China’s TCL corporation offered free health check ups for consumers who visited any of its 24 retail branches in India. It is a consumer electronics company and it sets to distinguish itself by showing concern for consumers health. Companies donate a certain percentage of sales for socially relevant causes such as water-harvesting, education, women’s empowerment. Coca Cola’s ‘drops of joy ‘ campaign features an emotional narrative where deaf and dumb are employed to inspect bottles by them.” Drops of joy ‘ cover all their cola and non-cola products. PepsiCo takes initiative on its activities on water and waste management. Honda campaign ‘ Nature rides with Honda ‘ features its concern for safety, environment and energy conservation. SKF, a bearing maker, burns lot of steel, and is thus concerned about reducing environmental pollution of carbon monoxide emissions.In their ad, a toddler is shown riding a toy car in the lush green field with the tag line ‘ We’re driving India to a cleaner future.’ It conveys their concern for future generations. Tata Tea’s ‘ Jaago India ‘ commercial connects the awakening effect of tea to social awakening. WorldSpace has launched a Go-green initiative. When a company shows concern with social causes, it empathises with the consumers. They then favour such a company and its products. Other things being equal, consumers tend to prefer brands associated with a good cause. There is likely to be an indepedent CSR audit of companies in future. Though in the short run these companies are a drag on the bottom line, they bring more returns in the long run.
Author: Shabbir Chunawalla
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Ibne Safi
Ibne Safi was born in Allahabad in 1928. He was a prolific and popular writer of Urdu crime fiction. He migrated to Pakistan soon after independence and continued to be popular in India for close to three decades owing to the availability of high quality translations.He passed away in 1980 in Karachi. He has extensive body of work — around 125 novels in the Jasusi Duniya series dealing with the exploits of Col Ahmad Kamal Faridi and his sidekick Capt. Sajid Hameed. There are another 120 odd books dealing with Imran, a buffoon who is a secret service chief. In all he produced around 241 detective novels. He put two novels a month at his peak. In 2010, a few Indian publishers approached his Karachi-based son for rights to translate his novels into English. Ahmad Safi, his son, has launched recently the translations of four of his father’s novels into English. These are Poisoned Arrow, Smokewater, The Laughing Corpse and Doctor Dread. The translator is Shamsur Rehman Faruqui. These books could be seen as the origins or at least the foreshadowing of some of the coventions of popular Hindi cinema of the 1970s and 1980s. The heroes were pitted against the villains. There were extravagant action scenes. There was a dose of comedy and romance. Javed Akhtar was inspired by Ibne Safi while creating larger-than-life characters such as Gabbar Singh and Mogambo. The sub-continent thought the West to be morally lax and a foreigner was not easily acceptable.
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Waste-to-Energy (WTE) Plants
Municipal waste is put on land reserved for this purpose, but with the rise in municipal waste in urban India, there is no land to fill such an enormous amount of waste, the estimated the waste production being 165 million tonnes by 2031 and 436 million tonnes by 2050.Right now India generates 70 million tonnes of waste a year, of which 80 per cent is dumped without precaution in landfills. These landfills emit toxic gases such as dioxins and greenhouse gases such as methane. The second method of waste disposal is composting which has not worked as the waste has not been segregated due to several reasons. Since we cannot stop the generation of waste and other methods are found ineffective, in the short to medium term, an alternative is to use WTE plants to take care of what cannot be reused or composted. Waste that is organic and 50 per cent is organic, can be gasified or composted. The problem is non-organic waste or mixed waste.
Waste-to-Energy plants are essentially doing controlled burning or incineration of waste to convert it into energy. Waste-to-energy plants are resented as they spread foul smell and fly ash. In developed countries such plants are located in the heart of the city. There is no significant public opposition to them. The WTE plant if well run does not leave any ground for opposition. If not well-run,. it is very dangerous Smell mostly comes when waste is transported. Waste can be transported in closed containers or underground. That takes care of the smell part. Burning causes pollution but modern technology is used to make it minimal. At 850 degree centigrade, dioxins and furans which are cancer causing are not produced. There is a scrubber that prevents fly ash from going through the smoke-stack.The waste has low calorific value, especially Indian waste on account of its high moisture content. Some energy is utilised to remove water or moisture from the waste. Western technology is not suited to deal with this problem and hence Chinese technology is used by Indian WTE companies.
