Agriculture(in India) and India is like Ramesh-Suresh

“Ramesh and Suresh are legendary (atleast for some) character of famous Indian Television ad for a chocolate company they represents the similarity”

Agriculture represents the soul of India, yes it does, not only factually but also emotionally. If they would have been some sort of individuals they would have certainly greeted themselves like the brothers lost in some mega fair (Kumbh k Bichade Bhaiiii).. ouch Sachin and he just banged on my head asking what kind of joke is this .. and I said: perhaps it isn’t, just look at the below Ramesh –Suresh moments and you might agree to it..

Agriculture and India as primitive as it could be

Indian civilization is one of the oldest civilization in world same as Agriculture one of the most primitive industry around the world and both holds its traditional practices intact especially in India.

Just a top line

India having 16% of world population holding less than 3% share in global GDP similarly agriculture employing 60% Indians contributing only 16.7% to Indian GDP.

Caste and religion system

They say castes and religions are manmade, yes they are.. Especially in agriculture industry atleast :P

Treat Agriculture industry as a religion, where any agri graduate is bound to borne and it is so receptive like Indian society that it adopts any other graduate with utmost humble and gratitude but vice versa is something, which every Indian wants to but barely can.

Hold-on, let’s get to the caste system of this religion

Seems complex, yes it is but very well defined in Krishi-Shastra of any agriculture industry in india.. So, how does it start.. once you get out of the college, you are born as an agri professional, now your caste is decided by the first company you join.. Supposedly if your first company is a seed company then this is how you are labeled throughout the life (as it does in typical caste system).

 A relationship between like recruiter and recruit is like marriage affair. So be prepared that your resume (lets write biodata atleast here) exhibits the typical caste of that recruiter company. So a seed guy may not be entertained at pesticide industry or vice versa.  And if you are too modern and join the recently formed castes such as banking, tech etc then it will be a typical orthodox Indian family situation and back of the mind there may be a voice like – “Dekh tu ja to raha hai banking me, teri marji hai but aaj se input industry k sare raste band hai tere liye, tu jindagi bhar ek banker ban k hi rahega (see you are going to banking, now all the doors for agri input industry is closed for you, you would be labeled as a banker for life) .. Seriously isn’t it like you are going for a love marriage and your father says – “now you are no more my son from today onwards I am ending this relationship for life”.

On the other hand we need innovation, new perspective but we are not getting over by this caste system.. Do we need here a Nana Patekar of Krantiveer movie moment, where he says – Ye le nikal diya maine seed or pesticide resume se ab pahchan kaun seed wala, kaun pesiticide wala.. jab distributor wahi, farmer wahi crop wahi to tu kaun hota hai fark karne wala :P  (I have removed seed and pesticide from resume, now identify who is from see and who is from pestcicide .. when distributors are same, farmers are same, crops are same then who you are to differentiate :P)

Predictions are as dubious as opinion polls

When the population and variables are too large the sample often doesn’t represent the true situation, like opinion polls, demand estimation in agri input is also a critical but very challenging and often lead to failure.

As democratic as agriculture

You might have often heard the democracy in agriculture, recently I realized that democracy is nothing more than somebody exercising his power of saying no, isn’t it happen when you launch a new technology in Indian agriculture.

As chaotic (dharne wala) as opposition

A small complaint become quite chaotic, no matter what the issue is, like opposition party your customer are agitated in groups and start paying dharnas.. Obviously they are few PIL wala advocates who pings customer to file a case on any complaint no matter what it is.

Product sales is equivalent to contesting election

Collection of crop wise village wise data, strategizing who will buy your product, the full of food and entertainment mega famer meetings.. Those forcefully captured audience in buses/autos for a speech by bade wale managers.  The tireless rallies oops farmer meetings. You even don’t know till the season ends what your exact sales is just like till the results are announced you can’t say who is going to form the government.

Products are as legendary as leaders

There are few agriculture products in India, which has become so legendary that the customer even keeps them at their religious place, he is completely gung-ho about it and can go any stretch to get a feel of it. Like the politico leaders in India.

Controlled by outside

India is reliant on its external trade and investments so does agriculture on external factors.. Sometimes I wonder if god should shower the rain by measuring in beakers. From water logging to dry-spell you can observe in same field in one season... from drought to flood etc..  

Too many segments

If you are to classify Indian customer into different segment may be you can do it basis different attributes – could be economic, social, geography, age, income, education, aspiration etc, similarly in agriculture you can do it like- soil type, crops, irrigation, management, geography, landholding etc.  and yeah you can’t give exact segment by mixing 3 or more attributes.

Hawa Chal Rahi hai (can’t find right English for it :P)

Before elections you might have heard that this time – “Modiji ki hawa chal rahi hai” and that’s the constitutional sales language during sales season in agriculture – “Hawa Chal rahi hai”.

