Thde power of !: 1 Branding

Reinventing One: One!

By Harish Bijoor

Just look back at the decades that have gone by in our sales and marketing lives. Look at the one big idea that has changed radically over all these years.

The one big idea that is different in the world of Marketing: In the old days we were very good at marketing direct. We took the first few brands of teas that hit the Indian market in packet form and demonstrated it in the remotest corners of the country. We marketed direct. 1:1 Marketing!

Today, we market on a format that is 1: Many!

The one big idea that is different in the world of Advertising: In the days of yore, we advertised the product and service alike on a 1:1 format. We went direct to the consumer and seeded the idea of the product. We created advertising messages that were direct and personalized. One specific message for one specific need. Advertising was specific!

Today, we advertise on a format that is 1: Many, if not 1: Very Many!

The one big idea that is different in the world of selling: In decades gone by, we sold at a very personal level. Selling has always been a 1: 1 effort. The salesman met the prospect and sold physically right in front of him. The appeal was specific, customized and special.

Today, we sell on a format that is 1: Many!

Indian marketing witnesses a great big change in the Big Idea! The old big idea was 1: 1 and the new one we have so wantonly adopted is a 1: Many format.

The worry then! 1: Many is a format that is just not working. Not working hard enough to produce results in the marketplace!

As the worry-lines engulf many a marketer facing the great big marketing meltdown of recent years, it is time to take stock and check on all those things we do right in the world of selling. And worryingly so, the many things we do wrong in the world of selling today as well.

Think efficacy. Think 1:1 selling!

The most efficient form of selling we see in the Indian market today is the one where the seller meets the buyer face to face. This form of selling is as intrusive as it can get, but efficient!

Do you remember the pesky salesperson that came up to you and wanted to sell you that stuffed doll no one ever wanted in the house but you ended up buying? Or that “insurance Uncle” who kept coming to your house and wanted the collective audience of the entire family as he told stories of other families and how they handled crises in their families? Tales of woe and joy told with equal panache to an audience that was being seeded the very thought of Insurance as a product?

Do you remember the first few women who actually came home to home seeking the privacy of the afternoon hours when no man was to be found at home? Do you remember the evangelical talk they took you through with product flip-charts that detailed the benefits of using a sanitary napkin as opposed to the use of cloth?

Do you remember buying 'papads' and ‘murukkus’ from the same woman who came to your doorstep week after week for those twenty years you spent as a housewife at large? The woman was a friend at large! A salesperson you saw eye to eye and trusted with an emotive appeal that was different! The week she didn’t turn up, you missed her!

Selling 1:1 is an art and a science all of its own. It is personal. It is custom-made and packs the best of the integrity approach there can be in the realm of selling. It is selling the way it is meant to be!

Over the years, when selling of a personal kind got difficult, marketers started depending on the persuasive power of the media influences that exert pressure of the selling kind on the mind of the consumer. This morphed personal selling onto a platform of impersonal selling, if you may. The television creative that had the functional motive of selling in mind did a great job or reaching out to larger numbers in its one all-embracing sweep! Never mind if the creative seemed forced to some in the target segment! Never mind if the emotive appeal of the message was not strong enough! Never mind if the creatives meant everything to everybody! The sweep was great.

Early first generation pieces of advertising, which were really a form of aggregated personal selling did wonders to the fortune of brands. All of a sudden, a brand of 'pan masala', which depended on the evangelical selling of its produce on a 1:1 format, realized the power of mass-selling through the media of television! Pan Parag is a classic example!

The early-years of success spoilt the marketing man on the prowl. In many ways, the sales person in the marketplace started depending on the power of advertising to offer umbrella cover to his selling line. This was fine!

And then came a time when the salesman on the field lost his selling sheen slowly but surely , and laid his tongue and every trick of the trade of selling to rest. He started depending more and more on the power of television and indeed the power of advertising in every format there is to advertise.

And then comes the dreadful time when your salesman starts complaining that he is unable to sell your soap and shampoo as the company is not advertising enough! What’s more, even if you as a marketer are advertising to adequate and decent norms of acceptability, the New-Gen salesman is the first one to complain that he is unable to get the sale going as the competitor in the marketplace is spending more bucks on his advertising!

Selling has indeed come a full circle. From the days of pure and undiluted 1:1 to the days of pure and undiluted 1: Many! Selling, to many a salesman in the field today means more advertising!

How wrong!

What has happened to the power of one? The power of 1:1 selling?

New Gen salespersons have forgotten the art of doing it right on their own might. The New Gen salesperson depends a bit too much on the crutch that marketing and advertising provides.

Time to wake up and smell the coffee. As advertising as a pure selling tool works less and less in this day and age of spiel, spit and polish, it is time to re-invent and re-invoke the good old ways of doing things right.

Look at the categories that are the toughest to sell today. Take the case of the toothpaste, the detergent and your daily tot of tea! The consumer is getting more and more tired of messaging that is 'parri passu' across the competitors in the category. The consumer is tired of the ridiculous USPs that are making a joke of the marketing process itself! The consumer whets your advertising message with a filter that has a loud statutory warning of sorts on it that says,”An advertised product is not necessarily the best product out there”! There are memory tags that come free with it.“An advertised product is more expensive”! “An advertised product uses hype to sell”! “An advertised product is a massified solution”!

The tags can go on. While amongst one generation of customers these tags were really of positive connotation, as the generations go through more and more of advertising as a core form of selling itself, the consumer is getting sensitized.

While at one end of this sensitive scale is complete magic and involvement with the advertised product, at the other end of the scale is a complete state of consumer apathy! The consumer in every product category, be it simple soap or high-tech sun-shade, traverses through the various milestones on the scale. From complete magic to complete apathy!

At this point of time, in every category of detergent, toothpaste and tea alike (which incidentally are the oldest marketed categories of them all in the Indian market, and therefore face the brunt of a very sensitized consumer) there is a keen need to re-invent the selling process. The keen need to re-invent processes 1:1!

The first one to do this will be the first one to see growth in these meltdown categories of the day! Bring back personal selling here. Bring back the old approach to the market. Bring back personalization. Bring back hard work!

The author is a business strategy consultant and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.

Email: harishbijoor@hotmail.com