In India, several plants of WTE are operational. Ramky is one company that builds such plants. The Okhla Waste-to-Energy plant is located between Apollo Hospital and CSRI at Delhi.There are plants at Jabalpur, Pallavpuram, Surat, Jawaharnagar (Hyderabad). These plants produce energy ranging from 5 megawatts to 25 megawatts. There is significant reduction in pollution as compared to coal.
The plants are high-cost and have a long pay-back period. The monitoring of gas emission in real time is difficult. The regulation must be sound.The plants put many out of the job.
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Some Bold Ads
Amritanjan balm is perceived as out-dated grandma’s therapy for pain relief. It was to be connected to youth. The love and affection route was used. A young man and his companion board a train, and he complains of a head-ache. A young woman follows him in the corridor, and offers to apply balm. As they retire for the night, the man assures that his wife is asleep on the upper berth while he reaches out to the young woman across the berth.The Agency is Shining Consulting.And the creative director Shombit Sengupta.
In Mirinda ad, a chief guest arrives at a college function. He notices people panting and breathless. The next day’s newspapers feature him and a teacher heaving and panting.The headline is ‘caught in the act.’ Created by Swati Bhattacharya of JWT. It is a tasteful but provocative ad. It has naughty tonality but it highlights the breathlessness concept of the campaign.
Lowe Lintas Aru Iyer Fasttrack ad shows an air-hostess entering cock-pit. As the pilot puts the plane on auto-pilot, the hands can be free for other activities — rather pleasurable activities. It was a little funny ad with innuendo, although in a classy manner. According to Piyush Pandey, innuendo is creativity, provided that it is culturally accepted.
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Transactional Analysis (TA)
Berne has put forward a useful framework for exchanges and relating to others ( 1964 ) . It is called Transactional Analysis ( TA ) which suggest three ways of relating. Each individual has three egos — parent ego, adult ego and child ego. Parent ego is learned from parents. It is protective and moralistic. Whenever in any situation, there is dependence or the question of morals and values, the parent ego is activated. A superior may exercise parent ego while dealing with the subordinates. The adult ego is reality-oriented, problem-centred and mature. It allows one to cope with stress. The child ego comes naturally to a youngster. It is an ego in helpless situation and dependent situation. It is playful and inquisitive. A successful transaction occurs when a teacher’s parent ego interacts with a student’s child ego. There is conflict if the teacher’s adult ego transacts with a youngster’s adult ego.
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Synthetic Biology
Synthetic biology is a rapidly expanding discipline that uses synthesized DNA, the genes of the most living organisms, to create biological functions not found in nature. These genes are edited ( using a computer ) and then synthesized from scratch ( using chemicals). In future, genes could be designed and printed. There are possibilities of finding solutions to problems of environmental pollution, shortage of food and energy. It is expected that synthetic bilogy would create food and fuel, drugs and chemicals. Scientists have found a way to write, erase and rewrite information into the DNA of bacteria called E coli. This ability to programme DNA could one dat let us switch off cells when they become cancerous.
Artemisin, anti-malarial drug, is currently extracted from plants. Funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the drug is created by inserting genes from various organisms into E.coli. This is a big milestone for synthetic biology, as the plants from which it is extracted are short in supply and grow slowly.
Viruses are seen as apps of biology providing infinite possibilities for us to credit new living systems. Viruses are chemical codes that add features to organisms they infect. A bacteriophase is a bacterium infected by a virus. Viruses can be used as diagnostic tools, as gene therapy.
Scaling is a big challenge for every synthetic biology application.Synthetic biology is drawing big research funds.
