Blog by S.Swaminathan

We have often heard of Harley Davidson and their loyal customers club.

Here's a great example of Vespa leading the way with Vespaway. This is a customer blog and is the customer's voice of the company. Customers start writing about the brand and sharing their brand experience with the world. It puts...

Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz talks about the importance of emotional connections.

I really loved one quote " ...we are not in the coffee business serving people but people business serving coffee..." .

I really think this clearly explains the fabric of that organization - employees who...

I had written yesterday about the fact that marketing managers must begin to work like product design managers.

Kotler's tips on marketing success seems to be suggesting a similar thing.  I quite liked the example of America's best selling imported beer. It's Corona. He cites this as an example...

Just got to read an old archived article Seeing the white elephant. It sounded too familiar to customer experiences many of us have had.

It is not difficult for companies to understand this and make it work. But, I guess the challenge is "breaking down" the silos. Which then brings me to t...

I quite like this idea of learning thro' internship. The ancient Indian way was called the "gurukula" system. You have to live with your master to learn crafts like music, vedas etc. There was no formal method of teaching. It was learning by observation, by doing, by helping the master... ...

Here's a good point for brands to focus on how channel partners could focus on households to act as referrals. Simply get one household and the "word-of-mouth" spreads. This also gives me ideas on how to do lead generation. Simply doing radom calling may not be as effective. But how about ...

Ten Commandments - Google's philosophy kind of explains why they continue to innovate for their customers everyday. The one on focussing on the customer  where they believe their growth comes from not a TV campaign but from satisfied users and their word-of-mouth is a telling point for many bra...

Have you identified what Mass Collaboration will do to our businesses. It simply means the best minds coming together to solve a problem. It just means a new unknown entity will keep emerging next door. It simply means keeping your mind open to new ways of hiring people. It means new ways of remuner...

Almost, always customer issues flare-up because somebody, somewhere in an organization has not taken a decision. This article from Fortune makes this issue vivid and real. It sometimes does not matter, if you have all the information to take that decision. Nevertheless, decision must be taken. That'...

To have  Imaginary board of Directors to challenge what we do for our customers is a great idea.

Many a times I have found we get stuck to "our way" of doing things. How we see the problem may not be the right way of looking it. We then get lost in a maze of questions. Or patting our ...