Brand Building and Brand Killing...

Ever thought how advertising could be used for brand building..Check this hoarding in Chennai which indicates the open fight between Kingfisher and Jet Airways.

Now,after few days,one more flier,the low cost airline Go Air also joins the bandwagon.Guess,if Air Deccan also joins this fight,than it's hoarding would say "We don't think we need to change"(though I can only afford and love Air Deccan)

Definitely you would have a smile on your face,when you see this one

Spawners April,2007

This session was started in February,2007 but I missed the month of March,2007 .Now as April is nearing it's end , here is the list of my picks for this month

• Mahesha speaks about Attracting Clients by speech - An article which reminds about some of the fundamentals in Business,which we tend to forget
• Toni Schneider(CEO of Automattic,company behind Wordpress) speaks about How to get your start-up noticed - without a PR budget
• Hitech Strategies speak about Ten Reasons High-Tech Companies Fail

Thanks Mahesh Pidshetti for his help in the compilation of this list

Insight into "Open C"

There was a roadshow on a new technology "Open C" by Nokia.Unfortunately,I could not make it to the show but Ashwin aka TheCruisemaniac was there at the roadshow.

He has a good update about the roadshow here

India + China = Win-Win situation

Many books and newspapers have spoken about "India V/S China" but what about India+China = ChIndia.Imagine the superpower

There is a good article in Times Of India(26th April 2007) ,which focuses on a JV between India and China(ie what if they work collaboratively).IMHO,the best part of this article is:

If China has become the manufacturing powerhouse of the world, Gartner analysts say India appears to be well on the way to becoming an IT services powerhouse. IT services account for approximately half of India's services exports, and they are growing at more than 30 per cent per year.

This also sends ringing bells that "India needs more product companies as well".
Read the complete article here

Thoughtsprevail has a comment !!!

Of late,lot of unknown and memorable incidents are happening on my blog.I have met lot of new and like minded people,business guys but 25th April,2007(7:30 PM) would be a date(and time) to cherish Through the post,you may find me childish but do spare me for that behaviour.Also,this post is made after few evidences and I believe it to be correct(to the best of my knowledge).I hope you guys are still plugged in

There was an interesting observation which I made(from Business Gyan) and turned out to be a good article.The article definitely had references to Guy Kawasaki(the great Guru).

Apparently this article fetched me comments by none other than Guy Kawasaki himself(Comment below)

But many times,there are pranks played by the readers and I also thought this to be a prank.But when I investigated,I did feel that the person who commented was(or could be) Guy Kawasaki himself and the reason is the statistics provided by my SiteMeter.

If you might know,Guy Kawasaki(who was Chief Evangelist in Apple) madly loves Macintosh and with this evidence , I just felt he could have been the one who has commented on the article

This evidence does not prove completely that Guy Kawasaki (my business Guru) has commented on my blog but with sheer excitement,this article was born.Now with these happy memories in mind,I would return back to my business

iGate : An Interesting (and Innovative) story

In India; TCS,Wipro,Infosys and other IT services companies have become household names.IT services companies have a simple rule of thumb:"They charge their clients based on Hourly basis of the employees that are in a team.This also includes the team members who are on bench ie they are a part of the project but unfortunately they are left with no work So with this saturated model being followed by all the IT services companies in India,time had come for some innovative model ie question the existing model and innovate to define a new one.This innovation came from IGate CEO Phaneesh Murthy......Keep on reading rest of the story(Note:Inputs taken from "How Innovators Connect" by Rohit Agarwal)

Phaneesh Murthy left Infosys in 2002 to start Quintant(which was later acquired by IGate).Murthy always knew in order to succeed,he should differentiate his company from the other players in the services industry.During his stint at Infosys,he had noticed the following problems in the business:

1. Service providers get paid regardless of whether they succeeded with a project
2. Service provider employees are usually very young and hence customers have to pay for their training
3. Service providers had no stake in a project's completion and hence,they benefited even if the project deadline has missed
4. Service providers talked about YOY increase in cost and salaries,while customers talked about YOY reductions of cost.

