I am launching my own Podcast - ContraMinds - Decoding People, Minds, Strategy & Culture. 

This is a podcast that explores thoughts and conversations around the DNA of purposeful minds. It tries to decode what really goes behind the minds of people with a purpose, what are their motivations and inspiration, attempts to understand the why behind what they do and how do they successfully accomplish what they set out do. It helps provide a mental framework, markers and a mind map for each one us to learn and discover from their life purpose, their cultural ecosystem and their experiences. These conversations will hopefully open your mind, help you put some these thoughts to practice both in your life and career.

In this first episode, I am going to be sharing with you my thoughts on 'Differences between a professional and an employee mindset'. I look forward to having your feedback, conversations and comments from all of you.

This Podcast is available in Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Tune-in, Spotify and please do go ahead subscribe and share this with your friends and colleagues.

Last week, Unilever announced it had acquired Dollar Shave Club.  Tech Crunch carried an interesting article on the $1 billion acquisition and the challenges reputed & established FMCG brands face with the onslaught of innovative and emerging brands. 

FMCG companies have been living in an era of mass marketing for over 100 years now. They have working on the premise that if they  create a great brand and have an efficient supply chain, then the sale is done. Hence, over the last few decades, they have been working on building an efficient supply chain and ensuring the stocks are placed ahead of competition and replenished efficiently. As far as the customers were concerned, if they had a top-of-mind recall about the brands and if there was availability when they landed in a retailer's store, the sale was completed. However, digital disruption and democratization of technology is transforming the  FMCG industry. Leaders like Unilever, P&G, Nestle, L'Oreal and the like have been reeling under this disruption.

The thinking of FMCG companies has to move from managing the supply chain to building a robust demand chain. The FMCG companies' supply chain approach  is about 3P strategy- " Place, Push & Purchase". However, the demand chain approach requires a drastically different mindset which is a 3F strategy " Find, Fill & Fullfill". The customer behavior here is about "Discover & Buy" rather than "Reach & Buy". Also, it is no more about replenishing retailers'' stock but it is about replenishing customers' stock. This for FMCG companies turns their marketing thinking on its head. However, the customers are lapping it up, as they are able to get value & convenience like never before. This also throws-up new big data opportunities about customer purchase behaviour for FMCG companies as new direct-to-customer digital channels are emerging to engage with customers and they now need to understand the insights that arise out of these huge data sources.

The era of direct mass marketing is around the corner for FMCG companies and they need to serve these customers in new ways in the future.

Last week Facebook's Chief Privacy Officer - Stephen Deadman, wrote about the need to refocus the debate around personal data. It was a thought provoking article where Stephen talks about the need for a kind of a new coalition between tech companies on the use of personal data.

I had also written the week earlier on my blog on the trends that I saw - Transformation of software vendors as data vendors. As I read  his piece, some interesting thoughts, challenges & framework to use personal data came to my mind. It also needs a variety of stakeholders - policy makers, governments, tech companies and citizen groups across the world to come together.  Also, Doc Searls and Dan Mitchell who I follow, added a lot of perspectives around this topic and the initiatives that are being undertaken. 

The key issue that came to my mind was, who is more empowered today to use personal data and who is the owner of personal data. I strongly feel, the individual is highly dis-empowered today when it comes to use of his or her own personal data. Very often, I find tick boxes, check boxes, cookies that outlines all kinds of T&Cs  that we literally have no control of this data. Also, the way marketers treat this data, is purely in terms of economics and there is no strand of trust, whatsoever. It represents an unequal relationship, an accelerating decay of distrust for the individual when it comes to her personal data.

When it comes to personal data, the internet has disrupted national boundaries. The data individuals leave behind, for example in Uber or Amazon or Facebook or Google or Apple to put it mildly is subject to interpretation on ownership. When it comes to offline identity, governments have found a solution with Social Security numbers  or Citizenship or the like. But, when it comes to personal data, the rules are however archaic.

