Faculty Spot Marketing Strategies during Recession - Ms. K. Kee rth i, Asst. Prof. The marketers should have to do every thi ng wi thi n thei r power to survive in the battle against recession. The eff ect ive and affordable marketing strategies that help to stay alive in a period ofeconomic downturn like this are listed below: Sur viv e Unt il The Storm Is Over: Recession is only a part of the busi nes s cyc le. His tory reveals that there is recession in eve ry decade. The first thing that every marketer has to fix in their mind is that, they have to save their current market share until the recession is over. Don’t get the fever of recession and think that it is only a period where demand forproducts will fall and we ought to take every step to increase our sales. Serve Your Customers As a Slave: Director’s cabin It makes me very happy to start a separate newsletter of DOMS. I heartil y congratulate all the staffme mbers for thei r contr ibu ti on and successf ul compl eti on of our 2 nd Periodi c Audit-Quality Management System - ISO Audit. I extend my heartfelt appreciation to DHILIP of MBA first year for having won weight lifting competition both at state and national level and I want to congratulate our students M. Ranganayaki and R. Saranya for winning first prize in national level meet organized by Annamalai University. A.V.C COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES DOMS KNOWLEDGE GRANARY “CREATING SAMRAJYA” ’
have to do everything withintheir power to survive in thebattle against recession. Theeffective and affordablemarketing strategies that help tostay alive in a period of economic downturn like this arelisted below:
Survive Until The
Storm Is Over:
Recession is only a part
of the business cycle. Historyreveals that there is recession inevery decade. The first thingthat every marketer has to fix intheir mind is that, they have tosave their current market shareuntil the recession is over.Don’t get the fever of recessionand think that it is only a
period where demand for products will fall and we oughtto take every step to increaseour sales.
Serve Your Customers
As a Slave:
Director’s cabin
It makes me very happy to start a separate newsletter of DOMS. I heartily congratulate all the staff
members for their contribution and successful completion of our 2nd Periodic Audit-Quality
Management System - ISO Audit.
I extend my heartfelt appreciation to DHILIP of MBA first year for having won weight lifting
competition both at state and national level and I want to congratulate our students M. Ranganayaki
and R. Saranya for winning first prize in national level meet organized by Annamalai University.
In a situation of economic downturn, consumersare really the king. When their purchasing power is reduced,they will tighten their purse and
only the best can survive. So,what a marketer has to do is heshould make his customersdelight, he should make themfeel that they are gettingsomething much more than theyare expecting. Remember, asatisfied customer willdefinitely bring more clients toyou.
If you are serving onlybig clients and neglect smallorders, now it’s the right timeto change your policy. There isno financial loss in servingsmall clients or someone withspecial needs, as long as itdoesn’t eat your profits. Notonly it will help you to cover operation cost, it will have thepotential to pull you out of recession. If the business of your small clients growsquickly, then their order valuescould come into your regular scope of business. Try withsome trial orders to decidewhether it suits you or not.
Invest In Your Brand:
It is the right time toinvest in your brands. Usually,the initial reaction of almostevery marketer in respond torecession is reducing themarketing cost. But it is thetime for you to build your brandloyalty. You will be heard whenall others are shutting their marketing mouths. In battle,everybody will get wounds but
the one who never shows hispain will be the survivor. So
keep it in mind, bargain withyour media for the rates andinvest in building your brand.
Concentrate In your
Core Business:
It is the time for you toconcentrate only in your corebusiness. Companies who diddiversify and split focus awayfrom their core competenciesoften struggled to manage their unrelated business whereascompanies that remainedfocused or re-focused on their
core created opportunities togain market share more easilyfrom their competitors.
The first thing you haveto do, if your industry is worstaffected, is that you shoulddivest your less profitable or unrelated business. At facevalue these divestments will bea part of a strategy of cutting
cost or generating short termliquidity.
Lower Your BEP:
Even if you are monopolyor selling a premium brand or even if your customers areloyal, strive hard to cut your costs. You should cut your costs and not your investments.
Try to lower your Break EvenPoint to new lows. If your company is the lowest costproducer then you have a better chance of survival.
Concentrate More In
R&D:
Every marketer should tryto introduce new products to
should use R&D to meet theincreasing diverse needs of their recessionary customerswho seek greater value for their spending. Try your level best to
introduce most promisingproducts that met the immediateneeds of your customers. Thereis an old proverb called“Necessity is the mother of invention”. Try to make thereverse of it. Introduce newproducts and make it as anecessity to your consumers. Itwill make your business togrow when most move in the
opposite way.
