Category: A Mix

  • ‘What happened’ isn’t exciting

    Auto Expo 2010 is underway at Pragati Maidan, Delhi. My guess is this expo has been most anticipated one in the history of automobile exhibitions in India.

    So how do fans across the country try to follow the happenings at this expo? Of course, you would say through bikeindia.in, blogs (like bikeadvice.in, indiaon2wheels.com), twitter, etc.

    Ideally everyone would expect updates to come from bikeindia.in – the online face of the eponymous bike magazine. But who's giving you real time updates from the Auto Expo? Yes, the blogs, not BikeIndia. And if you just click on the links above, you would know what I'm talking about.

    What happens really is this. BikeIndia releases its issue once every month. Auto Expo is a big draw. And therefore, thinking that it would decrease its sales, BikeIndia doesn't share the happenings online. In stead, it waits to cover the happenings in its monthly issue. Unfortunately, the monthly issue releases after 15 days of the Auto Expo.

    Is it so tough to see that bike enthusiasts want to know 'what's happening' and not 'what happened'? BikeIndia lost a great opportunity. And publications continue to lose opportunities to thrill the enthusiasts. And then they wonder, what's happening?

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  • How will you fill your time in 2010?

     Fill your time Not your space 1

    With these objects? Unlikely.

    Look what Business Today wants it's readers to do. Buy these objects. They'll fill your cupboards and whatever space you have. But not your time; unless you love those cars and bikes so much that you are always out driving them, exploring and wandering. That's quite something, indeed.

    However, most people would only drool over these cars/bikes. They can't buy. Should these objects become the goals to achieve, then? Not really. Yes, they can be bought once you also have some good amount of money. But where will that money come from? By doing something worthwhile. And what are you most likely to do? For you to figure out. Once you figure out 'which activity', strive for excellence in that activity, find out ways which will help you perform easily and excellently.

    One response to “How will you fill your time in 2010?”

    1. Tushar Jambhekar- tujams Avatar
      Tushar Jambhekar- tujams

      Call it fuel for imaginations and a well planted ploy for people to indulge in spending they really don’t need to incur.
      If you see a Gallardo, may be you will buy a Fiat Linea. May be a wine bottle will be your gift for your dad on his birthday.
      The street car named desire needs fuel… which a glossy magazine cover page definitely provides…

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  • They don’t understand Avatar at Mahindra Scooters!

    If you are bored of the prevalent tastes or haven't tasted the good wine yet, you would prefer trying new wines in new bottles.

    If you like the tastes and are quite content with life, you won't mind old wine in new bottles.

    Unfortunately, Mahindra 'power' scooters are old wines in old bottles. Why? How?

    Mahindra hasn't changed much when it comes to styling of the scooters. They haven't changed the engines. The only things that have changed are the brand name and the sticker.

    Sure, they got it right when they thought the market needs 'power
    scooters'. But then they discontinued the most powerful scooter of the
    lot – Blaze. If these scooters are really power scooters they should look that way, they should ride that way and they should deliver that way. Ride a Mahindra scooter, ride a Honda Scooter and you would feel that the latter are more powerful.

    Down goes your great thought!

    Imagine! A new player (with significant monetary and marketing muscle power) entering in a booming industry and bringing in products which the consumers had already thrown out of their consideration set.

    Exploit a great thought, a great strategy, with great execution. Surely marketers at Mahindra know better.

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  • Fill your time, not your space

    Few days back, I went to Northpoint to take a few sessions on Integrated Marketing Communication. I was going there for the first time. Didn't quite know what kind of students there were. So to get a measure, I did a few small exercises on their motivations in life. Indeed, discussion about goals is an obvious consequence of such exercises.

    So, as the discussion progressed, this is what I discovered. And this is what I had to tell them about goal-setting. Goal should be such that it makes you,

    Fill your time, not your space

    What do I mean? 

    While reading their responses in those exercises, I realized that most of us try and define our goals in terms of what we want to own (great cars, great brands, big luxury products, etc.), where we want to reach (CEO/director of so-and-so company, owner of such-and-such business, etc.) and so on…

    The thing is these are all objects. Car is an object. Luxury goods are objects. CEO is a certain position in the hierarchy; in a way it's a point/place, and therefore an object. Owning a certain business sounds like owning an object of sorts.

    This is the point. Objects fill up space, not your time. So?

