BBM for Android and iPhone - Is this a good communications strategy?

In the month of 2013, Blackberry announced that BBM would soon be available for Android and iPhone users. It will be the first multi-platform version of the instant messaging app which has 60 million active monthly users.

By October, over 6 million people signed up for 'information about BBM' at bbm.com. Over 2 million people found out ways to download the BBM application on their Android and iPhone devices unofficially using 'creative ways', as Blackberry would like to say.

As of November numbers, the news is that BBM on Android and iPhone is a big hit. It has been downloaded over 20+ million times. BBM's engagement of around 40 minutes per user is also higher than other multi-platform messaging platforms such as Tango and LINE.

It is a Branding Harakiri.

All the above sounds great. But are we missing the forest for the trees? Around 2008, almost all my friends had a blackberry, and all of them swore by BBM. In 2013, only very few have remained loyal to Blackberry, but all of them still swore by BBM. Only change is that they have added WhatsApp as an alternative to BBM for friends without Blackberry phones.

Still they were the privileged few to enjoy BBM service. Those few users are around 60 million. With BBM becoming multi-platform, these loyal 60 million users would surely feel a pinch in losing their exclusivity. This is something the Blackberry brand managers have missed in their enthusiasm to get into the instant messaging marketplace. They seem to have momentarily forgotten that they are primarily a device company, at least in the minds of the consumers.

Messaging Marketplace is fiercely competitive and commoditized.

In the instant messaging marketplace, WhatsApp needs little introduction since it is arguably the world’s most popular messaging application with more than 300 million people using it each month. It is number one in the biggest mobile app market, Europe boasting a weekly engagement stats of a whopping 160 minutes per user. It has reached the critical acceptance level to charge $0.99 for a one-year subscription - although it is free for the first year.

There are over 22 mobile messaging applications in the market such as GroupMe, Line, WeChat, MessageMe, Kik, Tango, Hike etc. Kik is one of the few messaging apps that doesn’t require you to provide your phone number. It is therefore in tablets that does not have a SIM card. There are also a few regional apps like the KakaoTalk of Korea. Then we have the Facebook messenger app that can't be ignored with its mega user base.

Surprisingly, Blackberry has decided to shift focus from its device business to this crazy competitive marketplace which is just about to get commoditized. I can't understand the branding and business motive behind this costly move. It is not only costly in terms of capital and operational investments, but also costly in terms of dis-illusioning its loyal consumer base.

Where is the revenue?

Blackberry had announced in September 2013 that it is planning to cut 4,500 jobs, or 40% of its worldwide workforce, in an attempt to staunch huge losses. The smartphone maker said that it anticipated a loss of as much as $995m (£621m) when it reports its second-quarter earnings.

Blackberry's Chief Executive Thorsten Heins said: "We are implementing the difficult, but necessary operational changes ...to address our position in a maturing and more competitive industry, and to drive the company toward profitability."

This is where I have a disconnect. How is multi-platform BBM, a drive towards profitability? What is the revenue model in this instant messaging marketplace? Putting ads onto the app is unthinkable, as such intrusions are taken very negatively by the generation of today. Subscription revenue is the only likely revenue model, which can be dangerous in a commodity market. Facebook has shied away from putting a subscription revenue model even then they had over a billion users hooked.

Games, video, digital stickers, music sharing are probably the other upcoming revenue generators, but that space has been already keenly fought by other players. Of the $58m, LINE made in sales in the first quarter of 2013, half came from selling games and 30%, or roughly $17m, from sales of its 8,000 different stickers. With KakaoTalk, which is thought to be on 90% of all smartphones in South Korea, registered users can choose from more than 100 games they can play with one another, and games alone helped the company generate $311m in sales in the first half of 2013.

WhatsApp has clearly identified communications as its mainstay. It doesn't intend to dilute its proposition by offering everything possible in the messaging environment. That is perhaps the reason of its ever increasing user base. It is profitable by its sheer subscription revenue.

I am not clear what is the revenue thought behind making this multi-platform BBM? How does a multi-platform messaging app sell a Blackberry phone or its services? It will perhaps erode the user base whose only reason for a blackberry phone is BBM. Whatever the revenue model is, it is surely going to be one difficult business to sustain for Blackberry.

Conclusion:
Both from branding and business perspective, I believe that Blackberry has got it wrong. It is wasting its energies in uncertain domains, rather than focus on the device division creating more exclusive Blackberry services like the BBM for its loyal retail and corporate customer base.

