Will Online Retail Become Bigger than Modern Trade

After seeing the aftermath of the "The Big Billion Day" Sale an interesting thought is coming to my mind, will online retail overtake Modern Trade or Organized Retail in India? One of the reasons this question came to my mind looking at the reactions which came from the members of organized retail. They have all queued-up to complain against the 6the Oct sale and the fight in Mobile retail and online has been on for quite some time. Without getting into the rights and wrongs of the issue, I will move on to the moot question.. 

I will briefly summarize some of the key challenges which organized retail faces , prohibitively expensive real estate for setting-up retail stores. Internationally large format retailers would locate themselves outside the city where real estate is not that expensive and people would drive to buy from them. India we have challenges of people willing to travel long distance for shopping: one is the challenge of travelling along with the widespread smaller kirana trader…

Added to that the fact that no one has cracked the format which would suit India, so we still do not know which format will work. Lack of clarity on regulations, especially on the entry of multinational players. and most of the retailers are bleeding....

On the online front, there are challenges too, but somehow I have feeling they have the potential to challenge the Big Bazaars and Reliance Retail's. And perhaps the low priced "android one" phones might be the bridge that ecom players are looking for. And add to that the regulations are not very clear for ecom, though the government is making the wrong noises...

Though organized retail has been around for quite some time it not managed to breach the double figure mark in market share. Internationally the online players have become an additional channel, and co-exist with the large format retailers, but in India because both of them are emerging simultaneously the scene might turn out to very different in the next five years. 

I am confessing that I am going with the hype, the bubble….. but then that is the fun in being part of the hype and sticking your neck-out…

TCS Generation Web 2.0 Trends

The results of TCS Generation Web 2.0 Trends a nation wide survey covering 12 cities and over 14K kids 12-18 years old is just out. There has been a lot of coverage on the results of the survey, the summary of the findings are there on their website, link.

I thought will try and look at some of the finds and draw out implications for marketers. The survey covered kids from 12-18 , some of whom are already buying products and services but in the next 5-10 years these are the kids who will form the nucleus of the society, so the survey provides good pointers to the marketer on what he should focus on from the communications perspective.

The survey covers four areas, information access, social networking preferences, future education mindset and career interests and youth and technology. I will focus on the first two aspects that is information access and social networking preferences,

The first finding of the survey that google is the most preferred source of information does not come as a surprise, followed by print and TV. Though the trend in mini-metros is still more towards TV , but I think this will change in a very short period of time. Implications galore for all marketers, having a website is not sufficient , ignore SEO marketing techniques at your own risk, presence on google is going to make-or-mar your brand and company.

Internet access through mobile is maximum in Kolkatta (24%), and with mobile becoming indispensable , we would see its usage increasing and mobiles have to integrated into all communication campaigns and the current one-off attempts are not going to be sufficient.

Blogging is also catching up very fast, Bangalore named blogging capital of India with 66% students being part of it. Monitoring of blogs and reactions on them which are being done in the developed market need to replicated in the country, both to understand the consumers and safeguard your interest in the marketplace.

Social networking sites like orkut and facebook are quiet popular, and the question is do you watch the reactions and questions raised by your consumers on the various communities on your brand which have been started by consumers themselves on these sites??

There are many more insights which the report brings out, which should ring a warning bell in the minds of Indian marketers into the future they are walking into, the consumer in 2020 is going to have media consumption habits which are going to be radically different from what we see today....

L K Advani a la Obhama !!!!!

With the general election clouds gathering in the horizon, all political parties and their leaders are gearing up for the Mega Event. Historically the role of marketing in an election campaign inIndia has been quite minimal, especially when seen in the context of the US Presidential elections. But the advantages of the leveraging social media and technology to connect directly with people has not gone unnoticed and our political parties , their leaders are trying to ride on the technology wave especially to connect with the 100 million first-time voters who would start voting from this general election.

Though the attempt to connect to people directly is a very good idea on paper, but how does it get implemented is some thing which needs to be seen. All across the internet on most of the websites that one would visit regularly one can see the campaign of L K Adva

ni BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate . I was tempted to write more about it after I read Gaurav's post almost a month back, but resisted it. But the fact is that wherever you go on the net , blogs, websites you have the banner ads of  L K Advani's election campaign floating, estimated at 200 websites. So thought as the blog is supposed to share observations on what is happening the Indian market I thought I should share some of my thoughts with readers.

Starting with what is good about the whole campaign, the idea of having a well designed webpage, a blog and book are something which fits into what is needed to start a campaign like this. But there are a series of negatives which I have observed in the campaign,

Firstly,  I am pretty disappointed at the level of creativity, which can be seen from a 'We Can Do it' to a  'Its Possible' tag line in the banner ads , through this sort of campaign you would want to connect to the younger consumer who are net savvy and this is the best you could think of. How much time does it take to see the similarity ????

At the second level I also see the approach towards the campaign seems to be more of an extension of their mass marketing intrusive approach. With banners ads all over the net they are trying to do what a typical mass media guy will do buy all good spots on the TV and Radio and keep sending the same message over and over again, but that is where social media is different. Though the idea of creating a buzz is right but you cannot create buzz in a Blogsphere by forcing your presence across internet by putting banner ads all over, I see more negative fall out this than anything else... 

But hopefully from a marketer’s angle the campaign would improve with time and realization of how to operate in the internet domain would evolve, and will have more observations to write.

Indian Social Networking Sites

The launch of 'ishare' a social content sharing platform by rediff.com has prompted this write-up. Though for most of us who spend considerable time on the internet orkutting, the addition of one more social networking site is not a news worth mentioning. In India orkut is by far the leading social networking site, followed by Hi5 with a very small share and even smaller for Friendster and Fropper. 'ishare' promises a host of activities for the members, including sharing of video, music and picture. But will an avid orkutter really switch over to 'ishare'.

One social networking site in India which made a lot of buzz was the sunsilkgangofgirls.com launched by HLL. The total number of registrations at the site is 5.8 lakhs plus. The site offered a platform for girls to share their hobbies, interests online with community members. The site has blogs, expert advice and jobs. The site is considered to be a success but the issues of retaining interests of the members would mean constant innovation and addition of activities for the members.

The value of a network is proportional to the square of the number members using the same, a single stand-alone phone would have no value in itself, but once it is connected to a network the value of the phone increases exponentially. This law is called the Metcalfe's Law. For the Indian social networking sites to succeed they will have to work through the principle, as the existing players have a head-on advantage..