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Is FMCG really as fast-paced and exciting as people say it is? How does working with sales help you learn marketing? What is it like to work as a product head in one of the leading FMCG companies in India? These are only some of the questions which will be answered in this podcast: FMCG Unplugged podcast in association with Marico.
In the first episode, we are in conversation with Kunal Bhardwaj, a product head with Marico. Kunal is an IIM Kozikhode grad, and he has worked extensively in sales before taking up an important position in the marketing function.
Do let us know what you think about it in the comments and we will make more of these!
Here is the transcript of the video:
Ankit: Hi Guys, welcome to the first episode of FMCG unplugged, in association with Marico. We are with Kunal Bhardwaj today, who is from IIM Kozikhode, which has a beautiful campus. There are many interesting things that Kunal has done, that we will talk about. So, let's dive straight into the questions.
So, Kunal, you have done sales for 10 years before moving to marketing. How important is sales for an FMCG career?
Kunal: Putting, I think, 10 years is making me feel old. But, yes. If you ask me, I think it is important and there are certain reasons why I say so.
So, it is important for a large number of reasons. And I think, one of the most important ones is that it actually gives you a very on the ground and a hands-on experience where you are able to learn the ropes by directly interacting with trade. And trade actually becomes a very big conduit through which your product moves from manufacturing to the end consumers. So, that becomes the first bit, why I think it is important.
The second would be that the experience itself is very humbling. In marketing, you tend to see the world through the lens of your brand only and that is what I am experiencing right now. But when I was in sales, you see it, not just as the microcosm of your brand because you are selling all the brands that your organisation manufactures but also in conjunction with other brands that are your competitors or are able to supply to the consumer in a much better fashion.
So, these are a couple of reasons, I think, with respect to the Indian market, in particular, the best part about doing sales before moving into marketing is that the dichotomy that gives you of looking at urban and rural together.
And trust me, if somebody is being able to experience the rural markets in depth like the kind of experience that sales provides you, it's a mind-changing experience that you can go through. So, for me, I think these are the top 3 reasons why I feel that sales is important as an experience before moving to marketing.
Ankit: So, Kunal, you have done some really exciting work apart from your decade-long career sales experience. Tell us about the Fit Foodie Chatbot. It is a very very unique initiative when experimenting... So, how did that come along?
Kunal: Just taking a step backwards. So, Saffola Masala Oats, I think, is one of the most successful innovations from Marico especially in the food space. Because we have never been in the food space. And that was a first.
What that enabled us, is because of us being the first in this category and being able to create this category it also gives a lot of responsibility where we need to bring excitement and increase the category.
And somewhere this whole advent of technology and E-Comm kind of made us think that - No, I think we need to not just look at it from an offline space, but need to do much more in terms of the online space. And that's where the genesis of Fit Foodie as a website came in, where we said that okay - healthy eating is good, it's a good trend. Can we make it healthier without asking you to give up on everything that you like? And it was basically about creating healthier recipes of the normal food that every person eats.
So, we used the help of bloggers and chef that we have on board. They will create healthier versions of regular food and then we run it past the nutritionists and then we give it a score. So, now what chatbot does is, it makes it even simpler. With Chatbot, you are able to directly interact with the Fit Foodie chatbot and can pose personalized questions regarding recipes around health and any particular ingredients that you want.
So, it's more of one on one, rather than you going through filters on the website and going around it. And the response was phenomenal because of the very fact that I don't want to look at recipes that are popular or in that order.
It is more about that - Okay, today I feel that I want to have something sweet but healthy, just put that question to the chatbot and we will give you 10 recipes that you want to go ahead with. Or you want to say there is a seed quinoa and I have heard something new about it, so are there any good recipes around it? And the bot will answer you back.
So, in that way, it is much more interactive and much more personalized and I think that's the space that technology would provide you. And we have been able to leverage that and we are getting good response from the consumers.
It's just that it's only been a few months since that's online but now we are looking at more innovation around it. That is in the pipeline for people to see later.
Ankit: What I found most interesting was that you can also send that as a Whatsapp message to yourself which, I think, is a very thoughtful kind of feature.
Kunal: Absolutely. WhatsApp is as universally penetrated as any technology can be. So it was basically leveraging both of them. But yes, that enables it to become much more easy to use by the consumer.
Ankit: So, you know the FMCG marketing career going forward maybe in the next 3 or 5 years, what kind of skills do you think future brand managers or marketeers need to possess? Something that students who are on campus today can start preparing for?
Kunal: See, if you ask me basic ground rules of marketing would remain the same. So, I don't think there is any change in that. But yes, the biggest change that is happening right now is in terms of technology. And I think that is where certain new skill sets would be needed.
And that is something that probably I discuss with my friends also is that probably other than the 4 Ps that you are taught on campus, there is an another P that is going to come in. That's more about personalization and not automation.
That was something I was discussing when we were discussing the chatbot that now consumers don't, even when they are eventually fulfilled through that, they don't want to assume that I am having the same mass product, that everybody else is also having. So they want that level of personalization and personalized content directed towards them which makes them feel special. And I think that is the skill set that will get added on otherwise the basic ground rules will definitely remain the same.
Ankit: Is there any marketing campaign or a trend or a new technology that is being currently used elsewhere in the world, that has excited you or something that you kind of noticed?
