The most entertaining aspect of life is when one sees no boundaries when it comes to imagination, landscape to paint, place to live and freedom of thought. In such a grand world it is upon every human being to let his/her mind wander to limitless boundaries to paint the real imagination of what can be achieved when a human mind is put into real action with no boundaries.

The spirit to reflect this is simple if you ask me, the title of this post reflects every human being’s thought process of how one would perceive what levels could an imagination take you to if the world is mine, very simple but a very broad creative thought.

Imagine you being a musician and you compose a song, irrespective of what kind of musician you are; whether jazz, rock, pop, country or whatever the kind of music you would create there would be a pep in the output simply because your imagination of freedom takes over your thought of what you could and will do when the world is yours.

I love the theme, lets put it this way. What if this was a brand brief? I dont know if it was but when I finish this post you will realise that both you and I have similar thoughts on what the brief would have been but lets assume that the brief was around the world being mine, what would would we deliver?

An awesome 360degree approach to the whole thought and deliver maybe the most winning proposition that would stun the world jury, the audience and create brand impact.

Add to it some celebrities to this like say - Beckham, Tiger Woods, Rahul Dravid to name a few and you know that these personalities work around their strength and what a strength it is to believe that the world is mine and deliver through their entire career, week after week, month after month and year after year. They are all winners snd thats the brand’s biggest attribute - TO WIN!!! Yes you are right, Gillette is the brand I am talking about.

Not because my partner owns this studio that Iam posting this blog but man what an output for the brand on the internet, check it out, to me it is one of the most brilliant work that has ever been delivered in recent times. A web 2.0 product that rules the roost.

http://www.gillettebeawinner.com/

Paste the url in your browser and experience the world is mine.

This is pure web initiative and not much of media involved but this is where my brains have started ticking real hard and everyone in the internet adsales who is reading this - guys, lets all together grow this industry with some winning ideas around this. Agency is Mediacom and we are figuring out what we should do, so I request one and all to use their skills in growing the business not by ridiculing one and another but by delivering some quality solutions in media to the client and the agency.

Lets do it guys!!! We are all here to WIN

And Team Webchutney Bombay - Rock On, brilliant work!

Following up with my last blog, here are some ideas I feel may be worth trying for establishing your own unique sense of balance in your personal and professional life:

Find the Right Workplace
Many companies have started recognizing that family-friendly policies help them attract and retain talented employees (not sure if it’s the same now
during recession.. :-). But I believe, Infosys is one such company and then Networkplay. In the past couple of months I’ve come across employers offering paid parental leave, flexible scheduling, job sharing or work-from-home arrangements – Mostly seen among IT & media companies. Since these options vary widely from firm to firm, you may conduct as much research as possible before thinking of a job shift.

If you like your current job but need more flexibility, you could consider negotiating a mutually beneficial arrangement with your employer (I did it for more than a year with my previous employer and my wife has done that now!).
Be sure what you propose is realistic given your job demands. Would you have sufficient time to meet with your clients if you move to a shortened workweek? Is work-from-home really a practical option for the type of work you do?

Meet with your boss to discuss your situation. Explain that you have some pressing personal needs that also require attention, but you want to find a reasonable balance. Be careful not to seem demanding. Before proposing your own plan right away, wait to see what your employer suggests. The company may have already dealt with situations similar to yours and have strategies in place that can be adapted to fit your particular case.

If you seek more flexibility than your current employer can offer, you may want to look for a new position elsewhere. Of course, you’ll need to consider the job market and the availability of other positions before beginning a search. Look for companies known for their family-friendly policies.

Plan Defensively
Some of the responsibility for achieving work/life balance rests on your own shoulders. Be sure to plan for those unexpected & unpredictable scenarios as well as for scheduled events. Working on a contingency plan for emergencies will enable you to continue with business as usual in the midst of a crisis. Make sure you have duplicate business files and phone numbers at home in case family responsibilities
make it impossible for you to come into the office for a day or more – This does not apply for those working only on laptops & blackberry’s like we do at Networkplay.

It’s possible to achieve your professional goals without sacrificing your personal life. Likewise, you can realize personal dreams without giving up a fulfilling career. It all depends on your ability to define work/life balance in your own way, negotiate with a current or future employer to address shifting priorities, and accept responsibility for making adjustments as circumstances change.

