Category: India

  • Yodel Tales

    I’ve always wanted to catch a big web entity’s brand campaign. No, Zapak and Rediff are not included because those were more product feature led campaigns, mail or to a lesser extent-gaming (because that was more a concept). I did find a few instances of ambient advertising from Zapak interesting though. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of any rediff ads. It is disappointing because given Rediff’s eminent status among Indian sites, it would be great to see it create some brand ads based on the Indian internet scene, and to cement its position. Having said that, Rediff has created a lot of this equity already, so maybe they don’t feel a necessity.

    So, I was happy to note that Yahoo is planning a campaign in India (via Ideasmarkit), though again, its product centric- Yahoo Search. You can catch the TVC here. The idea is to show that sometimes every second matters, and Yahoo Search gets you results faster. Taking this further, Yahoo hopes this will make the audience choose them as the start page. This move is understandable, in a market dominated by Google’s search. But I’d say that Yahoo could’ve thought of a much more creative way to say this, than making fun of a man’s speech defect (stammering)

    That being said, Yahoo seems to be taking India very seriously, since they have even launched (in limited beta) a social network targeted at the college going audience in India – SpotM (via TechCrunch). It has SMS integration with anonymous chat that will let users correspond via SMS without revealing their phone number. The other key development is the testing (again limited beta) of a new front page. (via Contentsutra) I like the fact that Yahoo is acknowledging user needs – the fact that they are emphasising apps from Yahoo and from third parties, including a dashboard with a way to view email from multiple providers, also gives me a perspective on confidence in their own content and services. 

    So I’ll have to wait to see that brand campaign. I would’ve loved to see the Yahoo purple campaign in India. The idea lends itself to a variety of activities, most notably on Flickr. I wonder though what’s the status on the city specific sites that Yahoo came up with sometime back. I, for one, thought it was a pretty neat idea. Let’s hope Yahoo hits a purple patch in India soon. 🙂

    until next time, Y!

  • In the news

    Sometime back, I’d written about the need for newspapers to give the digital medium a bit more consideration in their strategy. While India claims to buck the trend of falling newspaper subscriptions, I wonder how many economies have a thriving newspaper ‘raddi‘ market, the process through which the Indian household gains money by selling old newspapers as scrap.

    A few days back, Google announced its efforts to bring old newspapers onto the internet. The Google News Archive is being expanded and will let you search newspaper archives from decades back. I did a few searches, and for now it only has the already digitized versions of newspapers (in India), its a long and arduous task, but well worthwhile for Google. Over time, they plan to blend these into Google search results also. 

    Meanwhile, the latest group to join the anti Google-Yahoo bandwagon happen to be WAN (World Association of Newspapers) Their concern is that advertisers will increasingly migrate to Google from Yahoo when they see diminishing price advantages on the latter. (via Startup Meme) So the deal will give Google ‘super powers’ and weaken the competition in the search-ad market, since the two players had so far forced each other to give the best possible terms to publishers, like newspapers who offer display and search ads on their websites – a consortium of 200 US newspapers run Yahoo ads. 

    So newspapers are afraid that their revenue from third party ads served by Google/Yahoo would reduce? To me, it looks like if they had developed better ways of selling their own ad space, maybe they wouldn’t be looking like a bunch of whining kids. It adds to my belief that newspapers refuse to treat the online medium with the respect it deserves, and only react when their turf/revenue gets affected. I recently read this post, which explains how, many newspapers and magazines employ their regular ‘interruption advertising model’ even on their websites. 

    However, some top newspapers, are showing exactly why they are where they are. The NYT has an offer of a ‘print ad free with an online ad’. A daring reversal, that is perhaps aimed at switching the relative positions of print and digital, from a revenue perspective? The WSJ, has changed its design recently, and that includes adding a social network, the big deviation from normal procedure being that this one has paid access. While this might be considered not-so-smart in the era of free Facebook and LinkedIn networks, I think Mashable’s argument in favor of WSJ’s move has merit. The Time article also states that this might become available to non paying users as well, and there are plans to integrate it with existing social networks.  I think that if WSJ can back this move with some really good content that is flitered for its elite paying subscribers, this could be a long term winner.

    And while all that’s been happening across the seas, Google’s relationship with local newspapers is different. It has come up with Google News in Malayalam, which indexes news from almost all leading offline and online sources, with Malayala Manorama conspicuous by its absence. Other languages are coming soon. (via Medianama) 

    With digitising newspaers and local language news Google seems to be pushing from different directions. But, as these sites have shown in search, it is possible to best Google. For newspapers, its not just Google, there are different threats. For example, GateHouse Media is starting an online-only daily in Batavia, NY. They see tremendous opportunity for a local news and community site, since the leading local newspaper does not have content on its website. (via Publishing 2.0) This opportunity could exist in any place with good internet penetration and where the local newspaper hasn’t capitalised on that. On a sidenote, here’s a good post on how the traditional syndication means used by newspapers might expect a reversal soon. 