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Incretins to Control Blood Sugar
Insulin is secreted by pancreas in response to the rise in blood sugar after the intake of any food.Incretins enhance insulin secretion after eating.In digestion, two hormones are secreted — Glucagon-like Peptide I or GLP 1 and glucose-dependent Insulinotropic Polypeptide or GIP. Both these hormones are dissolved within minutes after their secretion by another gastro-intestinal hormone — Dipeptidyl Peptidase 4 or DPP 4.
Incretins can be used to control blood sugar in patients with Type 2 diabetes. They can be given GLP 1 analogue or we can increase the activity of incretin by inhibiting DPP4.Insulin levels are increased.
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Aroma Therapy
In the late 1920s, this therapy was discovered. In 1928, French chemist Rene-Maurice Gattefoss was working in his family-owned perfumery. There was a sudden explosion which burnt his hand. He quickly plunged it into a container of lavender oil. He was surprised to see it healing completely.
Aromatherapy
It is the practice of using volatile plant oils (including essential oils ) for psychological and physical well-being.
There are about 90 essential oils. There are Absolutes, Co2s and Hydrosols.Essential oil is a blanket term used for all of these. There are other complementary natural ingredients such as cold-pressed vegetable oils, jojoba ( a liquid wax ), hydrosols, herbs, milk powder, sea salts, sugars, clays and muds.
Perfume oils (fragrance oils) are not the same as essential oils. They have synthetic chemicals.
The US does not regulate aromatherapy.
When essential oils are inhaled into lungs, they stimulate the brain to trigger a reaction.Eucalyptus oil removes congestion.It is physically applied on the skin but should not be applied undiluted. It should be diluted in a carrier oil.
Oil blends can be used. It is to get synergy.
Jean Valnet, a French surgeon pioneered the medicinal uses of essential oils.The applications are three-fold — Aerial diffusion, direct inhalation andtopical application.
Absolutes are the fragrant oils extracted from flowers or delicate plant tissues. Carrier oil is oil such as sweet almond oil.
Herbal distillates or hydrosols are acqueous by-products of distillation process, e.g. rose water.
Aromatherapy is avoided in the first trimester of pregnancy and for those who are allergic to these substances or are asthmatic.It is avoided in people who get seizures. In those with B.P., we have to avoid stimulating oils such as rosemary and spite lavender. In estrogen-dependent tumours such as breast and ovarian cancer, we have to avoid estrogen like compounds such as fennel, aniseed, sage and clary-sage. We have to use this theray with caution in cancer patients on chemotherapy.
It is a complementary therapy. It is not to be used as major treatment.
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Factors Affecting Brand Potential
The future of a brand is affected by several impending factors.Let us examine these factors under five categories.
Manufacturer
Brand objectives must be communicated to all in the organisation. Organisational culture (OC ) and brand must match each other. Distinctive competence must be utilised to contribute to brand planning. Swatch uses its distinctive competence of design and production to satisfy the need of novelty watches of its fashion conscious consumers.
Organisations may decide to cut costs. But it should be seen whether the market is mature enough to put a product on par with the competitor but at a reduced price. If yes, then all aspects of the organisations value chain must be geared to cost reduction, e.g. operational efficiency by longer production runs, compact product mix, avoiding C class customers who contribute marginally, eliminating operational inefficiencies etc. It is to be seen whether the brand name can be leverged by charging a premium. The unique charactertic could be high quality, innovative production process, exceptionally good customer service, acclaimed advertising etc. When consumers expect a brand to deliver clear benefits, all the departments in the organisation must work harmoniously to maintain these benefits, e.g. helpful customer support executives on phone lines, the promptness in answering a query, the cleanliness of transportation etc. Sometimes an inherent added value is diminished by a link in the value chain — sale of quality insurance from a shabby office.
Organisational staff should have beliefs, values and attitudes conducive to brand success. Organisational culture must contribute to the brand’s mission.