#greatestfan campaign - Reliance Life Insurance

"Sudhir is Indian cricket’s most well known fan. Let us support him" is what the latest campaign of Reliance Life Insurance says.  I have seen massive hoardings in Mumbai, heard radio commercials, and have visited their Facebook and Twitter profiles. I think the campaign is perhaps live on TV as well.

Every ad mentions it without fail that this campaign has no commercial purpose. It is a social responsibility led initiative from Reliance Life Insurance in support of the greatest fan of Sachin Tendulkar and India's favourite sport, Cricket. :)

I wonder, "why is Reliance being so foolish?" Why are they thinking that consumers are gullible and stupid enough to make believe anything on mass media.


What is even surprising is that the campaign is not in the news. There has been very little PR push around the campaign. I could find just one press release from Reliance Life Insurance that said 'Sudhir's passion is such that he does not have a regular source of income. He spends all his time cycling across the country (even abroad) following his idol Sachin Tendulkar. All this has led Reliance Life Insurance to come up with a social responsibility campaign to support him.'

The company’s Facebook page states, “For us, he is an embodiment of everything that comes in the way of planning for one's future. And that's why we have taken up Sudhir's cause and want to help him secure his future with a regular income. After all, retirement is definitive and needs planning before it becomes a shock.” If that is the fact, shouldn't Reliance be discouraging such fanatism?

I have been into communications for the past 15 years and I can say with certainty that consumers would look at this campaign as a desperate attempt by Reliance to take advantage of the media hype about the retirement of Sachin Tendulkar. The current perception of Reliance in the minds of the consumers of being a shrewd business house further adds to this conclusion. Consumers would not take it as a CSR initiative.

It is also a classic case of how a good opportunity is lost because of wrong execution strategy. The thought of helping out Sudhir is surely a good marketing idea, and a social idea. There is nothing wrong about being opportunistic to build business and profitability. But it has to be executed well.

The flaws of this campaign are as follows:

1. An initiative like this should not be taken to the mass media in the manner that Reliance did. More so, if the initiative was a CSR initiative. The disclaimer added salt to the wounds. Instead, it should have been a PR campaign with a local activation strategy. The media would have brought the initiative to the various mass media.
2. The campaign is not clear about what Reliance is actually doing for Sudhir. The campaign says, "As a part of CSR, Reliance Life Insurance is providing financial aid to Sudhir". If Reliance had taken up a few conclusive steps for the family of Sudhir, and informed us about the same through a PR and social media campaign, media then would have taken the message to the consumers through TV, Radio and Newspapers.
3. The campaign is asking consumers to join them in supporting Sudhir by texting 'SUDHIR' to a short code, by liking the company's Facebook page and by using the hashtag #greatestfan and following the company's Twitter account. But the motivation or rationale behind the same is missing. For example, Reliance could have said, "every 'life' or an 'SMS' has a value of 1 rupee. Each 1000 likes, Reliance Life Insurance will give Sudhir an insurance worth Rs. 1000/- as premium.
4. The campaign is just featuring Sudhir. It may not be a flaw, but India sure has many crazy cricket fanatics like Sudhir. The campaign could have been inclusive. The campaign idea could have taken all cricket fanatics as the target audience, with Sudhir being their mascot (or ambassador). An offer could have been weaved around the same. It would have been an honest attempt to support Sudhir and Cricket.

I have always believed that communication strategy and creative strategy have to be honest. And that there are ways to communicate any damn thing on earth without appearing dishonest.

Marketing Communications in the times of the World Wide Web.

Marketing Communications over the last decade has taken a big leap (of faith!) with the advent of interactive, super-fast, inter-connected world wide web and the myriad web technologies. All the critical pillars of communications - message, media, consumers, design tools, skill-sets etc have undergone a change.

Or I should say, the technological advances have brutally demanded a change in the way we think, create and execute brand communications.

The creative process required to roll out a print ad or a TV campaign is very different than the process of creativity required to create a message on the Internet. Building a website, designing a search campaign or executing a social media campaign requires a completely different kind of skill set.

Media, in the good old days was the kingdom of the media planners and the buyers, today the scene is fragmented. Adwords professionals are equally important media buyers and planners. With content aggregation and inbound marketing, the media is not even always a paid commodity. There goes the 15% commission revenue model.