The coming of a Data Passport Era

There is a need to build a ecosystem by linking offline identities of individuals thro' what I believe will look like Data Passports. This will be fundamental to building a data coalition that Stephen talks about across companies. Data Passports are an equivalent of Data Vaults that will be owned by the individuals against their passports, mobile devices, broadband connections, banking relationships etc. etc. Data Passports will have streams of an individual's personal data. This massive repository will have links to personal data of individuals and will be classified with specific lifestyle and usage behaviour tags. Like ICANN, there is a need for a non-for-profit organization - called DCANN( Data Corporation of Assigned Names & Numbers) which will be linked to the massive Data Passport APIs across various countries & personal data passport vaults.

This data passport vault, which will be owned by the individual along with other identities, will have permissions from individuals to share specific strands of data for mutually beneficial economic and social value. This kind of a data passport platform will then be shared amongst companies & governments to derive value thro' mutual exchange of trust.

This is a long journey that needs to be taken to empower and give the control back of personal data to individuals themselves. It needs a new kind of data coalition that calls for collaboration, sharing, flexibility and mindset change across borders, governments & companies to enable this. 

I often hear a lot of businesses and managers talking about a metric Cost-to-Serve(CTS) - reducing cost-to-serve a customer. They continuously talk about moving customers to lower cost channels and hence reducing the cost-to-serve & improving profitability. I find this ridiculous as an independent metric measured by businesses.

Let me explain you why:

What does Cost-to-Serve(CTS) mean?

Currently, if a business is using high cost channels, resources to service customers and hence it eats into the  profit margin of the business. Hence, the managers & leaders in the company are mandated to move customers to lower cost channels so that it is a self-serve channel for the customer and minimizes resources from the business's end.

Let me now look at it from a customer's point of view - What is Cost-to-do-business(CTB)?

I reached out to my service provider thro' the phone( a relatively lower cost channel) and spent about half hour explaining my problem to the associate on the other side of the phone. I was told that the problem will be resolved in 24 hrs and that they were transferring it to another technical team who will address it. I waited and nothing happened - no response or no resolution was in sight. I called my service provider on the phone again and this time to my horror, I had to repeat the problem all over again for another half hour. Here's one hour of a customer's time that has been wasted by the company -that's pretty precious, in my view which businesses give a damn, as it does not cost them anything.

I also emailed the problem I was facing, to put things in writing to customer service - which took me another 15 mins and then there was a spate of automated mails that were generated promising resolution within further 2 working days! Now, I had lost close to 72 hours in addition to an hour over the phone. Now, the web channel again was a low cost channel to business but it was a high cost-to-do-business for me, as a customer, as nothing was resolved. Neither, the channels were integrated to treat my problem on priority given my prior poor experience. The Cost-to-do-business with the company was too high for me, as it was eating into my time and effort - that close to 73 hrs and 15 mins( 72 hours of lost opportunity and 1 hour and 15 mins of interacting with them over different channels). How does business pay for these costs and factor for these?

Many of the financial services companies who I do business with, have asked me to move to e-statements, mobile app, online banking etc. Now, I am increasing my storage space on cloud to factor for these and storing them as if I ask for an e-statement beyond a year or so, then they charge me for it. However, none of these businesses have optimized the charges they debit to me - as earlier they were sending me all of these and providing services. Now, all my online fund transfers are charged, my POS transactions on debit card has increased but my debit card annual fees is not reduced, it is the same as I had paid couple of years back! Since, the time I moved to online & mobile banking, am not visiting their branches which saves them a lot of money as they have reduced their cost-to-serve me. The cost of doing business- CTB- with my bank has in fact increased for me - If I factor my time and transactions charges that I pay to them.

I believe there is a balancing metric that companies need to look at -which is Cost-to-do-Business(CTB) for the customer while they look at cost-to-serve metric. For my bank, if my branch visits have come down, if my ATM transactions have reduced & POS transactions have increased or my problems with my utility service provider is not resolved over phone, web channel etc. the cost-to-business in fact has increased and they must pass on the benefit.

It's time for business to think from a customer's point of view and then factor for these as customer migrate to newer channels & touch points. The cost-to-do-business(CTB), then it is to be tracked as a metric and differential value of benefits passed on to customers too.

