Talk to me!

Krishnan Thiagarajan

N. Nagaraj

IN this second part of the article that follows the eWorld story, Dial Asia-Pacific to go digital, that appeared on July 18, we take a look at how to market to the customer of today and tomorrow, as tech-savvy as they are, and as tech-savvy as they can get.

The first thing about marketing is that one should speak the customer's language. Easier said than done, because with more and more direct marketing becoming possible (and happening) over the Net, companies are being forced to move from the English-centric Web. The bias toward English, of course, is natural in a hi-tech environment that is dominated by developments in the US. However, the biggest markets, typically China, and East Asia, are not so strong on English as, let's say, Europe is.

So, if you want to talk to the chip-buyer (of the numbercrunching or the potato fry crunching kind) in China, you'd better talk to him in Chinese, or Mandarin. If you are talking to a vendor in Japan, talk to him in Japanese, and if you want to sell chocolates to people in the Hindi heartland, again, talk the talk in Hindi. Anyway, with industry analysts estimating that more than three-fourths of Internet users by 2005 will not be native English-speakers, a significant number of those surveyed indicated that Chinese could be the single most-often used language on the Web.

And now, prepare for a shock if you are a marketer of hi-tech products/services. If you have been trying to sell to people through traditional media ads and through Point-of-Sale (PoS) promotional material, and have found the results discouraging to say the least, well, the consumers have news for you. They don't recall any of that. Only 13 per cent of the respondents said that they got information from advertisements and a hugely disappointing one per cent said that they got information from a store.

Want to know what really gets them the information that they want? For one thing, Web sites do. A fifth of the respondents said that they get information from Web sites. Is this because someone who is interested in tech products is likely to be tech-savvy enough to do the information gathering on the Web, or is it because marketers fail to communicate properly to consumers when it comes to tech products?

Word-of-mouth assumes great significance in this area. Most people who are looking for a technology product refer with other people about it. It's like how many computer buyers in India talk to people in their EDP/MIS departments or talk to a neighbour who has just got one, or talk to one of the neighbourhood whiz-kids. All this, in spite of the fact that some of these people may never have bought a computer for themselves, but are expected to be a fount of wisdom on the subject. Anyway, according to the study, 20 per cent of the respondents refer with colleagues at work, 11 per cent talk to friends, and three per cent go to their relatives.

Okay, so much for information, but how about building the excitement, inspiring the consumer to try out something? By far the most important factor was, again, word of mouth. A whopping 40.5 per cent of the respondents pointed to a colleague, friend, or relative when asked where they last saw or heard about a tech product that got them excited.

How about advertising? The scene is very dismal here, with 4 per cent naming a print ad, another 4 per cent naming a TV ad, one per cent naming a PoS ad, and none naming a radio ad. So much for the resurgence of radio, as far as tech marketing goes! Surprisingly, (not so surprising for eWorld), these media were beaten comprehensively by print editorial, with 15 per cent of respondents naming a magazine article for generating excitement in a tech product.

The lesson for tech-product marketers: slash the budgets for flashy ad campaigns, reach the influencers with all the information they want, and wait for the buzz to build before going on the offensive for the consumer.

Please e-mail us at eworld@thehindu.co.in if you have queries on computer usage or if you find an interesting way of using the computer.