With Internet and technology, the content is no longer uni-directional, aimed at the consumers. User generated content has become a major source of content. Youtube and the whole of social media runs on user generated content. They are interestingly multi-directional. Even TV, Print and Radio have not stayed uni-directional with the advent of tools like Shazam and QR code

Consumers of media have also changed in terms of time spent on each media, attention span and general lifestyle attitude towards brands. Television and Print have lost a good deal of youth in the age group of 15-24 to these new media. Even a cricket match is getting tracked through tweets and Facebook updates.

For the advertisers, it has not been easy. The tools, the terminologies, the knowledge domain is now not with one big agency. There are so many things to know to implement an effective advertising campaign. We need to not only know vector images, illustrator, TRP, Readership and the works, but also know Impressions, PPC deals, HTML5, JAVA, Email, SMS technologies and the whole new media related knowledge.

The client servicing teams and the other creative, studio and production departments of the bigger advertising agencies have not been able to cope up with the digital onslaught. With media and creative separating in around 2003, it only added to their woes.

A marketing company now has to deal with a creative agency, a media agency, a digital agency, a website agency and a technology company for mini interactive applications. At one end, it may be taken as a positive outcome that the industry is moving towards specialized businesses and services, improving the quality of services, helpful to the economy in general.

At the other end, it is diluting the concept of advertising. There is no single brand custodian. The advertising agency used to be brand custodian in the good old days, but the advertising industry has lost its credibility or ability to be the brand custodian. Today, there seems to be no unanimous decision on who is the brand custodian today. The level of confusion in the definition of 'brand custodian' is quite funny (and stupid).

In a 2008 HT article, Madhukar Sabnavis, Country Head – Planning and Discovery, Ogilvy & Mather India, once said, “The marketing director or the marketing head is the brand’s custodian.” MG Parameswaran, Executive Director, Draft-FCB-Ulka, once said, “The CEO of the company that owns the brand, is the brand’s custodian.” Lynn D’Souza, head, Lintas Media Group, says, “The brand manager is the brand’s custodian.”

The brand custodian is the person or team that knows the brand the best. Brand, from a marketing communications perspective, is what the consumers perceive or feel or believe; or what the consumers should perceive or feel or believe. The advertising agencies used to have an Account Planner or an Account Planning team that used to understand this aspect of branding. They used to understand the consumer behavior behind brands.

Understanding consumer behavior, or the interest to seek this understanding makes the basis for effective communication. The effort required to understand consumer behavior in this world of fragmented myriad media scenario is a big challenge. But it is a possible challenge.

The second basic truth about advertising is that it is exponentially effective if there is convergence of media. 360 degree communication in true spirit is the need of the hour (and always been the need)

For an advertiser and a marketing person, it is always easier to have one brand expert managing the whole gamut of communication. There is a need for a consultative cum outsourcing business model to provide an effective 360 degree communications services to advertisers.

We at TSO - The Significant Other, work in the this new media paradigm. We are working hard to make ourselves experts in consumer behaviour in terms of media consumption, branding and purchase cycle behavior so that we can create the most relevant message. We also tried hard to understand all the available media so that we can sent the most relevant message through the most appropriate media, through the model of outsourcing.

Outsourcing is the key to the execution of such a strategy. In effect, appropriate knowledge and experience in liasonning with all the myriad vendors is the key.

Amul Ads - Simple and Consistent Strategy

They are bloody consistent. The fact that I absolutely adore about AMUL.

We all know about their age old topical advertising. They do a great job in selecting a current hot affair and make an ad about it. There were even controversies when AMUL commented on national political events such as 'Emergency in India' in 1976.

AMUL Ad during the Emergency

Click here to see some of their fine ads that TSO - The Significant Other has compiled on their FaceBook page.

The cute utterly butterly 'Amul girl' is an icon of the middle class India right from 1967. Woah! Do we have any other mascot that old?

When Aamir Khan's Ghazini was released

The Amul girl is a hand-drawn cartoon of a young, chubby Indian girl dressed in a polka dotted frock with blue hair and a half pony tied up. 

The brief was to draw a mascot which is easy to paint in walls and outdoors. Those days didn't have those huge printing machines to print huge outdoor vinyls. The idea was conceived by an agency called ASP (Advertising, Sales and Promotion) headed by Sylvester Da Cunha and his Art Director Eustace Fernandez

Even the media strategy of AMUL was clear, crisp and consistent. Almost all of their print advertisements come in the top corner of the third page in the main newspaper. Earlier it was Times Of India where this media innovation was to be seen, now we can even see it in Hindustan Times.

