The only Constant Change!

The only constant in the world – change. The business world is too stimulating and it bombards the consumers continuously with stimulus and messages. As a result people are jaded and a sense of Déjà vu prevails. They are becoming cynical and crave for change

One way of exciting customers and shaking them out of their stupor is to innovate or making things appear, new and exciting. In a world dominated by Google, everything is accessible and easy to get. The customers have to be thrown off their zone of comfort. They have to be taken by the scruff of their neck and be shown how the new product, idea, concept or service is the only thing that matters.

This is one challenge that all marketers have to face and the companies that can adapt to the challenge and the changing market place will emerge as winners a la Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp. Companies that are myopic behave like ostriches. Ostriches it is believed bury their heads in the sand when an enemy approaches.

They think that just because they can’t see the enemy, the enemy can’tsee them. Meanwhile the enemy nicely sits at a dining table, takes out a nice sharp knife and makes a meaty meal of the obliging ostrich. These companies become dinosaurs and remain a byline in the business history.

Discussed below are some jaw dropping innovations; a car that can be bought at a very reasonable price, pizzas being delivered by drones, a company that encourages piracy and a CEO who eats his company’s dog food …. read on and be zapped!.

Car at a very reasonable price (The customer foots only 25% of the cost and pays 24 of the 60 EMI installments)-:Dreamers Media and Advertising launched an interesting scheme for Out Of Home (OOH) advertising. The company will pay the EMI of the car which the customer buys through them; in return the customer will have to allow Dreamers to run advertisements on their cars.

All of us have seen radio taxis with advertisements on them, which helps the taxi companies in boosting profits. Dreamers is trying to do the same and this can benefit those who don’t care much about what the exteriors of their cars says or has on it.

So how does it work? The customer decides a car he wants to buy (up to a maximum of Rs. 6 lakhs) and pay 25% as down payment on the 5 year loan. The car will be brought through Dreamers who will then pay the first three years EMI on the vehicle. The remaining 2 years EMI will have to be paid by the customer. Anyone who travels a minimum of 1500 kms a month is eligible.

The company will cover 40 to 60% of the car’s exterior with advertisements and the customer has to keep the car clean and not tamper with the stickers or VTS (a device which tracks how many kms have been driven by the customer).

Dreamers Media and Advertising is targeting customers from middle income group who have an annual income of less than Rs. 10 lakhs. The stickers used on the vehicle will be Vinyl printed using eco solvent inks. Clarity about other terms like in cases of dents and accidents as to who will bear the cost of replacing the stickers is still not clear.

A 24×7 call center has been put in place to ensure smooth functioning of the system. The company is betting big on higher budgets from advertisers, increasing commuting distance and decreasing penetration of newspapers and televisions.

So what is the benefit? Let’s take the Honda Brio’s MT for example. The vehicle costs Rs. 5.55 lakhs (on-road, Mumbai). The ex-showroom price is Rs. 4,89,425/-. 25% down payment will be 1,22,356/-. The pending amount which will be the loan is Rs. 3,67,069/-. EMI will be Rs. 8064/- at an interest rate of 12% (Dreamers might get lower interest rate as they will be having higher volumes).

Dreamers will end up paying Rs. 2,90,304/- and the remaining two years EMI will be Rs. 1,93,536/-. So in total, the customer will end up paying Rs. 3,76,467/- (Rs 60,575 for insurance and taxes + 25% down payment of 1,22,356 + 24 months of EMI of Rs 1,93,536) for a Rs. 5.55 lakh car. The customer’s total saving will be Rs. 1,73,533/-.but actually it is Rs 2,90,000 as it has to be paid if Dreamers was not subsidizing the car.

There are very few cars which fit in this scheme since most cars go above Rs. 6 lakhs in price. A diesel car will be easier to haveas the minimum running has to be 1500 kms a month.I have many doubts about this scheme; will people like this idea? Will the customer like being a part of a big advertisement?

