New Media, Marketing and Entrepreneurship

A lot can happen over coffee!! Yes I agree to it as would thousands of others who flock to these cafe shops each day and spend a chilled out time with their friends and folks.

Most of my informal business meetings and many a times, startups that I consult have just one thing to say: hey lets catch up at CCD (whatever place) and we will talk.

Though this post is not to promote this coffee chain in either way. What I am talking about is how the positioning of a particular franchisee of the coffee house affects sales for the franchisee.

Positioning, yes I already know it, this post is much late in todays time!

Yes, I know it is, but hold your horses.

Can a good dentist be responsible for the Cafe store’s business booming?

Good thought? Well, I am undergoing a treatment at a well known Dental Surgeon in south Delhi. Now after each sitting, I am instructed to not have anything solid or warm for at least 1-1.5 hours and have only liquids during this time. Moreover since I am numbed with anesthesia, thus for the next 3-4 hours at least I am not supposed to be eating anything.

Let me describe you how the dentist is positioned. The dentist’s clinic is on the 1st floor, facing the market entry and there is a Cafe Coffee Day at the ground floor, and with the human eye if you are standing 7-10 feet away at the ground floor, in a single vision you can both of them.

OK, GOOD, but how does that affect CCD’s business?

Well, I said hold your horses’. After every sitting when I am told to just consume cold liquids, the first thing I do is to go to the CCD and order a cold coffee. And not just me, almost each time I am at the coffee house, which is as small in size as you could think of, I see at least 5-6 people who were sharing space with me at the dentists’ a few minutes back!

In the world of Online Media

In this world of online media, proper positioning for your brand is a an ultimate necessity. Brand positioning is affected with the message that you devise for your client’s client. You need to get out of the advertising clutter and make sure that your brand has exclusive access and a good eyeball time by the intended target audience.

Positioning matters for your brand.

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Okay, so its been pretty long since I have really written a blog post!! There has been much action in life since the past couple of days!

Well, and today I share about a relationship which is the purest relationship in life and binds two individuals for the rest of their lives together. Its about growing old together and what am I talking about, well, I am talking about marriage!

Yes Marriage!

Today I was sitting at Cafe Coffee day Cannaught place, New Delhi, with a friend and well, I had three families meeting at three separate tables doing what? Well, discussing prospective suitors for marriage! YES! there were three families with smartly dressed fathers, shying away daughters, mothers and the prospective grooms family!

Right opposite to my table was a girl who was probably alone and had come to meet the guys family, who was with his brother and mother. And I could not resist looking at the girls reactions. How she was shying away and fiddling with her hands. How she was both confident and so confused at the same time. How she was looking at future and looking at her present at the same time.

The moment really created with me something which I cannot describe in words, but there was a feeling which said, well, life’s happening right now. There is nothing which is going to come tomorrow! Its all happening in the now. Looking at the reactions of the girl, well, the feeling was kind of overwhelming, which also was like reinforcing the feeling of being responsible at the same time making me a bit unnerving!

India is changing

I always have heard form my parents how they got married when they did not even know each other, and now parents meet at coffee houses, which makes the whole discussion causal and the girl does not have to cover her head wearing a traditional dress and shyly walking in the room where the guys family is present in all force, with tea in her hands.

The whole experience was good to see, as the whole concept of marriage as an institution is taking a whole new shape and people are getting to know and interact and the whole process is about people, its about the realtionship. Its about the bride and the groom and the realtionship together.

And now the coffee ends and I am off for a long drive back home, while thinking in my mind, God Bless the guy and the girl and may they be happy forever!

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Cafe Coffee Day, one of the leading coffee retail chains in India, one of    my leading favorites! For anything, all that I know is starting from       catching up with friends to discussing my business plans and new          ideas, I go to a CCD.

And I’m not the only one! India goes there!

So, what happened this valentines Day?

Okay, so this 14th February, the Valentines Day, as I decided to  catch up for a coffee after a meeting, I parked at the Saket market and hoppped to the cafe coffee day there. Good ambience and as usual nice music with Love in the air, I was looking forward to my cuppa!

So what do we do, when we need to look at the menu  to order our coffee?

We, Look at the menu! And what do you do, when the menu is missing? Well, you look here and there and you don’t find it. Then you suddenly see the guy from the store approach you with a small vertical shaped menu (I clicked the pic, but formatted my phone, so lost it), which was like a make your choice Sir, or there is no coffee for you.

Visibly the menu was made especially for the day, with some special couple offer and all the glitter

But I was left asking for my usual cuppa! Finally after staring at the menu which INTERRUPTED me, it made me think:

Is my usual cup of coffee not available for today? Has cafe coffee day really gone overboard with the Valentines fervour? And in this thought process, I was almost left deciding that if this is the menu for the day, well, I dont like it and NO, I DON’T WANT YOUR COFFEE!

Luckily, to break my thought process one of my friends dropped in and before i could ask the coffee guy, he ordered for the plain old usual amazing cold coffee with cream that we order, and the coffee guy got it!

But I did not like the interruption! It was not a well designed interruption!

Let me now share, what was wrong with the interrptive message! Well, the design of the vertical card on which the message was printed. The whole card was designed wrong. the message never got communicated to me in the right way, instead it came negative!

When on the usual menu I have multiple chouce to choose from and keep experimenting with my taste buds, here I am with a card sitting pretty in my hands, with just a single option of a couple offer! Guys, I Didn’t want it!

The whole message was designed poorly and it curbed my zest to experiment each time I visit a cafe coffee day!

What do I say?

Though I do not know how much sales shot up due to this strategy (many of the customers would not have even spoken out, they would just have ordered from the vertical card) but I know of this – cafe coffee day is a brand which has the highest recall amongst all the rest due to their “Soft Purple color” which attracts me from far off, wherever I am.

It’s a purple cow – Seth Godin!

I think, cafe coffee day guys could do much better by understanding what the consumer really looks for and with the standing in the market, well it needs to communicate the message right maintaining the “purple cow” status and just NOT go ahead with the usual Interruptive marketing tactics which products go ahead with. Cafe coffee day for the ususal young Indian, is almost once a day feature, whether at office or driving back or catching up with friends, thus cafe coffee day guys don’t have to PUSH hard, for them the PULL is common with people!

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