Read Between the Ps

Here is a list of the Initials used by companies to signify the Legal Entity that they belong to, in different countries:

Interbrand and BusinessWeek recently published the Top 100 GLOBAL Brands - A list of the Best Brands in the world , in accordance with the value they promised in the markets. The Title is promising - " Here's how we Calculate the power in a name " Though originally I had heard of the Michael Berkin's Model of evaluating the Brand Value - which Currently Infosys and Coca-Cola are using, a similar method is used by Interbrand also. The method , in short, calculates the profits of the company due to the "brand" - reduces the investment made on the promotions of the brand - and then, after reducing the taxes, dicscounts the value to present day earnings (NPV) Then, there is a multiple added - A modification factor - Brand Strength Multiple - to this value to finally come out with the Brand Value. A similar method is used by Interbrand also. Just that the documentation has been done differently. The procedure mentions that the value is calculated "on ...

On time-this time... Weekly collection of 20 Brand Pills and a P-Ad Dose :-) Here they are... This Brand was acquired by Morepen in 2001. It was originally a brand of Boots Company PLC. What is the name of the brand? (Burnol) This company is famous for training Marketers. Steve Case,Steve Ballmer,Meg Whitman,Scott Cook,Jeff Immelt - all have, at one time, worked in this FMCG. Which company am I talking about? (P&G) Rapidex English course were the first to use him as a model to prove to people that lack of knowledge of English was in no way going to inhibit them from reaching the top. Identify their model (Kapil dev) It was first introduced in 1974 on a pack of Wrigley’s gum,and have served quite well since then, in providing product identity. It has certainly delivered the promise of providing manufacturers and retailers the ability to exercise greater control of their merchandise pipelines. What am I talking about? (Bar Codes) This Cincinnati, Ohio based company launched a new b...

An interesting question came up on the Marketing Profs a few days back. What is Click-through Fraud, and what are the ways in which we can prevent it? A little research from my side did give an insight into the topic. Here is the thread. Category: Pay-per-click (PPC) Advertising Click-through Fraud is a major bottleneck in traffic Measurement on your website. The Search engines set up programs, or hire third-party vendors to automate clicks and surfing on your website, thereby increasing the hits on your site. This fabricates the numbers, giving the impression to the client that his website is being sourced and marketed well by the Search Engine.This increases the revenues for the Search Engine, which is paid on a per-click basis, which in turn, shares the revenues with the third-party contractors. The prevention Mechanisms are similar to Credit-Card Industry mechanism, wherein Any Fraudulent Transactions trigger a tag against the Transaction, which is stalled and later, investigat...

Am 2 days late. Here are the 20 brand pills for this week: What concept evolved from a major embarrassment that Frank McNamara faced in a restaurant while entertaining his clients? (Diners Club Credit Cards) A by-product of World War II was the discovery of this soap-like product by a famous consumer goods company. The product, made from a soap-like molecule without the potentially irritating alkaline element, is a ph-neutral, mild cleansing product. This product was first introduced in the US in 1957. How do we know this product? (As Dove, the "beauty bar" from the Unilever Company) This Company was started in Czechoslovakia, in 1894 and established itself in India in 1931. Today it is the most common name in the shoes Industry. Which Company is this? (Bata, founded by Thomas Bata. It started manufacturing shoes in India at Batanagar in 1936. The Batanagar factory is the first Indian shoe manufacturing unit to receive the ISO 9001 certification in 1993) Boman Irani and Vijay...

It increased from 4 to 5 initially, with an addition that Marketers identified with the Luxury Sector. There was one addition to the Traditional Set of Ps. Now, the " family " has grown to 8 here also! Reiterates the very basis of this blog - As long as Marketing Continues, there would continue an evolution to Extend .... The Bridge of Ps ! The 8 P's of Marketing for the Hospitality and Travel Industry : - Product - Price - Promotion - Place In addition to this Traditional list, following have been added: - Packaging - Programming - People - Partnership For the Luxury Sector - Another P was added to the list of 4 , making in all 5 Ps - Product - Price - Promotion - Place - Placement ! And if you still havent got P syched out, here is a list of 5 P's of Marketing of Professional Service Business , that I found out at www.actionplan.com - Positioning - Packaging - Promotion - Persuasion - Performance P-Mania is contagious......

As I mentioned, how long can you keep on harping on the four Ps.... Just read about the 8 Ps of Marketing in Micro Finance Price - Quintessential parameter for this business. You need to decide the price points you can offer, and the corresponding tax rates. You would need to know the demand, and decide the profit/sustainability objective using strategies (like cost- based, cost-plus, demand-based and break- even). It looks at behavioural attitudes, perceived value, prestige etc. Product/services provided -Proper segmentation of the product, and evaluation of factors like ideas, concept creation, adaptability, cannibalization, sampling, surveys, prototyping, and of course, quality. Is it a new product? What is the advantage it commands, with respect to its competition? Place/distributions/location of operations - One needs to make sure that the service/product is accessible where and when it is wanted. It includes the spread of the Sales group and POS. Promotion - What is the tar...

Marketing Sherpa recently announced the Best Blogs in the field of marketing, advertising, and public relations for the year 2005. It is indeed an insight into the best in the industry, and their perspectives. The Results and the methodology is pretty transparent, wherein they have mentioned that 2065 votes were received. The blogs were selected out of 52 nominated Blogs. Here are the results: Click Here Most of these blogs are new for me, but a glance at them and a peak into their entries reflects the effort the Bloggers make. Here is the list of winners and Important Mentions Category: Individual Blog on Marketing and Advertising Seth Godlin’s Blog (Winner) Adrants Category: Group Blog on Marketing and Advertising MarketingVOX (Winner) Marketing Genius Church of the Customer Category: PR Media Guerrilla (Winner) Strategic Public Relations Category: B-to-B marketing Guerrilla Consulting (Winner) B-to-B Lead Generation Blog Category: Small business marketing Duct Tape Marketing...

