Promotion Design Secrets that Mediums wont share with you

 Today, Flipkart reported that 53% of their Big Billion sales came from Tier 3 and 4 cities of India. So, what does it take to reach that last mile, which has the money, but nowhere to spend it?

 

Kaithal, Joshimath, Parowal, Nagothane, Una, Ulwe, Udupi,  Nanded, Dhanau, Kudal, Vardha, Solapur, Solan, Vishakhapatnam, Boregaon, Kolhapur, Ubarni, Nadurbar, Hinjilicut, Keonjhar, Sangnai, Madhopur, Bhimavaram, Ajmer, Avinashi, Arakkonam, Barnala, Jaitaran, Kair village, Madhopur, Salav, Guwahati, Palani, Patiala, Vadodara, Ukkunagaram, Surat,  Gangtok, Jaipur… these are just some of the places from where we get contributions and emails.

 

The journey of The Children’s Post has been truly phenomenal during the pandemic.

We have been able to establish connect with the last mile of India’s children. We now reach about 20 lakh children in Tier 2,3, and 4 cities of India.

Not surprisingly, The Children’s Post has emerged as a great medium for advertisers to reach parents and children in Tier 2, 3, and 4 cities of India.

 

In this post, I am going to share 6 secrets that we, as a medium have learnt.

 

1. Whether it is Sunfeast biscuits or Whitehat Jr., a consumer needs to have at least 5-6 interactions with a brand before they even recognise the brand.

Learning: 4 half page ads work better than 2 full page ads. Your brand may make a splash one day, but public memory is short and needs to be frequently jogged.

 

2. Cutting the clutter is a part of gathering the audience. The first part of gathering the audience is the right target group. One of the greatest mistakes advertisers make (and we made) is not doing the second part – removing the clutter. They get very besotted by the numbers mediums show them. For The Children’s Post, the TG is parents of children 8 and above. But once we get to that vast number, the next step is to find parents who want to give their children a newspaper. THAT is the tricky part.

 

As a product, we have advertised on digital media (Google and FB ads), and facebook groups. With no success. Our Facebook group has just 2700 members, but most advertisers who have promoted there have got enquiries and sign ups.

Learning: It is not just about the numbers. Removing the clutter from the numbers is as important. 2700 engaged and interested parents are better than 270000 members who fit the general SEC profile.

 

3. ONE interesting visual is enough.

One of the best ads we ran had just one image – but that image was very unique and it dominated the ad. That eye-catching image was enough to bring the reader to the ad. The rest of the ad was just plain text. We learnt a lot from that campaign. The ad did very well. The advertiser also got optimal returns because the size of the ads was reduced, and frequency increased. Think Amul girl or Parle G baby.

 

4. An exclusive offer ALWAYS works

Even if it is a simple 10% discount, every single advertiser who has used an offer “For The Children’s Post Readers Only” has got a good response. One of our best ads offered a lovely discount to our readers, for just one weekend. That exclusive offer, call to action, and a deadline by which to get the offer, ensured that people actually acted on the ad. Yes, they did have a lovely product -audience fit too.

 

5. Giving comes before getting

It is the oldest tip in the book, and it is always true. Take your ad space, but use it to give the reader something that helps them. This tip is especially useful for ed techs. They forget the importance of user education in customer acquisition. The TCP website is one of the few places where we give our advertisers an opportunity to create user education articles with their branding. The beauty of this placement is that it boosts the brand’s SEO for all time to come. If you teach Vedic Maths through games, create a few puzzles in your ad OR write an article on the website about Vedic Maths and how to get started.

 

6. Be sincere

Our early advertisers were teachers who moved to online classes. Their ads were simple and sincere. We found that in a world full of clutter, this sincerity and directness of communication really made the ads stand out. Every single one of them got enquiries and signups. 

Note: This post is appearing parallely on our TCP Blog and our website. 

 

On Foundational Skills

When my son was born, I wanted him to have real-life skills. The more I saw his school books, the more despondent I became.

I feel that when they had to design curriculum for Indian children, the Brits went to a section of the library called "The Most Useless Things To Know" and put that in our curriculum. After independence, some of the things were remedied and some were made worse. But after 1990, India, and indeed, the world, changed at a rapid pace. Skills that children used to pick up with their peers automatically, became scarce because peer interactions changed. Many of our grandparents learnt swimming in the village pond on their own.

So, after leaving work, I sat down and created this list of life skills that a child should have, but is missing from the curriculum and the environment.

It is not the list that is important. It is the idea that we, as parents and educators, need to equip children with a toolkit for life, not a degree. Increasingly, research points out that young adults are failing at adulting. We don't blame the parents. But we should. Drowning in their screens, living in nuclear families, how much parenting is our generation doing? It is either helicopter parenting, or absentee parenting.