After a long time, I met a person who took me back to my Media2India days when Internet was still a mysterious animal and most people could not tell a modem from a website (I still know a few people like that, but that is another story).

And this was a young brand manager I was talking to, probably younger than me and not some elderly person resisting change.

For the first time, the slides at the beginning of the Sales Deck, which talk about the growth of the Internet Industry were ones, where maximum time could be spent.

For the first time in a long time, I met a guy who equated doing Rich Media ads with creating content.

He also assumed that networkplay is an agency which is pitching to replace his existing Media Agency.

He was shocked when I mentioned the need to buy impressions in multiples of a million.

He seemed lost when names of sites beyond rediff.com and yahoo.com were mentioned.

He didn’t want to do branding. Instead he was interested in doing some innovations.

He seemed maha impressed with a fairly simple rich media idea that I suggested.

There was a flash moment when educating him on the Internet and its functioning seemed to me like teaching my four and a half year old how subtraction works. I was trying it yesterday and found it extremely difficult.

I get the feeling as I read through the blog that the intent here is to ridicule this gentleman’s lack of knowledge of the internet, but cross my heart and I hope to die if I lie, it isn’t. I am on the contrary trying to highlight the refreshing change I experienced from my regular meetings with know-it-alls of the medium.

Of course, impressing him with the ideas will be simple but getting money out of him for trying out the Internet will be extremely difficult.

Voyons!

Its just amazing to think back to the bad old days of slavery to Jesse Owens to Mohammed Ali to Ruben Hurricane Carter to Martin Luther King to Nelson Mandela to Magic Johnson to Chris Gardner to Colin Powell to Barrack Obama, what a transformation it has been in the way world has changed itself, some of the greatest names of the era whether Black African or Black African American have all lived to change lives for others and themselves only through the strong belief of what one can do if one decides to do and much of this lies in the fact of hope against reality but hope has always been the winner if it was backed with conviction.

So what a momentous day it has been with the United States yesterday, I don’t care what policies will be made, I don’t care what decisions will be taken, whether the economy will boom back or go down (dumb pundits drive the markets and yesterday we saw a dip of close to 4% in all markets in the US) or whether the world will be a better place to live in for the generations to come.

But what I care is there is a will to change all of this, there is a will to fight terrorism, there is a will to change the beliefs of fundamentalists, there is a will to overcome every hurdle that comes your way and this will is backed with conviction simply because there is hope and to carry the thought of one man with all his might fighting his way in the last 2yrs before the run up to election and then to win it through massive support of the people of The US in itself shows that the power of hope can drive millions together to see a better tomorrow.

So hope is more than a slogan or a prayer if you ask me simply because it just brings the best in you even in adverse situations. Look at what hope can do…

“If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer”

These words simply shows what hope can do and Barrack Obama has just proved that in reality.

Welcome to the White House, Mr. President or should I say Welcome to the White House - President Of The World - Barrack Obama.

Everyone in this world who believes in HOPE with WILL & CONVICTION will agree that the world has changed for the good!

I love you Barrack Obama and so do many millions across the world who are living in hope, you have shown us the way and I am sure this is inspirational for everyone who wants to contribute for a better tomorrow!

Balancing Professional & Personal Life (Part 1)

It’s a known fact that the responsibility of balancing work and personal life solely rests on one self.

Striking a balance between job and family demands is a common issue for working parents. Dads and moms alike are juggling deadlines and play-dates, presentations and cricket practice, business travel and family trips, birthdays and business networking.

Infact, I recently case across a report on survey conducted by Officeteam (Staffing Agency), most of the professionals said work/life balance is their top career concern, rated above job security and competitive pay.

But then there is no “one-size-fits-all” method to achieve the best of both sides. Everyone defines “balance” in his or her own way, and the definition changes as priorities in life shift.

I am trying to find ways to balance this in my life.

I think the coming long weekend will keep me busy finding out solutions for the above….

Pls check this space on Sunday for more on this… 

Entrepreneurship which lot of people aim at and swear by, but hardly experience in their professional life time, is the purpose of my existence.