Now with so many weaknesses in the existing model of IT services industry,Murthy decided to be different from the crowd by implementing the following strategy.

Rather than asking his international clientele to pay for effort or input,customers would pay for value or output.

But when you try something innovative,initial hiccups are bound to happen,same was the case with Murthy as well.Below is a short glimpse of how Murthy convinced his initial clients to prove his point:

It is not wise to compare in Dollars per hour.But when the output is compared,definitely IGate is more competitive due to its strength of experienced employees.His point was that many IT services companies hire young employees so companies can mark up their hourly rates to make profit,on the other hand,IGate hired employees with more experience,who are more productive.

There were six companies who were competing for the bid but in the end,IGate won the bid and the reason was quite evident-"None of the companies who were competing for the bid were able to quote on price per transaction"

This was just a small example of Innovation born out of existing problems.There might be many such examples of innovation born when long standing flaws have been tolerated but only few like Phaneesh Murthy try to question them and than correct them(to get an upper hand over the competitors)

Related Posts:
From Ideas to Execution
Why more Google's are needed

Who will change the world?

There has been a million times that I have mentioned Guy Kawasaki(the great guru) in my blog.So by this time,you might be knowing what is the title of his blog - How to change the world

I read Guy's interview on one of the website's(oops can't recollect the website ) and he told that he has already started working on his next book named "Who will change the world",yup it is the same title as his blog.

Apparently, when I purchased April,2007 issue of Business Gyan , I was shocked to see that the book has been released in India.Since,it is Guy's book,I had to buy the book but was surprised see Guy's name not being mentioned in the book review.Finally,I came to know that the book has been written by David Bornstein and not Guy Kawasaki.Check out the image which is taken from Business Gyan,April 2007 issue.

Now I wonder who would change the world-would it be Guy Kawasaki or David Bornstein .Also,now the suspense remains about Guy's next book (obviously, it won't be titled "How to change the world") since, David has already made an attempt to change the world

Statutory Warning : Do not ignore blogs...

There have many bloggers(including myself) writing on blogging, its impact on business and marketing.I was just going through "Blog Marketing by Jeremy Right" and came across one interesting instance that proves the "Real power of blogging".Some bloggers might have already read about the "Kryptonite Story" and if you have not,than don't miss the rest of the article

Kryptonite Locks is a unique story in that the company was aware that blogs existed,but it chose not to respond to bloggers for a variety of reasons.Sounds interesting ah...than lets unlock the (lock) mystery

In 2004, Kryptonite, maker of top-selling locks,suffered a heavy loss at the hands of a blog.A blogger discovered that it was possible to pick a Kryptonite lock with a standard Bic Pen

After the blogger blogged it,the story was picked up by Engadget,a popular gadget and geek blog.Check out this post on Engadget , which describes the issue and yes,do not forget to see viewer's comments as well.As you might have felt,Kryptonite was not aware much about this talk in the blogosphere and when it became aware about the situation, it was very very late

The impact: Kryptonite's business was hit with a class-action lawsuit and the company engaged in a massive lock exchange program.

The unanswered question:What would have been Kryptonite's loss,if it would have responded to the original blogger's post(before it was picked up by Engadget) ... Makes you think, isn't it

This was a very old instance and it occurred in 2004.Now let us have a look at the current trend.
I just happened to check Entrepreneur Rajat Gupta's blog and this post grabbed my attention.As you might have seen from the post, Rajat got his flight money refunded by just putting the comment(given below) on the Clear Trip Blog

hi,
This is regarding the cancellation refund. Its close to 2 months and I have not got my refund. I have sent numerous mails to customer care but no response. This doesn't make sense.

