Connecting with consumers is both an art as well as science. Both go hand-in-hand according to Shalini Raghavan, Global Brand Director, Dove Master-brand, Unilever. If you look at the science, market research helps us know consumers through insights which can be used to design products and fulfil their needs. Today, consumers are ahead of marketing. Information and data available to both are different. The future holds really big opportunity. The art is the ability to respond creatively to consumers.
The opportunity to build brand connection through consumer research and digital medium is bigger now pointed out Ajay Kakar, Chief Marketing Officer – Financial Services, Aditya Birla Group. The three point matrix for success is: 1. Business of attracting consumers. 2. Retaining and growing relationship with consumer. 3. Consumer advocacy. Those retailers that are managing to get the right mix of art and science to connect with consumers are hitting the nail.
To Bobby Pawar, Managing Director, Chief Creative Officer Publicis Worldwide – South Asia, business is about people. And the best tool people have to connect with brand is technology. Retailers need to understand both technology and people. If they don’t understand the feelings, they won’t be able to connect with people. The business is about reaching people’s hearts. Lastly, creativity plays an important role. The harder you try to analyse, the faster it disappears.
Being authentic and consistent is the mantra. Stay relevant. It’s all about how you are available to consumers. It’s about being relevant at right place right time, only then will loyalty follow. Ajay Kakar emphasised that we cannot keep consumers at bay and if we tell consumers what’s in store, they will come to us.
The panellists felt that market research helps and it is about finding the balance between what one wants to achieve and what the product is. Research in the right hands is worth its weight in gold. And that research in itself is not important, what one does with it research is important. How the data is interpreted and used is what matters. It’s not about research, but about actionable research.
It’s important to have a marketing team that has a healthy mix of creativity and business some of art and science and some of business will rub off then art will be created. Brands need to put people first. How you really put brand as part of people’s life is important. Be in consumers shoes, and you will create amazing connections. When you create anything for people, it will definitely connect well. Consumer connectivity beats the art of science.
Best music happens when two people come together. Its great partnership between creativity and planning, creativity and marketing & creativity and client. Unless it becomes organisation’s art and science it becomes history. You need the right attitude rather than only aptitude
Gone are the days when you will do one commercial and wait to get reaction from consumers. The word entertainment has become big while connecting with consumers. Its absolute critical to be rewarding. The reward could be emotional, intellectual or material.
Having said that, engaging with every consumer is different.
Content plays a crucial role in engaging consumers. Content is and will always remain the king irrespective of category or medium. Content can win over consumer if you speak consumer’s language. Authentic and relevant content plays vital role. Branded content is the new buzzword.
Kamath concluded the session stating brand engagement, brand content is relevant in today’s world and everything from packaging to designing product is important. Not all insights are right, you have to take your gut and intuition decision to build brand and connect with consumers.
Monish Chandan, www.monishchandan.wordpress.com
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CHICAGO (January 6, 2014) – The International Home + Housewares Show and International Housewares Association (IHA), the global sponsors and organizers of the gia (Global Innovation Award) program, today announced the national gia winners of 2013-2014 – including 23 innovative and unique home and housewares retailers from 22 countries around the globe.
The IHA and International Home + Housewares Show created the gia program in 1999 to foster innovation and excellence in home and housewares retailing throughout the world. The competition is structured on a two-tier level, national and global, to honor independent and multiple location home and housewares retailers for excellence in several business categories:
- Overall mission statement, vision and strategy
- Store design and layout
- Visual merchandising, displays and window displays
- Marketing, advertising and promotions
- Customer service and staff training
- Innovation
Each national gia winner is invited to the International Home + Housewares Show in Chicago where the global gia jury, consisting of four experts representing Asia, Europe and the Americas, plus a rotating group of co-sponsoring trade publication editors from around the world, will select up to five gia Global Honorees and the winner of the Martin M. Pegler Award for Excellence in Visual Merchandising.
During the 2014 International Home + Housewares Show in March, the winners are honored at a festive awards dinner, where the 2013-2014 gia Global Honorees and the winner of the Martin M. Pegler Award for Excellence in Visual Merchandising will be announced. Other gia highlights at the International Home + Housewares Show include a gia showcase in the Hall of Global Innovation, in Lakeside Center Lobby, where visuals of the national gia winners’ award-winning store design and branding ideas, examples of exquisite visual merchandising and innovative displays are on display. Banners for the honored retailers can be seen in the walkway that connects the Grand Concourse and the Lakeside Center.
gia is more than an awards program. Representing retailing excellence around the world, it is part of a larger education initiative that includes seminars by retail experts, columns in international housewares publications and educational sessions at events in sponsors’ home countries. Part of gia’s educational offering, on March 17, Martin M. Pegler, together with the other gia Expert Jurors, will conduct a special session in the Innovation Theater of the 2014 International Home + Housewares Show, with topic Creating the Store’s Brand Identity.
For more information about the gia (Global Innovation Award) program, the co-sponsors, or participating in 2014-2015, contact Piritta Törrö at piritta.torro@inspir edconnection.fi. Additional information on the gia program is also available online at www.housew ares.org/gia.
