The future of the newspaper as we know it

Something major happened in my life this May. Something I never thought would and I am still at times struggling with this new reality. I stopped my subscription of all the newspapers! Well not all of them. I retained one – Times of India.

Why was TOI the chosen one? For one, the wife would once in a while rustle through Delhi Times catching up with all the Bollywood gossip. And second, I still had withdrawal symptoms that the familiar rustle could take care of in case of severe depression.

What’s so earth shattering about someone stopping his news paper subscription! The global news paper industry with the exception of a few countries like India is grappling with this phenomenon every day.

It becomes significant when you consider that a) I am on the wrong side of fifty b) that it is habit which maybe is more than forty years old c) news paper subscriptions do not create any dent in your pocket and therefore is not a significant saving d) I read at least four news papers every day and e) when I am adopting a new way of accessing news – digital!

The change did not happen overnight. It has been quite some time that I have been switching between the virtual and real world while accessing news. It has taken me much longer to give up the familiar ‘thump’ of the newspapers landing on my balcony where the vendor expertly throws it every morning and untying the band and staring at the headlined news of events that happened late last night as the world slept. And then sitting with my favourite cuppa and trawling through the rest of the paper.

Here is what made me want to change:

• I have much better access to news via gadgets that fit so conveniently in my pocket
• I have a choice of what kind of ‘news’ I want to read and can use the services of a news aggregator which makes it so much easier to separate the wanted from the unwanted
• I can easily clip and save information that I cannot consume right now but can have easy access some times in the future
• I have the ability to access news as it happens
• Any significant information that is useful to someone in my network can be instantaneously sent across to him
• Even after going through the more news sources now than before, I feel I am managing my morning time much better
• Archived copies can be accessed easily
• I make a small contribution to the environment

How has my experience been in the last few months? To be honest, I am not sure if am over the old habit as yet. The reason being that there is a huge difference between newspapers and how they manage their digital products. I somehow prefer the ones that convert the item of your choice into a PDF file. That way, the news and graphics stay as organized as they were in the actual paper. I also find that some of the images, especially data, are of such poor quality that you really cannot read the information.

It is time that news paper publishers looked very seriously at digital products and the user experience. The younger people, who are the bulk of the population today and would also be the bulk of the consuming class, are more comfortable in a digital environment. And as per my own experience they are not used to reading print versions of newspapers, and have to be lured to newer forms of news access. Without this audience, the publishers stand to loose a large portion of their advertising revenue which is the mainstay of this business. That to me does not make business sense.

Is a 'Happy Diwali' for real?

It is that time of the year once again - frantic sales, endless traffic, necklaces of diamonds and light and then darkness, polluted air, piles of garbage, sore throats and life is as usual or so we like to believe.

Every year, schools coax children to abstain from bursting fire crackers. People in high places plead and cajole the public at large to have a 'different Diwali'. The public media on their own do their own bit  but no one seems to care or give a damn.

It is a mystery to me as to people are so uncaring about everything including themselves. The bad air and the piles of garbage that collect affects all of us equally and some more. So why this death wish?

But to all those who stayed away or celebrated Diwali responsibly, here's wishing you and your families a Very Happy Diwali.

A Sense of Right....

There is lot of excitement and wishful thinking around the recent events surrounding Anna Hazare. It is wonderful to see a large number of specially young people rooting for a just cause - a corruption free India.

There are chain mails, BBMs, SMS and all kind of viral media urging everyone to join the movement and demand the bill be passed in parliament. Some very excited people have included my name in the Facebook groups and my inbox is flooded with minute by minute updates of what's going on. I am amazed and impressed by the energy and passion of these young people.

My concern, however lies somewhere else. How do we implement the spirit of this bill along with the hundreds that we have passed before. Will the introduction and passing of this bill stop these same young people in greasing palms to get ahead of the line? Will it stop individuals from acting in the selfish manner that we all have become used to, when it actually comes to us? How about jumping the red light when no one is looking? Questions, questions and more questions! As we are questioning and demanding answers from those in power, we need to stand in front of the mirror and do the same to ourselves.

Let us all make the one square foot of space that we stand on a corruption free area in order to make this whole new awakening a successful one.