Kunal: So, outside of Marico and to be very politically correct as well I'll say that there are 3 campaigns that I have liked in the recent year or so. I think the first campaign that I liked, was the Fearless girl campaign. But that was what the fearless girl that was put on the Wall Street. I think it did a lot more, not just to the organisation that actually put it there on ground but to be able to resonate with the feelings or the emotions that in general people in America have.
The second campaign that I really liked is more in the Indian context. It was the Savlon Healthy Hands Healthy Chalk campaign and that actually won like 7 awards at the Cannes festival. I think what was very unique was that it was able to pick a very fine everyday nuance of children going to school, specially in the rural parts of India. And being able to put not just an effective use of what the product stands for in terms of hygiene but to be able to weave it around the life of the consumer, which were the children, to make it much more healthier and effective.
I think the last campaign and that really interests me because it is in the food space and was able to effectively use technology, very very, in not just in terms of being innovative, but in terms of being able to give you a fillip in the business as well, was the Campbell Soup Vogon campaign, which they did with the help of Google.
It was brilliant. What they were able to do was make a personalized campaign for a huge number of keywords that consumers could put in. For example, if I am a consumer and I put in that I am feeling very happy, there will be a personalized, creative content that will get posted on the page.
You are feeling sad, you are feeling hungry, you broke up with your girlfriend, you just got married and you will keep getting personalised content. The way it was able to resonate with the consumer and do wonders for the brand, this was done in Australia, is phenomenal.
The numbers are there to back you up. So, it was not just a fancy creative idea but it was backed with a big fillip in business that the organisation also got, because I believe they were declining sales before that campaign went on air.
Ankit: How important do you think has analytics become for marketeers, given that so much data is now available as compared to earlier, you know, while analysing? Like, for example, if you were to put out an ad in the newspaper earlier, you would only know that, that is a circulation of the newspaper. But right now, you can follow engagements.
Kunal: Absolutely, you are very right because what marketing is construed as many years back, was just being creative and to be able to convert to a very creative thought to catch the attention of the consumer. I think now with the advent of technology and being able to capture data in real terms it has become a science in itself.
And that same campaign that I was talking to you about, on the Campbell thing, I think that itself is one of those campaigns that have been able to effectively use data and analytics, to be able to help them in creating a good marketing campaign. And the stuff that is being done by Facebook and Google, goes miles on that.
Ankit: So, just giving a little light-hearted flavour now to the discussion. So, Kunal, any memorable experience at IIM Kozikhode, that you may want to recount?
Kunal: I think it is not just at Kozikhode but at every IIM campus would be the dreadful placement days because that's the time when you have to look your best, but you know you are not. You are too tired and your eyes are going red because of the kind of stress it puts you on. But that would be probably the worst and the most memorable time of my time at IIM K.
Ankit: Since today is teacher's day, any memorable professor or course that you would have done at IIM K?
Kunal: So, I loved the course on Sales and Distribution Management, that was taught to us in the first year.
And I think that was one of the courses that also helped me decide this future career path of mine and I thank the professor who taught me. Still in touch with him.
Ankit: Oh, that's amazing. Tell us about your funniest moment at Marico over the last few years.
Kunal: My funniest moment at Marico was, I think, during my first stint in Bihar, when we were trying to make a new GTM of reaching out to as small villages as possible in terms of population. And it required a new GTM change, because of which we obviously needed certain investments to be made by the organisation and I remember one of the heads of sales development coming in from Bombay just to see, what we were trying to do.
And to make it look more realistic, we actually made it across the river by standing on a small raft. He freaked out, we freaked out. And he knew, we were just trying to just add that initial drama to it, that to why it is important in Bihar. But overall, I think he bought the idea. He loved the fact that we actually made all the effort of making him sit on the raft. Yeah, we got the project through. It was funny, yeah. But it was good experience.
Ankit: Any message for students who have just joined MBA campuses, they probably would have spent only 2 months so far and are still figuring out what career to choose, how to sit for summer placements and how life is going to be in the future? So, any message for them?
Kunal: On a serious note, I would want to say that, when we join b-schools, I think less than 1% of us are absolutely clear, what you want to do in life. And more or less, all of us come in with this thing that, I am doing my MBA just to get a professional jump in my career, and that's why I want to do it.
I think my personal advice to those people in particular and to the general student body would be to be absolutely clear why they are coming to a b-school in the first place and to be able to ask the right questions around it because essentially one realises only once one has passed out of the business school, that why those 2 years are very important.
Because only until and unless you ask very fundamental questions to yourself what you want to do and what you want to take out of those 2 years is when you will get the most out of it. For me particularly and it is not because I am working in Marico, but I think I was very clear after the first semester, that I would make a career in Sales and Marketing.
And what that led to the fact was that during my summer internship and the time after that, I was able to even interact with a lot of companies, who were in that space and to be able to choose the future employer of choice. For me, that was Marico. And because of the thought and time spent on it, I am still working in Marico for more than a decade. And that's the best part of it.
Ankit: Thank you so much, Kunal. I think we had a great time talking to you. I am sure this is going to be of great use to all students who are currently preparing for placements. Even those who are just generally deciding what career to choose going forward. So, thank you so much for doing this with us.
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