The growth lies here

As entire world is looking India as one of the biggest market so does entire India is looking towards agriculture, both has a potential to give the growth rate and returns in double digit.

There are many more such moments, agriculture is surely a true representation of India. As they used to say during my college days – “Desh ka Culture Agriculture”.

Kindly excuse the spell check and grammar (written on the go)..

Love,

Ankit

My shirt is better than his!!!

Away from hustle bustle of daily life, it was gourmet delight from wife (yeah she does it daily) at the dinner table. As we were near end to our capacity of overloading our stomach, a fine advertisement appeared on our TV screen  – this tooth paste is better than that. Though this may appear just as an advertisement but it summarizes our competitive behavior of placing ourselves better than our near peers/products and what not.

There is one good product which created its own segment and all other followers just simply quote their product as better than that. Making all negative statement about the leader to push their products.

While as a small business for a temporary and easy sale you may like to follow that but certainly if you want to see a sustainable growth and a marker leader approach than for god sake stop doing it.

Just give a thought, from where the buying decision come- either heart and or by mind. then for what sake we believe that merely placing our words in consumer mind would place us top of his heart or mind.

the common mistakes a marketer does are –

• He defines his market as per competition landscape rather than defining market as per his portfolio.
• At the lowest level it is most of the time persuasion rather than realization.
• Just try to create negative sentiments on competition USP, what we may generally say negative marketing.
• His countdown starts from competition loopholes rather focusing on his own positives.
• Short term goals rather than long sustainable approach.

While he may simply follow-

Talk less – sense more

Just sense how the consumer his feeling about your product during demos rather than giving him global gyan about you product.. let him sense your product, let it get registered in his mind rather than his ears.

Never Counter

Its completely waste of resources if you start countering your product against consumers alien questions, non available features or competition comparison. Be positive, have assertive discussions rather than counter arguments.

Focus on your positives

Simply focus on your positives, stop naming any competition or giving any hint about it (please see, are you marketing self or competition?) . Let your brand be registered as unique, different and let it own create its own market.

i don’t know at how far degree i am correct but just sharing these few examples-

• one can’t get other’s girl friend by simply saying that he is better than his boy-friend.
• The biggest and ironically smallest differentiation in you is your DNA. So believe me stop becoming a me-too, create you own identity which has been injected to you biologically, just figure it out.
• Just a rough survey suggests that NaMo during Delhi elections campaigns spoke AAP/Kejriwal name more than 3.5 times than his own party name. And then you know what happened as a result.
• WhatsApp never said it is better than a SMS or rather now when they have competition never compared
• Other such marketers swept across the market never tried comparing them such as FB, OnePlus, Apple etc.

you can never win a race if you keep on running against you competitor..  have a competition with your self.

last but not least –

• Stay hungry but stay positive
• Deliver value not merely amusement to your tall claims
• Relate your consumers or rather you be your first consumer.

Hope i wasn’t sounding that absurd .. don’t mind if i did.. !! :)

Be a human, prove it, don’t be a mere sheep following the herd.

Love,

Ankit

IF Coke or Pepsi would have been Agri input product in india…

Ye dil Mange more..

Thanda Matlab coca cola..

Toofani Thanda

am sure most of us can easily identify by the tag/punch line that which product it is..

Lets change the scenario, think if those are marketed in Agri-input category in India.

Coke-

• ‘000 employees taking day in day out user meeting calling them in a temple
• Every meeting must have the society’s Bade wale Chachas and Taus (Key influential Person)
• Before meeting everywhere there would be coke posters/banners  and leaflets hovering the entire venue along roads
• in the meeting the must have would be a sales pitch saying
  • Coke is more black
  • Coke is more cool
  • Coke Jaldi Thandi ho jati hai
  • Coke can be mixed with your favorite drink
  • Coke can be opened like champagne
  • One bada Tau will stand-up and say I have drunk this and would recommend everybody to drink.
  • One non user would say Government is not helping us to drink
  • Another would say Last time my friend tried this, it was brown
  • Another would say my friend complained about the opener quality he couldn’t open it from his mouth, he demanded for compensation and the case is still pending.
  • The ground force team headed by a Commander called TM followed by Lieutenants PO/FT would pacify the concerns  saying- this lot is different and every user is repeating it.. Its fantastic and revolutionary
• at the end/start of the meeting the bade chahchs and taus would be garlanded and given some present
• Few giveaways for everybody who is attending the meeting
• There would be all food and entertainment management for the audience
• At last they will be shown few live samples –
  • Person drinking coke one after another and burping like anything
  • 4 guys on a table enjoying their party with coke
• Post meeting they would most likely throw a promotion/booking scheme

Pepsi-

everything remains same except-

• Chahchas and Taus (may be earlier coke customers as well)
• All coke posters to be replace by Pepsi
• Sales pitch would be-
  • Pepsi is blacker
  • Pepsi is cooler
  • Pepsi can even be mixed with non-color drinks for great color
  • rest all same

Ironically both Pepsi and Coke ground marketer are mostly each other’s ex-employee only. they would be least bothered to know what is happening to the world, they would only be guessing how much each other is selling. The biggest source of information for them is their trade channel.

