The idea of Customer advocacy

I came across a nice article by Jeannie Walters titled – Community Managers as customer advocates. I completely agree with her when she says “This emerging role is really the first line of advocacy for customers. These people are engaging and interacting with customers, former customers and future customers daily. If the C-level isn’t asking for constant feedback from them, they are missing out.” My day time role is as a customer advocacy manager at a large multi-national software giant. So, I was very much interested in the post. She does have a few interesting points to make: When I took this role early […]

How can Crossword compete with FlipKart.com?

The only thing I indulge myself is in buying andreading books. Lots of books! I love going to a bookshop, browse their bookcollection, read a few pages of a book and buy it if I like what I see. Thereare times when I got so immersed in the book that I read the complete book atthe bookshop itself. I loved the cozy chairs that these bookshops provided withso many books to browse and read. Of late, I have seen that the stock of books atbookshops like Crossword has been on the decline. I also find myself and all myfriends (who […]

Saving the Nano….

After the fantastic launch of Tata Nano, the cheapest car in the world, we have seen that the fan fare and the interest levels have not kept up and there is a drastic decline in the sales of Nano and the Tata Motors management is working overtime to get this corrected and to generate interest. A big ad campaign has been launched. The results are yet to be seen. Tata Motors is trying hard to revive the fortunes of their Chairman’s dream project.  Safe and Secure: No one wants to buy a car which is considered to be un-safe. The […]

About

Most entrepreneurs fail. Most know that they are most likely to fail. And yet, we have more and more people wanting to become entrepreneurs. I have been in that boat myself. You could also call me a failed entrepreneur. From my stint as an entrepreneur, I know first hand the challenges of starting and running a business. And a lot about closing down businesses as well. Unfortunately. Fortunately, I learnt a lot in the process. I learnt a lot post this experience by being a corporate entrepreneur. I learnt a lot by looking & working alongside entrepreneurs who persisted with […]

Measuring sales-force effectiveness

One of the key challenges that I have seen in senior leadership is to measure the sales-force effectiveness. This becomes even more important if we are in an environment where revenue growth is difficult to come-by. So how does one measure the effectiveness of their sales-force. I think there are a few key indicators that show if the sales force is doing a good job or not: Revenue growth: The easiest and the most measured variable is the revenue growth. If the revenue is growing month-on-month, quarter-on-quarter, year-on-year, the sales-force is considered to be doing a good job. This shows […]