With mobile device in the hands of customers and quick adoption of smartphones, will it redefine the shopping habits of customers? I believe it will. 

Mobile will increasingly act as research and shopping tool in their hands. Right now, I don't think it is widely used but with increasing app downloads & penetration, mobile internet adoption etc. this is certainly going to change shopping experiences - right from the way they search for products/brands/services and helping them choose & buy them too.

I believe it will  be a " check, learn, ask & walk "(CLAW) shopping model on the mobile. It will be a mix of ' text & mortar' shopping. Mobile will overtake internet shopping in my opinion and adoption of mobile in certain categories will be significant.

Which categories need to get ready for this change?  An nice study by emarketer can used as a benchmark by marketers to ensure they get ready for this shopping  habit transition. In countries like India, China & Japan where the mobile penetration & growth is high - the impact will be felt the maximum.

This mobile shopping habit will have to encompass a mix of mobile apps, call-in advisors, chats, mobile alerts, location based services, mobile coupon downloads & redemption@ the store. Marketers will have to plan for an Integrated Mobile Shopping Experience (IMSE). 

I read an interesting post by Fred Reichheld's on the influencing effect of good customer experience in a way that happy customers and employees collaborating with each other and how this behaviour seems to extend between customers too. Reichheld writes:

"It didn’t take long to figure out that the caliber of customers who frequent a business - and the way they treat employees and one another- often play a vital role. In air travel, consider the difference between a flight where you’re sitting next to a noisy jerk on his cell phone and one where your neighbor sits quietly and maybe offers to share his newspaper. At a baseball game, a beer-swilling loudmouth can ruin the experience, while an avuncular neighbor who explains the nuances of infielder positioning to your kids can enhance it. In a hotel, you might have a thoughtful neighbor who keeps his TV volume low or an idiot who slams the door at midnight. In fact, other customers create a big part of our experience in retail stores, fast food, hospitals... most businesses, in fact."

I agree with him completely and this indeed has a huge ripple effect.It is true across some of my experiences too. One of them is Jet Airways. Every time I travel with Jet Airways in India, the consistency of the quality of customers who travel along with me and employee service is quite evident across cities. In fact, I would say that this also resets expectations of service within the company and helps them break their own benchmarks on this service. Also, the positive word-of-mouth is also a contributing factor. For example, I have seen many customers talk to me positively about their experience during flights and it has a lasting impact on the service levels of the employees.

This can be true of small companies too. Here's a small restaurant that has created a ripple effect and  influenced my customer experience in Mumbai( India) called Rajdhani. What I really appreciate about this place is that they have a counter in front of the restaurant that has a count of number of "dinners or lunches" served till date! It runs into several hundreds of thousands of servings.This has a ripple effect on the pride of the employees serving you on the table. They are agile, involved, empathetic and quick to proactively respond to what you need. They have interesting signs through which they communicate with each other to ensure you are served without you asking for it! The customers in the restaurant too have a great experience which in turn converts into repeat customers and positive word-of-mouth.

Measuring or observing the ripple effect on your customers, between your customers, amongst employees and even with your channel( retailers) partners is a good metric of the quality of customer experience your brand is delivering in the market place.

Tim O' Reilly tweeted about an interesting interactive feature on NY Times on using the popular movies rented data on Netflix by neighborhoods and zipcodes in the US! It's a lovely little application that tells movies marketers the kind of preferences consumers have had in 2009. 

This made me reflect on the infinite opportunities that are available on how data can be used in a number of ways imaginatively. Imagine the interesting applications of data:

1. Grocery stores - Households and neighbourhoods that are calorie conscious and like exotic foods. FMCG brands can then use this information to do interesting promotions across different zones based on consumption patterns.
2. Fitness Shops  - Zones that have different membership rates and ability to differentiate fitness freak zones from the not-so-fitness freak zones. Nike could use this effectively to build a community of fitness awarness champions across zipcodes to make the zones fitness conscious and the based on the number of people joining the fitness campaigns the 'heat maps' can become more and more red everyday!

I came across an interesting service platform Meme Machine which has interesting customer-focused applications using data.