There would be few TV adverts where one person with background of a party plot comes out and say Drink this its cool, black and mixable. (30 seconds and advert gone in flash) or few party-men talking about their problem in drinking softdrink and a bada tau coming  in a car saying drink this this has all the solution to your problem.

Ouuuch he hit on my head.. Sachinnnnn  Stop this.. (sorry i didn’t introduce Sachin, he is my colleague).

He is saying  “you (I) so called intelligent human-being telling us to CTRL+C and CTRL+V the marketing tactics of them in Agri-input marketing”

Naaahhh not at all, i never ever meant to say that.

Agri input marketing in India is so complex that even a new definition has to be calved out .. do you know why because-

• Its neither purely FMCG nor FMCD
• Its neither purely a consumable good nor industrial raw material
• Its neither purely B2B nor B2C
• Its neither purely distribution-centric nor product-centric
• Its neither purely on functional benefits nor perceived benefits

So now you may think that i may suggest you some specific solution, sorry not this time :). Not because am an Agri input Marketer (competition to fellow marketer) but because there are no ready-made solutions, we all have to make hit and trials to find out the solutions for creating brand in Agri-input which are sustainable, affordable, renowned and acceptable to all the markets. We are not in a state of dealing with matured customers, they are still information deprived. Not only our consumers but we ourselves are also not equipped with complete data, believe it or not they are mostly guesstimates. Collective and synergistic marketing may save our resources in piloting the things out.There are 130 million farmers and markets are defined basis crops/Geography and not by their socio-economic behavior. CRM, ATL, BTL, TTL are still remains buzz words for us.

Sharing good practices, case studies, blog posts may help us in becoming resource savvy and help our consumer to obtain only the right information at right time.

Hope i wasn’t been too bad in writing.

As Always, Love!!

Ankit

Yay!! I sold a Jet Today!!

Sachin (am sure you now know him that he is my colleague) a recent grad from top notch B-school was on the way to buy his first keys. Showroom after Showroom, multiple of test drives, with umpteen no. of expert advises and with google Baba’s blessings he was confused like anything.

Since he was a young grad it was but obvious that he will make all his knowledge to be practical in every aspect and this time he used Multiple Attribute Utility Theory to scale down for fewer options.

He started re-interviewing the sales guys on the three selected options and the key USPs post his talks with sales guys were like-

Option A – It doesn’t run it flies, it’s a jet.

Option B – Any breakdown, road side assistance will be even before you blink your eyes.

Option C – It’s a fixed deposit, no maintenance cost at all.  

And the Smart Sachin, who always wanted to fly bought option “A”. But wait, after few days he started realizing that it doesn’t take off, this jet only runs on runway that too many a times raced down by few average cars around.

Sachin came to me with all anguish… “bloody I paid 100k extra for this car because that sales walah told me this shall run like jet but it doesn’t run like even a SUV, and that sales walah now joined some other company, what to do with this”

And there was that typical smirk on my face, I said, Sachin listen- “At first place you always wanted to buy a car

-          That runs

-          That too with minimum costs

-          That leaves minimum maintenance costs/headaches

-          That can run on your local city roads

-          That makes you and your family drive safe and comfortable

-          That fit into your budget

then how come the question of jet came into picture?? Dude this is a car and doing all the job which you originally thought for, yet you are completely dissatisfied. “

Ironically I could only make one customer satisfied but think day in day out there are ‘000000 of sales walahs raising the expectation bars of consumers which at the end of the day results into the dis-satisfied customer with no repeat and referrals.

If I were given a chance to define what business is, I would simply quote –

“Business is nothing more than mutual exchange of MINIMUM PREDICTIVE VALUES”

In today’s competitive era when functional benefits are kept aside to overshadow the next competitor.  

Be it anywhere-

-          A manager raising board expectation for fresh round of funding, going certainly away from ground

-          A finance guy showing budgets like company has spent just like that last year

-          A sales guy selling products on his imaginative grounds

The common most issue resides as “Exaggeration”. In order to make ourselves better-off, we knowingly and unknowingly exaggerate the things and many a times it falls flat. The being grounded and genuine approach seems to history now, as we now only focus to encash that moment without even worrying about what it may result.  

