ET - Corporate Dossier: Why CEOs find social media to be a double-edged sword 

...the single most important thing about social networks-they are a great leveler. They also blur the line between what was considered one's professional and personal space.

"Besides, I am a Tamilian, married to a Bengali, so I should be acceptable to both Jayalalithaa and Mamta di. Why not?" Her irrefutable logic is met with much hilarity and even endorsement by the people who follow her. But looking beyond her easy candour, what's interesting is how the managing director of Paul Writer effortlessly wields social media across half-a-dozen platforms. For Paul, who is a regular on content sharing and networking sites like Slideshare, Youtube, Facebook and Flickr, online networking sites are food and drink.

The author of a book on frugal marketing and former Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) of Wipro was one of LinkedIn's first users in India in the early 2000s. In fact, Krishnan of LinkedIn India says that Jessie Paul is a case study, in the way she created a network of CMOs in her earlier avatar to trade best practices.

Achieving Sustainable Competitive Product Differentiation

t's an incredibly competitive world and you need to keep your product visible with smart, sustainable tactics. How do you stay relevant and differentiate your product from the hundreds of others currently in the market?

Here are a couple of well-worn tactics that companies have been using for years:

Why this doesn't work: Pricing is a dynamic factor that needs to be changed on a daily basis to keep up with the competition. Every day there is a new player in the field, with better features at a lower price. Try to undercut your competitors on a daily basis, and you might just end up losing out on a significant amount of earnings.

Read more...

How to get ROI from your Outsourced Partners

Get into any marketing gathering and the most common topic of conversation will be how the agency is just not working out.  Assuming that you are not working with a dud one, possibly some of the problems are caused by, ahem, you!  

I've seen all sides - I spent three years in account management in Ogilvy Advertising and then for 12 years managed a large outsourced ecosystem of agencies, consultants and freelancers, and now for the past two years I've run an advisory firm, which among other things also guides clients on their marketing supply chain or vendor eco-system.  

During these years, I have of course made my fair share of disastrous choices (and how to avoid those is a whole different topic) but I've also established some very productive long term relationships and pulled off some great work with them.  So here are my thoughts on how you as a client can actually benefit more from your outsourced partners.

Here are some tips...

How Apple, Dominos, Delta Airlines Rise Despite Slumpy Economy

This week Apple, in another of the unexpected moves that has made this company famous, bumped up salaries for employees in their retail stores as much as 25 percent. The raises are based on worker performance reviews held earlier this year, and come as no surprise to anyone who has stepped into any of the over 350 Apple stores around the world.

It is to those 36,000 employees' credit that the Apple experience is uniformly high no matter if you step into a store in Munich or Manhattan. 

Like Apple products, Apple staff are people friendly. They actually know (and care about) what they're talking about-or they'll find someone who does. All of which contributes to making Apple's face-to-face time a largely positive experience, and makes their stores the highest-performing retail spaces in the world.

Dominos, the global pizza chain based in Ann Arbor, has also been making changes since its 2008 brand relaunch. Serving a wildly divergent audience spanning 16 countries and a consumer market aged from 19 to 65, the company realized several years ago that while they were the experts in delivery, their product perception was low, service was low and, since they delivered the pizza to your door, a retail experience was nonexistent.

Time for a change.

Thriving in Change

Marketing Events

Paul Writer has speaking engagements and association with a few upcoming marketing events and afcourse we are organising our flagship event The Futurist CMO 2012 in August this year. Get all the information about these events in our event section on paulwriter.com

102nd Social Media Workshop by Digital Vidya, August, Bangalore - 

Are you interested in leveraging Social Media for Brand Building, B2B Lead Generation and Customer Acquisition? You may want to consider participating in 2-day, hands-on case study driven Social Media Marketing Workshop by Digital Vidya

Futurist CMO 2012, August, New Delhi 

Are you a forward-thinker?Youʼre intrigued by how digitization is changing marketing. Youʼre not a geek, but have a technology roadmap for your team. Youʼre thrilled by the changing role of the CMO. Then you should join us, and a hundred other senior, forward-thinking global marketers for the second edition of

Think Glocal Conference 2012, September, Mumbai 

Think Glocal Conferences is a banner started by Attitude Events Pvt Ltd in the year 2011, to conduct knowledge based business conferences in India. 

The second edition of Think Glocal is on a larger and grander scale with the theme of "Building Brands", a Journey towards building a strong Brand.

Get all the details here...

Job Listings on Paulwriter.com 

Watch this space for new job listings on Paulwriter.com every week for mid to senior level marketers. Or post a job here...  

CMO - IFB  - Panaji / Bangalore, Goa/ Karnataka, India

IFB seeks to appoint a senior marketer to head their marketing efforts. You will define and execute the company's marketing activities to achieve the financial and strategic objectives of the organization. You will manage marketing budgets, set up required business processes and track return on investment. We are in an aggressive growth mode and need a go-getter who combines thought leadership with execution skills.

A visual and graphics designer who can create compelling design for Print (Posters, Cards etc,) Web (Intranet and external website, webpage and rich media) and the Presentations (in PPT and Flash) for various communication programs.

PR Manager - All Cargo Logistics, Mumbai, India

The PR manager will be responsible for establishing and raising awareness for Allcargo Logistics as a leading Indian MNC in the Integrated logistics space among the Media community which will ultimately help raise the visibility and drive new business for the company. 

This role will also be responsible for building strong relationships with key industry bodies and leveraging them for building awareness.

This role will be responsible for strategic planning and supervision of all public relations programs across business and trade media for Allcargo Logistics

Apply Now...