Distributors
Brand strategy and distribution are related to each other. Distribution support is a pre-requisite for brand success. Each retailer has his own objectives. Manufacturer chooses those retailers whose objectives match his own objectives. Manufacturer must assess the strengths and weaknesses of each distributor. Retailer power is on the rise. It affects the bargainning power of manufacturers producing weaker brands. Retailers deal with manufacturers on their own terms. This undermines the well-being of manufacturer’s brands. Manufacturers must assess distributorwise sales proportion of their brands.Such analysis shows the respective strengths of the distributors. We have to see the synergy between our brand and the distributor outlet.
We have to assess the appropriateness of distributors for each brand. We have to consider what support must be given to the distributors. As shelf-space is limited,while introducing new products, research is necessary at the level of trade, apart from consumer research. A triangular design may be acceptable to the consumers, but retailers may resent it on account of stacking problems.
Consumers
Buying process, in essence, is a problem solving exercise for the consumers. A problem may be identified, say a proposed summer holiday. We then seek information through, travel literature and visit to a travel agent. We evaluate the information, say assessing three different destinations, and make a decision by selecting one of them through the travel agent. The process can vary depending upon the product, the buyer characteristics and experience. But this process is worked out for brand selection. Though someone may select the brand, someone else may use it. Marketers have thus to appeal to both the users and buyers. In industrial marketing, several individuals may be involved in buying. Marketers develop brand strategy in such a way that the benefits get communicated to each target group in a relevant fashion.
Brands minimize consumer search for information and evaluation. Brands bring to our memory a whole lot of relevant information. Consumers should be exposed to high quality bits of information. Surfeit of information causes confusion.
In the buying process, a brand plays a role at each stage. A business meeting calls for formal dress which tends to reduce the risk. In other situation, a Gucci Watch can make a life-style statement.
Competition
Brands are always compared to the competitive brands. But prior to this, it is necessary to identify our key competitors.Consumers can be asked to assess competitive brands which are similar to our brand. Once competitors are identified, their brand objectives and strategies must be studied.Previous experience may be a guide but we must also anticipate competitive response.
Returns are based on market share. The bigger the market share, the bigger the returns. Strong brands give us a better market share.
A brand leader becomes aggressive when assaulted by rival brands. Leader loss price is followed by a longer firm with a good portfolio. Loss leader underprices the small-time competitor. Later the prices are increased by the brand leader when competition falls off the way.
Brand strategy is ingrained into company’s plan in anticipation of competitive response.
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Internet
The largest network of computers in the world is Internet. Many computer networks collectively make up the Internet, and therefore it is called network of networks. Internet helps to access information, to provide information and compile information. Information on Internet is presented as the world-wide web (www). Internet services include direct communication (say e-mail and chat ), online conferencing, distributed information resources (www) and remote login and file transfer.
An ISP is a company that provides Internet service. World Wide Web is a system based on HTTP and hypertext. It provides and organises a wide variety of resources, e.g. text, images and sound. These are available via the Internet. A web page is a document available on www. It is a unit of information. The web pages are sent and received through HTTP. HTML is a code of hypertext mark up language. It describes the structure of the web page. HTML documents are portable. A web browser is a software programme. It set as interface between the user and the world-wide web.It sends requests for information and displays it. Web index collects and organises resources available on world-wide web. Search engines like Google enable users to locate information on world-wide web.
When we see the web pages and the websites, it is called web browsing or net surfing.IP address identifies a computer by assigning it a unique numeric identifier. Domain name identifies and locates the computers connected to the net. Each domain name is unique. Electronic mail is shortened as e-mail. A URL is hierarchical identification and location of Internet resources. TCP/IP is a set of protocols that govern the way the data is transmitted across the networks. File Transfer Protocol (FTP) governs the file transfers from computer to computer. HTTP protocol governs hypertext data transfer from computer to computer. Telnet protocol governs the connect between the computers.
The Internet browsers in use today are Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Opera and Chrome.