What's Ching's Secret?

There was an ET article on brands doing well in social media. True to mass media understanding of social media, it was a bit sketchy, a bit rudderless & reflected the general lack of understanding of the social landscape.

My friend & fellow digital road warrior - Shubho has done some analysis on his blog here...That in turn inspired me to have a dekko at Ching's Secret, Barista Lavazza and Just Dial Facebook pages...

Here's my analysis and ranking of these 3 brands on a 5 point scale where 5 - excellent and 1 - very poor.

1. Intent
Ching's Secret - The top management buys into social media. Lives and breathes it. The only brand to talk about the ET article on its fb page the same day!!
Rating - 5

Barista Lavazza - Looks like the social strategy is still at the marketing department level. Top management says - Lets see what happens, then we will scale up guys!
Rating - 3

Just Dial Social media for these guys is just another mass media channel. Judging by the quality of the strategy, it's still quite low on intent.High usage of the medium, low social intent of the brand.
Rating - 1

2. Content
Ching's Secret- Recipes is a great long running idea. Cooking is a bestseller conversation topic, immenselty shareable. Doesn't really matter if the recipes appear cut-n-paste. Content repurposing is part of the social media strategy.
Rating - 5

Barista Lavazza- The content is still small print ads dressed up insufficiently as conversation!
Rating - 3

Just Dial- Very boring and repetitive, It's a shame because with a product as engaging and diverse as Just Dial they could have really capitalised on content. Bollywood and sports however keep the people involved on the page...
Rating - 3

3. Engagement & CQ(Conversation Quotient)
Ching's Secret - Pretty high engagement and CQ. Is genuinenly a social brand and not a pretender. Not trying hard at all. The frequency of content upload matches the social vibrancy of both the brand & fb!
Rating - 5

Barista Lavazza - Quite average. Again promos pretending to be brand conversations & driving social currency.
Rating - 2

Just Dial- Below par. The comments by 'fans' are solely for/ because of Bollywood. Zero engagement with the brand Just Dial.
Rating - 1

4. Community
Ching's Secret - Lots of traction and not merely transactional.
Rating - 4

Barista Lavazza - Casual connect.
Rating - 3

Just Dial - Akin to people at a railway platform. High traffic. zero connect.
Rating - 1

5. Voice & Personality
Ching's Secret- Has a unique voice , has a sense of humour. Very human , very Ching , very consistent!
Rating - 5

Barista Lavazza- Quite artificial, very mass media tonality. Quite 1 way...
Rating - 3

Just Dial - The voice & personality of a bulletin board with pictures:-)
Rating - 1

While putting this post up, I commented on the Ching's Secret fb page a little before mid-night and pat came their reply...That's some impressive commitment to social media and consumers as people. These guys truly walk the talk!

Cheers and Happy Diwali

JohnAbraham.com

Just stumbled upon what appears to be the promotional website of the UTV film (Jhootha Hi Sahi)- JohnAbraham.com...

I quite like the simplicity and the peek into a celeb's life content. In one video John talks about his Tulsi chai(he drinks some 40 cups every day!!)

There is a very simple idea of 'pairing with John' where you can upload your picture and be paired with John:-)

I guess where many brands struggle to understand the conversational nature and playful content of social media, this JA site gets it right...Am bookmarking it for reference...

The Sign of Our Times

Source: Blaugh.com
Source : Hubspot.com
Source : weblogcartoons.com

Logan Loves India But Does India Love Logan or the Ad:-)

The new TVCs of Mahindra Logan are so bad that it makes the car look good in contrast! Honestly, for a solid ugly car that was doing good mostly in the taxi circle this new found love for India is laughable...Need Hajmola Sir!!

From Social Media to Social Conciousness

It's a nice long weekend and Neo and I are at Cinnamon. Him drawing on some clay pots! And me trying to unwind and forage for ideas and inspiration.

One of the things that has niggled my mind for some time is how to better use social media for social causes, community service, bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots, create a better work environment, create more meaningful work for everyone, make more meaningful connections and not just the quantity of connections...

So, in the morniing when I stumbled upon this profound and brilliant article by Umair Haque on the HBR site, thought of sharing it...

He talks about the "message" of the Internet's social revolution as being more meaningful work, economics, politics, society, and organization. Social media promises radically more meaning: to make stuff matter, once again, in human terms, not just financial ones.