What if the company where the customer is working is a competitor for the company advertised on the car?What if the general public mistakes the customer as a representative of the company being advertised and asksfor a demonstration and for free samples? What if they think of the customer as a travelling salesman?The general public might think that the car is a cab and stop it for a ride?How would the car be taxed - as a private vehicle or a commercial vehicle?

Domicopter (Drone delivery system):Domino’s Pizza made headlines when the company’s independent U.K. franchisor released a YouTube video of a drone delivering pizzas.A one minute video featuring the “DomiCopter” flying over fields, trees, and homes to deliver two pizzas had become hugely popular.

The story made national and international news, appearing on websites for CNNMoney, US News and World Report and several other media outlets. Despite the interest, the DomiCopter won't be put to regular use. Domino’s was always looking to innovate and find new ways to deliver its pizza and a DomiCopter could fit the bill perfectly in the future.

The popularity of the Pizza company depends on speedy delivery and Dominos is committed to staying in that leadership position of delivering its Pizza as fast as possible.One day pizzas could fly. Freemium - If you can’t beat them – join them:Gamers recently downloaded Game Dev Tycoon, a new title from a tiny start-up Greenheart Games.

The game challenged players to build a game developer and turn the game developer from a tiny operation to a mighty studio capable of turning out hits. The only problem was that the gamers downloaded a pirated version of the game instead of paying $7.99 for the official version. And no matter how well they managed their assets, their in-game funds dwindled as the new games they created was pirated by unscrupulous crooks. Eventually their virtual game-development firm went bust.

The entire sequence of events is the brain child of Greenheart Games' founders, brothers Patrick and Daniel Klug, who released this self-defeating pirated version to highlight the challenges budding games developers face in the online world. They realized that piracy was inevitable and transpired to hit the gamers where it hurts the most, the inability to play the game as intended.

Within 24 hours of release 93% of gamers had opted to download the cracked version of the game while only 214 gamers paid the fee of 7.99 US $ that the brothers were asking for on their website greenheartgames.com for the genuine official version of the game.

Game Dev Tycoon isn't the first developer to hit the pirates in this innovative fashion. In 2001 a first-person shooter called Operation Flash Point was released with an addition; if the game was pirated, the players' weapons would become less and less accurate, and less powerful. Eventually the players would be slaughtered.

Similarly a pirated version of Grand Theft Auto IV sees the gamers’ gangster character Niko Bellic stumble around like a drunk, making completing the game practically impossible. These types of stunts draw attention to how developers have to adapt to new 'freemium' and pay-per-play business models to stay one step ahead of the pirates.

Dogfooding is a term used where a company uses its own product to demonstrate the quality and capabilities of the product. In other words the company is practicing what it preaches!Dogfooding can be a way for a company to demonstrate confidence in its own products. The idea is that if the company expects customers to buy its products, it should also be willing to use the same products. Hence dogfooding can act as a kind of testimonial advertising.

One perceived advantage beyond marketing is that dogfooding allows employees to test their company's products in real-life scenarios and gives management a sense of how the product will be used, all before launch to consumers.In software development, the practice of dogfooding and private testing can allow several validation passes before the code is integrated with the normal customer ready software.

In the 1970s television advertisements for Alpo dog Food, Lorne Greene pointed out that he fed Alpo to his own dogs. Another possible origin is the president of Kal Kan Pet Food, who was said to eat a can of his dog food at shareholders' meetings. In 1988, Microsoft manager Paul Maritz sent Brain Valentine test manager, Microsoft LAN an email titled "Eating our own Dogfood", challenging him to increase internal usage of the company's product. From thereon, the usage of the term spread through the company.

The development of Windows NT at Microsoft involved over 200 developers in small teams, focused on dogfooding, using a daily build or feed, initially text only, then with graphics, and finally with networking. It was initially crash prone, but the immediate feedback of code breaking and the knowledge of obstructing the work of others and the possible delay in launching of the software were all powerful incentives in making it better.

By:Dr M Anil Ramesh