In communications terminology, we call it a strategy to create expectations of readers to find a particular kind of content in a particular place. Like we always open the supplement of Hindustan Times, Brunch from the last page expecting the fixed format short & interesting interview of a celebrity.

If you refer to image below, this is exactly the spot in the 3rd page of Hindustan Times where you can expect an advertisement from AMUL.

Media Innovation - Amul

AMUL has just been ranked as the No. 1 Indian brand by Campaign magazine in its list of Top 1000 Brands of Asia for three consecutive year. AMUL is one brand which truly deserves this accolade. Although advertising plays a critical role in getting this coveted rank, the product management also has to be hailed and saluted. What would advertising do, if the product does not perform as per the expectation and perception that advertisements create.

There is so much to learn for Mumbaikars and Townies like us from AMUL started 65 years back in a small town in the state of Gujarat called Anand.

A Big Salute.

Google Network Vs Yahoo-Bing Network

Everybody knowing or having interest in search marketing would know that Google dominates search volumes. In the US of A, Google handles two-thirds of all search queries. However, can we ignore the network that accounts for one-thirds of the search queries that consumers type-in in the US?

The truth is that we know very little about the Yahoo-Bing Network (YBN).

This post is about a research done by AdGooRoo which sought to gauge the success of the YBN network in gaining market share against Google. The research report from AdGooRoo compared the performance of Yahoo! Bing against Google in six critical verticals.

Verticals basically referred to those industry segments that account for the majority of the total search traffic and click-throughs in the U.S. Search market. Comparing the paid search spends of these industry segments could give a representative idea of where each of the networks stand in terms of search effectiveness and outcomes.

The industry segments measured were as follows:

1. Retail (Shopping & Classifieds)
2. Financial Services
3. Travel
4. Education
5. Computer & Internet
6. Business to Business

This methodology of dividing the spends into verticals was interesting. It brought up a number of questions, such as

1. Which are the verticals where Google is dominant, and to what degree?
2. Is Google dominant in every aspect of paid search - Impressions, Click through efficiency, CPC, CPL etc
3. Can we compromise on impressions to get lower CPLs in some of the industry verticals? etc.

While the report had the obvious findings, it also had a few surprises. Please read on to get a quick gist of the report.

Impressions:

Google Adwords served more impressions in all the verticals except for 'Financial Services'. Retail as a vertical, is the biggest money-maker for advertisers and Bing was a distant second. The research was done in Q3, 2012 and Google had 7.3 million impressions more than YBN in one quarter alone, for 'Retail'.

Bing Ads performed strongly against AdWords in several other verticals in terms of ad impressions. It outperformed AdWords in the Financial Services vertical with 5.31 million impressions compared to 4.11 million for AdWords. Analysts have credited the popularity of Financial Services on Yahoo! and MSN for pushing Bing Ads into the lead.

Click-Through Rates (CTRs)

In addition to earning more search traffic, advertisers on AdWords experienced higher CTRs on Google network, with AdWords campaigns getting 2.4 to 5.9 times higher CTRs than those on YBN during the same period.

Interestingly, for advertisers who were active on both the engines, quite a few of them got higher CTRs on YBN including Citicards and Fidelity Life. Quite obviously, it was found that among the 39,000 advertisers surveyed, 55% of them were running ad campaigns on both AdWords and YBN.

Otherwise, the competition in terms of CTRs was completely one-sided favoring Google. The biggest discrepancies came in Financial Services (3.53% compared to .81%), Travel (4.14% to 1.27%), and Business to Business (3.12% to .60%).

Cost-per-Click (CPC)

Not surprisingly, CPCs for YBN were invariably lower. There is a price to be paid for Google’s successful track record with AdWords. While CPC data was fairly close in each vertical, the Computer and Internet vertical saw a CPC rate on AdWords that was 117% greater than Bing Ads.

As a result of lower CPCs, impressions were cheaper on the YBN. It varied from 76 to 90 percent cheaper on average. YBN therefore can be taken as a brand awareness medium giving high visibility at a lower cost.

For a lead generation campaign, YBN may not give high volumes, but can bring in leads at a lower cost per lead. It can prove to be very useful for brands who cannot handle high volumes of leads coming into the system.

Conclusions:

As an advertiser, I would suggest presence in both the networks. It would only put a multiplier effect on the search outcomes in terms of lowering of cost and increase in volume of leads.