My Case Ref: 1-50690.
Could you please let me know the status on it.

rajAT

So,with changing times,strategies should change and this is how Blogs impact your business.Now, let me get back to my personal blogging

My first Venture, first Experiences...

Ever experienced how you feel on the first day of your very first job?.Yup,you are a bit tensed and equally excited to work in the corporate environment Now imagine you are into the corporate environment for few years and than decide to follow a different path which is somewhat different as well as lot more difficult.Same was the case during the first meeting(with my partner) of my very first venture(Name undisclosed due to various reasons).

I did speak here about my first idea(which I wanted to convert into a venture) but this is the second idea and I started working on this idea, after discussing with few other people....Yes,timing is very important.Now let me summarize my first experience.

Day 1 (22nd April,2007):
My second venture lies in the Web 2.0 space and the work started on 22nd April,2007(4:30 PM).Now,the first part was registering a domain.Now the fun started .A serious brainstorming session on what should be the domain name and what should be it's plus points?The domain name should be appealing,simple,creative,easy to remember as well and on & on... Apart from internal discussions,we had suggestions from few known people in the IT as well as the Non-IT industry.The day ended at 9:30 PM and we were left with one name but were not so convinced with its appeal.

Day 2(23rd April, 2007):
This day started a bit early at around 11:00 AM and we wasted some time in checking mails,blogging and other activities(Guess,we should avoid doing this in future).Finally at 12:30 PM we were back to work and decided to go with some other name since,the current domain name had lot of hidden problems This time,again we came out with 5-6 domain names and when we shortlisted two of them and the sad part was that both were already booked.Phew...after so many trials , we had to take a lunch-break.But as many say,when you change the environment,minds work faster and the same happened...We came out with 2 more names and after lunch,same old discussion started....Finally at around 6:00 PM , we managed to successfully book a domain . Now we understood that small things matter and are more time consuming , when you start-off.After the initial success,we would now focus on the following aspects:

1. Logo design,caption development
2. Layout and Color combination in the web site
3. Visiting cards and T Shirt printing(yup,we would follow reverse trend of marketing...just kidding,this would be used only when our website becomes public)

I am sure the initial phase(and the entire journey) would be very tiring as well as exciting, without which "The entrepreneur's journey is not memorable"...

One word of advice:You would be laughed at or ridiculed or even questioned for your idea,but just have faith on yourself(and your idea) and say to yourself "You are here to prove yourself right rather than to prove others wrong"....

I would sign off with this winning mantra

LinkedIn group for budding Entrepreneurs

Few days back there was a post on my blog , which was written with the intention to form a group of Entrepreneurs.This would have the benefits of sharing ideas,finding partners, discussing problems(which would result in generation of new ideas) and the list keeps on growing.

It is quite accidental that there is a similar group on LinkedIn started by Dharmesh Shah of OnStartUps , which has a similar kind of purpose.According to Dharmesh,below are the 5 reasons why you should join the "OnStartups LinkedIn group"

5 Great Reasons To Join The OnStartups LinkedIn Group

1. Find other people in your area interested in startups (even if you live in the middle of nowhere).

2. See if you can locate a co-founder for your maniacally brilliant startup idea.

3. Recruit unsuspecting victims to join your startup team

4. Locate a promising startup to join and try your hand at this whole entrepreneurship thing.

5. Find funding for your current startup so you don't have to beg and plead with your friends and family.

It's an amazing step by Dharmesh , though there are lot more reasons to join this amazing group .I have already joined the group , so go ahead and join the "OnStartUps Entrepreneurial community" and help spread the word of "Entrepreneurship".

Last but not the least,you can read the complete article here

India's (really) shining

I guess whatever I am writing is not new since, we have read this stuff in newspapers , magazines etc etc We have heard a lot of outsourcing,cost cutting and lot of work being transferred to Asian countries(like India,China etc).Some people have labeled it as a measure to cut costs and some think that India is becoming an IT superpower.Different people,different perception

Few days back, I had come with this post which has Thomas Friedman doing research for his bestseller "The World is Flat".Somehow I felt that India is becoming an attractive place to sink some of the global talent but one incident with an unknown foreigner(cannot say her foreigner since,I felt she was very much impressed with India) proved it all.Keep on reading to know more about the story.

