Youtube – your next search destination

For long google has been dissed for its investment made in Youtube and how it was unwise to invest in the video platform with low monetization potential.

Over last couple of months have started seeing increasing usage of youtube among peer to check reviews for things ranging from cars, white goods, holiday destinations to movie reviews as preferred way of discovering information. This means its important for consumer facing brands to have a strong online video strategy which focuses on creating online video content for users to consume similar to whats happening on Television.

In recent past my searches have brought me closer to selecting Skoda Yeti as potential car to wait for instead of Honda Civic or looking to buy a new laptop which lead me to this hilarious video which actually proves point on how light weight their thinkpad laptops are. (Video)me.

What aspect of online video content generation should brands focus on

i) Generating Editorial content on laptop – nothing to see other people talking about their experience with product

ii) 1 minute video which are either information driven or entertainment driven which embeds a brand product line feature as whenever someone will talk about owning light weight laptop i am sure to point to this video seen.

iii) Why not like a music artist own a channel and keep creating content and keep engaging user.

When we look at positioning its also important there should be connecting videos which doesn’t require user to leave the youtube platform and keep consuming more brand mantra.

If anyone has a better case study of something being done in US or elsewhere would like to dissect it further from RoI point of you.

M-Commerce India – The Future & Challenges faced!!

For last couple of days have been doing lot of research on M-Commerce Models in India and lot of people have come to my rescue in making me understand perils imposed by government regulations restricting growth of e-commerce in india through mobile medium.

Best to my understanding all the existing M-Commerce model been adopted by players like M-Check, Obopay, Paymate etc require user to map a banking instrument like credit card, debit card, bank account etc to their mobile phone account and via an application installed on phone or through the provider concentrate on making payment instrument mobile enabled.

Although its a big leap from security point of you enabling people to start paying via the mobile phone WAP,SMS medium for various merchant services available though still such services have not reached a critical stage due to lot of factors like non-tie up with all the banks or people still not comfortable sharing credit/debit card account information etc.

Trying to understand with such stringent norms coming through TRAI guidelines making its mandatory to identify customers which are as stringent as required to open an saving account and get a debit card, it made me wonder telecom companies with their access and reach are in the best for forward integration into becoming a bank then other way around. If today i using my mobile phone account could start paying at merchants like credit cards or using pre-paid cards start buying stuff like vegetables etc, my bank usage for daily transaction would reduce significantly.

I am sure it may make you think why are people at telecom companies doing same though biggest barrier understood from various experts is the TRAI license fees calculation system which is approx 6% of annual gross revenue. So until unless you register as VAS provider with operator and clearly revenue parted is shown in books it will be still counted as net reciept revenue making the commerce business unviable as merchants wont be ready to pay for transactions around 7-8% where banks are charging between 2-4%.

Compliance to RBI banking norms is much simpler task for such telecom companies for handling banking, fraud transactions but the biggest barrier imposed by TRAI in terms of license fees need to be cleared.

The way around for now is to build MVAS application which can be charged to user account on service or tangible asset delivered for consumption on mobile device then its workable.  The TRAI Guideline paper(linked) actually doesn’t restrict telecom companies to use their platform to accept payments as when you clearly read 2.1.3(iv) it clearly states in case of M-commerce one needs to adhere to RBI guidelines where ever necessary and if you goto RBI guidelines(linked) it states clearly that these guidelines are for “BANKS” for dealing with customers via mobile as a medium, this still doesnt govern the telecom companies.

I  am talking to lot of telecom’s to get their views on same and will do a follow up post if see some success.

Health Startup Opportunity in Indian Market

For last couple of days had been trying to demystify the health space in India and found out most of the startups rising are targeting the B2C space where doctors are the businesses and connecting them with consumers. Though the space tend to be bigger but if you try to work out revenue per user and scale required to breakeven without the right money muscle power it makes it difficult to pull of the same.