But think for a second, can it just by any sense become sustainable-

-          What if the person you sold car realizes that it’s just a car not a jet

-          What if the person you sold a seed realizes it’s a seed not a miracle

-          What if the board whom you sold a three year break even realizes that’s it’s anything but three years

Let’s learn from our few examples of politico environment nearby-

-          We made this party to enact the Jan-Lokpal bill .. (where is it now, did you ever think how difficult and cumbersome it would be)

-          The moment we are into power India would be a developed country (well I exaggerated a bit J, but did they ever thought how practically difficult for them to handle the opposition)

-          Dadri shows the India is intolerant like never before. (well hasn’t it been exaggerated?)

Everybody loves surprises and when this exaggeration comes into picture the surprise quotient become inversely proportional.

So next time when you are trying to sell perceived benefits be sure that your customer perceives it, else be firm on your functional benefits only.

Simplify the things rather than exaggeration.

A child is more likely to buy a certain chocolate in anticipation of a surprise gift inside.

So surprise your every customer rather the just bearing them for a moment.

Build stairs rather simply jumping which will only induce gravitational force and can keep you high only for moments.

Love,

Ankit 

Does Rural India need Government support in availing ICT services???

“The More you Know the better you grow”. Information Communication Technology (ICT) provides power to individuals for their information quest to enable them for taking right action.  ICT sector in India is expected to contribute 7.5% of total GDP in 2012*. The sector employs 2.5 million Indian population directly and over 8 million indirectly, primarily by software services*. The major part of ICT services in India is catered to export market or urban population. Rural population is unable to enjoy the ICT service at large, which is creating a digital divide.

The idea is widely accepted that wider access to and use of ICT throughout a country will reduce inequalities in income and quality of life between rural and urban residents is compelling. Various organizations have implemented this idea and helped rural population in –

    improving their access to market information;

    lowering costs;

    increase efficiency, competitiveness and market access;

    better price realization;

    helping global economy through food, education and health;

However such organizations/interventions are yet unable to reach the masses. 4As - Affordability, Availability, Adaptability, and Accessibility are the major challenges to be addressed to make ICT interventions transforming rural masses.

    Spending capacity of rural Population (Affordability)

    Suitable infrastructure and technology dissemination (Availability)

    Utilization of the technology and breaking the middleman interventions (Adaptability)

    Education, Training, connectivity and Language barrier (Accessibility)

These challenges can’t be addressed in isolation, Government and Organizations has to join hands. Organization can bring their techno-information expertise and Government can support them with facilitative policy framework and financial assistance, which would make these interventions more viable, available and sustainable.

Rural India is slowly getting equipped with hands-on power through ICT services. However the scalability and sustainability of such ICT services remains on the partnering efficiency of Government and private organizations.

Investments In Africa- Is It Only a Land Grab??

Investments in Africa are quite often seen as merely land grab. The World Bank’s study released in September 2010 identified 45 million hectares under negotiation for allocation during 2009 alone, of which 70 percent (about 32 million hectares) was in Africa. A new study by the International Land Coalition suggests that the true figure could be much higher, at around 80 million hectares, 64 percent (about 50 million hectares) of these in Africa. The exponential rise of interest for investing in Africa is chiefly because of 3As- Agri, Area and Affordability. In 2007-08 fluctuation in global prices of commodity forced many food grain importing Nations to change their strategies. They started looking out for meeting their food demand through own production at foreign lands.

Steep rise and high fluctuation in oil prices has laid foundation for alternate source of energy. Few Agriculture produce have identified as potential source of energy. A large area needed to produce them for mitigating the expected demand.

Africa being in under-developed tag offers quite low price for lands, which allured investors to set their eyes for resourceful cheap lands largely for their agricultural operations.

Despite categorized in investors ideology of just land grabbing, Africa still attracts just less than 5% of global FDI projects. This low share of percentage showcases that it isn’t merely a race for land grabbing but of well sound business motives. Investors are choosing Africa because of

1.  733 Million hectare arable land, which can play a great role in world food security
2. Only 57-58% of agricultural productivity compared to their Asian and South American counterparts, sets opportunity for quality input suppliers
3. Big economies are at single digit growth rate, while Africa provides consumer side demand for over 1 Billion people
4. Cheaper labour availability
5. Availability of natural resources necessary for investment
6. Local policy and industrial facilitation

Business requires investments, in form of Land, human resource and many other business activities. Investor moving towards Africa because of cheaper lands, but this isn’t a sole reason for them to invest in Africa. A survey finding suggests that 88% of investors feels Africa is an attractive business destination for investment, compared to likelihood the actual investments are quite low. The root cause for this heavy difference is because of sound business plans. Investors want to invest in Africa with a long term vision. However, to avoid any land-grabbing interest local government can design policies to secure national resources.