Disha Patani, Tiger Shroff and other celebrities have been tut-tutted by Shobhaa De for escaping to Maldives. I can’t offer you a flight there but I can do a newsletter that steers clear of the topic that is topmost on our minds.
It’s a slow (non-COVID) news day so this actually hit my feed “Fortune 500 Industrial Giant Seeks Digital Growth In India By Partnering With International Digital Marketing Agency GO MO Group” For all of us in B2B marketing this resonates – a client who refuses to lend their name to the press release. But if we move past that, there is the realization that despite 60 years in the country, the un-named Swedish giant has just realized that they need to ramp up their digital marketing efforts. And the reflects the acceleration of an overarching trend across industries – Direct to Consumer.
It’s going to be a massive transformation. Imagine being liberated from having to buy only what can be physically stocked in a shop? What if you could order from a catalog and it would reach you in a day? Shops would become destinations where you ‘experienced’ the product but not necessarily where you took possession of it. Supply chains would transform if I didn’t have to stock in anticipation of a customer coming in to purchase something. Product design might become a lot more modular – parts ready to be assembled on demand and as per customer wishes. If you’re willing to wait, say 48 hours, you could get a white shirt with crystal buttons instead of those boring white ones! Or perhaps shoes with your kid’s name and grade stamped on the inside.
When “shelf-space” is not a consideration, packaging can be more consumer and eco-friendly. Years ago I had a client called Vendee which had edible oil vending machines in 250 outlets. You took your container and at the press of a button got the oil of your choice, pure and in reusable packing. In the direct to consumer world, it is not so far-fetched to consider a collection of such kiosks for regular consumables.
What does this direct to consumer world require? We need to think of how we would be able to treat the consumer as a market of one and then work backwards to align the rest of our sales and marketing ecosystem. Existing dealer and retail networks would have to be empowered to do hyperlocal marketing – a big shift from the mass, centralized marketing favoured today. But even more significantly it would lead to hyperlocal production.
Just as the winners of the last century were those who could crack mass manufacturing and marketing, the winners of this decade will be those who are able to crack “personal production” and marketing. Marketing has already transformed with a good ‘growth marketer’ making more than the average CMO. A growth marketer is actually closer to sales at scale and often delivers conversion with minimal sales intervention. Another key trend for the future.
And it’s not just in India. In this series, Ravi Teja tells us about Growth Marketing in China If hyperlocal production or at least end-state production were to become viable, we will also see a shift in assembling and manufacturing closer to the growth markets – a huge shift – even as the retail outlets consolidated to become experience centers.
Hope you enjoyed your little break from the bad news.
Stay well.
