Musings of a Curious Mind

To say that marketing has completely changed in the last decade will be the biggest understatement ever. To say that marketers haven’t been completely able to keep pace with the evolving technology and the evolving consumer will not be completely false. There are new ways to a)        reach consumers (multiple new platforms and devices) b)       track consumers (digital footprints please!!) c)        measure performance with 100% accuracy Point a is followed by everyone. Point b would be explored by any digital marketer/agency worth their salt. But point c, I highly doubt. At least not by 99% of companies. Not yet. Yes, I am talking about multi touch attribution. For every conversion/sale that happened, we should be able to give partial credit to every marketing channel along the consumer journey that helped in the conversion. A possible example I am sharing from our line of bu...

Believe it or not, word of mouth is the biggest driver of sales in today’s world. With 1000s of ads from new and old brands alike on a daily basis coupled with the advent of reviews and social media, people do not trust every persuasive advertisement they see. Brands no longer control the narrative of what they want to communicate. Depending on who you speak to or which reports you read, between 30-50% of all first time product/service sales(only first time because your product/service decides whether it is worth a second buy) are influenced by word of mouth. And yet very very surprisingly, no big brand(whenever it launches new products/categories) or any startup gives this even 10% of attention and budget that it deserves.   And just to be clear, I am not talking about any referral bonus driven word of mouth. In the world of ROI driven marketing, it is no less than a crime. As of today, word of mouth manifests in 3 different ways. Public Reviews: You want to buy a produc...

Comebacks, Champions League, Solskjear and Manchester United. After Nou Camp and Bayern Munich/1999, we have a version 2. Beating 2 goals in injury team to win the Champions League is difficult. But I think Paris 2019 does it. This was as close to impossible as it got. This was football’s version of chasing 500 on a wearing day 5 wicket. 2 nil down at home in the first leg( something which has never been overturned before in the tournament’s history). 10 players out with injury and the best player suspended. The matchups will put the “David vs Goliath” saying into shame. It was going to be Fred/McTominay/Perreira Vs Di Maria/Verrati( modern Pirlo anyone?)/Draxler. It was going to be Smalling vs Mbappe. This was men vs kids. The kids didn’t stand a chance. Or did they? This was PSG. A team whose only legacy in Champions League is embarrassment. And this was United. Solskjear’s United. United of the fame, “Can Manchester United score? They always score”. So the belief was ther...

Is there a country more synonymous with a game than Brazil is to football? Considering parameters like population, global popularity of the game involved, and what the game means to the people of the country, the answer is a resounding “No”. The first image that conjures up when anyone imagines Brazil is hundreds of kids playing the beautiful game in the streets of Rio, in the beaches of Rio, in anything and everything where a round ball can be used to show some trickery. Most Indian football fans( especially from the part of the country I come from) swear by either Brazil or Argentina (depending on when you started following the game). Since I was born a few years after the Hand of God, and grew up just in time to see the original Ronaldo (not the robot with the six pack currently ripping shirts in Madrid) suffering a seizure at the biggest stage of them all and then redeeming himself 4 years later on the same stage, my allegiances were forever sworn to Brazil. And with how thin...

101-2. This is not India’s score after 20 overs. It is Rafael Nadal’s clay court record in best of 5 set matches. At Roland Garros, it is 78-2. No one has ever dominated or will ever dominate a grand slam again the way Nadal has dominated the red clay of Paris. While he is not the greatest tennis player of our generation( Serena Williams wins that crown hands down), Nadal is right up there with Federer and Djokovic when it comes to the GOAT in men’s tennis. Nadal is on the brink of an unprecedented La Decima at Paris this year. And he has hardly broken a sweat. Having already won the Monte Carlo and the Madrid Masters in the clay court season, Nadal was one of the favourites heading into Roland Garros. And so far, he didn’t disappoint. No sets dropped. 29 games lost over 6 matches. If you did not appreciate this fact, re read the last sentence again. In Tennis, you can win a set even after losing 6 games and this man, 12 years after winning his first grand slam, is winning mat...

Think of North-east India and what are the first things that comes to your mind? Rock and roll, scenic beauty, pretty women, and to some extent even football. In fact, Independent India’s first football captain, the man who was also the flag bearer for the Indian contingent in 1948 Olympics, Talimeran Ao, was from Nagaland. But inspite of this, teams from the north east have never ever come close to winning or even competing for the biggest honours in Indian Football( current avatar being I-League). But Aizawl FC are on the verge of doing a Leicester. And even if they somehow manage not to win the league next weekend, they have already created one of the biggest underdog stories in Indian sports history. 30 years back, Mizoram was not even a state. 15 years back, there was no individual from Mizoram who played professional football in India. And it was only in 2011 that Aizawl FC was reborn as a competitive team. If betting odds were common in India, before the start of thi...

Well well, for the first time since Fergie retired, United are back to where their fans think they should be- the top of the table. Although the kind of football played still doesn’t set hearts racing, but the “philosophy” is slowly being put to action. Not many clubs in the world can pull off 44 pass moves that ultimately results in a goal. And there are not many center backs in the world, who can come up with defence splitting passes resulting in goals, 2 times in a week. Van Gaal’s philosophy is based on the very basic premise of football that as long as you have the ball, the opponent cannot score. No wonder, despite not having a particularly strong back-4, United have been amongst the teams conceding the least goals ever since Van Gaal arrived. But, what excites the Old Trafford faithful the most is the injection of youth in the squad, and the infinite potential that the players seem to have. Despite all of Van Gaal’s success across countries, perhaps his most enduring l...