    The fact that you have life means you'll have to live out a certain duration of time before you die. How do you fill the time till you live? By living! By breathing! By 'doing' something. And 'doing' is an activity. The thing is, only activities can fill up your time; nothing else.

    Doing something (activities) forces you into experiences, builds your capabilities, hones your skills and develops your expertise. And it's the expertise that takes you places.

    Sure, you might need objects to do certain activities. In that sense, you will have to use those objects. But mind you, the word is 'use'. Not 'own'. Ownership or achieving those objects isn't always the deal.

    If you own objects, they'll fill your space. And they'll occupy that space till you want them to. But you don't have to live out space. You've to live out time. Until you use those objects, you don't fill your time. And filling your time is the bigger deal. If time doesn't get filled you'll be afflicted with the worst disease of life – boredom.

    Goal should be an activity, not a position, not an object, not a place.

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  • If it isn’t practical…

    My guess is:

    • You are making excuses
    • You've failed to imagine
    • You've failed to change
    • You haven't read enough
    • You can't understand what written in those books
    • You can't respect those experts and their expertise
    • You call them mere theories coz you have not concentrated well enough to read enough
    • You cannot appreciate mankind's greatest innovation, greatest idea – a book
    • You are behind in the evolution of 'thinking'
    • You've failed to see the connections that come out of those books and that can help you make things practical

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  • Lift

    How do you behave when you are stranded (for whatever reason) and you want a lift to reach your destination?

    Would you show aggression or show a polite smiling face? Would you portray a look which might make the driver feel that you could be a good person to give a lift to, that he could have a pleasant companion to talk to if he gave a lift to you?

    Very often when you make a sales pitch you want a lift to reach your target. How do you behave?

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  • If you are not responding…

    Your car will have no chance to move.

    For any work, any task or any project, your responses, your emails, your replies, your feedback, your updates are the wheels. You can have the best of engines, the most efficient of engines, the greatest of technologies and tools and yet your car won't move if you are not responding well (by 'well' I mean quickly and honestly).

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  • Management Graduates & Boring CVs

    Off late I've checked quite a few CVs of MBA graduates from different management institutes. The format of these CVs is so standardized that all candidates look the same.

    What is the purpose of a CV by the way? To portray in brief what the candidate is all about. To reflect the goodness of a candidate in some way. To showcase what's special about the candidate.

    If CVs are standardized to an extent that one candidate cannot be seen differently from another, then the entire purpose of making a CV is defeated. Besides, how does a recruiter make up his mind? How does he choose one and not the other if there is so little differentiation.

    It is an irony of sorts. Management graduates are taught in the class how to differentiate a brand or a company from the others but they are forced not to apply the same principles to their own selves.

    One response to “Management Graduates & Boring CVs”

    1. Tushar Jambhekar - tujams Avatar
      Tushar Jambhekar – tujams

      I guess your observation is valid for Campus recruits rather than people seeking job switch.
      As far as I have seen CVs, there is a standardization in terms of CVs that might come representing one institute as a group. This is predominantly a practice used by institutes and many people still dont know how to make a CV.
      Also since CVs are more like a formal communication going out from a college with a students information as a part of it, at times, institutes see this as an oppertunity to sell their brand to the industry.
      I can personally vouch for both the points I have made. As the person handling the placements for the batch, I have spent hours fighting with people who wanted every achievement since KG to be a part of the CV. I have still not understood why the academic topper wanted her status as the Secretary of the Girls Common Room of SRCC to be on her CV.(May be a DU thingy)
      Also format standardization was demanded by the placement cell as ever CV sent was on behalf of the institute. Since the pitch began with I’m from Symbiosis, there was a demand that the CV should live up to a particular standard. Also uniformity was an expression that the college is not playing favourites and giving equal oppertunity to all.

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  • 3-2-2-2-3-2-2-2 pattern

    A few days back, I experienced some difficulty in breathing, especially after running for a while. Felt heavy in the chest. Didn't continue for long but scary enough not to indulge in any heavy-duty exertion.

    But I find it difficult to feel good without some physical workout, in any form. Trying to find out the reasons for this heaviness in the chest, I read about all possible reasons. I diagnosed that I was breathing wrongly.