    Newspapers really need to pull up their socks and figure out how the digital media figure in their strategy. Now, though I might get lynched for this, already Web18’s consolidated reach has beaten that of the Times Group (India’s largest media entity), on the internet. And in.com, the portal which I think would be their flagship property on the internet, is still in beta. Why is the Times Group, with the #1 selling English daily, #1 finance daily, several language dailies, TV channels, radio stations etc not India’s #1 website. I think its a mindset issue.  

    I wonder, whether, with rising newsprint costs, and environmental concerns ( trees geting cut for newsprint), it might be a good idea for newspapers to start work on a Kindle like thing to distribute content, especially after I read this recent story on Kindle.

    until next time, print this?

  • Cause and Effects

    Sometime back I’d written about the potential of the net, and especially the latest community version to do good to humanity. One of the startups that was presented at TC50 (had written about TC 50 in the last post) was CauseCast. Its aim is to bring ten non profit companies into the spotlight every month. How does it do this? By getting celebrities involved, and communicating about the companies through videos, events, and showcasing the activities it does. Every activity has its own celebrity who champions the cause. The causes are broadly divided into animals, arts, community, environment, health, human rights and youth. They also have contextual news for each category. For example, I saw a  news item on Army killings in Manipur under Human Rights. The best part is how it involves the user community. The user can make a portfolio of the causes he has donated for. Over a period of time the list would start reflecting the performance of the companies. The portfolio can also be publicised using a widget on the user’s blog, for example. 

    There are ways for brands to get involved in philanthropy too, in ways which make business sense. Philips has a wonderful program, referred to as ‘philanthropy by design’ which is aiming at social innovation, designing things that help bridge the gap between technology and people. In what’s a very long term vision, it tries to “provide people the means of generating the income necessary to pay for your products.” There’s an interesting Indian piece of this here, which explains how this designing is tied up with employment opportunites and micro financing. The ICICI effort is more than a month old, but is in context. ICICI tied up with an NGO named Dignity Foundation, and created a portal DignitySecondCareers.org, whose aim is to “provide the retirees a platform to explore opportunities that will enable them to continue to utilize their expertise and to encourage them to lead an active post-retirement life.” (via WATBlog).

    As the examples show, these initiatives may not be the cash cow projects in terms of revenue, but the effect it has on the social and human side of life, and the equity it can thereby create for the brand is immense. With some tweaking in the organisation’s mindset/perspective, it can gain tremendous long term benefits.

    Mashable has a good read on starting local support systems, and again, bridging the gap between the real world and social media.  Speaking of local causes, I happened to come across Rang De (via HeadStart), a non profit organisation that has set up a Peer to Peer (P2P) lending platform to connect the socially conscious with those who are financially disadvantaged. “Rang De’s mission is to make microcredit accessible to all by lowering interest rates by doing things differently.” I went through the site, and their model is win-win for both parties – the lender and the borrower. Yes, you would get better returns if you rode the sensex waves, but hey, if that’s the criterion, this endeavor is not for you. I think the concept, like Kiva, is amazing and begins to address India’s substantial need for micro credit very well.  The geographical spread is right now limited to Maharashtra and TN, but its quite scalable, I think (i already saw 3 towns about to be added).  I am going to try Rang De out very very soon, and shall update on my experience. Meanwhile, on an immediate basis, I’m playing the quiz, in this very cool effort – HelpBihar.in, by Quasar Media and Cadence to help those affected in Bihar. Go on, do your bit.

    A few days back, we (my wife and I) made what some might call a strange decision. We chose to go through Give India, rather than Helpage, both are non profit organisations operating in roughly the same space, though Helpage is more focused. The strangeness comes from the fact that Give india takes a percentage of the sum we give for covering its expenses, Helpage doesn’t mention that. The value it adds, and the reason we shifted loyalty was because it sends us a mail every month (or whenever you make a donation) giving us the details of exactly how and on whom the money was spent. While Helpage’s site is far better designed than Give India, the latter has a web 2.0 characteristic I value – transparency. I guess even when we save humanity, we have changed such that we need some accountability. 😐

    until next time, be human

  • Talk of the Town

    A while back I’d read about Burrp, which started out as a great restaurant reviews site, expanding into lifestyle events – Art, Dance, Fashion, Film, Fairs & Festivals, Theater, and so on. Check out the entire bunch here. They’d also added TV listings. While it’s quite a diversification, I thought it was quite in sync with what they were doing so far, but it also means that it broadens their competition. 

    Among the bunch in the link mentioned, I thought Yulop was a great package, with their services spread across web and mobile. Meanwhile, I’ve been coming across a lot of websites appearing in the restaurant based services space – Grubhogs , which has reviews, and already shows the beginning of an event calendar, and A Place to Dine, which, in addition to listings, also allows for online orders and table reservations, and services for restaurant owners from website setting up and hosting to loyalty programs. It even has mobile versions. A very interesting path.

    I guess these new services ‘justify’ Burrp’s move into the events space, an expansion of the value proposition. I found some interesting associations here. Burrp has tie ups with Mirror (The Times Group) websites- Mumbai, Bangalore and Kolkata. I also read today that Buzzintown has tied up with MyToday SMS services, to provide its users events related information on the mobile, in three cities. 

