I AM A PRODUCT!

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At the risk of sounding extremely materialistic yet I always tell budding entrepreneurs and future leaders that an education in management teaches one among other things to become an expert in marketing products. It teaches one to understand the needs of the consumers and position the brand in such a manner that the consumer feels he / she needs the brand and goes and buys it. Most of the students of management are quick to learn this and by the time they graduate they are ready to impress the corporate world with their newly learnt skill of ‘marketing’. As david ogilvy once said “a great marketer can even sell snow to an eskimo”. Many management graduates pride themselves upon the fact that they can ‘market almost anything to anyone’, and most of them are actually pretty good at it too. So then all these so-called expert marketers must also be greatly successful in their careers?

Surprisingly that is not true. This is because these marketers learnt to market everything and anything but forgot to learn to market the most important thing and that is ‘marketing themselves’!

BOLLYWOOD, HOLLYWOOD AND BRANDS

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Amitabh Bachchan made his debut in Hollywood with a small but well portrayed role in the film The Great Gatsby. If you have seen the film you too would have been mesmerized by the grandeur of it, but if you have seen it from a marketer’s point of view you would notice how intelligently the film has been made to include well-known brands. It’s actually overflowing with premium products. The top international designers Miu Miu and Prada for the movie designed more than 40 different cocktail gowns. Brooks Brothers designed the lead actor Leonardo Di- Caprio’s clothes. Moët & Chandon provided the champagne used in the film. The top-notch jewellery designer Tiffany & Co. created the jewellery.

However, this time it has been done differently. There may be no obvious close up shots that the brands need to depend on to be noticed in the film. This time the brands ‘invested’ in the movie too. Which implies that they have specially created products for the film and in their advertising and branding strategies would highlight this fact. Since these are all limited edition pieces the brands have a lot to benefit. Tiffany & Co., for example, has already got a list of clients who would want to buy these pieces as a ‘keepsakes’ since the designs are from an era long gone and a lot of people are there who would love to own something from that era.

Brooks Brothers have launched their own “The Gatsby Collection” which has suits inspired by the fashion of the 1920s. The brands in question will promote these new collections in their advertisements, which will benefit not just them but the movie too.

DO YOU REALLY WANT IT!

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Michael Dell was in India recently. While addressing an audience he was asked, what is the secret of becoming a successful entrepreneur? His answer was something that surprised everyone. He said, “You need to be crazy!” If people call you crazy take it as a compliment for it means you are doing something that has never been done before! An entrepreneur is someone who dares to take risks, who dares to go off the beaten path. In fact, that is actually what success truly means. However, the irony is that it is success that prevents us from taking risks. Once we are successful we are too scared to change and do something different. Sticking to the same way of doing things seems to be the safest way to prevent failure. Take the case of a singer. Once his song becomes a hit he continues to make songs which are similar to the hit song, for fear that if he attempts something different it may not appeal to his fans. Same is the case with actors, painters, and even entrepreneurs! Once they find their ‘comfort zone’ seldom do they want to venture too far away from it?

However, a true business leader is one, who does not fear change, rather thrives on it! This is the only way to maintain your success, otherwise most often you may find yourself being left behind. Success comes not just when you do something different but when you continuously keep reinventing yourself. The ability to identify the changing needs with changing times is the key to long lasting and continuous success.

DARE TO CHANGE THE RULES OF THE GAME?

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The big players of TV are a little worried and it’s all because of a small company named Aereo, an upstart which wants to change the way we view television. No wonder all the big firms from NBC, ABC, CBS to Fox have all sued it but its CEO Chet Kanojia (who incidentally is a native of Bhopal) is not worried at all for he is absolutely sure of what he is doing. Aereo TV, simply put is an ‘online TV service’. The modus operandi of the company is simple. Kanojia has made very small antennas. Each user is assigned one antenna which grabs the broadcast-TV signals from the air and with the help of a software those signals are aired to the user. Not just this, the signal can be aired to any device which the user opts for – his mobile, his PC, or even his TV set. What this translates for the user is: a) he does not need to pay the hefty cable fees, and b) he can now watch his favourite TV programme anywhere. He could be stuck in traffic and watch it on his mobile, or in office on his PC. Kanojia saw a loophole in the copyright act and made the most of it, which is why in spite of his company being sued twice he seems undeterred and has in fact won both times. Not just that, today he is sitting on a funding of $38 million with the help of which he would spread his network, which is currently available only in New York, to 20 more cities.

Kanojia saw a gap in the system and filled it up with his service. According to him, everything will soon migrate to the Internet including TV. The youth today is more loyal to a TV programme and not a TV channel. He wanted the freedom to watch it whenever and wherever he pleased. Add to that the fact that he did not want to pay for the channels he did not watch, but under the current system he had to pay for a package. Aereo, on the other hand, gave him just what he wanted.

Whether Aereo really makes it big and becomes the next best thing is debatable and only time will tell. However, it has an important lesson for all to learn and that is ‘never fear to challenge the big players or the best ideas’. You may turn out to be a game changer.