    For some time, I was breathing a lot through my mouth instead of my nose while running. I read about the recommended ways of breathing. For running at slower speeds, they say you can adopt a 3-2-3-2 pattern of breathing. It means inhale thrice then exhale twice then inhale thrice then exhale twice and so on, matching this process with the moments when your feet hit the ground. The logic is when your feet hits the ground, you exhale greater air than what you inhale. So to breathe in the required air, there should greater inhalations and lesser exhalations.

    I tried this in the last few days. On occasions, I felt comfortable but on occasions I felt I was taking in more air than required. My lungs and diaphragm felt full and I was 'huffing and puffing'.

    Today I tried 3-2-2-2-3-2-2-2 pattern. And wow! I had a very satisfying run. No 'full' feeling. No discomfort. No huffing and puffing.

    The most commonly observed form might not be the most fitting form. You can change to suit yourself and that's the origin of a different style, a different pattern, a new thing in its own right and, importantly, a new opportunity when the time comes…

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  • If you wanna fly…

    Lighten it up. Throw away the extra (leave it to you what is 'extra').

    If you don't understand these few words, approach it differently. Watch UP. Disney's not paying me a commission but the DVD/VCD(Rs.299 and worth every penny, may be more)/BLUE RAY is out.

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  • Measurable and quick beauty solutions

    Preparing for a pitch for a new skincare+haircare brand, I went through quite a few campaigns done lately by different brands. I find common themes.

    Measuring beauty is a tough thing. So, for every beauty problem, to differentiate themselves brands are trying to introduce measurability and trying to assure results in a specific period of time. And this time is rather short. Say 30 days or 14 days or, in some instances, just a week.

    But here's the catch. Now there are so many products for each little purpose that if you were to dream of keeping your skin in perfect condition then, going by all the marketing claims, you would have to devote no less than 1 hour daily simply applying these products. But going by the packed routine in general and the commensurate laziness/pain in doing anything extra, even measurability is a tough motivation for people to use different products at the same time.

    My estimate is that multi-purpose formulations are gonna eventually do better business than individual need-based formulations.

    2 responses to “Measurable and quick beauty solutions”

    1. Khyati Sarang Avatar

      I totally agree to your point of view.
      No wonder brands like Garnier & Olay have come up with complete solutions.
      A lot of working women,girls who have little time to spend on applying coat after coat of these various cosmetics, have now started adopting total solution formulations.
      However, I feel that these cosmetics still operate in the niche category of “Age Miracle/ Age retention”.women in their late 20’s-early 30’s. While there is a lot of requirement of these kind of products/solutions for even younger generations who are highly deprived of time. Thanks to work hard, party harder attitude of the younger generation

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    2. Tushar Jambhekar- tujams Avatar
      Tushar Jambhekar- tujams

      “Do better” is a very relative term- much like success can be quantified in terms of Market share by volume and value. It depends on you wish to measure the success under units sold or revenue earned.
      Choice of product also a function of the need and seriousness of the problem; do you want a moisturiser, or a dry skin/ oily skin special, anti-aging or a fairness specilist.
      Multi-purpose do better… I have my doubts. A case in point: Zandu Balm, Amrutanjan, Boroline have been Multi Purpose. Vicco Turmeric was a baap of multi purpose. All have been monuments as brands and have seen their hay days. But in the long run, the Moov, Iodex, Volini, Fair ‘n Lovely have made a bigger impact as specialists.
      I guess a closer look into our closets will actually reveal that we are more game for specilists rather than multi purpose products.

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  • Bullet Classic’s got the thump – a first hear/glimpse review

    Sound of Music Bullet Classic 500

    Just been to the Royal Enfield showroom at Bandra. Didn't get a test-ride :(. Still 10 days to go. But here's the good news.

    This Bullet has the same old thump coming out of a better functioning and better looking machine… Purists can frown; I liked it and perhaps many guys shying away from the Bullets might like it too. Might buy it too. Go for it. This is the right machine; free of the numerous niggles Bullet has been known for.

    Apart from that, the sitting position is just right. Even with a modern, more refined engine, feels every bit a thumper, every bit a classic!

    The Classic doesn't look that great without the curved silencer. Neither does it look that great with the pillion seat attached; at least I didn't find it great. But then if you have a girl to ride with, there's no option :). Besides, when you ride a Bullet, you often forget the looks… :)

    2 responses to “Bullet Classic’s got the thump – a first hear/glimpse review”

    1. Anand Avatar
      Anand

      Dude where s ur sense of design…the rear pillon seatis just perfect! the silencer..well..i will have to look at it in real…cant u post the whole photo?

