 All right, welcome to yet another edition of E4M Presents Thursdays with Infobib, a specially curated series that focuses on various sectors with a core motive to deep dive and understand the latest as far as digital narratives and trends are concerned. Today's theme is decoding the digital influence in auto and consumer durable sectors. And the agenda is that we have a five-side chat followed by a panel discussion. So let me start introducing our first five-side chat that we have the first thing lined up. The topic for this chat is journey from a temperate reality to a modern day experience. And joining the speakers on this panel are Mr. Sumit Asthana, general manager of Samsung SDS and the moderator would be Aravindan Somasundaram Head Solution Consulting Infobib India. Thank you gentlemen for joining us over to you Mr. Somasundaram. Thank you, thank you, Royal. Welcome you all for this wonderful event. Let's begin here. It is rightly said, the more things change, the more they stay the same. This is for our customer. The customer is always right, the customer is the king. These words will always remain true and intact. Even in the digital age, business still needs to do whatever they want or whatever they can to meet customer expectation and foster strong for poor services and lethargic resolution times. If business fails to meet their demand, they could see the disheartened customer jump towards competition. Further, customer today are aware of the hand they have to play in this dynamics. So with so many opinions available, they can afford to demand better services from business. If companies wants to succeed in this environment, they have to not only meet customer demand, but exceed them. However, the customer experience and customer expectations are not the same thing. A great customer experience is the result of useful, easy, and enjoyable customer journey. To discuss this further on how the customer journey and expectations have evolved and changed over a period of time, we have Sumit as Thana, who has technology at Samsung SDS. And let's understand this better with him. Hi, Sumit. Hi, Abhinder. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, everybody. Good afternoon, Sumit. Welcome and thank you for joining us. Sure. Thanks for bringing me here. So shall we begin with the fireside chat, Sumit? Let's go ahead. Yeah. It's my first question to you, Sumit. Over the past year, there has been a shift in customer expectation. And as a result, the overall customer experience looks different and got transformed into a whole new world. There is more competition in the marketplace, which means the organization needs to do more to create personalized experience. What, according to you, Sumit, will take to reimagine this customer experience and how can companies become institutionally empathetic so that the customer feels cared for? Okay. So, Abhinder, I mean, see, in India, what consumers really need as far as for me is to have a look and feel of the product what they are buying, whether they are buying like a mobile phone or they want to buy like a car or end of the day, I mean, anything for that matter, right? And well, unfortunately, due to COVID, right, a lot of people are becoming really cautious, to kind of go to the stores and kind of touch, you know, the things in the stores and, you know, they want to be, they really want that experience, you know, just sitting at home, right? And a fantastic thing which I saw in the past, I think a couple of months back, which Chroma, you know, one of the retail stores, right, which has started in India, is giving, you know, the in-store experience while the people are sitting at home. So, I mean, if today I want to buy something, I really don't have to go to the Chroma store. I can just go to their website, I can request that, hey, can you give me a demo or, you know, look and feel of the product, a video call kind of starts and, you know, that look and feel can be given to the customer, the customer can ask questions. The same can be answered by the executive who is in the store and give that in-store experience. Well, that's one, you know, and other things like, you know, maybe the use of, you know, the AR, VR, you know, that can definitely bring in the change in the market trends. Because I personally, if you ask me, I mean, if somebody can give me a look and feel of a product while I'm sitting at home, I really don't want to go outside anywhere. I mean, that's what I can say is can really change, you know, the customer experience in India. Thank you. Thank you, Sumit. So, Sumit, you would agree with me that, you know, communication is hard of human interaction and it can make and break a business. Awesome. But InfoBip, yeah, yeah. But InfoBip, we believe to have a great solution. We need to start with a strong insight about our customer that helps us understand how to communicate with them. Where does you feel that Samsung seen alignment with our belief and keep the pulse of Indian customers? See, InfoBip has been really helpful, you know, in the transformation of what Samsung is in the journey of right now. And over the past year, I mean, past year, yeah, more than a year now, we have this association with InfoBip. And it would really, I would say, you know, when we started WhatsApp, like around 10 months back, around 10 months back, yeah. So it was really a great journey, you know, where InfoBip has not only given us the solution, but has also given us the guidance in terms of how we can make our WhatsApp journey successful. Right, and I'm really thankful, you know, to InfoBip and all the folks involved at that point of time. And also I would like to explore more solutions. I know that InfoBip has some, you know, the R&D team who's kind of working on more solutions. So definitely, you know, I would like to have more association with you guys in terms of what more we can do to bring in our customer experience, which is the most important thing at Samsung. Thanks for the kind words, Samith. Moving on to the next one. So delivering your message to its intended audience is the key essential to effective communication. You would agree with me. How are you delivering this information to those who need it? Especially in the era when customers are becoming more empowered to a selective, because they're selective in their approach. What tools and technologies do you think a B2C brand should use to engage customer with a value and that could add an experience. Where do you feel so, or what do you have to say here? Sure, sure. So I would say, see, from