Blackberry Losing The Enterprise Smartphone Market Share To iPhone!

Turns out that Blackberry has lost its stronghold on the  only niche segment that it prided itself. Yes, iPhone has unseated Blackberry as the most preferred smartphone in the workplace.

According to the quarterly mobile workforce report published by  iPass,

iPhone is now the top smartphone in the enterprise with 45 market share among mobile workers, up from 31 percent in 2010. Blackberry’s market share actually dropped to 32 percent from 35 percent in 2010

The results were based on a survey of over 2,300 mobile employees at over 1,110 enterprise worldwide lending some credibility to the percentage based market share split.

Enterprise Mobility Being Powered By iOS and Android based devices

Enterprise mobile brands growth / fall (1010-11)

Come to think of it, it is not so much about Blackberry losing significant market share (~3% down) but more about increasing market share of iPhone and Android based smartphones even in the enterprise.

What the graph also suggests is the marketshare loss of Symbian OS (Well, we knew that already) and Windows Mobile also losing market share. Well, its not so bad for Microsoft (and Nokia) since the early reviews of Windows OS based Nokia smartphones seem to positive and even the respondents in the survey (3.6% of them) are looking to buy a Microsoft Windows mobile as their next phone.

But even as the incumbents have been losing marketshare, its the growth of Android based phones that is staggering especially given the skepticism in enterprises around anything open-source. Well, kudos to Android for creating a new market more than stealing the marketshare

There are multiple reasons for this shift in smartphone preference in the enterprise.

• For one, it is clear that Blackberry’s USP around highly secure e-mail is not enough for domination. Enterprise Mobility is now more than just using e-mail and is more about applications, mobile browsing etc. No surprises then that iOS and Android based smartphones are lapping up the marketshare then.
• There is also a clear shift in who provisions the smartphone at the workplace. 58% of the companies are now provisioning smartphones to their employees as against an estimated 66% last year. Companies are warming up to the idea of employees using their personal smartphones for work related activities or in other words open to the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) to work mantra.

What this means is that mobility in the enterprise is increasingly being led by the end users and not some large IT department which are often a few years behind the technology adoption curve. The only worrying aspect to this trend is the mobile security vulnerability which companies will have to work on.

The mobile workforce report also points out an increasing adoption of tablets emerging as part of enterprise mobility tools with iPad being the leader with Blackberry’s Playbook with around 4.8% marketshare.

Guess it never hurts to have a sizable installed base to sell your new shiny product even as the existing one is fighting a lost cause.

Overall enterprise mobility space is evolving at a rapid pace. There is a clear shift in the demand side preferences and the supply side is hard at work to WOW this ‘I decide my mobile work device’ workforce.

One thing is however clear, iOS and Android seem to be the way forward be it enterprise mobility or general consumer preference. The others can fight for the third spot!!

Yahoo Mail Home displays Full-page Fastrack Ad [Desperation?]

I visited Yahoo Mail probably after a few months as my amazon account is attached to it and mails come to that email ID. However, I was taken by surprised when the page loaded – I was a bit confused for couple of seconds wondering if I landed on “Yahoo typo” homepage. But that was not true….

Here is the Yahoo Mail Homepage which was presented to me!

Yahoo Mail had a full homepage advertisement of Indian brand - Fastrack . The ad diverted me to their Facebook page. I am assuming that this ad will be shown only to users from Indian sub-continent and even then Fastrack is guaranteed of hundreds of thousands if not millions of Facebook Fans.

Fastrack being a youth brand, seems to be on a big ad-spending spree just before the Valentines day and this Yahoo homepage mail campaign is a great way of capturing huge number of fans.

However, I am surprised that Yahoo is accepting full homepage ads on probably one of its most popular pages in India – Yahoo Mail.

For me it comes across as a serious sign of desperation – what do you think?

Smartphone Market grows 61% in 2011 [Market Share Stats]

IDC recently released stats on Worldwide Smartphone market and its growth has beaten analysts expectations as well. According to the the IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker, Smartphone manufacturers shipped 157.8 million units in 4Q11 compared to 102.0 million units in the fourth quarter of 2010. The YoY growth of 54.7% was higher than the 49.2% growth registered in 3Q11.