      Like

    2. jeans for mens Avatar

      Wow! It’s looking amazing…. Royal Enfield is my favorite bike. thanks very much for sharing it. keep posting such an informative articles.

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  • 5-min interviews with b-school students

    A few days back, I interviewed some candidates who had applied for summer internships with our organization. The candidates came from one of India's very highly-rated b-schools located in Mumbai.

    Before they came for the interviews, I went through their CVs. And there wasn't much in those CVs to really arouse my interest or curiosity. Coming from a b-school like theirs, I expected something really interesting. I wasn't ready to believe their CVs were a good representation of what they were.

    So I conducted an experiment. When they came for the interviews, I got them all into a room, gave them some info on our organization and said:

    I want your responses to just two questions. One, tell me the story of your life. Two, tell me a story from which you learnt a lot and from which I might also learn something. For the first question, you have 2 minutes. For the second, you have 3. And you have 15 mins to prepare. Post which you can come (in any order that you feel like) and share your stories.

    I was expecting something interesting, some stories. But here's what I got.

    I introduced one more question for the interviews but didn't tell them in advance. To each one of them I asked, "What were the two questions I asked you to respond to?" Out of 9 candidates 6 couldn't answer that correctly! This is what they said:

    Tell me something about yourself… Tell me an incident from which I learnt something…

    Imagine! I completed all the 9 interviews in 60 minutes.

    I took the three who could more or less repeat the questions correctly. And indeed, the ones who could repeat the questions correctly, also had the most interesting responses/stories to share and also sounded more emphatic.

    When one is learning, listening is the most important skill. When undertaking something, you are more likely to get it done when you are listening carefully. 

    Listening carefully might very often lead to questions. No one, whom I interviewed, questioned why the first question was allotted just 2 mins while the second one was given 3. Story of one's own life would apparently take a lot more time than just a story from which you learnt a thing or two.

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  • Questioning our imagination

    Making magic out of nothing. How else does one explain this?

    Makes me question my imagination. I thought animation is only possible by drawing, sketching, caricaturing using pens, pencils, colors or digital equipment. I thought stories are told only through talking, writing or on the celluloid… Wrong! Too early to run dry!

    Every belief or thought one holds conclusively can be questioned, right here, right now. Are you questioning your imagination?

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  • Boredom and low-rise jeans

    Am bored of low-rise jeans. Partly the boredom is due to the inconvenience of handling the low-rise style.

    Low-rise jeans
    Picture courtesy: Flickr

    But I like the tapered bottoms of low-rise jeans. So now I wear mid-rise slim fit.

    We always used to wear mid-rise; in fact, the default is mid-rise. Since it is the default we almost ignored the significance of that style. But only till low-rise was hyped up and made a rather popular style.

    Mid-rise gets its classic status, greater importance and greater acceptance as a style only because of the fad of low-rise.

    I like predicting. More so speculating. So here's the thing. How about a jeans which is low-rise in the front but ass-covering in the back? Or is it already there? 

    2 responses to “Boredom and low-rise jeans”

    1. Ninad Avatar

      The butt crack is grosse….really! and cant understand the fashion…It cant become a turn on ever!

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    2. Prateek Kabra Avatar
      Prateek Kabra

      its already there …dude….
      havent you seen akshay kumar wear a mid rise on his ass…and low rise at the front….do notice…at times he does….
      but then yes that looks classy….

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  • Machine Music

    Sound of Music Bullet Classic 500

    When I keep the door wind shields of my car pulled down, I experience nothing but a cacophony. Jarring obnoxious noises everywhere. Amidst all this, every once in a while, a thumper (Bullet Motorcycle) passes by and gladdens my heart, sorry my ears.

    Yes ears! It's the thumping sound that endears Bullets to owners and non-owners alike. The thump is almost music to motorcycle lovers. So the nickname. And I feel, so the brand and so the cult.

    Indeed for quite a few people it might not be music. It might be another machine making noise. But isn't that the case with many a form of music? For some, rock is still nothing more than head banging rubbish.

    I am gonna make a couple of shackle-raising points here.

    We are surrounded by so many machines and invariably all these machines make some or the other kind of sound. It's often claimed and proved that music is the ultimate form of aesthetics and experiencing beauty, and is instrumental in changing our moods. If we are surrounded by cacophony all over, it might be that the noise would result in unpleasant effects (and sometimes serious ill-effects) on people in general.

