replace old media, or use a mix of both?
A: We need to find the best fit there. The old media avenues cannot be left out since it has brought about immense success so far. Since predictability is still a question, it is not known if a new media avenue will work. Therefore, you need to be with the old media, and experiment with the new media for best results. Many companies are reluctant to experiment mostly because of the fear of failure. They do not want to allocate their budgets to something that might fail. They have to be open to this. You cannot master an art without failing, and that is the trick.
Q: In your view, what e-avenues are underused and does this differ from region to region?
A: I would say inducing consumers to transact online is an underused avenue. There are huge problems when buying online that consumers are not confident to pay over the internet. To get online purchase going, the younger generation needs to be tapped. For them buying online is a norm, whereas for the older generation, it is a risk. The younger generation has already adapted to most of the online activities, so online transaction could be made popular through them. When you compare the online transaction usage from region to region, certainly the West is using this largely.
Q: In the current context, what are the challenges faced by the marketing function?
A: The most pressing challenge faced today is that the professionalisation of marketing justice has made those in the profession to depend of aggregate data over qualitative date. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but in the process of doing so, they have lost their ability to observe and learn to talk to consumers directly.
They are losing the consumer insight and marketers developing this rather than depending on quantitative data is a challenge.
Q: Looking at the future, what according to you would be the upcoming challenges?
A: In the future, the consumer is going to be the dominant player, since he is going to have much greater choices. If consumers have choices, how would my product or brand be the most preferred? In future, the world is going to be cluttered with many products. Breaking through this clutter, and becoming salient in the customers mind will be a challenge in the future for marketing, since there will be competition not between products but, between product categories. It will be all about understanding the consumer at base level.
Q: What is your message for the marketers out there?
A: For the professional marketers my message is not to be carried away with techniques in marketing. They should actually understand the consumer at base level. For the young marketers, do not ask ‘what is the decision that should be taken?’ instead ask ‘why is it taken?’ Understand this and you will certainly get the best outcome from marketing.