I was walking with my friend on 80 feet road in Indiranagar,Bangalore when a young lady named Lisa(who works in a Non IT firm in Bangalore....yup Non-IT ) comes and asks us(me and my friend) for a cricket playground.Well,I had no idea about the ground and so I decided to kickstart a small conversation.The conversation revolved around her experiences in India.

Lisa told that she is from Germany and than she started telling about Bangalore(and how she landed up here).I could a big glimpse in her eyes when she started telling about it ).One thing I was impressed with is that she knew the names of many roads in Bangalore(and I wasn't aware about half of them )From the way she spoke,I could make out that she really liked working in Bangalore and I asked her the reason.Her reply was a surprise to me.She told that she wanted to mention India in her resume as that would add lot of value to her resume.

Her talk pretty much amazed me .She also mentioned that some of her friends are planning to shift here and if she feels more comfortable here,she would settle in Bangalore itself.

This is just a small example of India shining and I think more news(like this one) would put India in a different zone

From Ideas to Execution

Just started reading the book "How Innovators Connect by Rohit Agarwal".Each and every line in the book leaves a message but it starts with the difference between Invention and Innovation.Let us see what does WikiPedia say about "Invention" and "Innovation".

Invention-An invention is an object, process, or technique which displays an element of novelty. An invention may sometimes be based on earlier developments, collaborations or ideas, and the process of invention requires at least the awareness that an existing concept or method can be modified or transformed into an invention. However, some inventions also represent a radical breakthrough in science or technology which extends the boundaries of human knowledge. Legal protection can sometimes be granted to an invention by way of a patent.

Innovation-

1. the process of making improvements by introducing something new
2. the act of introducing something new: something newly introduced (The American Heritage Dictionary).
3. the introduction of something new. (Merriam-Webster Online)
4. a new idea, method or device. (Merriam-Webster Online)
5. the successful exploitation of new ideas (Department of Trade and Industry, UK).
6. change that creates a new dimension of performance Peter Drucker (Hesselbein, 2002)
7. A creative idea that is realized [(Frans Johansson)] (Harvard Business School Press, 2004)
8. "The capability of continuously realizing a desired future state" ([John Kao, The Innovation Manifesto, 2005])

Well,the first line says it all "An Invention is an object, process, or technique which displays an element of novelty and Innovation is the process of making improvements by introducing something new".Hence,there is a thin line of difference between the two which means, Innovation can be built on an existing and proven idea(provided it tries to solve some of the problems) in an already existing innovation.

Every day or should I say every minute each one of us would have thought of some idea(which could solve an existing problem) , but you parked your idea aside(for that very moment or permanently) due to various reasons A loss of your idea could be a gain for others.Now let me come to the crux of the entire problem.

I was chatting with an enthusiastic and aspiring guy Mahesh Pidhsetti who shared his idea with me but had problems in sharing his idea with others(ie he could not find soulmates).This is not only his problem but a problem faced by many of us.

So,before our ideas die out,I have decided to take some step....These are the suggestions from my side:

1. Have a GoogleGroup(YahooGroup is banned ) which would be used for the sole purpose of sharing and reviewing ideas.A record of all the members(and their backgrounds) would be maintained for further reference.
   
2. Plan to meet on every alternate weekends to know each other and also see which person is suitable to be your soulmate.

Well,there may be some who would agree with this idea and some may disagree.I would welcome your feedback(either though mail) or through a comment.

Let's work together to give birth to ideas and to build ventures around those ideas

Bozos Bozos everywhere....

Before I start writing about anything,let me define what or who exactly is a BOZO.