    Now, world over product designers are so concerned about noise that increasingly we find machines which do not give out much sound. Is that good? Two points here:

    1. Sounds can be turned into music. That's not news, I know. However, in the context of designing machines it might just be. The thump of Bullet is music to motorcycle lovers. I feel the same when I drive my Chevrolet UVA (though of course the sound's audible only to the driver). In case of Bullet, guess the music was an inadvertent result of the engineering that went into building the machine. Can product designers and engineers deliberately consider aesthetics of music as well while designing products instead of nurturing a single minded obsession of suppressing all sorts of sound? One might say, what's the need for machine sounds at all! That brings me to the second point.
    2. Sounds are indicators. When a piano-player mistimes or puts even a finger wrong, as a listener you know how it disturbs the flow and kills the pleasure. Smooth functioning machines give out a certain rythm. You hear the sound and you get the rythm. Any deviation or disturbance and you know something's wrong. Why not make good use of these indicators? Why not enjoy the rhythm and the music?

    One response to “Machine Music”

    1. Tushar Jambhekar- tujams Avatar
      Tushar Jambhekar- tujams

      There is something in addition to the sounds… its called vibrations..
      Riding a Bullet or driving a car is like a conversation between the machine and the driver. Every time you reach a certain RPM, it says that you need to change gear or how well is the engine firing. I would say the vibrations through the car/bike are the most true words it says. Its like the body language of a person you talking to.
      I can say that bcoz I have experienced it. Try driving a car with the music system screaming- the vibrations talk. Wear a massage seat on the drivers seat… the vibrations go haywire and your vehicle interaction can go for a toss.

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  • Yeats to Salesmen

    "Tread softly because you tread on my dreams." 

    – William Butler Yeats

    Aggression is such a sought-after attribute among salesmen and among recruiters of salesmen. I can't prove in general if aggressive salesmen are effective or ineffective. But I can count numerous instances wherein I encountered an aggressive salesman and bought what he was trying to sell and then regretted what I bought and spent a lot of time pursuing and arguing with the salesmen or the customer service.

    Every product or service sold is a dream or a significant part of that dream. What aggression often does – as seen from a sales point-of-view, I feel, is it disturbs the balance, the equilibrium and forces an outcome. Forced outcomes very often lead to unpleasant feelings and not-so-fulfilling feelings. Dreams simply become unpleasant illusions. So much for brand building and craving for brand loyalty…

    One response to “Yeats to Salesmen”

    1. Vivek Avatar
      Vivek

      awesome.. makes wonderful sense!!

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  • Why feel guilty?

    My last post was about feedback. I mentioned something to the effect that "building database could be the ulterior motive" of designing certain kinds of feedback forms.

    Ulterior? Yes, doesn't it look like that in the marketplace? So many brands doing so many activities, running competitions, collecting feedback and most of them with a motive that these activities will help them get contacts of the people whom they can bombard with marketing communication in future.

    The question is, why is database building an ulterior motive?

    Don't people shop for their needs? Don't people wanna wear good clothes, good accessories? Don't they wanna do up their houses? Don't they wanna give good gifts to near and dear ones? Don't they wanna stay abreast with the latest trends? And besides, doesn't everyone wanna save money?

    So why can't database collection be done upfront, explicitly and honestly?

    One response to “Why feel guilty?”

    1. Tusha Jambhekar - tujams Avatar
      Tusha Jambhekar – tujams

      Sirjee… how honestly do u feel a person will give his mobile number or mail id in times when spam has become one of the most irritating aspect of life.
      Take any database and I can assure you only about 60% is usable. The rest has fictitious info, some dated, some needed to be filtered due to DND regulations… a small faction entry errors. So an effort to get a database is gonna be a mammoth exercise with a heavy cost.
      I give my mail id to afaqs to get a link to download case studies on brands. Next I get 10 mails- 8 of which are about things I am not even remotely connected with. Whats more, my own mail id features in a database my department wishes to buy.(So that one case study got me tons of junk mail and they earned big money as well)
      If I had a plain download option I would never give my mail id. Just asking anyone for your genuine data will just never work. If you doubt, ask the guys who gonna see you soon when the Sensus happens in 2010, as to how much things change even when its a Govt certified representative.

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  • How do you design a feedback form?