It is said that no matter what a parent does, it is wrong. That is true, to some degree. But when so many young adults are failing to create and sustain relationships, when business models are made out of seemingly everyday things like studying, dating, friendships, then really, can we leave parents out of the responsibility zone?

On the Facebook group of The Children's Post, I shared a post asking for learning resources for Observation skills. There were some helpful ideas, but mostly, many parents asked for the list. And, its not the list that is important. I am hesitant about sharing that list because this checkbox style of parenting really irks me. This list was made for my child. It may not be relevant in another place, to another child. And therefore, I feel, that every child's need for life skills is very different. Some children come equipped with some things automatically. Some children are naturally gregarious. My son is shy and introverted. Some communication things are important for him. Some others, not so much.

So well, thats my dilemma. It helps to talk to oneself sometimes. :)

What are your skills, exactly?

When a woman comes to work after a break, the no. 1 question she is asked is "skills." So here it is, a skill based:

RESUME OF A WOMAN

Profile Brief

A CEO level talent with incredible view of all dimensions of running an enterprise. A dedicated and mature leader who has proven track record in aligning contrasting stakeholders to a common goal.

Finance

End to end budgeting, funds allocation and management of funds, accounting and internal audit for an annual budget of XX LPA. Upto 7-10% YoY increase in the budget every year. Additional responsibility is absorbed with no team augmentation.

Operations

Task Scheduling and Monitoring to ensure end to end efficiency in operations. Track record of less than 2% outage/task slippage over x years.

Operations Planning using CPM to ensure non-stop business continuity with minimal time investment.

Maintenance Scheduling and monitoring for all capital and operational assets including perishables.

Inventory Management

Demand forecasting and Inventory Management for 120+ SKUs, panning across Capex, Opex and perishables, with 0 outages and less than 10% forecasting error.

Human Resources

Recruitment, Talent Engagement, Agile Performance Management system with ongoing 360 degree feedback for a team of 5. Annual Attrition at <20%. Exit management and HR transactions like payroll, benefits, grievance and discipline management. 24*7*365 POSH monitoring and control.

Stakeholder Engagement

Excellent stakeholder management skills with proven ability to align stakeholders with opposing agendas to arrive at a common ground and collaborate. Ability to deal with a variety of stakeholders across levels, domains and organisations.

Negotiation Skills

Ability to negotiate in 1:1 and 1:M situations and arrive at Win-Win outcomes.

Project Management

Ability to plan, execute, monitor, control and close projects of short and long term duration across travel, construction and education industries. Brings valuable client perspective to the table.

Procurement

Ability to source on both “L1” and “L1,V1” basis for industries as varied as FMCG, Stationery, Appliances, Construction, Materials(B2B) etc.

Vendor Management

Contract Management, Performance Monitoring, Review Feedback, Payments processing and ongoing vendor relationship management.

Risk Management

Operational and Behavioral Risk Management in operational capacity. Ability to foresee risk, threat, vulnerability and plan accordingly.

Internal Audit

Ability to deduce information from written and unwritten sources and remain an agile internal watchdog. Also ensures organisational preparedness for external audits.

Communications Management

Ability to customise the message according to the needs of the recipient. Ability to be sensitive and responsive to the communication needs of various stakeholders and ensures adequate contact and communication.

Quality

Ability to apply simple QA and QC procedures to ensure quality. Ability to train team members on the importance of quality.

 

 

 

An article from 2011: Not betting on Android yet

 

I love the news that Android has overtaken Symbian as the mobile OS. It is, in principle, the victory of the open source.

 

But am not betting on Android just yet. Because, Android is yet to face and successfully deflect a major challenge. And that, is the acid test of a victor. An unchallenged victor is not a victor – merely a figure of preponderance.

 

Sample this: An Android app is created. it appears to be a simple stress buster app that allows you to knock a hammer virtually when you are stressed. Great. A few million downloads happen over a time unit – say a month or so. Its a viral app that is promoted by online word of mouth and because its free, the download is easy.

 

What we do not know is, that underneath the hammer code is another code – malware. It could be anything – a code that surreptitiously handles your data – either obliterating it systematically, or acting like a virus and moving to other phones (not the app section, just the virus section, or monitoring all your connections and forwarding your emails to another address in bcc without telling you, or using your phone to participate in a DDOS attack .. anything at all.

 

The 2 things that stack up against Android as against other OSs are:

1. The easy implementation and the much higher “Viral” impact possible.

2. The more the no. of connected Android smartphones, the greater the temptation for a malware creator.

 

I’d love to see the victory of the Android.. because it puts the power in the hands of the user – because it allows people to contribute and use .. creating a community of producers and consumers. 

 

Which is why, its important for Android to anticipate at least some of the growth pangs, and to plan for it by creating security apps that can be downloaded by users. Am sure someone has thought of it already and its in process somewhere.. just wish we non geeks knew about it.