BOZO is a Guy Kawasaki terminology for a loser of a person.He/she would definitely try to bog you down during the course of the venture.He/she is always on a spree to make you believe that you would not succeed and want you also to join the group of LOSERS where they belong BOZO could be anyone right from your friend to your colleague or an unknown person.

So,why exactly I am writing this post.Well,there was one incident that happened today which made me write this post.There was a guy and girl who just passed besides me and looked at me(and smiled) as if they saw a monkey coming out of the zoo .Damn,I was really embarrassed and at the same time,made me wonder if I have some problem.I looked at myself in the mirror(yup,even I am a human being) and just wondered if I have some problem.

When I came out I was very much satisified with myself and just thought "Why the hell should I think about those guys since I am pretty much ahead than those guys...Damn,instead of them I would take advice from guys who have better knowledge than me or who are guys who are not loser of a person".

There are many people(like the ones mentioned above) who would question your capibilites or your looks or your attitude and it is upto us to just ignore them(though I made a mistake by not ignoring them ).For me "Narayan Murthy" is a great example who is an average looking person(or should I say below average) and built th massive Infosys empire.I am sure looks or your physical appearance has nothing to do with your venture(or your entrepreneurial dream) but I think there could be more people like me who could sometimes have the same feeling(like what I had this time).

This also reminds me of Dharmesh Shah of OnStartups quoting "He left India only because he felt that India was not suitable for shy people like him and US was a better option for him"......I also got a similar kind of a thought in mind after this incident (I know I would be a fool to decide things based on one such incident).

In my honest opinion "These BOZOS are our teachers and they give us more strength to move forward and perform better" Just as I complete this post(which does not fit in the theme of my blog), you might be wondering why I wrote this post?....The answer is "Beware of BOZOS and learn how to ignore them(which I also need to learn)"

Bloggers Code of Conduct

Every day several blogs receive spam comments,anonymous comments and though you might can block some of the comments,still some of these would still be there on your blog Take a look at this link which describes about death threats to bloggers.With so many problems in the BlogoSphere,it was high time to bring a code of "Conduct for Bloggers".

O'Reilly came out with the Code Of Conduct for Bloggers at the ETech Conference , which addresses some of the common problems faced by Bloggers.

Some of the rules that were discussed at the conference are given below:

1. Take responsibility not just for your own words, but for the comments you allow on your blog.
2. Label your tolerance level for abusive comments.
3. Consider eliminating anonymous comments.
4. Ignore the trolls.
5. Take the conversation offline, and talk directly, or find an intermediary who can do so.
6. If you know someone who is behaving badly, tell them so
7. Don't say anything online that you wouldn't say in person

These are not the final rules but more rules would still be added after further discussions.You can read the complete description of the Code Of Conduct here and believe me,you would find it very true and interesting as well.One strange thing is that there is no rule that adresses theft of content from other blogs.

Some interesting guidelines for Women Bloggers which has been set by BlogHer can be found here

I hope that this Code Of Conduct improves the scene of the BlogoSphere

2K Bloggers - Face of the blogosphere

For guys who have been in the blogosphere,would have definitely seen 2kBloggers.So,if you feel that already there are many guys aware about it,than why does this post appear on my blog.To get the answer,keep on reading......There are several reasons for this post since, this post focuses more on what exactly is 2K Bloggers forum and why should bloggers contribute to the 2000 bloggers forum.

What is 2K Bloggers?

Why join 2K Bloggers forum?
As Chinoy Ray points out "2K Forum is an excellent place to meet 1999 bloggers" and I won't repeat what he has already communicated in his post

How can 2K Bloggers forum help your blog?
First of all,let me see where am I in the 2K forum

One of the main advantage of joining the 2K Blogger's forum is that it helps in getting some more recognization in the global scene of Blogosphere.Above all,it really helped my blog move up by 8000 in the Technorati rankings Nearly 5 new blogs linked to my blog after I had my profile on this forum

So go ahead and join the 2000 bloggers forum