Entrepreneurship technically and simply means - Someone who organizes a business venture and assumes the risk for it

For me Entrepreneurship is:

1) Life: It’s like you give birth to a new life and nurture it throughout our life time and make it stable enough to stand on its own feet. The achievement of the same is experience equal to achieving heaven itself. (eg. Tata Group)

2) Responsibility: You need to become a lot more responsible towards every attempt you make as you know there are lot of lives attached directly or indirectly in that attempt. You can’t be self centric and individualistic in decision making (eg. Satyam fiasco). Business itself is looking up to you as a child looks up to his parent.

3) Stability: You need to have a lot of mental stability as you go through a lot of hustle and bustle in business development. Your mental stability means enterprise stability. Company as a new born will learn from its parent. The way you act the business will act likewise.

4) Innovation: The only playground which gives you free hand to break existing rules and develop new is Entrepreneurship playground. You are free to envisage, aspire, and work upon ideas which can work wonders for human existence and its future.

Welcome to the world of Entrepreneurs

So we have set up our own outfit and sport the ‘co-founder’ status on our cards. So we have prepared a kickass sales deck that we take out to the market and let people know what we are all about. So we are also a kickass team who is passionate about the whole venture and are willing to slog our butts out to make this a success.

But we can’t ignore the fact that we are working against the tide in this CPC, CPL and CPA dominated market by offering CPM and CPM only. So when we hire Sales People, what do we need from our Sales Team to ensure that we get where we want to get and go beyond?

Following are ten characteristics that every Sales Person who is either working for us or wants to work for us or whom we want to hire, has to have. Most of these are ‘dismissible’ as being ‘common sense’ but as the cliche goes, ‘Common Sense is very uncommon’. So they merit mention. The traits I am talking about are:

Positive Attitude: Working against the tide is never easy. If there is one person who says good things about the company, there will be at least ten who will bitch. And this is true of even those companies who offer CPCs :). Phir hamare baare mein to pata nahin kya kya bolte honge. Plus the fact that saala CPM deals are anyway so difficult to come by. There will be failures and there will be rejections. So positive attitude and relentless efforts are critical.

Enthusiasm: Enthusiasm is infectious. And so is the lack of it. Lack lustre pitches will face more rejections than enthused ones will. If you are enthusiastic about your offerings, some of it will positively rub off and influence the buyer in your favour. The energy needs to show.

Big Thinking: If the spend on the campaign is 50 lakhs, why should we get only 2 lakhs or thereabouts? Only when we aim for the stars will we reach the top of a tree. 5 lakhs propose kiya to 2 lakhs milenge, 20 lakhs kiya to ho sakta hai 8-10 lakhs mil jaayein. Hai na?

Planning and Preparedness: One more saying - If I had an hour to chop down a tree, I would spend fifty minutes sharpening my axe. Plan and be prepared. Understand the objective of the meeting, anticipate objections and be prepared for the same and suggest workable solutions, know your product and how it delivers tangible advantages to the campaign objectives. It will definitely dispose the buyer in your favour.

Punctuality: Being on time is critical. What if you had to catch a flight or a train? Wouldn’t you be on (or in fact before) time?

Belief in the product: A tele sales person recently called me up and said, “Sir I am calling from Country Club”. And then there was a pause. I said, “Yes?” I think she expected me to say, “Not Interested” and I heard incredulity in her voice when she asked me, “You want to know about the membership????” I couldn’t resist smiling and said, “No, thank you” and that was that but obviously with that approach, that caller will never make a good sales person. A great sales person believes in his product, is able to use his skills and expertise, bring people around to his point of view and make the sale.

Shamelessness: Hindi cliche this time - naachne nikle to ghoonghat kaisa. I think there is an English equivalent as well but I don’t remember it. If you are in the market to sell, don’t hesitate to do the following:
1. Ask for the sale. Don’t beat around the bush.
2. If you have the sale, ask for a bigger chunk.
3. If you don’t have the sale, ask why not and offer practical alternatives.
4. Ask for information on where else the money is being distributed and why.
5. When the sale is done and the campaign is over and bills are raised and the credit period is over…you got it…ask for the money because that is what you are in this for in the first place.

