Official Blog of GTM360 Marketing Solutions
People throw around the M word too freely. Whenever a company increases its price, behaves arrogantly, sucks at customer service, or acts in any other manner against the consumer’s proximate interest, Jane / Joe Six Pack rushes to accuse it of being a monopoly. This is wrong. Monopoly means there’s only one supplier in a … Read more
Forty years ago, people used to ask, we have FORTRAN for scientific applications and COBOL for business applications, why do we need PASCAL, C++, and dBaseIII+? Twenty five years ago, the question changed to, we have C++ and Foxpro, what’s the need for Java and .NET? Ten years ago, people wondered why a decentralized app … Read more
(This post is a slightly edited version of my answer to the above Quora question.) Equating the cash handling capabilty of a vending machine with that of an ATM is like saying a shovel and 80 feet container are the same because they both handle loads. Most vending machines only accept coins. The few that … Read more
Branding is often conflated with marketing and other elements of marketing. Before we clear some of the misconceptions about branding and amplify some of its other attributes, let me copy-paste the definitiion of branding from our previous post titled Power Of Branding In B2B. Branding “Branding” is endowing products and services with the power of … Read more
I described ticketing problems with Pune Metro in my previous posts titled Pune Metro First Impressions and Pune Metro Second Impressions. I experienced another ticketing snafu on my third trip. I bought a return ticket from Ruby Hall Clinic to Vanaz (the two terminuses of the Aqua Line). I got off at Vanaz Station and … Read more
PayTM is the first digital payment product I’ve used at scale in India. When RBI enforced the two factor authentication mandate for online payments, bill payments became a major PITA. By requiring users to fill credit card number, expiration date, and half a dozen fields, Reg 2FA caused tremendous friction. After they received the OTP, … Read more
According to the popular narrative, branding is needed only in B2C. That’s not true. Branding plays an equally important role for B2B products and services. For the purpose of this blog post, we will use the following definition of branding: Branding “Branding” is endowing products and services with the power of a brand. Where a … Read more
The Indian capital markets recently moved from T+2 to T+1 settlement. For the uninitiated, under T+2 regime, you got two days to deliver stock that you sold and the buyer got two days to pay you for the stock she bought. Under T+1 regime, both you and the buyer get only one day. Many self-styled … Read more
In Five Pricing Paradoxes, we covered many pricing paradoxes and speculated on why they happen. In this post, we will examine if and how they need to be fixed. Is There A Problem? While there’s a logic to pricing paradoxes, we cannot expect the Average Customer to accept them. As a result, they will complain about … Read more
According to common wisdom, middleman adds a margin, so his price will be higher than the original manufacturer’s price. Why do D2C brands price their products higher on their own website and make them cheaper on marketplaces like Amazon? I always assumed buying from their website is cheaper, given they save on commissions. What's the … Read more