General Mills Yogurt Brand Yoplait on Twitter.

Twitter is a media that consumer brands of today cannot ignore, or be careless about. With Twitter and Facebook  the brand has to be active, living and breathing 24/7.

The brand has to post, read and respond every minute of the day. It has to do all three keeping the brand positioning and attitude in mind.

I have come across an article which gives a good example of how Twitter and Pinterest among other social media is being used by a Yogurt brand called Yoplait from the house of General Mills.

You can either click here or read the article copied here in my blog. Courtesy: http://sproutsocial.com

Why General Mills Yogurt Brand Yoplait Sets an Example on Twitter

When you start with a popular consumer food item, especially one like flavored yogurt, it’s that much easier to create a great brand presence on Twitter. We spoke with Alexandra Heide, Community Engagement Specialist for General Mills’ Yoplait brand, to get her take on the value of incorporating what she calls “joy” into Yoplait’s Twitter account.

The tone of Yoplait’s Twitter account is always upbeat. Whether it’s tweeting about who to watch on the red carpet at the Oscars, or links to innovative yogurt recipes, the brand posts a nice mix of product and non-product related tweets. The common theme is always fun and positivity. “Just like the way people enjoy our product, we like to provide Twitter content in bite-sized portions,” says Alexandra.

The brand also appears to have subtly associated itself with health and social issues by posting links to promote events like Athleta Esprit de She and International Women’s Day. This is not only a way to reiterate the positive theme of the Twitter account, it’s also a clever way to post content that’s relevant to the brand’s target audience.

Let’s take a closer look at how Yoplait uses the overarching concept of fun, along with specific strategies like posting images, soliciting feedback, and using social media management tools and teams to carve out a commanding presence on Twitter.

A tangible way that Yoplait contributes to the success of its Twitter account is to post lots of fun and colorful visual content. Following a strategy we’ve long espoused, it posts pictures from its Instagram account, including generic upbeat images like the one above. Of course, it posts lots of product shots as well. These are usually accompanied with some thought-provoking copy, such as “What challenges are you facing today?” As you might expect, Yoplait also has vibrant image galleries on Facebook and Pinterest and occasionally cross-posts these pictures to Twitter. The net result of all these images in its Twitter stream is that Yoplait’s followers are exposed to numerous visual impressions of the brand in a way that never seems like advertising. The visual strategy on Twitter is obviously working. Alexandra confirms that its visual content always gets the most interaction whether it’s “a picture of yogurt pops or a cute baby animal.” 

Other tweets that you’ll see a lot of when you peruse Yoplait’s stream are solicitations for feeback, suggestions and input from its followers. “We get a lot of product suggestions for new flavors and new products,” says Alexandra, adding that they’re always interested to hear what their fans think of the brand. 

It’s evident that fans are obviously paying attention to the brand on Twitter because the account is filled with retweets from happy consumers. Perhaps because of the health-conscious connotation of Yoplait yogurt, a lot of celebrities like Chris Tucker and Carmen Electra have been willing to lend their endorsements to the brand as well.

Business Modelling - India as a Market !

India is supposedly a hot market for the world, and the entrepreneur enthusiast. A rising urban consumer population with increasing disposable income is becoming a target market of choice for many aspiring businesses. Absolute number of consumers in India and especially in the Metro cities, gives a positive shade to any initial discussions about new revenue models.

Innovation in Internet technology and India being a country with a huge pool of IT experienced working class is giving rise to a lot of business ideas at various stages of incubation. E-commerce, Payment Gateway and Mobility related business ideas are discussed at almost every coffee discussions between professionals.

Quite obviously, almost all of these businesses are targeted at the retail consumers. Starting from global business ideas, which have become successful such as 'The Facebook' and 'Twitter', to smaller business ideas that are sprouting in every Indian city, every business is targeting the retail consumers.

Target Market definition and its true potential builds on a business model. Going by the normal belief that 1 out of every 100 business ideas fail, it is critical that this target market called India is studied and understood a bit more incisively to get business and revenue objectives accurately and realistically.

India is fragmented.

It sounds like a no-brainer, and we tend to get blind by accepting it as a common place argument. We need to go beyond the fact that India is fragmented. It is not about demography. Businesses need to deal with the softer aspects of psychology to ascertain the consumer demand for a particular product proposition.