a digital transformation perspective, you know, I mean, that is the most important factor, you know, for our market, for the B2C market, right? To kind of meet the customer's expectation. And given the situation of this pandemic, right? I mean, it really becomes very difficult for enterprises like us to kind of share the information needed, you know, to the consumers, to the customers. So we are really sitting in the digital era, right? I mean, the current era, you know, we can definitely eradicate, you know, the problem of engaging the customer by using the digital mediums and, you know, by SMSs or by using WhatsApp, you know, and looking at the Indian market or the Indian consumers today, Indian consumers is one of the biggest users of WhatsApp, right? So, I mean, WhatsApp, definitely, you know, I mean, Facebook has not allowed the sales, you know, WhatsApp has a sales channel till now. But there are, you know, kind of, at least from a customer service perspective, if we are launching a new product, we can at least, you know, tell the customers or tell to our consumers that, yes, this is the new product, what we are kind of launching in the market. Not kind of offering any discounts and stuff, but again, at least we can share the information, right? And then there are other OTT platforms, right? Which we can use and which can really help us in passing on this information, you know, to the customers. Right, right. So, digital technologies, you know, have enabled completely the new customer journey. Especially the big tech companies and startups today, you know, deploy these technologies, keeping in mind that they would change consumer behavior and continuously increase customer expectation. So according to a research of IDC, what we have seen is, you know, two-third of the CEOs of global 2000 companies will shift their focus from traditional offline strategy to a more modern digital strategies to improve the customer experience before the end of year. With 34% of companies believing that they will fully adopt digital transformation within 12 months or less. So looking into the future as well, what are some of the digital trends that will make an impact in driving seamless experience so the customer feels connected to the brand? Good question. So I would say the very first thing which I would like to say is that, you know, and over the last year, as I've seen our customer service, you know, kind of shifting from voice to kind of the little medians like chat and WhatsApp, I strongly suggest every organization should, you know, adopt WhatsApp as a customer service channels. You know, I mean, this is what I can say, because my, you know, I myself, I might have maybe 100, 100 SMSs, but I might not have more than 10, 100 WhatsApp messages, right? So, you know, even if you go by the study, I mean, a person kind of pick up the mobile in India, like, you know, more than whatever, 100, 150 times a day, right? And kind of out of that 150 times a day or whatever that, let's take an example of 100 times a day, right? 90% of the times person checks, you know, the WhatsApp, right? So that is one thing which definitely I would like to say that, you know, the organization should adopt in terms of customer service, not sales I would say, but at least customer service and, you know, and then other than that, I mean, definitely social listening is very important where we should listen to the customers, right? And then respond to the appreciation, not only to the complaints, but definitely responding to the appreciation as well. So if customer appreciates, let's say I go on Facebook, you know, and kind of appreciate some organization. So I, as a human being, you know, as a human tendency, I would expect that at least I'll get a thank you, right? So that impacts a lot, right? So that is important as well. And then Facebook Messenger is not that kind of popular in India as of now, but looking at the new Facebook strategy, I think they're gonna be promoting Facebook Messenger, you know, strongly as well. So that's the third channel which I would say, you know, which customers should adopt or organizations should adopt rather. Agree, agreed, Sumit. So touching upon the challenges, Sumit, we all know that staying digitally relevant through a seamless omni-channel approach will improve the customer experience. What do you feel is the biggest challenge holding back organization from delivering excellent omni-channel experiences? See, coming from a technology background, I would like to say one thing that the biggest challenge what we see here in this industry is that any industry for that matter is that when we start a journey, right? Some years back, you know, nobody thought that WhatsApp will be that great of a channel, right? Nobody thought that, you know, people would appreciate chatting rather than talking, right? I mean, if you go like 10 years back or maybe 15 years back, everybody would like to talk, right? Nobody would like to chat, right? So that way is in terms of business, I would say. And that's where the challenge kind of started where people have adopted one technology for voice and when they kind of went further into the line, they kind of adopted other technology for chat. Now, WhatsApp coming, you know, the business coming in 2018, they adopted a different technology for that, right? So kind of, you know, giving an omni-channel experience is really important because me as a customer, I would expect that if I called, if I chatted, if I sent a WhatsApp, you know, I am actually, for me, I'm sending it to the same organization, right? So I, the organization should know what I have talked, what I have started and what I'm now, you know, what I'm now doing on a WhatsApp, right? So that is something really important that this is really not an easy challenge to kind of overcome it, but definitely, you know, I mean, we, this is the biggest challenge, different technologies. So if a provider, you know, like one solution is definitely, you know, if a provider comes in and give you an omni-channel stuff, but then it doesn't make sense, you know, a company spending like millions, you know, maybe two years back and now again, companies spend millions again to, you know, kind of consolidate all the channels. So yeah, I mean, this is what I feel is the biggest, is the biggest channel in terms of giving the omni-channel experience. Thanks for sharing the challenge. So one last question from my end, given the time as a circumstances, what is Samsung roadmap on adoption of omni-channel journey? Take this engagement