Indian IT – Crisis Or No Crisis?

Wipro lays off 600 employees due to poor performance. Cognizant fires 6000 employees consequent to its annual appraisal. So on and so forth. The media is full of bad news about the Indian IT Industry. Notwithstanding that, rumors of existential crisis for the industry are grossly exagerrated. Whether you use a bell curve or a … Read more

Can Chatbots Replace Humans?

If you think bots will never replace human agents, you’re amongst the lucky few who has been served by intelligent human agents. Let's stop pretending that the average Customer Service Rep has an IQ of 140 when we believe that chatbots are not intelligent enough to replace human agents. https://t.co/ErzpUfMmLP via @verge . #CustomerService pic.twitter.com/ujDj2l3593 … Read more

How To Win A Deal By “Sharing An RFP Template”

“Can you give us an RFP template to share with our client?”, asked one of our customers recently. “We can Google it but you can save us the trouble if you have something readymade”. Good they didn’t use Google. There’s lot more to sharing an RFP template than finding, downloading and handing over a standard … Read more

Why Gmail When Hosting Provider Gives Free Mail Boxes?

After trying out a half-dozen hosting providers, I settled on one that I’ll call ACME. Among other things, I selected ACME for its following two features: Hosting for virtually unlimited domains on a single hosting plan Free unlimited number of mail boxes, each with virtually unlimited storage (subject only to the overall storage limit under … Read more

How To Fire Developers And Assemble Software From APIs

A few months ago, I’d visited the South Indian temple town of Tirupati with my family. On the way, whenever the train stopped at a station, the engine was switched off. But the air-conditioning still worked because it was powered by huge battery packs installed in the AC coach. Coincidentally, the manufacturer of these battery … Read more

Uber Creates Loyalty To The Deal But Not For The Brand

In his book Loyalty 3.0, author Rajat Paharia, Founder of gamification solution provider Bunchball, says that loyalty programs of most brands generate loyalty to the deal but completely fail at their fundamental purpose of fostering loyalty for the brand. Uber is a great example of one such brand. The world’s largest rideshare company extensively uses … Read more

Why COD Still Rules Ecommerce In India

Contrary to popular belief, Flipkart didn’t pioneer ecommerce in India. That distinction belongs to Fabmall, the startup that introduced ecommerce in the mid-1990s well before Flipkart was founded in 2007. I remember placing orders from a dial-up modem in 1998 and paying online by credit card, which was the only mode of payment supported by … Read more

Mastering Targeted Offers – The Uber Way

Uber uses targeted offers as the bedrock of its customer engagement management (CEM) strategy. For the uninitiated, a targeted offer is a personalized deal for an individual customer segment – or even individual customer. It’s the antithesis of spam, where the same deal is sent to all customers. A simple example of a targeted offer … Read more

Unschackle Your Inside Sales To Make It More Aggressive

As SAAS gains traction, software companies are making greater use of inside sales. According to Salesforce, inside sales is growing 300% faster than outside sales. With more and more sales development representatives fishing in the same pond, the market is getting crowded. As a result, inside sales is finding it ever harder to get through … Read more