Integrity: Just because it is listed as the eighth quality does not make it any less important than the others. Integrity (or lack of it) shows and while false promises get initial deals, repeat orders become difficult, if not impossible.

Diligence: Fix appointments, meet clients, collect briefs, send proposals, follow up for the sale, address concerns, close the sale, follow up for the RO, follow up for the creatives, get the campaign live, troubleshoot if required, follow up for invoicing, and get the payments out. Don’t do one of these and you miss the diligence bus. Sab karna padhta hai.

Persuasiveness: There was a sales person who was so disillusioned with life that he climbed atop a huge high rise and threatened suicide. A cop was sent to placate him. After a while, when passers by saw agreement, they cheered. But the next moment, both the cop and the sales person jumped off the building. That’s persuasiveness.

There are many more but these are vital. And it is not like a question paper with options where you need to answer only 6 out of 10. Chahiye to saare 10 chahiye, bola to bola.

I am just trying to analyse how we could find more takers for Web 2.0 products in the Indian Marketplace keeping in mind that there is enough and more traction happening.

We have that category with us and though there are a couple of partners, we are very happy to sign with, we still dont have a clear picture on how it could form part of an offering in a Network environment.

Lets take examples –> Bigadda, Ibibo, Yaari, Peerpower, Desi Martini and a couple of others have enough and more traction and the audience is pretty serious irrespective of however we want to ridicule any of the above brands. Seriousness in its own right, for Eg: Ibibo has serious youth audience, Peer Power is grappling with playing in the business community category but the point is how does one sell this entire offering?

1) Have seperate sales team and create a network focussed only on this than offer the whole platter if it was a company like us who were to manage their advertising revenues.
2) Be a creative hotshop when it comes to brand offerings with clients.
3) Talk a lot about creating zones and ambience of liking within the audience that relates to the brand.
4) Be more in the representation mode than the network mode.

What else?

Look forward to ideas…..

Thanks
Ram

PS: I am not naming any international sites because I am figuring out Indian product’s monetisation who are still young than compared to their International counterparts in similar categories. So not naming Myspace, Linkedin, Facebook, Orkut and the likes since I have a fair idea on how to monetise those. And the same logics cant be applied for Indian Products since the products are very different but still have decent traffic for monetisation

It was a regular weekend with all the thoughts of life trying to find place in mind on how to take things forward and sudden quiver diverted the attention. Brain navigated my hands to blackberry and to my notice was a great read of my life from Washington Post- a real life story.

A Violinist in the Metro
 
A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousand of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.
 
Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.
 
A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk.
 
A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work. 
 
The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.
 
In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100.
 
This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?
 
One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:
 
If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

Courtesy : Washington Post

I am sure ADA does not have the time to read this suggestion but I am penning down my thoughts on the synergy and the value that could add up for ADAG Group.

1) Anil Ambani lost over 30 Billion USD in the last quarter due to market crashes worldwide.
2) He is currently valued at 12 - 13 Billion USD.
3) Its peanuts for him to put the money on the table and bail out Satyam at 2 Billion USD.

Why should he do it?

1) He has tremendous plans on offshoring and software development through on of his firms.
2) Synergies through his telecom businesses are high.
3) He already has interests in the web domain, which can get extended to other aspects of intellectual pool available at Satyam.
4) Saves the reputation of Corporate India.

What makes him the most suited?

1) He is known to being opportunisitic in the stock market.
2) He is a fantastic player at the scrips.
3) There is a high possibility that when the economy recovers and he sustains Satyam he would have access to the client pool and when the scrips comes back to normalcy then not only would he have recovered his current 30 Billion through his current portfolio but would have gained humongous proportions when the Satyam scrips better and by then he would be holding definately over 50% of the company unlike Raju and would be worth several more billions of dollars and possibly could be the richest Indian in the world.

Flip Side:

1) When there are gains there are pains too so….
2) He will inherit all the law suits around the world.
3) He will have to pump in atleast another Billion Dollars for operating costs including salaries for a year, which by itself at Satyam is over a Billion Dollars.

But he would be blessed by so many more families that he would be a over night hero not that he isnt one currently but he is the best bet for Satyam’s future.

Come on Anil Bhai go get Satyam, you are the saviour!!!!

Cheers
Ram