Top Five Worldwide Smartphone Vendors Market in 2011

Vendor	FY 2011 Shipment Volumes	FY 2011 Market Share	FY 2010 Shipment Volumes	FY 2010 Market Share	Year Over Year Change
Samsung	94.0	19.1%	22.9	7.5%	310.5%
Apple	93.2	19.0%	47.5	15.6%	96.2%
Nokia	77.3	15.7%	100.1	32.9%	-22.8%
Research In Motion	51.1	10.4%	48.8	16.0%	4.7%
HTC	43.5	8.9%	21.7	7.1%	100.5%
Others	132.3	26.9%	63.7	20.9%	107.7%
Total	491.4	100.0%	304.7	100.0%	61.3%

The total smartphone shipment volumes reached 491.4 million units in 2011, a whopping increase over 304.7 million units in 2010. However, in percentage basis, the growth was lower in 2011 (61.3%) as compared to 2010 (75.7%). IDC report also states that by December 2011, one out of every three mobiles phones shipped worldwide was a smartphone.

Top Five Worldwide Smartphone Vendors Market Share Changes

Apple:

Apple regained its market leader position by launching iPhone 4S worldwide. It also reached a new shipment volume record for itself and for the entire industry for a single quarter. The holiday season, delay in the product launch from 3Q to 4Q and the addition of multiple mobile operators has helped Apple achieve this record. The much hyped 4S has left few Apple fanboy’s disappointed as it lacked 4G LTE connectivity or a different size screen.

Samsung:

Samsung too had its share of milestones. It broke the 30 million units mark for the first time and also posted the largest year-over-year increase of the top lot (yeah true!! Who bothered about Samsung phones couple of years back ;)). Samsung also has concentrated on expanding in all kinds of market with Galaxy S2, Galaxy Nexus in the high end sector, Galaxy Ace and galaxy Y in the mass market. The biggest achievement for Samsung though was that it managed to marginally beat Apple in terms of number of units shipped!

Nokia

This is something which Nokia wouldn’t be proud of – Nokia posted the largest year-over-year decrease amongst the top manufacturers. But, Nokia has been in news again for good reasons due to the release of first set of windows smartphones – Lumia 710 and the Lumia 800. Nokia claims that it shipped over a million units’ in its debut quarter. However, the Symbian phones are losing their charm and Nokia could stop shipping these Symbian’s soon.

Blackberry

2011 has been a mixed bag of results for RIM (Blackberry). Firstly, the good things – The new BB OS 7-powered BlackBerry phones reached new markets. And then the not so good things – the global network outage in October (I almost died laughing at few of the jokes on BB!). Also the news that the first BB 10-powered smartphones will arrive only by the end of year 2012 has left the BB fans disappointed.

HTC

HTC has timed its releases quite well and it has been releasing the smartphones from time to time. It not only relied on Android smartphones but also released Windows Phone’s like Titan and Radar models. This strategy of HTC catered to both the mobile operators as well as the customers quite a well. However, when compared to the last quarter, HTC has shipped less number of phones.

5 things that great brands do!

What do you think makes great brands so powerful, long lasting and unique even when they’re not selling products and services that are radically different from one another? Have they really got their fundamentals strong or are they simply relying on smart advertising? Let’s check out what great brands really do and how they make that bang-on impression in customers’ psyche.

A great brand makes a long lasting emotional connect

Many experts say that customers purchase emotionally, which is largely true, especially in India, where advertising and branding is so emotionally driven. Do you remember the "Kuch Meetha Ho Jaaye" campaign by Cadbury, the Vodafone campaign with the pug or the Zoozoos and the Surf Excel campaign with "Dho Daala"? Why do these brands use an emotional pitch? Because they know that two washing powders or bars of chocolate can’t be much different from each other after a certain point. In the Indian context, substituting "meetha" with chocolate and "thanda" with Coca-Cola means going straight into the heart of the average local consumer.

A great brand is backed by great products and services

Great Indian brands like Raymonds, Asian Paints, ICIC Bank, Bajaj, Tata, Dabur, Naukri.com, Infosys etc. didn’t become great overnight. There are thousands of product and service providers who come into the market every single day but are unable to float their brand. That’s because great brands need time, patience and constant re-invention. The biggest mistake that most brands make is to be purely aspirational and cool, without maintaining substance, innovation and quality in their products and services.

A great brand elevates just about anything

If you thought that just because you manufacture bolts sold only to industries, you don’t need to have a great brand, then you are completely wrong. Whether you produce shoes, tea, pliers or travel services, you must give priority to branding opportunities and strategies, no matter how small your business is. Great branding can make just about any product or service so powerful that customers may recommend it without even realizing that they are actually doing so.

A great brand always has a story to tell

Every brand works on an association and a story. For instance, people associate innovation with Apple, Reliance with growth, Pantaloons with family shopping, Hindustan Unilever with quality, ICICI Bank with reliability and more recently speed with Flipkart.com etc. Over a few years, great brands build up stories around their existence to increase their connect with customers. This mythological build up can exponentially increase the recall value of a brand in the customer’s mind.

