The bytes just got smarter, profitably so
Posted on July 23, 2007
Filed Under Featured Posts, Social Networking / Media, Trends |
John Mudie is learning the Chinese language. The lessons are delivered to him in MP3 format through his mobile phone while on the move.
Social networking sites like Orkut and Facebook have olive oil, hazelnut and canola communities. Dalmia Continental deals in these products and has joined these communities to promote its brands.
Starting with Delhi, subscribers of the just launched IPTV services for delivering television content to homes will be able to experience pull advertising. This will allow them to view any advertisements they choose to, enjoy a virtual experience as at a store itself, talk to salespersons and even place orders. All from their couch.
Tried riding a cow? Or milking a horse? Would be tough as it would not be in the natural order of things to do so. They all came designed to be suited for certain tasks, and are best left to perform exactly those. And so it was for technology.
At least until not so long ago. Phones meant for talking, social media sites for making friends and televisions for viewing programs are suddenly being exploited profitably by businesses and executives in the country to perform more than what they were primarily designed for. In a way not even thought of by the folks who developed these, or other gadgets, websites and applications.
Knowledge and information on the go
Mudie is someone you would call a globalized executive. Presently general manager, read country head, for CSR India, a leading provider of personal wireless technologies, downloading language lessons from ChinesePod.com is just one of the ways to get around the world better. His previous posting in Shanghai may have prompted the need to learn Chinese, and he would love to do likewise for Hindi and Kannada. He is still searching for any options of similarly programmed lessons. For a busy executive like him, learning through his mobile may just be what the teacher ordered.
Jay Pullur, founder and CEO of Hyderabad based Pramati Technologies, carries documents, presentations and corporate brochures in the additional memory installed on his smartphone PalmTreo. “Unlike a pen drive, this device is always with me. I can run presentations wherever I am, transfer files if need be to other people’s devices using Bluetooth or even show our catalogs to someone on a flight next to me,” he says.
The phone is not the only mobile gadget being used to the hilt. The iPod for example, purely an entertainment device, has now, without a single tweak to its hardware or software, also become an executive’s knowledge and training medium. All one needs to do is download appropriate content formatted as audio and video files called podcasts. Says Pramod Jajoo, managing director of Xora, a mobile workforce management solutions company, “I use the iPOD extensively. Whenever on the move, I listen to podcasts related to business, management, training and software industry. I particularly like podcasts from Knowledge@Wharton, Harvard Business Review, BusinessWeek, SandHill.com and Stanford University. I believe listening to these on a regular basis and applying the ideas makes me a better manager.”
Networking4Profit
When Rupert Murdoch bought MySpace.com for $580 million in 2005, social networking sites were seen more as a dating, mingling and gossip fora of the under-25s. They continue to be so, and much more. Sales and brand promotions, leads generation and meeting prospective employees are just some possibilities of leveraging these platforms for profit.
Call him a professional grade networker, but a site like LinkedIn.com is the lifeline of someone like T Balaji, vice president and head of the global division of Feedback Business Consulting Services. “My job entails business development overseas, and it is not easy to find the right person even if you call up companies in the west. Receptionists can rarely guide you in large organizations, more so because the system does not lay an emphasis on designations. I find LinkedIn very useful in finding the right person, or getting directed to the one through other members on the network,” he says.
“The trick is to expand your network as much as possible. You can only search for resources within the database of your immediate contacts, and their networks. I have been on LinkedIn long enough to have a built a substantial network of useful contacts. I met 30 people on my last trip to USA, all appointments coming through because of LinkedIn. And I expect at least 10 to give us some business,” add Balaji.
“Such sites are also extremely useful for market research, exchanging ideas, sharing information and access to resources,” he adds.
Sites like LinkedIn and Ryze.com, positioned for business networking, are what one may call the after-generation of fun networking sites. But it’s not as if other popular social media platforms do not have a value for businesses. Take the case of Dalmia Continental. Says Narayanan Rajagopalan, the company’s president and COO, “Organisations are now harnessing technology in ways never imagined. Olive oil, hazelnuts, canola oil and our other premium health products are new to Indian consumers. They need to be educated about the health benefits of these products and how to incorporate them in their lives. International communities on the Internet are an excellent way to reach our consumers because it links them to their counterparts globally who already know about these products. We take part in olive oil, hazelnut and canola communities on Orkut and Facebook.”
If there were awards going out for creative uses of existing web applications, Pramati Technologies would surely win some medals. To promote a consumer product like Dekoh, designed so one can organize all their media at one place on the hard disk of their computer, Pramati has made its presence felt all across the net. “We have posted product screenshots on the photo hosting site flickr.com, product tutorials and videos on Youtube.com and presentations on slideshare.net besides creating accounts on sites like MySpace. We have hyperlinked wherever we have appeared in the press and bookmarked them on the social bookmarking site like deli.cio.us. The advantage is many people now find us automatically. When someone is seeking information about our company and products, we just need to provide the links,” explains Pullur.
People matter
In the new business order, people are more important than any other resource for an organization as any HR manager will testify. “We often need overseas professionals to carry out certain time bound assignments including content polishing, logo redesign, documentation and user interface design to be more aligned to the tastes and needs of a western audience. We cannot go to a placement consultant for such requirements, but find them in a matter of days through free classifieds services like Craigslist.com,” says Pullur.
He also crawls social sites seeking profiles of a person he may be meeting for business. Useful to strike up a more engaging conversation believes Pullur.
What about executives looking to move up a few steps? “Really good people are not advertising themselves, nor looking for vacancies on job sites. Social networking is a highly dynamic environment with a very personal feel, a huge advantage for a job seeker. Close knit social networking websites like ours helps them explore and identify opportunities via a highly trusted network. They can filter out, analyse, discuss and close in on the most suitable job opportunity to move their career to the next level. The privacy controls enable the user to control information which he wants to give out,” says Satya Prabhakar, founder & CEO of Sulekha.com.