 

And before we place that Victor crown of olive branches on the Android head, Android will have to prove that it can quash more than one malware challenge. It will take one, exactly one major application based attack to completely kill the Android credibility. And thats one chink in the armour that some competition is waiting to exploit.

 

As i write this, there is, am sure, a programmer somewhere, writing such a malware and smiling to themselves, and there is somewhere, a programmer writing a code that will take care of phone security on Android. Like the African Giraffe and Lion story, we just have to wait and see which one runs faster.

 

How to Design a Dashboard for a customer

 

1. Do NOT sell flashy stuff for the sake of appearing “trendy” or “up to date” . “Up to date” gets dated pretty quickly. Useful, on the other hand, usually endures.

 

2. Use common sense more than you use the solution vendor’s marketing material.

 

3. Ask a few questions:

 

A. What are your categories of users? (Line managers, Middle Managers, Top Management, HR Business Partners, HR Senior Managers, Finance Managers..)

 

B. Do the information needs remain the same through the year, or do they change according to your time of year (financial year end closing, Appraisal year end closing, quarter end closing of sales…)

 

C. What is the top DECISION SUPPORT information that you need? no less than 1, and no more than 8. For each category of user. Gather this information using questionnaires divided by user category. Arrive at the top (by mode) answers and finalise them.

 

D. How often does this information change enough to impact ur decision making? (Eliminate all information that does not change significantly for a month or more. e.g., gender diversity is a statistic that will not change for the rest of the year, except during the campus recruitment season, when we need to actively monitor if we are hiring enough from each gender)

 

The second use of this information, is to determine the refresh rate with the database.

 

E. Do you want the dashboard to be the opening screen, or do u want to access this on need basis? (Tells you a lot about the actual usage of the dashboards being designed) . Please get this information, again, by category of user, then determine. Some categories may want it to be the first screen, others may want more than one dashboard that they access on need basis.

 

F. NOW, go to the flashy stuff – the look and feel.

 

What is the process you would like to follow, as an Analytics consultant?

 

 

 

Employee Engagement and Productivity – The role of the employee personality

 

This morning, i set self a small challenge – Does employee engagement have a positive correlation with productivity? Can employees be productive even if they are not engaged? Can they be engaged without being productive? (think public sector in India) .

 

In most research studies (see links below) Engagement is almost always found to be positively correlated with Productivity.

 

But what if, it was possible for employees to be productive without being engaged? What if they brought to work  – not their personality, but their experience and expertise?

 

Surprisingly, this was the predominant school of thought in the manufacturing era, when we expected people to leave their personalities outside the door, with their shoes, and to wear them again on the way out. Inside, they were time and motion machines (think Frederick Winslow Taylor and the One Best Way theory) .

 

In the IT era, we said, we are hiring brains and not time and motion machines. And yet, we continued to do effort estimate on “man days” and “man hours” – based on the “average time it should take a person to do this task”.

 

Coming back to the subject, does an employee have to be engaged to be productive?

 

I think that productivity is a function also, of the personal discipline and professional ethics of the employee. Of course, here we assume that the employee has the relevant experience, expertise, and authority, and all the organisational factors have been taken care of. Those are hygiene factors in any discussion on incremental productivity.

 

Without any employee engagement measures, using the pure “Work-for-pay” model, the output is:

 

Work = Pay

OR

Work  < Pay

OR

Work > Pay

 

What are the factors affecting this equation and the direction it tilts in?

The employee’s personal engagement level, his/her personal traits, since all employees are treated the same, but some are on the left of the equation and some on the right.

 

So, at least some part of the engagement quotient comes from the employee – from their own personalities.

 

When doing any engagement initiatives, the organisation has to target them, not towards general theories of psychology and Organisational Behavior, but towards the kind of employees they have hired in the first place. The extra benefit obtained from each engagement dollar is also a function of the fit of initiative to the personalities of employees.

 

In a small organisation, it is self evident. And in large organisations, this principle should be exercised using a simple breakdown process – let each sub organisation decide what works for them. Monitor results, correct course where required, but do not assume that the entire organisation has exactly the same kind of people.

 

Now, lets assume positive correlation between engagment and productivity, such that, for every dollar spent on engagment, the producivity does go up, only the scale is unpredictable.

 

i.e.,

Pay + Engagement = Work + x

where x is the additional productivity created by engagement initiatives.

 

Question to ponder: Can x be a negative value? Can engagement intiatives backfire and make employees even less productive than they would otherwise be? What do you think leads to negative values of x?

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Further reading

 

Here is the set of online resources that mentions other studies done on the subject:

http://www.workforce.com/article/20130501/DEAR_WORKFORCE/130509997/how-do-we-know-our-engagement-efforts-are-paying-off

 

http://www.insyncsurveys.com.au/resources/articles/employee-engagement/2012/10/impact-of-employee-engagement-on-productivity/

 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110720142459.htm

 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090513121050.htm