Great Brands are consistent

Apart from maintaining consistency in providing good products and service, great brands also try to keep the same color palette, design rules and visual appeal wherever they go. It’s orange for Barista coffee chains, red for Vodafone, the distinctly recognizable ‘Oooh la la la’ jingle for Kingfisher and the Amul butter girl as Amul’s mascot form decades. Whatever the visual representation may be, a great brand can be recognized without uttering a single word about it.

Flipkart’s Letsbuy Acquisition – Consolidation in Indian Ecommerce Begins!

Now, if this news is true, it may probably be a game-changer for fast growing Indian E-Commerce space. Last night, Medianama reported that Flipkart will soon be announcing acquisition of Letsbuy.com. Although, there is no official word or confirmation on this acquisition, the news has a good chance of being true.

Flipkart recently closed USD 150 million dollar funding, and are currently flush with funds to make such acquisitions. However, I am a little surprised that they have gone after similar multi-brand space acquisition in which they themselves are in.

Flipkart.com is clearly the leader currently in multi-brand online retail space, while Infibeam, Letsbuy, Homeshop18 and Indiaplaza all have very similar traffic from India as you can see from the Alexa traffic ranking given below.

Although, Amazon’s entry in India should not be much of worry to Flipkart in its current form, this acquisition points to one fact that they want to be far ahead in the game by the Amazon make a full fledged entry with their own multi-brand retail products.

Medianama also points that Letsbuy’s valuation is roughly in USD 20 to 25 million region and is expected to be part cash, part equity deal.

We will update when we get some more details of this deal!

Customer Acquisition through Social Media!

It was interesting to read in a recent ET report that auto giants like Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai and Tata Motors India are planning to make refreshed efforts in 2012 to tap their existing and potential customer base through Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms. As per the report ‘E-Marketing Outlook in India for 2012′ by Octane Marketing, the top two online marketing initiatives that will see an increase in marketing investments in 2012, as compared to 2011 are social media (at 68.8 percent) and e-mail marketing (at 53.1 percent).

DNA and TOI on the other hand, gave a detailed reported on how social media was increasingly used by Indian brands in 2011. All of this basically proves Social Media gaining prominence as a customer acquisition platform amongst Businesses in India.

We have listed down some pointers that should help Businesses acquire customers through Social Media.

A platform for good customer services

We’ve seen newspapers in India frequently reporting tweets or posts of angry customers on a company’s social media page. Once this kind of content about a company’s faulty product or inconsiderate service gets rolling in the online marketplace, there’s no looking back on the company’s reputation being harmed – Vodafone India is an example in this case.

A great way to acquire customers though social media would be to use this feedback to your advantage and gain your customer’s trust. Welcome feedback and act upon it so that customers know that you’re there on social media not just for lip service, but for actually being able to get things done quicker. Word of mouth for good service always spreads fast. Act on the praise and the brickbats with equal gusto.

Catering marketing strategies to reach out to the B-towns

We commonly tend to think that only people in the Mumbai locals and Delhi metros would be carrying smartphones. Hence, many brands make the mistake of forming their internet penetration strategies that apply only to that demographic. But remember, with the smartphone coming of age in India, about 75 percent of users of mobile networks belong to B and C class towns, as reported by the Business Standard. You can acquire customers through social media by catering your social media marketing strategies keeping in mind B town demographics, requirements and sensibilities.

Connect with offline events

Social media marketers in India need to remember that they still have to keep offline marketing as a part of their campaign. Relying on social media alone would cost them their non-Internet using customer base dearly. Partnering with offline events that match the brand image is crucial for acquiring a large following on a company’s social media page. Take for example Koovs, an Indian deals site which acquired a huge following when it partnered with the Great Indian Oktoberfest in 2011.

Share interesting content that may not be directly related to your brand

This is primarily to show your fans and following on social media that you’re not here to use them as scapegoats to promote your business 24×7. A chat, irrelevant conversation (to your business or product) of current happenings, polls, contests and interactive opinion taking quizzes etc. would be a great way to maintain relationship with your customers.

Make members amongst your following interact with each other so that as a brand or an individual seller, you can keep a track on what’s hot and what’s not. Check out HDFC Bank, Kingfisher and Tata Docomo’s Facebook pages to see how they have interspersed their wall posts with promotional and non-promotional conversations.

Associate promotions with days and dates

You wouldn’t expect the Indian shopping and deals portal Deals and You to run an Agony Aunt corner for the upcoming Valentine’s Day on their Facebook page right? Well, that’s exactly how they are planning to attract young customers to their Valentine’s Day special deals. If the Future Group is famous for strategizing its big sales in Big Bazaar chains according to the local festivals of each state they operate in, you can do the same on social media too.