experience to the next level. So would you like to share that? So as I explained, right? One option is if I get, you know, maybe InfoBip can offer me something, you know, if InfoBip can be the integrator of all my channels, that is one option. Then the other thing which I can definitely see as an easier, you know, adoption or it's an easier implementation is that what we do in our customer service is that whether it's a voice call or whether it's WhatsApp, whether the person is kind of walking in the service center, whether the person is chatting with us, our backend remains the same, right? I mean, all the information is getting fed in that backend by all sort of executives, whether it's voice, chat, WhatsApp, service center, anybody for that matter, right? So in our voice, definitely, you know, as soon as the call comes, we kind of pop up the, you know, the backend CRM and that is also something which we are trying to adopt, you know, for the other channels as well. So that at least the customer will get that personalized experience and customers should feel that, yes, I mean, you know, this is the person I'm talking to and he knows what I'm calling about, right? So that definitely, you know, gives a good impact, a very positive impact on the customer experience. Thank you. Thank you, Sumit, for your time. Just to summarize, you know, digital technology has transformed consumer habit, mobile, apps, machine learning, automation, much more has allowed customer to get what they want, what exactly they need at that moment. What more these new digital technologies have caused a small shift in customer expectation, resulting in a new kind of modern bias. Today, the consumer are constantly connected over native apps and aware of what they can do with technology, because of the opportunities that rise from using modern technology, customers often rate organization on their digital customer experience first. So auto and consumer durable enterprises should look at distillation as their core technology, of course, as a core technology as well to provide better customer experience and improve customer engagement. Thank you, Sumit, for joining us and enlightening the event for decoding the digital influence towards auto and consumer durable sector. Thank you all for joining and stay tuned with our next session. Thanks, Sumit. Hashtag digital transformation. Thank you. Mr. Amit Tiwari, Head Marketing Heavals. This is our panel discussion as I stated earlier. Recording the digital influence in auto and consumer durable sector. Thank you, Mr. Tiwari, for joining us. Mr. Anirudh Haldar, Vice President Marketing, Community Photocyclists, Scooters and Corporate Brands, TBS Motors. Welcome, sir. Deva Gosha, Vice President, Anjum, General Manager, Marketing, Honda Cars, India. Shakti Upad, Marketing, here, yeah. And taking this discussion, Mr. Shankar, I am a consumer success. Thanks, Anurheel. Hello. Yeah, thank you. And thank you gentlemen for joining. Hello and welcome to all who have joined us today to discuss decoding the digital influence in the auto and consumer sector. It's a great pleasure to have this panelist for discussing such an important topic. Let me set the context here. The modern buying process has changed. I mean, right from an air conditioner to an automated car, it's something we all know that the consumers take partial decisions, almost partial decisions online and then try to authenticate that decision by visiting the dealers. This has been one trend. The other trend is about interestingly finding some third-party companies coming in play with some e-commerce capabilities and then, you know, fastening with dealers who can offer some kind of great customer experiences. You know, while manufacturers focused more on the only channel experience, we found that a lot of dealers focused on tactical solutions where, you know, they had a lot of data systems integrating with information and creating multiple touchpoints to various digital channels. While the revolution in the automotive industry evidently seen as more on the mobility and the connected services area, the digitally-influenced sales in the consumer-durable sector is expected to grow almost by 500% as per BCG from 2018 to 2023. So for more insights about these data points and as you all will see your customers, the behaviors and experiences you've been having for the last 18 months, if I could say, pre-COVID, COVID and some kind of post-COVID, it will be great to hear from you all on the trends which we will see going forward from now. Let me turn to my questions first and I will probably ask, you know, Shakil to take my first question. Shakil and I just want to focus on the point of segmentation of customers here. In a personal vehicle segment, especially, you know, you have a lot of segmentation of customers which is a very key element for your marketing plans, especially physical as well as digital platforms. First question to you is, is there a major shift in segmentation in work from home in the new norm? And also, mobility is looked at more as a safety today that compared to convenience or luxury. And if yes, how do you see the plan and the approach for personal vehicle manufacturers like you changing going forward? All right, so thank you, Shankar and good evening everyone and thank you for having me here. So let me break down the question into three small parts and I'll be quick in answering them. The first part, Shankar, is that do we share? Do we see a change from a shared mobility towards a personal mobility platform with work from home and with the fears of pandemic, COVID, et cetera? Simple answer to this is yes. However, at this stage, it is very difficult to put a number to the size of the segment and whether this trend is the whole. Why I so easily said yes is because there are two data points which are currently available with a significant drop of almost 80% in commercial vehicle registration and sales. There's a very significant drop in the sharing platform bookings. At the same time, after the lockdown got over, there's almost a 15% jump in personal or personal vehicle registration. So clearly there is a demand in the market. There are people who need a vehicle for personal use and in spite of a journal economic slowdown they are willing to spend money. So the demand exists clearly. The second part of your question is this. Do we see a significant shift away from say luxury feature variants more towards utility and safety? Let me start with the easy broad answer. It is no. To support this data point, we launched our most popular model that is fifth variant in July and almost 55% of the sales in the city have come from the top end of the segment which is significantly higher than our previous launch. So clearly the customer is giving equal importance to his bells and whistles. 