Yet, Haque points out most "social media" strategies have one or more of three goals: to "push product," "build buzz," or "engage consumers." None of these lives up to the Internet's promise of meaning.

They're just slightly cleverer ways to sell more of the same old junk. But the great challenge of the 21st century is making stuff radically better in the first place — stuff that creates what he calls thicker value.

Umair talks about the 7 social strategies that are turning yesterday's zombieconomy upside down - Character, Creativity, Control, Culture, Clarity, Cohesion, Choreography - They're what he looks for when evaluating investments, innovations, and ideas across the social mediascape.

A must read, immerse and act!

Merchant Clark, Cecil Hotel and a 30 year dream...

It's been a hell of a long time away from the blog. I feel guilty, anxious...and the fingers feel a bit rusty!! So where was I and what kept me so busy for almost 4 months!

Here's the story. A story of a small dream that first took root in the eyes of a 6 year old/ maybe 5. That's me. A dream that sort of has had a gestation period of 30 long years!!

Merchant Clark. When I was of Neo's age(that's about 6 yrs) I had learnt a new word Merchant which I thought was a cool word(cool and merchant sounds weird I know:-) and there was this 5 star hotel in Patna called Maurya Clark. So my little innocent dream was to open a hotel for travellers called Merchant Clark which would be the finest hotel in the country.
I don't think I ever shared this story with anyone. Locked in my head for 3 decades...

And that's where the dream/ desire stayed for the next 30 years. School. College. Engineering. Servicing. Creative Planning. Consultancy. The journey through life. But the dream like the stickiest of post-its never left me. I had ideas but no money. Ideas but no time. Some money but no team. Team but no consensus. And the dream gathered moss...Thick green, slippery moss...

Dare to dream. And then I read this fascinating biography of Rai Bahadur M. S Oberoi by Bachi Karkaria some years back. Of how Sr. Oberoi dared to dream. As the hotel bell-boy had the audacity and ambition to pawn his wife's jewellery to buy the Cecil hotel from the gora owner.

And the dormant thoughts of starting a hotel/ service brand again floated in my mind...I remember finishing the last pages of the book in the wee hours of morning. Warm tears on my cheek. Of life passing by. Feeling inspired. But that was the max that happened again. Work. Life. Sceptics. Naysayers. More work. Energy sappers. More Life. I-know-why-it-won't-work well-wishers...Tum to planner ho. Business-pehle-kiya-hai gyan!!

And then when I shifted to Gurgaon mid last year, between lazy beer sessions and some back of the napkin calculations, the truncated idea of a service apartment/ brand(prequel to the grand hotel) started taking shape...

It took a dedicated/ passionate team of four, four months and a couple of lacs to turn the 30 year old idea into a small reality! Our service villa - it's an apartment in a villa called Cinnamon Corporate Stays(it's got 5 interesting rooms - Green, Grand, Unwind, Doodle and Puraani Jeans and a bit of story everywhere.) Far from perfect but it's happened...

Cinnamon for us/me is a story of belief. Belief that stuff happens when you push it hard enough. Stuff can happen when you really wanna make it happen. That stuff happens not in a grand planned way but in the most random way when you least expect it to happen...

It took me/us a lot of time to convert the idea into reality. To convince a small team to move ahead when budgets and time were huge constraints. It's still some months to break even. But it's there. Our first brand/ service. Not to a client's brief but to ours. And it has been sweat, passionate obsession and bloody tiring. Especially with a full time day job! But immense lot of help, support from my team.

Along the way, I picked up a couple of lessons in brand building. This time around not between the pages of a book, but between visits to Lajpat Nagar and worrying about the leaking tap and the 'garam chai'. But more about that later...

Today I just wanted to share that it's important to hold on to your dreams. However, weird, wild and wishful. And sometimes it may take up to 30 years for a dream to shape up...But don't let any one's laughs or cynicism get you off-track.

If you really want something bad enough, the universe conspires to help you...Paulo Coelho saheb was right in his book Alchemist...At least even if I fail. I will have a story to tell my grandchild around the fireplace...LOL

You could check us out here. But in case you are travelling to Delhi/ Gurgaon and want to stay in a cosy little place mail us at cinnamonstays@gmail.com

We would be happy to host you...Cheers