Although a niche space not being explored and which can be scaled easily to other markets and have higher adoption by the doctors is to create a Doctors startup kit for independent practitioners which is primarily a vehicle for pharma and other medical device companies to reach out to smaller practitioners. The kit can take either of 2 directions

i)  Medical Journal Route where one discuss new happening,drug discovery and tries to push such information on regular basis, host webinars and conferences for doctors and takes care of sending free medical samples, garner feedback for medical companies etc. Help bring down cost of marketing for Pharma companies. The model is different from webmd.com which again concentrates on just the research information part but not concentrate on the business model for organizing free medical supplies and feedback loop from practitioners to Rx companies.

ii) Online Clinic Management Tools for doctors which help doctor use power of internet,mobile to manage patients their history etc free of cost again sponsored by Rx companies where access to patient data to pharma companies and doctors schedule help them push relevant diagnosis and suggestions of their products.

Rxvantage.com is another startup based out of US which has taken similar B2B route in the overcrowded B2C market and has great potential for growth if it clearly keep launching services which will enable doctor to keep moving more of his offline MIS online for more convienence.

Is Internet Changing our History

Sorry had been out to singapore for the last edition of AD:tech and didnt get time to write any new post, it was interesting to meet lot of  people from the APAC region which mad me realize the kind of work we do in India is of supreme quality and digital advertising industry in India is most evolved and trend setter.

Important technology or point of reference used by a lot was either Wiki or Youtube. Youtube is a phenomenon which is gaining traction around the world with broadband infrastructure improving day by day its share of viewing minutes per user is increasing.

Wikipedia on the hand has went ahead and changed the business models of encyclopedia’s and initiated a user-collaboration model which has helped create content on non documented things which has existed in various other forms now available at one single point. Although the concept is really good the only problem being faced with increasing content on Wikipedia and use of it as a reference point by people in academics is ability for people to change history without adding facts.  For instance if i want i can go ahead and create parallel history of Greater Kailash in Delhi and if marketplace dynamics don’t come into affect with other people bothered about policing my content and verifying the same, some day after couple of months my version of story will be start to be used as reference point and soon be the official history of Greater Kailash as repeated by everyone.

For over 10 years working in the Internet Industry have seen lot of technological evolution which helps us to use internet as tool of documenting or archiving our actions which do tend to become history. let it be social networking platform like facebook or a blog which documents people lives or tweeter post on iran covering the protest news.  But media driven documentation of history is very dangerous and need for a recognized authority to validate such information has become necessity. Did hear from people that couple of universities in US and have taken project initatives which will look into developing standards which would create process and feedback system for validated addition of content and decide what becomes history for us.

Its important we all take this matter seriously as Media has the power to doctor and change our view about things and now with everything documented and easily accessiable on internet it becomes more important we look into bringing some regulation to this not from perspective to regulate internet or people freedom to express but from view point of preserving the factual truth.

Top 10 Business News Portals India

Lot of news sites exist in India but there are very few which concetrate on business news although all claim to be receiving relevant audiences.

These are the few which are my personal favourite and strong in terms of content and audience access

1. Livemint – Official website of Business newspaper in collabration between Wall Street Journal and HT in India. Their differential content from the newspaper does tend to attract the offline audience to their online pressence. A perfect example on how newspaper can always remain engaged with its audience and find ways to increase yield.

2. Economic Times- Online presence for India’s Leading Business and Finance News portal which is more of replicating point of information for all news covered in print.

3. Financialexpress.com – Really like the editorial quality and due to its inaccessiabilty on newstand makes it daily read for me

4. Business Today – One of the oldest business magazine in india from India Today Group. Covers quality content from the magazine and new effort being taken on adding web exclusive content is good.

5. Domain-b – Online Business magazine with no affilation to any print/TV or other forms of media. This shows in their effort to showcase information and act like a business infomediary then just a news coverage portal.

6. Business-Standard – One of the few Business News sites still investing in product innovations to help print readers have incentive for coming online.

7. The Hindu Business Line – Widely read newspaper from south, good quality coverage on industry development happening in southern indian states.

8. Outlook Business – Another print magazine which just went through revamp of web pressence. Just recently started following the content but higher coverage on government economic policies.