50% sales are coming from automatic. So no there is at least in Honda's case no major shift towards lower brand or the lower variants within the brand mix. And it kind of holds true for other models also. If we look at city, the major success stories of course have been the compact SUVs. Shakti is here from Kia. I'm sure he will be able to say this. Hi Shakti, long time, in more detail. But the fact that Kia, Kretta were able to sell a million million and a half price point in such large number shows that the industry is also not shying away from spending money and moving towards security. Third part probably the most interesting quickly where do we see growth or what can we do as an industry to look at this shift from shared mobility to personal mobility. So the shared mobility segment actually is at least on a very broad level in two parts. The first part, people who moved to a shared platform because of convenience, you know, parking hassles the managing your driver, cost of maintaining, et cetera, et cetera. So they could have afforded a car, probably already had a car, but you know, they felt confident because of the availability of the shared platform to utilize it. The second segment in that is more nor generation. You may call them X, Y, Z generation, but the fact is these are the people who do not want to invest significantly in an asset. They see this as a dead investment. They just want to use, paper users. So as far as the first segment is concerned, I think their fear largely rose from the safety viewpoint and convenience. Industry rose to the question. I think everybody, including Honda, launched an online booking and buying service. We launched Honda from home and it got available traction. We, almost 2% of our bookings are not being directly dispatched from, which is an eye-opener for us. And I think... I get your point. So I understand that, you know, and I hope, and I hope that whatever you told us in terms of spending, it's not pent up and it is something which is an ongoing thing. There is a market, there is a market for maybe which is not only for safety and convenience because of pandemic, but it is more of a preference choice and I think I take that point and the shift from shared to a personal mobility kind of an option. Moving ahead, you know, but obviously, you know, another discussion for these model and the XYZ generation would require a differentiation, but take a point. Moving ahead, you know, I would request Deba to join us. You know, you're from consumer durable industry and I wanted to understand from you on a holistic communication perspective. How is Vultas creating a holistic communication life cycle by integrating channels, content, marketing around the customer from an engagement perspective where, you know, you've seen that, you know, the physical engagement had taken a lot of it during the last one year. Okay, thank you for that question. And allow me to put Vultas in the perspective first. Sure. That's a picture I always make as a marketer. So we are a 60-year-old brand and we started their conditioning business in this country in 1954. And since then, there has been no looking back. And today we lead industry in the cooling space. We not only sell air conditioners, we also sell air coolers and commercial products and recently they also launched a wide range of appliances under the Vultas Beko brand name. So I am saying this is because of the fact that taking a cue from what Shakil mentioned in the previous conversation, segmentation. For us, we have to cut across segments, right? And for us, we need to talk to house fires, we need to talk to a house mail, we need to talk to children. So that makes tasks much more wider for us. So keeping in mind our portfolio products which we have and which my friend Amit and also share subsequently, this portfolio has to get it to a larger cross-section of consumers. And that's where we have to cut across genders, we cut across age, cut across SEC. And that's when engagement becomes very critical because how do we engage with such a huge cross-section of consumers? So looking at, we took a look at last year and bring them in the peak of lockdown and immediate after lockdown. We looked at our media agencies, there's a harvest groups meaningful branch survey which brought out very good insights for us. 61% of consumers were looking at brands to tell them how to use the appliances in the middle of a lockdown, middle of a pandemic. Okay, so that was very interesting because instead of pushing propositions, features, we thought let's be simple and let's teach our consumers how to use their appliances because they were looking for help. And that's when data and content came in for us. We used the data of a consumer base and we created meaningful content for our consumers in the middle of lockdown and also when unlocks started happening last year. And that helped us to engage in a relevant manner. We didn't push down things on their throat. And that's when it started. And we saw a huge amount of engagement, meaningful engagement, taking place in all our social handles and that helped us to stay relevant to the consumers mind. We created DIY videos which was, how to service your air conditioners, how to service your appliances at home. And that was very meaningful to the consumers. Later on when the festivals came up, we saw that there's some barriers to adopting categories. There was a pent up demand, there was a replacement demand but how do you ensure that consumers still come on board? So that's when we created content around consumer offers, EMI schemes, extended warranties that helped us to stay relevant to the consumer. So a mix of data and meaningful content, content helped us to stay relevant and stay engaged with the consumers. This year, I think it should carry on. Data, content, search and social will be our focus areas for 2021 as we move along. Thanks, thanks there for the answer and just excuse me in case if you hear a little bit of background noise, sometimes you've gone to virtual and working from home, sometimes you carry these kind of things as answers, please excuse me on that. My next question is to Anirudh and probably we'll carry from the point where Shakil left the personal mobility space. In the pandemic, especially we saw an increased demand