RIP Google Plex – But Big Tech Can Still Disrupt Big Banks

Bank accounts are not heavily branded, barring IndusInd Bank and a few more exceptions. The fifth largest private sector bank in India tries to create a strong brand for its bank account on the back of differentiators like return of canceled cheque. (For the uninitiated, banks return canceled cheques to customers by default in USA … Read more

Colgate Total PayTM Cashback – Most Rewarding CEM Ever?

Colgate-Palmolive is currently running a Customer Engagement Management program for its premium toothpaste brand TOTAL. Like all CEM programs, this one also mandates product purchase. The price of the product is INR 102 (US$ 1.25) and the reward for purchase is a cashback of INR 50 (US$ 0.67) credited directly to the consumer’s PayTM eWallet. … Read more

If The Pandemic Persists, Indian IT Will Enter Fortune Global 500 Next Year

The title of this blog post might sound insensitive at first glance but I couldn’t find a better way to capture the fact that Covid-19 has favorably impacted some companies and adversely impacted others on the FORTUNE magazine’s ranking of the top 500 corporations in the world. Last year, I predicted: … the assymetric nature … Read more

Calling BS of Disruption of B2B Sales

It has become a favorite pastime for a lot of people to predict the disruption of B2B sales. (Ditto banks, telcos, et al.) Take the author of this LinkedIn post entitled Enterprise Sales Has Been Disrupted – Why Sales Pros Should Care for instance. Like disruption talk in many other areas, this is a sureshot … Read more

Calling BS Of The “Indian Market Is Big Enough For Indian Companies” Myth

Every now and then, somebody points to the challenges of cracking the overseas markets and claims that the Indian market is big enough for Indian companies. Take the example of this founder of an Indian IT company, who commented as follows on LinkedIn: We (INDIA) can beat anyone in the world with Quality First, Customer … Read more

Mark Of A Great Salesman In Today’s Strange And Unprecedented Times

There are countless theories on what it takes to be a great salesperson. When I began my career in sales back in the day, Harvard Business Review called out Empathy and Ego Drive as the most important qualities of a great salesperson. A few years later, it changed its mantra to “A good salesperson does … Read more

Corporate Gift Supplier Pivots To Technology Company

Here’s our latest success story: Corporate Gift Supplier Pivots To Technology Company Digital Transformation Accelerates Sales Cycle And Boosts Ticket Size The customer began its journey as the supplier of corporate gifts to midsize and large companies, who used them to reward their wholesalers, distributors, dealers, retailers, and agents aka “trade” for achieving their quota … Read more

Why B2B Marketing Should Be Targeted At Company – Not Users

We saw a spate of B2C marketers trying to get into B2B six to eight years ago. At the time, I’d shared my thoughts on how to harness emotions in B2B sales in my blog post titled Role Of Emotion In B2B Sales. Maybe it’s the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic or whatever but we’re … Read more

On The Internet, Nobody Knows You’re Not A Big Dog

If you glance through LinkedIn, you’ll find a lot of people who claim to be big shots at the Amazons, Googles and Microsofts of the world when they’re not. Neither LinkedIn nor the companies named in these fake profiles seem to give a damn about these impersonators. Even I’m guilty of the nonchalant behavior: There … Read more