Understand Your
Customers:
It is the time you shouldlisten to your customers. Theywill show you the way to beatrecession. Only think you haveto do is that you should comedown and ask them. Try to
understand your customers. Sowhen your customers starttightening their purse, you cando that too. Also they will tellhow much they can pay you.Listen to that and strive to do it.
In every war, a hero willemerge. In this battle againstrecession, it is the time for youmarketers to show yourself as areal hero. Save your business aswell as the economy.
Personality of this
Month Lalu PrasadYadav
Lalu Prasad Yadav is an
Indian politician from Bihar.
He acted as the Union Railway
Minister from 2004-2009 under
UPA Govt. He is the one who
converted Indian Railways
from a loss-making operation to
a public sector unit that stunned
everyone by earning a profit of
Rs 15,000 crores (Rs 150
billion) in 2005-06. IR was
considered to be heading
towards bankruptcy, as per the
report of Expert Group on
Indian Railways. The fund
balance at the end of 1999-00
had reached a low of Rs 149
crores, improving to Rs 5228crores by 2003-04 and over Rs
• My mother always toldme not to handle abuffalo by its tail, butalways catch it by itshorns. And I have usedthat lesson in everythingin my life, including theRailways." –Lalu PrasadYadav
• When some Boardmembers expressedapprehensions inincreasing wagon loads,a decision which alonegenerated Rs 7,200crore (Rs 72 billion),Prasad said: "Wagon isthe bread-earning horseof the Railways. Load itadequately. Make it runand don't stable it."
Principle no 2: Sweat the
assets
• "If you do not milk thecow fully, it falls sick,"is which he practicedwhile running theRailways.
He achieved his targetsnot by increasing faresor downsizing, but byincreasing traffic.
Principle no 3 employeewelfare
• Given the financialperformance of the IR,the unions wanted adoubling of thecontribution to the staff welfare fund. Mr LalooPrasad offered them
nine times from Rs 26/-per employee to 222 per employee.
• Whenever concernswere raised aboutdownsizing , hemaintained:“Downsizing may makeIR thinner, but notnecessarily healthier “
Principle no 4 delegation andinterference
• Mr Laloo Prasad is anon-interfering, yetaware, He sets the goalsand expects results
• The current BoardMembers function as acohesive entity, due tothe force of expectationon legitimate initiatives
Principle no 5 customer
service
Some of the bestcustomer service camefrom the Railways
• Auto up gradation-reducing the corruptionand the malpractices of the TT.
• Launching of air-
conditioned –garib rath• The improvement of the
railway stations• Simplification of the
Railway reservationform
Principle no 6 image building
• Given his penchant for wit and one liner, Mr.Lalu Prasad was soughtafter by the media.Whenever there was anopportunity to highlightan initiative or anachievement,advertisements werereleased.
• In recognition of hisinitiatives, Mr LaluPrasad has also beenranked as the secondbest minister in thecurrent cabinet [IndiaToday, May 29, 2006].
Odd industry market
trends
There is no shortage of offbeat
jobs people do today. Here we
look at eight odd occupations.
Pet Food Tester
How do pet food companies
know what their products taste
like and if dogs and cats will
like them? They hire food
technologists who specialize in
pet foods. Generally, food
technologists taste foods to
develop consistent flavors,
create new product concepts
and check for food quality. The
same goes for pet foods.
Carnival Barker (aka Carny)
If you like travel and don't mind
hard work and long hours, a
carnival barker — or carny —
may be the job for you. There
are approximately 350 carnivals
that tour the U.S. every year,
and an estimated 350 million
people visit them. All of them
need ride operators,
entertainers, games facilitatorsand more. According to Simply
Two students arechatting during their lunchbreak and the conversationamong them goes like this…
Madu: Hey did you go seen thefinance budget passed byPranabji?
Mathu: Ya, I read it in thenewspaper. As usual one morebudget is presented today andone more year is lost. I foundnoting impressive in the budget.
Madu: Why are talking so?This budget is more beneficial
to the tax payers. In case of personal tax, the minimumexemption rate is increased to1.8 lakhs; citizens above 80years are exemption from IT for upto 5 Lakhs; and senior citizens entitlement is reducedto 60 years.
Mathu: First ask the Govt. tofind ways to reduce tax evasion.