for personal mobility and India being India and we know the tubular space is just so huge and that is one of the major mode of private transport. How has TVS motor engaged with consumers during this period especially when you know that the walk-ins are going to be far and few in the dealership segment and with that, have you seen a change in the buying process, especially in your segment? Good afternoon, thank you. And Sankar, that's a very interesting question. So as I get into that, let me just say that I think we are going to be looking at a new normal nature of time very soon and the BC would be before COVID, this would be during COVID and hopefully very soon we will be in after COVID. While we are in the DC or the during COVID portion, we might be making a lot of projections on what after COVID will look like and a lot of that learning comes from what we experienced. Some of the things that would probably stay and a lot of behavior that we adopted in this period was a reaction of fear, was a reaction of caution, the reaction of safety. Hopefully some of them will maintain but some of them will kind of fall away. Why did some of these changes come? So as you mentioned personal mobility became about safety. Mass transit or the public transport system at that point in time had to shut down but essential services needed to carry on. And at that point in time, two wheelers became a very, very critical dimension of it. And I'm very tempted to take their bus leave and kind of give you an unknown of the portfolio of TVS but much to say we have something playing in the rural market, urban market, scooters and motorcycles. So we really saw demand into play across the various categories. Very interestingly, the rural market because just the mask on this shutdown, there was a livelihood requirement. We saw the first upsurge that came in there. What we're seeing later on as we move along is that add-on vehicles started becoming important. So in urban centers, you may have had a car, you may have had one, two wheeler and the family the requirement for the second two wheeler was coming on because you had individual mobility needs. So personal mobility did not, which was earlier almost defined like that of a family was becoming very isentering. So when I go to what happens to my spouse, how is he or she going to this thing? All that interplay started coming in. So the demand nature started evolving. And staying true to the topic of the day in how the digital interface kind of helped in that period is that initially we got into doing service videos, according to how to care for your vehicle when it is not mobile for a long time. But we realized as we quickly moved along that while there was initial uptick in that what the consumer was really looking at was to say, how am I going to be taking care of going forward and to give a true sense of that individual mobility gives you this chance of social distancing, et cetera, being safe and you really need that solution. So those kind of stories and content started playing out we far better. We did our piece and booking online and we got a fair amount of traction on that. But I still think there's a long way to go before that becomes really the mainstay. But interestingly, a trend that was always there which is that you had to have seen or research some of it online. The proportion of informed consumers walking into the showroom that really lead forward. So earlier when you had 40 to 50% of people who were informed when they walked in that number jumped to 70, 80 in respect to the kind of market that you're looking at. So the role of the dealership change from information to validation, from providing, solving the information gap to solving the assurance gap. So really the role at the dealership, role at the frontline evolved and hence the kind of retail aids that we needed to provide them to help them the consumer journey that also went through its change and digitization. So I think it's still very early days and to your earlier question and segmentation that you had asked very interestingly, I refer back that post COVID, there will be a whole different segmentation that will even so we will wait for the after COVID to see how that kind of shapes up. But it's interesting times ahead. Yeah, absolutely. And I think I will save some time for a question which probably talks about the AC which you mentioned and, but taking a point from you which you mentioned and I think that is more relevant for my question to Amit where you mentioned about informed customer and Amit, you know, havens for me personally or for any consumer for that matter operates in a category where touch and feel is so important, right? I mean, that's an area where you operate. And as a brand, how was your customer engagement involved in this scenario where, as I mentioned, I know the decisions partially if I have to put it that way are made online and the assurance which the word he used is even at the store or at the retailer. Give me some insight on that. So hi, Shankar, good evening everyone. I think everybody has talked about their particular experience and Shankar, as you rightly mentioned, if you would see how does, I will operate, we operate around 32 categories. So even a pre-preparation of home and the final preparation of home that we actually use everything in every socket you have something or the other that can be offered even the socket can be offered from what the Havelson actually put it. Partially your right Shankar in terms of that you require touch and feel but actually today what happens is consumer is much more informed that you actually think of. And I always believe in the fact that consumer is at least 10 steps more than all the marketers in whichever categories that you're actually operating today. So what are we trying to fulfill? We are just trying to fulfill as an enabler to give him what he wants. All information what he needs he already trying to assimilate irrespective whether you are not providing somebody else to do it. What we have learned and what we thought of doing it in last couple of months is we actually focus on one particular science of marketing or science of entire social is is about Netrography. How does the Netrography actually talks about each and every touch point of a consumer? How it is actually behaving not only from aspect of social listening but also a very, very unbiased approach of what does consumer feel about. And that particular science has made us today it is just a playbook for us even for going for the next particular 10 months or 20 months