    I was at Pantaloons yesterday evening. Was standing at the payment counter when I noticed a feedback collection box. There were just two filled forms in the box. I was intrigued. In the whole day, a big store like Pantaloons just got two shoppers to write feedback! This being a festive season, the number of shoppers is definitely higher. I was intrigued. Wanted to see the feedback form.

    I couldn't find the blank feedback forms, so I asked the executive at the counter. He handed me one. Have a look:

    Pantaloons Feedback Form

    Would one be motivated to fill out this feedback (a voluntary unpaid-for activity) form standing at the cash counter? Isn't it important for Pantaloons to get customer feedback? Or is it that they are doing so well and they are so confident about everything that feedback form is just a show of politeness? Or is it that Pantaloons wants to collect database?

    Here are three important points to remember when designing a feedback form:

    1. Voluntary acts require really strong motivation.
    2. To evoke strong motivation, the act should be simple enough for the customer to not feel any 'pain'. This particular form looks scary; it asks for so many details that the first look itself discourages the onlooker to pick it up, leave aside writing.
    3. Getting the customer to give his feedback is as good as knowing him. Act upon his feedback and you might win his trust and his business. His name and address and other such details might build your database and help you to send him junk mails but not help you to understand him and win his business.

    One response to “How do you design a feedback form?”

    1. Tushar Jambhekar- tujams Avatar
      Tushar Jambhekar- tujams

      I guess Pantaloons has forgotten a basic rule of retail- Customers love to spend time in and around the isles, but when its the billing counter, it has to be instant. And having an essay form at a point where instant is desired; your entire purpose has been defeated. This form suggests they have made feedback more like a database generation system. And why a Green Card Number???? I can give feedback only a previledge user???
      But this is my overall opinion about the Future Group Retails, they are most slack about customer complaints. My gutt feel, if even 5% ppl complaint, I have 95% who will come back for my low prices.
      Since I am the types who expects stellar service standards, I had once given a piece of my mind in Pune Central. I was charged Rs 30 for car parking, refundable if I buy something (not mentioned anywhere on the ticket). But since I left the parking ticket in my car I did not get a refund on the parking charge. I wanted to lodge a complaint, The automated complaint Kiosk was not working. There was no Manager on the Customer service deak, just some trainees. I wrote 3 complaints that day: 1. For the Parking charge 2.Non functional complaint kiosk 3. No authority at the Coustomer service desk.
      As it stand, I never got any response to all my complaints.

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  • Name – connects or creates a hurdle?

    Any business faces and overcomes many hurdles to reach the consumers. Given a choice what would a businessman prefer? Create and overcome more and more hurdles or minimize and remove the existing hurdles.

    Brand names are words which have meanings or are imbued with meanings by the marketer. Four cases (a few more if we go in greater detailing) emerge out of this statement in the context of marketing.

    1. An already existing word which has a certain meaning in people's minds
      and when adopted as a brand name, matches the product/service offered. (Infosys for a software company)
    2. An already existing word which has a certain meaning in people's minds but when adopted as a brand name, marketer tries to attach a new or a different meaning to that word. (Pantaloons for a fashion retail outlet trying to lure women)
    3. An already existing word which has certain meaning in people's minds but is applied to a
      product which doesn't have any apparent relation with the word. (Cherry
      Blossoms as a brand name for shoe polish, Blackberry for a mobile phone)
    4. A brand new word (so of course it doesn't have any meaning in people's minds) is coined and used as a brand name for the product/service. (Accenture for a software company)

    In the first case the name assists the people to understand the offering. In the third, since there's no apparent relation (there could be a metonymical or a metaphorical relation) marketer has a blank slate and can take the opportunity to create that relationship between the name and the offering. Fourth case is similar to third one; again a blank slate, an opportunity to imbue the new word with meaning and create a relationship between the name and the offering.

    I didn't talk about the second case. Unlike the other three cases, the second creates a hurdle. Why? Coz there is a meaning already established in people's minds. So to get the name related to a new different meaning, the first task is to weaken the established meaning and then try to imbue it with the new different meaning. Marketers would know (or don't they?) this phenomenon is next to impossible.

    Someone might say, well, that's the challenge. Alright, I say, in the list of hurdles to overcome to make your business a success, don't you have enough already? And an existing and well-accepted perception is a tough hurdle to overcome. Go ahead and take the challenge!

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