Calling itself reactive advertising Meme Machine defines this platform as:

"Reactive advertising is a technology for dynamic customization how display ads look and behave in real-time based on what we know about each viewer and the surrounding factors for each exposure. So instead of one campaign having three different ads, we can run three million different ads, where each is unique for the person watching it. Real-time data and dynamic content are two of the things that makes the Internet really unique. Coming up with the basic ideas for a dynamic ad is just one piece of the puzzle and you also need an engine that can mix up the data and make sure that the right stuff is actually shown to the right people."

Meme Machine has a reaction library and has some cases like Scandinavian Airlines, Swedish Post etc. 

How do we really fuse data that's online, offline and transactional?

To make this more widespread & relevant to a consumer &  marketer, the question that came to my mind really was, how do we use offline data & behaviour for such a service in addition to online information that gets tracked. Imagine a variety of devices and vehicles that consumers today either read, watch, listen, carry along with them - radio( FM), TV, Mobile, Outdoor, Magazines, Newspapers etc.which is not tagged or data rich today.

I believe we still have a long way to go  & innovate here. Here in lies interesting opportunities waiting to be tapped. There must be different applications across devices & media vehicles that must bring this to life. The control, of course, must lie with the consumers to bring all of this together. The applications must talk to each other, pull relevant content, send proactive messages as things happen in each media vehicle or device or by interest tagged by consumers, to bring this conversation & experience to life with each consumer.

According 1-to-1 media, the mobile industry has a lot of learning to do from email marketing industry - esp. how not use it! Take a look:

Taking into account email's bad customer experiences with spam and email address sales, the mobile marketing industry developed its channel strategy around the concept that consumers control the relationship.

"When we hear that beep, everybody looks right away," says Steve Leonard, general manager at mobile firm Motricity, speaking about responsiveness to text messages.Consumers are now more willing to respond to offers via SMS because they know that no one will sell their mobile number and they can easily get out if the relationship doesn't meet their expectations.....consumer-controlled relationship will only increase as technology advances to allow mobile banking, purchases, and other applications. And while high-tech devices like the iPhone and BlackBerry are important to drive mobile's evolution....

The key to mobile marketing's future success lies in its metrics capabilities.... Calls-to-action like mobile coupon redemption or in-venue sweepstakes allow companies to track consumer actions to specific marketing initiatives.....

My View:  In India especially, this medium already has the effect of email marketeers' misuse. The amount of junk SMSs we receive is quite high. Also, many companies have started using it for mobile alerts, mobile marketing initiatives etc. Sometimes, it is quite a pain or does not get the attention of customers as it would earlier. It needs to be used judiciously and it must move away from regular transactional messages to relationship messages too.

Ideas are welcome. Any ideas to kick-start this thinking?

Over the last couple of months, I have been talking and meeting a lot mobile service providers in India across many forums. While most of them are in an acquisition binge, the challenges they seem to face are similar - irrespective of the vintage of operation or subscriber size. They either talk to me of huge shift from post-paid subscribers to pre-paid subscribers, reducing revenue from voice services, increasing usage of VAS and data services, lack of differentiation in their own offerings for customers to choose or switch, customer churn and many more! To add to the confusion, there are new service providers entering the fray. How do these service providers build value for their customers and become compelling?  Visionmobile provides an interesting perspective and approach to consider - Value Quadrants:

Value Quadrants maps value creation and revenue model changes by asking WHEN and WHERE is value being created. The WHEN of value creation is function of the handset lifecycle, from design, development and production (pre-sales phase) to point-of-sale and in-life use (post-sales phase). There WHERE of value creation is either on the device (hardware, software, patents and industrial design) or on the services ‘cloud’ (for designing and delivering content and services).

In one quadrant, value is created by intellectual property, in the other value is built out of licensing and in the other one it is out of infrastructure. Many companies have started to take position in these quadrants.

The revenue models that emerge out of these value quadrants are quite different and unique:

To me this is an interesting map for mobility service providers in India to evaluate their offerings and determine what  migration and transition of services that they need to make or build  to create value and stickiness in their offerings for customers either thro' alliances, product/service development, new revenue-sharing models etc.

Guess, there's lot to think now!