“Also, the fact that most HR departments patrol job sites to seek out their employee profiles helps make the case for social networking sites as a great choice to look out for jobs without being under the scanner,” he adds.
The blog story only gets better
Blogs may have been in the news for some time now, including as an important tool for businesses. In India, however, these were being used mostly by individuals until recently. But this trend is fast changing. Rajagopal says they promote their products on cookery blogs. “Our CEO makes use of an internal blog to update the company on a multitude of issues being confronted by the senior management. These blog updates are very informative and cover topics ranging from strategy, major development milestones, major customer news, investor opinion updates, and company policy announcements,” says CSR’s Mudie.
Pramati’s Pullur writes on his blog pullur.wordpress.com for anyone interested in subjects like software and technology. “A blog conveys a certain profile of a company and character of the people managing it, all-important to stakeholders. A prospective investor can read the blog and understand our thinking as of today, and how it has evolved over time by reading the previous posts. These are things he cannot always ask directly. Managers across the board need to start blogging more in India,” he says. If you ever get a mail from Pullur, his signature will carry links to some recent posts on his blog.
Staying in touch
Instant messenger and voice services may have originally been positioned for friends and family to stay in touch very cheaply, but businesses are waking up to benefits they can accrue from such technologies. “All our employees are being forced to become techno-savvy individuals. We use Yahoo, MSN Messenger and Skype to interact with regional offices and international partner organisations on a frequent basis. Besides this, all senior managers in our organisation are fully equipped with laptops, additional thumb drives and data cards so that they are always connected to the base office even while travelling to other locations,” says Dalmia Continental’s Rajagopalan.
CSR’s Mudie also uses Skype to stay connected in a cost-effective manner with his family still in Shanghai, also going through homework assignments of his son. On the flip side, companies need to be careful of such a technology: Customers are starting to use Skype to call help desks and customer service departments so that, if they receive poor service, they can record the calls using plug-in software that stores Skype conversations as audio files.
Getting down to selling
After CAS and DTH, the newest kid on the block is IPTV to deliver your favourite television program home. Launched through MTNL’s wireline telephone network by Aksh OptiFibre, IPTV claims to be equal or even better than other delivery formats in quality of transmission at a lower cost, while offering interactive features like VoIP(voice over internet protocol), TV-Commerce and E-Education converting the idiot box into a smarter one.
Another proposed service to be launched on this platform is A-Tube, de-facto the first on-demand ‘pull advertising’ on television. “Being watched by a consumer seeking information to make a ‘buy’ decision, we have done away with the 10-second advertisement spot on TV. Advertisers can make available all possible information, for customers to view as and when they like,” says Aksh’s managing director Kailash Choudhary.
“It is ideally suited for Indians as they are highly inquisitive before a purchase, and salesmen at stores are not always fully knowledgeable or have the time to explain things. It will also mean saving on the inconvenience of going to the shops just for the information. This service can be a winner for everyone from local businesses to big corporations as charges are based on viewership of the ads, all at a highly reasonable cost starting at a commitment of a few hundred rupees a month,” he adds. The full launch of A-Tube is just awaiting a critical mass of at least 1,000 subscribers being reached to justify the investment by advertisers.
Internet classifieds advertising, highly popular amongst individuals because of its usually no-charges model, is finding more takers amongst companies. “We have seen the paradigm shift in our classified user base. Initially it was mostly the individual user using classifieds. Today, we see the classified space coming of age with SMEs aggressively pursuing this space to reach out to their target customer. With internet becoming a key platform in retailing and marketing industries, classified provides the right outlet for B2C interactions,” says Prabhakar. Classifieds are one of the features on his site Sulekha.com.
‘Click to Call’ is another feature added to this site recently where a consumer is connected over telephone instantly for free with any of the listed vendors on the site, leading to ease of commerce between the two.
No afterlife, only secondlife
Technological advancements may be measured in generations, but it is also becoming important for companies to lead a second life. Pramati’s Pullur has opened an account on secondlife.com, to be activated soon, while IBM has set up something unique for itself.
It has created a new virtual IBM Business Center offering a place for IBM sales people, clients and partners to meet, learn, collaborate, and conduct business together. This center will have six areas: Reception, Sales Center, Technical Support Library, Innovation Centre, Client Briefing Centre and Conference Centre.
Accessible through secondlife.com, it will be unique because it is staffed by real IBM sales representatives from around the world, not robots or kiosks, who can chat with visitors in several languages and build business relationships.
“IBM is combining a 3-D virtual experience, its existing 2-D Website, and real IBM people to conduct business. And since we are naturally wired for three dimensions, we believe this will make customers’ business experiences more effective. This new engagement model has the potential to transform how we conduct business,” says Dr. Daniel Dias, Director, IBM India Research Laboratory.
Getting oriented
CSR’s Mudie uses Google Earth to orient himself in new places. In Bangalore, he used this service to find the locations of Café Coffee Day, HSBC Bank, the school for his son, a house to live in and even his office. He could well sound like an example of someone who uses technology for all it is meant for, and then lots more. Might seem a daunting thing for everyone to do, but if it brings with it the benefits at work, it may well be worth the effort.
Not that you may have much of a choice; if it’s going to give your competitor or colleague an edge over you, it may be time to give a bit more thought to the bytes present in almost everything we use in our day-to-day lives.
Ajay Jain is a journalist and blogs at www.ajayjain.com. He can be contacted at ajay@ajayjain.com
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Nice piece Ajay. Cheers.
R