9. Businessworld.in – Better of the 3 business magazines portal covered in the list with growing relevant content and page views on comscore its a must ready for all business information seekers. The site has been modelled a  lot on business week online presence which is good from content coverage point of you for readers.

10. utvi.com – Could have covered this in Finance Portals but didnt feel the site made the mark. Hence adding it part of Business news portals.

These sites are in no ranking order

Top 10 Finance portals in India – My favourite for Equity Research and Stock Movement Tracking

Top 10 list column is getting lot of page views with readership going up by 20% post adding category.

Today’s top 10 list look at 10 finance sites in India which i believe covers the best information required for equity research, keeping track of secondary markets and financial securities sector. Again in no order

1. Sharekhan.com – official online trading platform for Sharekhan securities one of the most efficient online trading platform with non clutter view to information. Their ability to keep non-sharekhan demat account holders engaged with content is highy appreciable.

2. Myiris.com – Started in pre-moneycontrol day when CNBC was still not the default financial market tracking channel. Excellent qualityof research and clean design keeps me bringing back.  Peers and CXO level audience in Enterprise 2000 and SMB’s have mentioned site as alternate channel to their existing online DEMAT account provider.

3. Moneycontrol.com – Most exposed financial site in India with content syndicated from Network 18 group.  Used to be one of my favourite site when they changed the way financial sites are to be used with web 2.0 tools which improved quality of research done and reduced effective time spent. For some reason lack of product innovation and repeative content from what i see on TV has some what weaned me away.

4. Indiainfoline.com – Another great online demat account company with great content exposed online without logging in again another site which has stopped evolving on product front but quality of content still ensures traction.

5. Valueresearchonline.com – Site has recently gone through a revamp and focus on mutual fund content has brought more interest from financial analyst community. The sites is targeted for more advanced audience which understand various investment instruments instead of amateurs looking for stock movements.

6.Valuenotes.com – Specific focus on Company Research Reports and very strong editorial content leads to high ranking among CFO audience. Biggest advantage this site carries is 70% repeat visitor rate due to high user conversion ratio into premium paid members.

7.Rediff.com/Stocks Section – My favourite Personal Finance tool site. I seriously love the stock hot or not barometer implemented. also ability to see historic movement of stock.

8.Taxindiaonline.com – Comphrensive guide on Taxation Rules & Law, This site is again big refernce point for CFO’s of today and their ablity to remain most updated in sync with Indian Tax Department notifications have got them high subscriber base even from Government departments.

9. InsuranceMall.in – Insurance Comparision engine – one of the early starters in the online space with well established finance company like Bonsai behind it.

10.  Apnaloan.com -  Not a big fan of the site due to lack of information on a self serve model.

Top 10 Ad Networks in India

In continous effort to bring new top 10 countdown of things happening around. List of ad networks in no order

Google Ad Sense – Mother of all self serve ad networks with largest pool of impressions availables though effective on long tail, in effectiveness in guaranteeing delivery of impressions on particular publishers or tier-I and tier-II inventory is poor.

Tyroo Media – Largest Advertising Network which supports more than just display formats like Banner,Rich Media but offers innovative formats like E-Tickets,EDM’s(emailers) for advertisers. Strong Inventory channels – Finance, Technology, SMB,NRI Cricket, News, Regional Inventory. Supports all CPC,CPM,CPL Model. Yahoo funded company

Komli Media – Right Media Exchange Platform based ad network with ability to offer display formats like banners, rich media.Supports all CPC,CPM,CPL Model. Group also behind Pubmatic  which helps publisher select what network to run on which ad slot.

DGM – Affilate Management platform uses multiple formats for generating leads across advertiser categories using SEO,SEM, publishers and more than ad network competes with agencies

Ad Magnet – Ad network started by Interactive Avenues Digital Ad agency based out of Bombay. They are focusing on Display and recently were in news for launching Video ad format.

Ozone Media – Headquartered out of Bangalore has been using accipter for serving with major strength in News Channel Inventory.