Madhusudan Thakur, Regional Vice-President, South Asia for Regus aptly summarizes the advantages of acquiring customers though social media:

"As businesses emerge from the downturn they are increasingly reconsidering pre-recession working practices and opting for more flexible, competitive strategies. From supply chain management, to leaner working practices, to cloud computing, to increased use of video communications and mobile working no area of business is being overlooked. Particularly in India where Nielsen reports that 3 out of 4 social media users visit a social networking site at least once a day, and a discussion forum once a week, more and more companies are leveraging this channel to increase the loyalty of existing customers, and as a successful acquisition tool." [Source]

Social Media is definitely a great platform for customer acquisition, however, it should not be looked upon as another tool for just self-promotion & marketing!

Views welcome!

5 qualities of top women in Indian corporates!

If you’ve read out earlier feature which covered the top 10 Indian businesswomen last year, then you’ll find this post to be more of an extension of the same. What are the qualities that what have gotten Indian women to the top spots of India Inc? Is it just about having a tough facade, compromising on family or having IIM/IIT degrees that allow them to skyrocket? No, there’s much more to that. Let’s find out.

 

Accepting that you will not be a star at work and at home

It’s only natural for women to not be able to give their 100 percent at their households and their workplace. If there’s an important board meeting the next day for which you have to prepare through the night, you simply can’t juggle entertaining your husband’s family for dinner simultaneously, for instance. As Business Today reports, Naina Lal Kidwai, HSBC’s India Head believes that this attitude is missing in urban women who still attempt to do-it- all. It’s okay to set up an alternative support system, ask for help and start by admitting that you can’t handle both equally if not less or more. That way, Indian women at work can start setting their priorities easily. These top Indian businesswomen affirm this quality:

"Shared responsibilities are the only way more women will pursue careers."
- Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairman and Managing Director, Biocon [Source]

“It’s better to spend quality time with your child, than spend the day after work cooking.”
- Renu Sud Karnad, Joint Managing Director and Member of the Board of HDFC Ltd[Source]

Not to accept or ask for any pity as a woman

Bunking work on the day of an important presentation in order to attend your child’s first annual day is probably not an option for women who want to climb that corporate rung. Although paid maternity leave / arrangements are arriving in India slowly, corporates don’t allow for extra time or a loose hand being given to employees just because they are female. Take for example, ICICI. Quoted in a Business Today report, K. Ramkumar, Head of HR at ICICI Bank says

"We do nothing. There is no chivalry, no kid gloves, there are no affirmative action committees. Your system has to be a pure meritocracy. No woman can play the woman card’.

Be on the top of your game

"My passion lies in the pursuit of excellence – can I do it very well, better than others?"
- Chanda Kochhar, Managing Director and CEO of ICICI Bank [Source]

This lady who can also ‘command an army’, as Business Today reports, is a perfect example of what focus and excellence are all about. As the CEO of ICICI Bank, each second of her day is scheduled for and planned, including the time taken by the elevator to reach her floor. K V Kamath recalls that when he newly hired Kochhar, she achieved her annual target in the very first quarter.

On the other hand Mallika Srinivasan, Tractors and Farm Equipment CEO recalls that whilst she was studying for her MBA from Wharton, she used to have her young daughter in tow, and would study in the laundry room because the hum of the washing machines helped her to concentrate.

Anjali Bansal, Managing Director, Spencer Stuart India, thinks that women who are poised to be successful have a killer work ethic and according to Shailja Dutt, MD, Stellar Search, "Letting anything slip is not an option", as reported by BT. These examples only point towards the fact that being a master of your expertise/area is a critical quality to have.

Don’t expect to please everyone

One quality that most top women in the Indian corporate space acknowledge is that woman needs to lose their nurturing side of obliging to keep everyone happy. You’ve got to be hard as nails and be ready to the extent of making some enemies in the workplace. For one, women in corporate India still face the wrath and envy of many men if they are climbing the ladder too quickly and secondly, trying to subvert the stereotype of being soft and submissive may tend to make female employees extra aggressive and hence piss people off.

Don’t give up easily

Most women in the corporate space give up when they have their first child in the age group of 25 to 35. The overwhelming workload combined with unsupportive families becomes a quick and easy reason for them to lose their cool and call it quits. But most of the top women you see in the Indian corporate space today are married, have children and yet have survived this tumultuous phase in their lives. The best way to deal with this is to think about where you will be in the next 5 years. Your responsibilities for your children would have decreased and you would be 5 years richer of work experience and perhaps a senior position. Would you want to let all of this go because of a hasty decision?

Vinita Bali, MD, Britannia has the last fair word:

"I think this gender thing is a bit overplayed. Ultimately, it is competence, skills, attitude and ability to lead that matter."