of going forward. We have a basics in place, not today. We know that it is not about only a pent-up demand on this is this is a combination of future as well as present needs that are actually moving for it. Coming to the touch points that you talk about today but what we are actually trying to fulfill is just trying to be as an enabler if you really let's say in a water purifier as a category if you want somebody to have a service we will help you out in terms of either through a virtual call or through a video call or WhatsApp call may you may not be having a direct access to the call center because call center is not operating things are not moving across but we can reach out to you whatever form and format to look for. If you see largely most of the around 85% of the business on the consumer appliances as well as the entire consumer durable runs on a very traditional format dealer distributor retailer where the trust is not in terms of who is selling the trust is how are you actually selling this guy will give you a trust the dealer will give you a trust by the I'm sitting here in terms of whatever the need is required that we've actually tried to fulfill by generating leads to those particular proposition we created a concept called O2O which is online to offline so we were creating and generating leads for all our dealer and distributors they were actually fulfilling that order because for example if Shankal is an XYZ part of the country and he wants a requirement for an AC how would that be fulfilled so we'll show him three options he can buy the same price he can actually go and the dealer can deliver and fulfill that entire particular order the idea is if at this particular point of time if you can actually engage a part of your particular consumer journey I think you're actually winning a consumer in much way also what I heard from most of the other panelists I don't know Rohail can actually comment I don't know how these two animals of consumer durable and auto can come together I couldn't make it out since the day the I think the info bib and Rohail can actually find out but the larger pieces digital is no more a medium and that's how I've been telling it is a part of life for anyone if me as a consumer for you and from a six year old to a 60 year old everybody thinks that it is part of life today irrespective of whatever journeys that you actually bring in that is how the evolution is happening thanks yeah I think you've accelerated the point of saying that you know so the last point which you made that it is part of the life I think the opinion is that it has not accelerated much more than what it was yeah and that acceleration brings in a lot of new dimensions to marketing and sales and to the point where you say how consumer durable and auto can go together I'm sure it is not going together that acceleration at least but for the part of discussion yes we're trying to bring it together and thanks for that answer Amit moving ahead you know coming to Shakti and I think very interestingly I want to ask you you know and you know probably you were exactly born kind of you know busy and you know you were during the covid is where you were established in your place and then now you have a position to take so I'm referring to your last 18 months you know I understand you came around 19 August during that period and you know it's been three launches after that and so my question more is you know to understand how have you been recording your customer feedback which is a very very key element right for you to you launch yourself and you want to know how your customers are reacting to it and the time of that feedback capturing period was so tricky isn't it so I just want to understand how did you manage to get your voice of customer and really understand what went well for you and what is that you can do considering the times where you were in the market thanks for an amazing question Shankar hi everyone, good evening actually as you pointed out we are the youngest on the panel in terms of all the brands who are present here but we have seen the three parts of life like when we started it was everything was going smooth we were doing great in 2019 we were happy that okay we have we have been getting a little bit of success immediately then COVID happened and now here we are in terms of all these three eras as Anirudh mentioned we have launched three products now as all of us know KIA has been a very late entrant in Indian automobile industry it was quite a big challenge and it actually became an opportunity for us the answer to your question goes real back when we started planning how to bring the brand in India the entire KIA product portfolio the brand positioning was decided and designed keeping the new age consumer in mind and since beginning through our interesting narrative that we had for the brand you know the Tiger, the Astronaut, the Badass, the Celtos we have been taking a very different take with the consumers now what that brings us to is that today consumer is more friendly than us than anyone else the best part of the new age consumer the person that I am talking to as a plan is that he loves to express and he talks back and this is definitely a goal now being in a high involvement category every emoji, every comment or every interaction that he does on my channels is an opportunity for me and we started doing the activities much before Celtos launch for example when Celtos was launched in August 2019 we were busy building the brand since October 2018 and since then we have been speaking to the consumers in a very positive way the first part was to get this entire following of the new age consumers to listen to them and then to come back with the product and the overall brand promise for example Celtos was Bible online from day one even when we were looking at in the booking period we were Bible online from day one bringing this brought us to the second phase when we were planning for Sonnet and exactly at that point in time COVID happened but as I said going back to the entire philosophy how we have cleared up for the market we realized that work from home was actually buy from and that was something which was a boon for us with the core key engaging and digital first approach that Kia has had we have been striking a chord with the new age consumer so that he is the most vocal with us for example the entire Sonnet launch was conceptualized and it was done in the COVID period but on day one we got more than 6500 online bookings so in a way I would say COVID was a boon for