Tribal Fusion -Global ad network with indian’s display arm reach. Blind in nature known to be strong on technology and news channel inventory.

Integrid Media – Full service publisher representation agency across digital and non digital format. Reseller for Axill and Ybrant digital international ad networks

AdRevenue – U.K Based ad network with focus on premium publisher Indian IP inventory. Business UK sites and gained traction by claiming first to offer linkedin in market.

Its good to see from 20 ad networks in 2008 starting we have seen only 10 ad networks survive or grade with 1 Network play missing which is more of a publisher representation business then a network. As a network is suppose to ad some kind of targeting or technology value to both advertiser and publisher – hence didnt make the grade.

(Please note these views are solely mine and have nothing to do with my employer and list has been generated for self reference)

TOP 10 Payment Gateway India – New Column on 10 things in no ranking order

After being on horizon with long posts which offered detailed explanations etc had been trying ways to look at daily blogging which wouldnt take much time and will also ensure twitter reader friendly posts

These posts shouldnt require much time and can be pieces of information which were there in mind but just needed penning down or something have been researching.

The first post will be on my favourite space ” Payment Gateways available for your sites in India ” and my 2 cents on same

1 .ICICI Bank Payseal Payment Gateway

Wouldnt recommend to anyone just on the pure customer service and lack of understanding on sensitivity required or processes companies utilizing payment gateway have. Detailed post available

2. Citibank Payment Gateway

Mix Reaction to their services as offline merchants are not the happy lot but online customers do complain about the time interface provided.

3. HDFC Payment Gateway

Traditional bank looking at adding traditional merchant clients – looks like not a core-service for them

4. AXIS (UTI Bank) Payment Gateway

After long time enjoying great customer service as their platform partner is good with technology and bank is very active on customer net turnover less than 5 crores through payment gateway

5. ABCPayments

No feedback available but its an Inter mesh corporation the company behind Indiamart.com

6. CC Avenues

Inability to accept Master card and higher transaction fees charges to customer is a detterent.Too many complains to even add on a post though very small merchants <1L Rs every year are very happy.

7. Paypal

International payment gateway not ideal for indian merchants due to lot of charges or fees paid in getting money into own account and loss due to currency fluctuation.

8. Transecute

No feedback available

9. EBS

Reseller model similar to CCAvenues but better they deal with banks and provide easy to use interface for SME’s

10. Had no one worth mentioning so self promotion as one stop consultant for payment gateway solutions

Facebook – Social Media or E-Commerce Strategy Required!!

Everyday facebook seems to be attracting millions eye balls across continents with average time spent on site increasing every month they soon needed a business model which evolves facebook from just being something dependent on Advertising to something which is recession proof or a transaction based business model which would lead to creation of biggest  marketplace platform which will have 10X  the valuation which it presently command and will be a true ebay or amazon competition.

There are already test runs being done for a payment system similar to paypal which will be available for developers to integrate with facebook apps being developed. With its availability it will open a new world for individual or mom&pop stores to come up on facebook giving competition to big stores due to power of community which empowered ebay.

Imagine coming up with a simple app of creating custom t-shirts with photos or coffee mugs with same for fan clubs to buy online and retail through community pages on facebook. Other hand even complex mico finance lending apps can become real time why facebook with money sharing and management throught online platform.

Over years online book stores like amazon have tried to invest in building products which help bring trust and confidence in people on search results via people reviews of product, community building etc which has helped in generating signifcant return by increase in ARPU(Average return per user) and increased order sizes, Now image with network of trust already established among people on facebook it will take right e-commerce strategy to get product results the way it would work on setting up store on internet.

Today when people talk about social media strategy they talk about blogging, community sites, apps on social networking sites and how brand/product can be positioned or communicate with their audience through such medium. All RoI metrics which are shared are similar media measurement metrics, they still dont map to e-commerce goals or sales goals for the product. I strongly believe its just due to the fact communication manager or marketing manager is defining direction for usage of platform instead of E-commerce manager who should be working on creating apps and strategy to sell products via an online catalog by understanding user behaviour with the platform.