    There are some very cool happening in the events space. Buzzd , a service in the US allows the user to find and share local events on the mobile. They have recently tied up with Virgin to provide data to the operator’s subscribers. I’m not sure on how the numbers are for city based searches on mobile, but I wonder if Yulop, with all their services and info, could benefit by tying up with an Airtel/ Vodafone. While on local events, Placecast, which describes itself as  “the world’s largest place-based interactive media company” has tied up with Eventful to produce some interesting location based advertising options. (via Mashable) 

    With the increasing usage of social networks, even events are finding their own long tails. So there are services which offer event planning for smaller groups. And while there are several event planning services available (including an Indian one called Funpiper), Doodle scores by having a facebook application that lets users collaborate on events. It also sends emails to non-Facebook users. Another service that stands out is Zipiko, which offers event planning on mobile.(via Center Networks)

    But before we get there, I think there’s a lot of scope for city based social networks, especially the mobile version. I came across an interesting net based service – Fwix, which, in addition to the usual stuff, and integration with Twitter, Yelp, Flickr etc, shows you “the most relevant and trendy information and media in your local area. It aggregates about 500,000 news stories per day, and delivers roughly 2,000 relevant news stories of those 500,000.” (via Startup Meme). But i guess, that will take us back to this earlier post of mine.

    until next time, text and the city

  • Blurring Social Networking lines

    ET had a story sometime back on how sites like Facebook, LinkedIn etc are helping SMEs and entrepreneurs gain business. It adds on to my belief that when the target is niche market segments, the net is the best medium to try out.The more encouraging part for me is that since these media are working for them, they even plan You Tube ads. So, they grow the medium, and the medium grows them!!

    Yes, social networking is not exactly the most known thing in the world, as this article would argue, but as far as online behaviour goes, the Indian stats are a bit encouraging on some parameters. And, with efforts like these, our internet penetration figures might start looking up sonner rather than later.

    So what have the social networks been upto? Lets start with business networking, where I’ve been reading about a lot of new launches. A new business network called ZaaBiz has been launched in India. More details on its activities can be found here.

    Konnects hopes to bridge the gap between Facebook and LinkedIn. According to them, Facebook has not been designed for business purposes, while LinkedIn is too restrictive. So, Konnects has come out with a few features, that will even enable even fresh graduates, who don’t have many years of work experience or projects to show, to share the projects they’re working on. Konnects, based on your profile, will reccomend groups and discussions that you should be part of, and plans to introduce IM and VoIP integration in the future. (via Mashable) I think all these together make it a very differentiated value proposition.

    The third interesting new site I came across is Publictivity. It aims to use social networking to boost productivity, by allowing users (in organisatons)to create work groups, and share information, files and it even has a video viewing mechanism. What I loved the site for, and it has nothing to do with the service, is that they have used Dunder Mifflin (of The Office fame) and an option to chat with Dwight!! Awesome example!!

    The last one I came across is 2Vouch, an Australian social recruiting website which offers referral rewards, with an option to donate to charity also. Companies don’t have to pay to advertise, they only need to pay if they hire a candidate. (via Mashable) The concept is interesting but I wonder about possible loopholes. Is it, for example, possible for a company to get the contact details of a candidate and then route it through other means?

    So, what has LinkedIn been upto meanwhile? For one, it’s been adding small features, like highlighting the sections of a profile that have changed, since you last saw it. (via Digital Inspiration) It has added enhanced group features, that includes a centralised group hub page. (via Tech Crunch). It has also tied up with CNBC to air content generated by its users on CNBC. (via PluggdIn) I share the view that most of these are quite basic features, and LinkedIn not only needs to be adding such things much faster, but introducing innovations too.

    This is of more significance, when we consider that the competition is not only new business networking sites, which are coming out with some neat innovations and targeting specific requirements, its also generic social networking sites like Facebook, if we go by certain studies, which raises the possibility of  business networking on Facebook superceding that on LinkedIn.

    Speaking of social networks, the interesting part is that inspite of the demise of entities like Yahoo Mash, new social networks still seem to be popping up. I read a post on Fwix, which, in addition to a great GUI, also shows the user, the most trendy information going on in his locality, by aggegating about 500000 stories per day. It also allows add on services, the list includes YouTube, MeetUp, Eventful Delicious, Twitter, Flickr and just about any you can think up. BBC has also launched its radio social networking site Radio PoP. And the omnipresent Google, in addition to its own social network Orkut, has opened up another front by adding a twitter-like ‘following feature’ to its blogging service – Blogger, so that users can now become ‘fans’ of other blogs. They have integrated it with Google Reader, and also plan to integrate Google Friend Connect into this, which brings it closer to creating blog based communities. (via The Inquisitr)

    There are new tools that are emerging in the social media space. How Sociable, which allows you to track your brand in the social media space; Lotame, an online advertising agency that is looking at changing the way advertising happens in social media,  Edopter, a way to discover and share trends in fashion, lifestyle, music and so on. New models are on the horizon, like contextual search in social media. The tools are there, its now for individuals and brands to make sure that they are used to their full potential. Like this article correctly states, business can no longer afford to ignore social media, and what GM has done – launching an anti-misinformation site, is perhaps a great start.

    until next time, socialise