Do you know about Hasan Ali?
And, I am not evensatisfied with the exemption onpersonal tax limit. Nowadays,an average citizen spent nearly20 to 30% of his income of food alone. I don’t think the taxexemption is sufficient tobridge the hiking cost.
Another important thingis that no effort has been takento control food inflation.
Madu: Hey not like that ma.
The food inflation is reducedfrom 20% to 9.2 %.
Mathu: No, I won’t agree. Thereal solution to this problemlies within the empowerment of farmers. I think no integratedstrategy is announced for agricultural sector.
Madu: I think you did read thebudget completely. The interestrate on agricultural loan isreduced from 7% to 4%. To meit is more beneficial than loanwaiver.
Mathu: Hmm, What about thecut on subsidies to fuel,fertilizers and food. Pranabjialso increased the rate of service tax on air travel and stillno effort has been taken controlthe fuel price.
Madu: Why you are talkingonly the negatives. He doubledthe limit on FII inflows oncorporate bonds. The surchargeon corporate tax is reduced andthe anganbadi workers arebenefited with a wage increase.
Pranabji has increased
the allocation for thedepartment of justice fromrs.280 crore to rs.1000 croreand the further added morecourts will be openedthroughout the country. He alsoallocated more fund toempower women and promotetheir self help groups.
routine exercise and he doesn’tdid justice to the common man.
Madu: Hey you should bringthis in mind, at times the
biggest reforms are not the oncethat makes headlines but theones concerned with the detailsof government which affectsthe everyday life of commonman. I think the present budgetis prepared on this ethicalground with the vision of stabilizing india’s GDP growthat 9%.
Mathu: Ethics ha? What aboutthe black money issue? You aretalking about the FIIs but whatabout our country’s investmentof more than 1,75,000 crores asblack money in other countrybanks. What the Govt. did tocease these money. You knowour entire nations growthdepend on this!
Madu: Hmmm… but….. HeyUGS sir came to class… willspeak later.
Good Afternoon sir….
Employee PrivacyVs employerSecurity
Workers of the world areexposed to many types of privacy-invasive monitoringwhile earning a living. Theseinclude drug testing, closed-circuit video monitoring,Internet monitoring and
phone monitoring, locationmonitoring, personality andpsychological testing, andkeystroke logging. Employersdo have an interest in
monitoring in order to addresssecurity risks, sexualharassment, and to ensure theacceptable performance of employees. However, theseactivities may diminishemployee morale and dignity,and increase worker stress.
The breakeven point at whichthe monitoring program
achieves business objectiveswhile also protecting employee privacy is dependent on variousfactors. The most importantfour such factors are givenbelow:
a. Target
What needs to be considered is
who is being targeted. Is it justone person or a group of peopleor all? Discriminating andmonitoring a single personwould not be acceptable to thelaw. Assuming that there is nodiscrimination or a group of people are getting monitored,some level of surveillance ispreferred and acceptable. For example, if a stock broking firm
needs to ensure that itsemployees are not transferringconfidential information aboutstock price tips to outsiders, itwould make no sense for themto monitor the support, adminor human resource personnel.
b. Purpose of the surveillance
Law expects employers to have
a reason or a purpose for monitoring e-mails and internet
usage. Reasons range fromproductivity to companyliability to confidentiality. If thepurpose seems fair and areasonable level of surveillance
is used, law would allow it.
c. The Surveillance
technology
The kind of surveillancetechnology used also is a factor that is taken into considerationin the reasonableness analysis.The decision to adapt the besttechnology would be the less
intrusive to gain its purpose aswell as respect privacyinterests.
d. Adequacy of notice
Before monitoring e-mailaccounts, an employer needs toinform the employee about thepurpose and method of
surveillance. The AustralianOffice of Privacy has providedsix guidelines that should beincorporated into companypolicies.
1. The policy should bedisseminated to all employeesto ensure that they understandand do not expect completeprivacy in their e-mails and
internet usage.
2. The policy should be explicitas to what activities arepermitted and what areforbidden.
3. The policy should clearly setout what information is loggedand who in the organization hasrights to access the logs and
content.
4. The policy should refer to theorganization’s computer security policy as improper usage could create anunnecessary legal liability for
the company.
5. The policy should outlinehow the organization intends tomonitor or audit staff compliance.
6. The policy should bereviewed on a regular basis inorder to keep up with theaccelerating development of the
