Interview with Sameer Kaul

Interview with Sameer Kaul, VP-Marketing, Dr Lal PathLabs

Here are the excerpts from the interview with Sameer on the importance of technology for marketers.

PW: As a marketer what would you say are your current priorities?

SK: Focus should be drawn on the following for this marketing year:

1. Customer Data Management & Analytics (Return on Insights (ROI) as well as the conventional ROI

2. Social Media & Digital Communication

3. Enhancing Customer Experience

4. New product development

5. E-commerce

6. Revamping the website

PW: At Dr Lal PathLabs, how has technology played a role in customer acquisition or retention?

SK: We are India’s largest chain of diagnostics labs serving more than 7 million customers. For us technology leadership plays a role at many dimensions. We have the most advanced cutting edge testing equipment at our labs leading to most accurate test results in the industry.

We launched India’s only fully dedicated National Customer Care infrastructure that acts as a customer touch point from morning 7 am – 11 pm. This facilitates a one stop shop solution to the entire gamut of diagnostic needs.

We use the best IVR and telephony technology to provide a ‘One Call Does It All’ kind of a solution. Our website provides fast viewing of test reports, our ICT technology integrates our thousands of centers together. We also launched Asia’s largest lab at Rohini to serve our customers effectively. All the above helps us to acquire and retain our millions of customers.

PW: How has technology played a role in new product development, market expansion or other areas?

SK: We have invested a lot at Rohini which has become a game changer in the Indian diagnostics space – Our Rohini lab is Asia’s largest lab. This lab is spread across around 85,000 sq ft. – has 6 floors, each dedicated to a specific discipline of diagnostics. This lab has a state of the art section on New Product Development wherein – the marketing team, R&D team, ops team, technical team, sales teams, technical group, and other cross functional teams meet every week to evolve and discuss launch of new products and services.

For us new products mean new tests, new technology and new medical practices based on customer feedback and customer needs. We have a franchising department that uses communication technology to stay in touch with doctors, business partners – with an aim to increase our market footprint and expand in other areas.

PW: Do you have a separate budget for the IT component of marketing? And how aligned are the marketing and IT functions in the organization?

SK: The marketing budget is segmented into c2b (I like to call it c2b instead of b2c) and b2b. We have internally allocated a budget for digital and innovations.  We are planning in the coming year to increase the % spends for Digital (including social and Innovations. Innovation as concept has taken shape this year in Q3 and next year FY 13 we will commit more time and resources to leverage digital, technology and innovations to make things happen for delighting our customers, connecting with them and improving topline. Marketing drives these new practices and is very well aligned with cross functional teams including IT team to make things happen.