us it brought us even closer to the consumer coming to the third part of your question we are saying how much is it important to catch the trend and ensure positive VOC as a brand I would say Kia has not catch the trend we have been creating a trend and we have been ensuring a positive VOC even before the trend catches up for example during COVID while everyone was silent mood was not good everyone was worrying Kia came up with a campaign which made people just to sit back and relax we said we did not even advertise our products we had launched Carnival in which there was a new commercial where the main product goes as far as to meet his girlfriend on a beach we just reversed the TVC back and we see Rewind Kia now that is the part of the work here because it is Kulukia as well so Rewind Kia and then we said you stay back stay relaxed at the back of it we launched programs which were giving people wellness ideas which were letting them do the best with their cars which were stationary and that is how we even managed to come closer to the consumer but yes we have been recording the feedback at each and every moment and we have been putting it in our products in the way they communicate I think you answered my question and I think my focus on that question was more understanding where you were born digitally and it helped you capturing those information but these were tough times to actually assess customer behaviour because there were no normal times that we gave differently and we heard that from all of you I think with such a large panel I can only afford having one more question but I am going to toss up a question with each one of you a same question and your quick opinion on that while there are trends I believe you touched upon some of the trends which will continue, some are irreversible trends some trends started before COVID which probably would give it to your digital adoptions and things like that but the major question still remains is we keep talking about a rural market which is much bigger in India that's a market which everyone wants to chase but bringing digital to rural market and that's where my question is do you see an ecosystem which is digitally equipped ready for you to bring desperate systems and functions within your organisations to connect with or probably create a customer engagement hub and connect with new customers customer relationships digitally connect customers, track customer behaviours put in a lot of those AIs and analytics so what I am trying to ask you is do you see an ecosystem which is ready where you can now scale up to rural markets and make it a little big because it is digital now I will start with Amit So Shankar, two parts to the question First is we already have a real time marketing centre which actually takes care about the entire ecosystem of all the consumers and customers that we actually talk about both B2B and B2C and it's a very very fairly large structure and unstructured data that we actually evaluate and do it Going to rural I think there is no option and I think you should go and if you see the trends, what is there during the COVID also when the lockdown was starting the first particular market that had actually started moving are all the markets which are already semi urban and rural markets to it it is not a matter of infrastructure it is also a matter of what is the level of interest that you can actually able to suffice what category you can actually move it to and what is the power of the product and what is the pricing that you can actually go for so I think it's not a matter of in terms of it's a huge market people have already explored that market obviously one size doesn't fit for all so what are we doing for the urban market we definitely have to come up with a new particular strategy for going forward and a lot of insights which other particular brands are doing because your insights will help you in terms of driving in those particular markets that's my answer to it Amit you are saying that the ecosystem is in place it's your project how you want to drive that perfect your thought just before I get on to that I can't resist answering Amit Ji's earlier question why auto and consumer are durable together so I have a product that plugs into the wall charges on electricity and runs fine that is as the appliance I get to the previous IC that's exactly what the steam probably uses a havel socket while it's at it so we are very very much close at it tomorrow than anything at least by that at least there's some particular monotony break-in has happened to the entire it looks like a so serious discussion at least we are trying to change the policies for India for consumer delivery of automobile so I'm thankful I'm glad at least I'm able to make that difference to the entire communication today thanks Anitha for participating in that coming back to the question that you talked about the rural market I think the rural market is already digital it's we were catching up to it from a content perspective enabling transactions that's a separate that doesn't mean they are not digital they are consuming content they are consuming content in rows there are already enough number of platforms out there which is servicing them are we transaction ready are we willing to completely complete the end-to-end transaction maybe not but are we transaction ready in urban centers also I don't think you are 100% there but good to say that you already see I mean examples like Shakthi with care which is very strongly on the digital we have a couple of products which are in our mind digital first where our campaigns rarely go on TV for that we have booking engines which are working online TVSI, Q, Ben talk these are all working online bulk of our business on that comes in are we transaction ready I think we can do better on getting transaction ready there are regulatory environments that prevent us to do that 100% and there are others but at some point in time that is enablement even after you enable that even after for example faction went online people would still want to walk in and check out the size of it and then go back and order it online the act of shopping, the experience of shopping is still something you can't take away so I think we have to be very careful in what we provide and what we take away and while you are transaction ready we do not really take away the joy of bringing home your next appliance, vehicle, car I think it's an intrinsic part of that you are bringing in something like that which will send the mail and we should be very careful