PINless Card Payments – Innovative Or Harebrained?

I’ve been asked many times to weigh in on the new PINless regime for credit and debit card payments in India. Most recently it was on Quora, where I was asked to answer the following question: Why is it not required to enter a PIN to authenticate a credit or debit card in many countries? … Read more

Britannia “Morning Jackpot” CEM – Making Digital Easier Than Paper

I came across a Customer Engagement Management program on Britannia bread recently. The program was called Morning Jackpot and it was run jointly between India’s leading bread and biscuit manufacturer Britannia and Payment Service Provider PayTM. Like in any other digital CEM program, each pack of the product – Britannia Healthy Slice and Britannia 100% Whole bread, in this case – … Read more

Are Digital Natives Losing Their Data Chops?

According to the popular narrative, new age companies leverage data in virtually every facet of their business (as against traditional companies that run on intuition). To a large extent, this belief is right. Many digital natives owe their spectacular rise in the last decade or two to their prowess with data and analytics. A big … Read more

One – And Maybe Only – Way To Revive Payments Banks

Every time I go to this leading public sector bank, I see a long line of people outside the branch. “Outside the branch” is the operative phrase because these people literally stand outside the branch. I found out that they’re migrant laborers who queue up to send money from large cities where they work to their family … Read more

Two New Ways To Overcome The Twitter Identity Crisis

It’s not easy to find someone on Twitter. This includes handles of individual tweeples as well as brands. This creates an identity crisis of sorts on Twitter. In a 2013 blog post entitled The Severe Identity Crisis On Twitter For Digital Marketers, I’d suggested the following tools to overcome the Twitter identity crisis: Twitter Search … Read more

Five Google Backdoors You Probably Didn’t Know

Sometimes you can use Google to find information stored in a certain website or app that you can’t by using the website or app itself. I call these hacks “Google Backdoors”. Here are five Google Backdoors I use regularly. #1. BUSINESS FINDER A new restaurant opened in my neighborhood. Its owner said they delivered via … Read more

Communications – Low Hanging Fruit For Enhancing CX

In Poor Communications: The Seventh Deadly CX Killer, I described the painful experience of activating the new credit cards I recently received from my bank. To recap, I didn’t get a paper PIN mailer as was customary during the previous renewals, and the instructions given by the bank on how to activate the new cards on … Read more

Poor Communications: The Seventh Deadly CX Killer

In Killing The Six Deadly CX Killers, I attributed six key reasons for poor customer experience (CX) and what brands could do to get rid of them, thus enhancing their CX. In this post, I’ll cover the seventh deadly CX killer: Poor communications. I have a Visa credit card issued by a Top 5 private … Read more

Mastering PUSH Notifications – The PayTM Way

In Four Out Of Five Brands Get PUSH Notification Wrong, I shared my experience with PUSH notifications from four leading brands. I found it impossible or very cumbersome to redeem the targeted offers made by them. At the end of the post, I promised to share the rare example of a brand that gets PUSH notifications right. To … Read more