Full Circle

Caught the new Tide detergent ad on television the other day and was reminded of 'Lalitaji' trying to do the same story for Surf many years ago. That time it was Unilever doing it to Nirma. However the tables seem to have turned this time against Unilever.

Why are we such sloppy service providers?

I was expecting delivery of my credit card through a reputed courier company. The Bank had sent me a text message with the consignment number and so I decided to call the company to enquire the status. I located the Delhi office details from the company website and I was ready to go.

I called first on the number mentioned on their website (Delhi) 30936666 on May 4^th in the morning. Five tries no reply. On the second number 39444444, a lady received the call and mentioned that due to late arrival of the consignment, delivery will be made only on May 6^th between 10.00 am and 6.00 pm. I explained to her, since this is my home address, I had to stay back specially for the consignment. She noted my number and address and confirmed that someone will call me before delivering the consignment.

May 6^th, 2.11 p.m. no call from anyone from. Called back their office – same result, no response. After about twenty tries got a response from another lady that she does not have a tracking system (30936666) and that I should call Customer Service at 45351515. Customer service says this a credit card and they do not deal with it and I should call 9310502361. This number is constantly busy and automatically disconnects.

After umpteen number of tries, a lady answered and said she can get me the details in half an hour after checking with her branch. Two hours later no call. So again I called back and without even a hint of an apology she blatantly said it will be done sometime today. On asking to be connected to her supervisor she put me on hold for ten minutes and came back to say her boss has stepped out of his cabin and will be back after ten minutes and call me back. When I asked for his mobile number, I am told the number I have been calling in fact is her boss’s number.

Meanwhile I shot off an email venting my frustration to both the Delhi office email id as well as the corporate office. Both the ids were taken from the company website. To add insult to injury, both the emails bounced back! Dud ids on a corporate website!!!

The parcel was delivered to me at 4.20 p.m. As I write, it is 8.30 p.m. and the manager’s ten minutes is not over. I hope the company – First Flight Couriers – has more time on their hand to survive in this competitive environment.

Green is the new gold! The ongoing (and rightly so) concern over environmental degradation provides a new opportunity for innovation in product development as well as marketing. It offers a unique opportunity to position your products and not only win market shares, but also to distinguish the brand as some 'who cares' for you and thge world at large.

Earlier reserach in similar areas indicate consumer's preferance fro organizations and brands that exhibit and aggressively persue larger interests. So the time to do something is NOW! For your brand, for your organization and for the world environment.

Shine on you Michael Jackson

I can never truly claim that I liked Michael Jackson’s music. But as an entertainer, there are a few who could match him.

But there is another dimension of MJ that I admire – that of a marketer and brand builder. Having started his singing career at an early age of four, he used all the media opportunities that he got (including the Ed Sullivan Show), to the hilt in building brand MJ. When the ‘Jackson Brother’ tag started to limit his musical style and repertoire, he went solo. His own extraordinary success and the less than average performance of the other siblings just go to prove how right he was to break the association.

The reported £ 7 million he charged Pepsi in 1984 for a series of commercials endorsing Pepsi, and the freak fire accident during the shoot, did much more to boost Pepsi’s sales than any other brand endorser could possibly achieve.

I personally feel he was a much better dancer than a singer (apologies to the fans of MJ’s music) and he used this to further brand MJ. He kept up with the times and his style of entertainment found a ready audience amongst the new MTV generation. The emergence of new media was a huge opportunity that Michael Jackson did not miss.

High visibility, global audience, unique characteristics (the ‘moon walk’ his wardrobe, unique hair style), awe (Neverland) are all classic brand building strategies that marketers world wide adopt and often struggle to implement. Michael Jackson seems to have mastered the art real early and what apparently looked to us, with absolute ease.

Brand MJ has had its share of bumps on the road. But the brand never got derailed. It came out almost unscathed all the time. The power of brand MJ was so strong that the industry believed that the concert in London, would not only wipe of Michael’s debt of $500 million, but it would kick start his career once again (beginning another S-curve?).

The person is dead. But brand MJ lives on. Already books are surfacing on the internet chronicling his life and incidents that led to his ultimate end. Be sure that brand MJ is not dead and will be around for a long long time in the future.