Possible applications

i) Event Ticket Retailing – With so much convience to manage invites for events among peer networks. First feature which can start to reap benefits would be events ticket retailing via facebook and like google long tail theory would apply where even person is able to sell 10 tickets in his network still due to M-M fundamental of people using the platform facebook will make lot of money.

ii) Dell Laptop store – Dell could have a laptop store on which people can customize type of laptops or desktops built over dell series host them on their profiles for other people to see as their recommended PC to buy and earn comission through promoting Dell product ofcourse with their knowledge guarantee in their network

iii) Alternate to Itunes- People recommended music can sell via hosted service similar to i-tunes probably catalog app developed by music companies.

These are couple of opportunities which will come for businesses more than that today professionals need to start investing time in understanding the platform and start looking it as a marketplace platform instead of communication platform.

Open to other people adding their comments on way they see facebook evolve. Though bottom line is I see facebook as the next killer e-commerce app!!

Inbound Vs Outbound Marketing – Digital Medium 2.0

After ages went on internet to discover what the great digital industry minds have been upto and came across a very interesting pop video on Ravi Kiran’s Blog which talked about Inbound Marketing.

For last 2-3 years whenever had been in discussion with evolved brands have been pushing the increasing important of inbound marketing over outbound marketing and how % of budgets should be invested in inbound marketing activities. To bring everyone on the same page with my defination of inbound marketing, All marketing activities like Cold Calling, TV Ads, Direct Mailers,Seminars, Road Shows,Banner Advertising when done with targeting to user behavior etc falls under Outbound Marketing where effort is to reach out to all potential and hope people interested would respond. Though their is nothing wrong in using this methodology and even in today’s world 90% of leads are generated by these methods but internet does allow us to generate leads which have higher quality of conversion and cost of acquistion will tend to keep getting lower. This can be done by the act of Inbound marketing which requires spending on creating information block to reach out to user of intent.

There are various other methods which can be propogated with effective use of Internet or Digital Medium which can vary from Search Engine Optimization(SEO) to Blogging, RSS, Social Media etc. Every brand’s objective has to be to create as much information possible around their brand product to create multiple gateways for prospective customers to funnel down in.

If we take example of a Mobile Phone brand like Sony Ericcson or Samsung with fixed money being invested in promotion and launch of series based on platform feature like cyber shot or walkman series there is high potential to create content on the web which first of all get customer to accept advantages of having high resolution photo capturing camera in phone over a normal camera and in unstructure way keep creating content with publishers on photo sharing sites,electronic review sites etc where peoples intent is some what driven to think investing in digital camera wouldnt add as much value as paying 20% premium on a phone which can do the same.  Also when brand does the same, create an agenda and propogate the same it should be open to criticism and should have feedback system to evolve the information as people start to accept or reject it. Even small things like ensuring a special message board or dedicated forum on music phones with 4-5 important sites where mobile phones are discussed or electronic reviews are done can help reach out to the consumer in mindframe or intent to buy.

One needs to clearly understand inbound marketing is not dependent on media buys being done on media plans but investing in the medium on more mid-term to long term horizon.

Inbound Marketing can be lot driven from traditional form of marke place marketing technique where how do you get the buyers to talk about you and create point of references or alternatively create information blocks which are must visit for people and your selling cash register is disguised as a help kiosk.

Few of the ways one can start taking lead on the digital media platform as inbound marketing tool

i) SEO – Please please please invest in SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and make your microsite landing pages Search Engine Friendly for more people to discover you.

ii) Blogging – Invest in sharing your knowledge of your domain and try to refrain from refering to your product more than once in the post as if people would start to respect you for your independence and knowledge they will automatically start respective your work or product you represent.

iii)Forums – Invest in forums and message boards by actively being present across

iv) Social Networking Sites-  My least favourite due to no RoI have been personally able to calculate their impact.

If your digial marketing spend is already 40% skewed towards inbound marketing you are at right path to achieve lower lead cost with higher quality conversion ratio. for the rest will be glad to help.