Nothing could be more pertinent at this stage on the Amul Hits Page to my blog. The latest 2 Topicals are a portent to my Blog Entries :-D. Had Done a case Study on Low-Cost Airlines sometime back, and then after that, took up DaCunha for it's Amul Campaign . Had mentioned there that I wanted something on Bunty and Bubbly from them. "Waiting for one on Bunty and Bubbly or "D", if they don’t put it, I will :-D ! Mr. Rane, are you listening? " Guess they do listen to me. Maybe Mr. Rane read my Blog. :-) Here they are!

Nice Problem - on Marketing Profs This one was interesting, not because of the problem that was on offer, but because the final outcome was incidentally the basis of my assumptions and opinion. The Questioner wanted to find out the techniques in which he could market an Engineering Institute, specialized in CAD/CAM, with the target segment as the students as well as the Working Managers , who wanted an insight into the subject. My take on the subject was to compliment the strengths of both the segments, and leverage one competency over the other, to ensure both of them overlap, and share the learning, which would ensue into the USP for the Institute. This was what I told him: Sunil, Just before I give my perspective, I would sincerely hope that you are positioned somewhere in the western belt (Maharashra, Karnataka), since that is where you would find a handful of prospective candidates! Having said that, here are some of the tips I think might be pertinent to your case: (Assumption) ...

Next lot of my pick of some of the Interesting Brand Questions, compiled from various sources. In 2002, the US-based Bakery Manufacturers' Association's charts showed that this company G was rated as the largest selling glucose biscuit brand in the whole world in terms of volumes. Which Company is being referred? (The company is Parle G. The others - Oreo from Nabisco and McVities from UK-based United Biscuits) Which company, when associated with the popular TV Serial Kaun Banega Crorepati, enjoyed almost 20% increase in its sales? (Britannia, when it associated the 50:50 round with its range – Britannia 50-50) Which is the world’s First Credit Card? (Diners Club – the founder Frank McNamara started it in 1950, specifically for Restaurants. 14 restaurants in New York accepted it. The cards were made of a paper stock with the accepting locations printed on the back, and not plastic) In Feb/Mar 2003, the sales of condoms in the red light area of Mumbai tripled. The reason behind...

A question was asked a few days back on the Credit Card Industry in India , and how to market that in the Indian Markets. Based on the limited experience in the Credit Card Industry, following were some of the inputs I had to offer: My Response To study the Credit Card Industry in India, from my experience and perspective, you would need to tap the following resources and ideas: (a) There have been quite a few White Papers published on the Credit Card markets in India - You can refer to the backdated issues of Business World/BT/Student Papers/Indiainfoline (I am not sure of the date though). My take is that why start from scratch when someone has already put in effort to collate data. You can leverage that and work on it. (b) Get in touch with a few front-line executives who would be able to route you to the correct resources - to get information on these. (c) A major chunk of the market of Credit Cards is held by HSBC and ICICI. You should read up on these banks specifically. (d) ...

Starting today, every week, I plan to put up a new Pill for the Market-eaters, er, Marketers! The weekly dose of 20-25 questions should fill your apetite. They call it “Brand Equity” – I call it “ P+ ”…. Weekly dose to energize and rejuvenate your Brand Genes! Collected from various sources, here is the first set presented to you of P+: Large quantities of Sunlight soap had begun to be manufactured at the original Levers soap factory in the UK. A large part of the residue was soap, good in quality. Lord Leverhume added rich red colour to it to produce a germicidal soap. Which brand are we talking about? (Lifebuoy) Which brand derives its name from Laxmi, the goddess of wealth? (Lakme) What famous brand name is derived from a combination of two words, which mean 'dead' in French and 'one' in German? (Mortien) Which was the first ever brand endorsed by Sachin Tendulkar? (Band Aid) Which company introduced the successful Aspirin tablets in 1915? (Bayer) Which was the firs...

Having spoken about the creator - the Ad Agency , and the Ramayana behind it, time to talk about the creativity - the Strategy behing the campaign! Time again, Amul has been cleped as a “ Social Observer ”, with the Friday-to-Friday star coming out with a verdict on the most talked about topic in the country, and of course, what it means to her in her own “ priceless ” world! (that’s where Amul is derived from – Amulya = priceless in Sanskrit) "Only a serial or event that is very popular or very unpopular and controversial will feature on the Amul ads," "We try to identify the most popular aspect of a serial in terms of a particular character, a catch line or an event that got the common man talking about it. There has to be something about it to make it stand out from the rest," – This is what you would get from the creators of the Ads, on the Advertising Strategy they follow for Amul Campaign. Another area where Amul has expanded its multi-media campaign, includ...

A brand that has been discussed time and again, and has been talked about by more than 3 generations. A company that relies only on a single theme behind its advertisements, for 39 Years continuously ? A Theme that has one of the highest brand recalls ever? An effort that has been internationally appreciated for its consistency, wits and innovation… A brand .. the utterly butterly delicious… which, in true sense, is an Adman’s creation! It might sound clichéd at the onset, but I wont be talking about Amul, per se (though that’s an interesting case study in itself), but more so, the Admen and the Agency behind this creation. What has been the history behind this revolution? An epiphany or a market research? A creative big bang, or an innovative insight? Who are the drivers of this moppet? What is the Advertising Strategy of the agency? Let me seek some answers in this Ps than frame questions…. Reiterating the Amul ( Anand Milk Union Limited ) story would be a redundant effort, since it ...