The need is to delve into the fragments and its associated consumer behavior, attitude and mindsets. India is divided into a rural and urban mindset. Within urban mindset, we have original urbanites, second generation migrants and first generation migrants. Then there is the mindset of highly skilled labour, semi skilled labour, self-employed and marginally employed labour.

Access to media is fragmented. Access to free office Internet, Smart phones, Facebook, Twitter, Television, Radio and newspapers is not homogeneous, and hence information consumed is not uniform. As media is a critical element in forming lifestyle related attitudes, it creates fragments that are not easily comprehensive. Similar is the extent of globalization of the mindsets. Similar is the adherence to religious and cultural beliefs.

India is rigid.

It is bind to its traditions and customs for thousands of years. The best examples of it, are to analyse the long rule of the Mughals and the continual charity / religious work by Christian missionaries. India has stayed a Hindu majority country. Christian missionaries have invested and created schools and hospitals all across the country. 'Don Bosco' and 'St. Mary's' sound like initiatives of the Indian Government. It is unfortunate that Indian Government didn't have the vision to create such brand names for education in the country. Irrespective of these facts, India has stayed bind to its traditions, customs and religions. Parents send their kids to Don Bosco to pursue English education with a chandan, or saffron, or kesar, or kumkum tilak on their heads.

The simple conclusion to draw from this discussion is the fact that changing behavior in India is not so easy. India is an elephant that takes time to analyse and arrive at decisions regarding change. Kellogg's is a classic case of surprise that the top management of Kellogg's got when they entered India in the early nineties. Introducing cereals as breakfast to the Indian consumers met with unexpectedly strong resistance. In the US, corn flakes are had with cold milk, whereas in India, it was hot milk when consumers slowly started accepting corn flakes as their breakfast cereal.

Famous brands such as Mercedes, Coca Cola, Citibank experienced similar surprises because they had been blinded by figures. They all forgot to understand India qualitatively.

India is price sensitive.

Every Sunday, Big Bazaar has a 5% discount. India is one of the country where credit cards are available without any annual fee. A Rs. 2 increase in Petrol prices creates traffic around petrol pumps to save Rs. 50 to Rs. 100. India saves by being price sensitive. There is greater trust on holding Gold for future, as compared to any other savings and investment schemes.

This psycho-cultural trait is pertinent to any revenue model to arrive at a realistic earning potential of a business. Fee income business in India is therefore a doubt. Consumers in India seems to have a belief that they are doing a favour by deciding to buy the product or the service. Fee income, if packaged upfront could face huge consumer resistance. The value of convenience is not realized against the opportunity cost of the service being inconvenient. The consumer benefit of providing convenience therefore has to be looked from the point of gaining consumer acceptance, not as a revenue opportunity from the end consumer. The revenue opportunity exists among intermediaries, and in the supply chain coming together to provide the convenience.

India is a potent B2B market as well.

This fragmented retail consumer base gives rise to immense risk in terms of conceptualizing a business and can therefore lead us to this B2B marketplace. The B2B marketplace in India is comparatively homogeneous and offers equally potent business opportunities. Importantly, it is not a targeted marketplace by one and all.

B2B business is about enabling another business or business processes. The target market for B2B business can be one large corporate. One corporate can make the business profitable and sustainable.

Online Payments as a business opportunity is attracting a lot of entrepreneurs and investors. India being one of the most progressive countries with advanced payment systems like NEFT, RTGS, IMPS, ACH and NFS, transfers of money between bank accounts have become enabled through varied means. With IMPS, mobile payments is a robust reality. With ACH, cash collection and management assumes a new paradigm.

The argument is that online payments business can either be targeted at providing convenience to the retail consumers, or be targeted at businesses to make their payment processes simpler, operation-efficient, cost-effective and audit friendly. And it may be just easier to target businesses. So it is imperative that unlike what is commonly observed, business modelling requires a strategic thought towards B2B potential, apart from focusing on the retail consumers.

Conclusion: 'Business Modelling' is a huge discussion. This blog post is an attempt to give cues to further analyse and arrive at a target market definition that has the maximum business potential. This is not exclusive, and is intended to farther thinking in the direction proposed by the blog.

Comments are welcome. We can add to this discussion for everybody's benefits. I would be glad to answer questions with regards to any confusion or fluidity.

The author has an experience of 12 years in the integrated branding, communication and financial domain involving traditional as well as digital media. He can be contacted at durlov@kuhipaat.in for consultancy and project execution.