in protecting that alright so we are ready with digital ecosystem consumers are digitally equipped but transactionally is what we are looking at as a space to be enabled let me turn to your views on this from a consumer great we have since a short of time I will just sum it up quickly I think our category is already there 45% of the durable business is already there in tier 2, 3, 4 towns so we are selling there already and the consumers are already there who are adopting us what is more challenging for us is how do we engage with our trade partners in these towns because that's how we want to digitize ourselves because we have a multi-level channel of distribution right so we don't reach out to consumer from our own exclusive brand stores which automobile companies do so we have to depend on a multi-level channel of distribution and that's how we have to engage with our sub-dealers also to ensure that they reach out to their consumers and to the day that's an important priority for us secondly in terms of driving generic demand for new categories we all know refrigerator sells in a cooler cell in upcountry towns but what we didn't know was dishwashers which we launched last year 40% of our sales came from upcountry towns amazing so we never knew that consumers are open for new technology new offerings and that's where we triggered demand so it's important to align with your trade partners whatever you do at least they are able to fulfill that that's my take on upcountry priorities I think along with transactionally enable you also to also be digitally to get those probably it is very interconnected with the transaction point which Anurad mentioned Shakti, your point and then I'll come to Shakil on basically looking at the digital ecosystem readiness I'll be I'll be very quick to answer in the interest of time but I cannot resist this small chat between Anurad and Amit that I was listening so Shankar you have the bridge between consumer durables and automobiles here in your panel earlier I've been the consumer durables for 8 years selling televisions and now being with Kiya I just bought a couple of cars also that's good so all I can talk about is the as a brand we are fairly new in terms of penetration we are in the penetration mode but what I can tell you is that India is not digital ready or the penetration is lower at the in some of the suburbs or when we say upcountry that is something that I see is a mix a little bit because for example in Kiya we have we have launched a service app through which you can book the service from your home the driver will come pick up your car he will take it back and as he is going you can even watch your car going on the map then he services this the service estimate comes on your app you approve it, you reject it, you change then you pay on the app and then the car is delivered to your home back I'll be delighted to tell you that more than 90% of the services that we are doing in Kiya that are being done digitally and the kind of traction that we are getting from non metro towns that's amazing that's the artistic that I will keep sure Shakil from you and then I can probably take one more audience question I think we have 4 minutes sure so very quickly I think very interesting perspectives in terms of infrastructure I think everybody is ready I don't see a divide in ruler and urban, it depends totally upon the infrastructure and data is in one place what are you going to do about it so in our case very quickly my focus at least in how can I utilize my existing customers and the prospects make them talk to each other and let my existing customers convert the prospects that is the data point and the digitization that I am looking for including my existing customers any use cases this is my focus okay so use cases transaction, trade readiness probably consumers are far ahead in terms of consumption of digital mode these are some of the things which probably are there and I think from a year down the line a conversation like this would probably be talking about how the new use cases are building from these tools and technologies or the availability of resources I have a question from the audience and I think the question is more related with the consumer durable kind of scenario so I think Amit and Dev both can come in in case we have time, the question is it is mentioning about digital transformation and social listening I think Sumit mentioned during his conversation I think Amit also mentioned about it, so Amit you can take it first about digital transformation and social listening are any of your segments using the programmatic marketing or advertising techniques based on user behavior for your brands in social media, so it is basically talking about user behavior getting used for marketing in social media So just to answer on this Shankar I think today most of the digital planning happens primarily on programmatic and you can see a lot of different results but the caveat it also depends upon category to category and what is the objective that you are actually trying to do for example in a category again like a water purifier versus an AC the objective is very very different yes there are on the basis of behavior you do programmatic by and it is very very relevant today it helps a lot of things in that thereby if you want to add something on this No you are bang on, programmatic is actually a staple diet for us now because it is going to be there for some time so if you want to devise your plans and your digital plans it has to be embedded in without saying So thanks for Shreyas Ranjim for asking this question I think you got an agreement from the panelists that yes it is the key area of focus I think that just brings to time I was wondering if I have five of you how am I going to manage it but thank you so much for actually supporting me on that and I think I just quickly summarize very interesting thoughts which came across from shared to personal probably consumption is there but we need more transaction and development trade, digitally born businesses and some interesting connects and collaboration between consumer durable and auto industry for the event companies to know that this is their mistake so really appreciate your thoughts and time gentlemen thank you so much and I hand it over to you Thank you so much everyone and we hope to and thank you for everyone who asked the question of the audience and we'll come right next week and see you soon on InfoBip before and present InfoBip Thursdays with InfoBip and a new topic thank you again for your time