The 2014 International Home + Housewares Show will take place between 15th to 18th March’ 2014 at McCormick Place, Chicago, USA.
The show is the leading global marketplace for homeware. The show features the entire product lines of leading U.S. housewares brands, product suppliers and designers. Buyers have a chance to review new products and product lines that are not yet available in other markets, making it a smart sourcing destination.
The show is configured into four expos, with exhibitors from six different continents. The four expos are as follows:
- “Clean, Contain + Sustain” – Innovative solutions for the home including eco-friendly and sustainable products
- “Dine + Design” – Fashion-forward innovative home goods for the kitchen and dining room
- “Wired + Well” – The world’s leading exhibition for kitchen and household electrics
- “Global Crossroads” – International Pavilions
Discover Design 
Discover Design is the premier design destination at the International Home + Housewares Show, featuring over 100 companies that are trend leaders, innovators, design specialists. High-end products and collections for table, kitchen and home — award-winning contemporary design products and fresh ideas.
| Examples of the companies exhibiting at the 2014 International Home + Housewares Show include AlessiASA, Blomus, Built NY, Joseph Joseph, Kinto, Koziol, Magisso, Nambe, R. F. Yamakawa, Robert Welch Designs and Teroforma. |
Global Design Points and the Global Design Points’ Showcase
The International Home + Housewares Show includes de
sign-driven country pavilions from Italy, Japan, Turkey, Brazil, Hong Kong, Colombia and Thailand, found within Global Design Points, strategically positioned throughout the Show. The Global Design Points’ Showcase highlights the best products from the various country pavilions.
Free education and trend forecasts
Retailers visiting the Show can discover insights into the latest trends, designs, visual merchandising, sustainability, retail success factors and consumer preferences at nearly two dozen education sessions. Highlights from the 2014 educational program include the Pantone Color Forecast revealing the major color trends for 2015 and the branding presentation by gia Expert Juror Martin M. Pegler.
Special displays for strategic information, ideas and inspiration
The Hall of Global Innovation gives visitors of the International Home + Housewares Show a visual summary of trends that are shaping the housewares industry. The exhibits include:
- Going Green: sustainable products and packaging, and exciting new materials
- gia Global Innovation Awards: award-winning retailers from around the world showcasing best visual merchandising and retail practices
- Pantone ColorWatch: nine palettes representing the strongest home furnishing color trends for 2015
- IHA Innovation Awards: innovative new products winning the 2014 IHA Innovation Awards
- Student Design Competition: the winners of the 2014 IHA Student Design Competition demonstrating their models
The What, When & How of the show:
DATE: 15-18 March
VENUE: McCormick Place, Chicago, USA
TEL: +1 847 2924200
E-MAIL: international@housewares.org
More information on the Show, the exhibitors and the special services, as well as free online pre-registration is available at www.housewares.org/show/attend/nonUS.aspx.
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The growth story of Indian Retail is well documented – but growth has come at the price of scarcity of Talent. 2011-13 has provided a window of consolidation – retailers have focussed on efficiency – and have used this time to strengthen internal processes including people management processes.
This year MMR provided the Retail Industry with an academic “twist” – the event explored how using standards to create careers in retail can help broad base growth.
The central theme of MMR was “Setting Standards for Productivity Enhancement & Career Progress”.
Any industry that creates career graphs based on standards attracts better talent. Thus, MMR this year created a forum that had multiple stakeholders – Thought Leaders, CEOs, CPOs (Chief People Officers) , Operating Managers, Academia and Skill providers/partners who brain stormed and discussed standards for productivity enhancement and career progress.
Retail in India has enormous prospects but also faces optimisation and profitability challenges. Scale has come at the price of efficiency which has affected productivity. The current people management challenge in the industry is about aligning – the owner/ shareholder’s need for profitability with the employee’s need for meaningful personal growth.
The sessions at MMR 2013 identified and deliberated upon the productivity tools that Retail Industry can use, depicted the ways of standardisation, and exchange interesting insights with business leaders on career progression of the employees.
Conference Highlights
The 7th Edition of RAI’s annual HR Conclave began with, Jamshed S. Daboo, CEO, Trent Hypermarket Ltd. Delivering the welcome address.
“Modern Retail in India is relatively nascent. It’s come into being by adapting the western practices in the absence of any other benchmark. In my view this was a mistake. Their model is based on part-time, student recruitees – not suitable to the demanding, service hungry Indian consumer. If you go to a traditional saree shop today, you will find that the sales staff there knows both product and sales. They may not be perfectly groomed but they can sell. This disconnect in terms of quality of front end talent between traditional and modern retail is because, in our quest for scale we used process to substitute for people focussed nurturing.
This is the first paradigm shift that we need to work on, if we want talent to develop.
Our second mistake is that we have not positioned Modern Retail as a destination career for the front end staff. So there is a disconnect between the ‘detached ’ front end employee and the service hungry, demanding consumer. If you dumb down the job you are not going to get the smartest people. To address this we need enhance the desirability of the job, make it attractive, and make it a meaningful job. We need to have less people doing more meaningful work.”
Panel Discussion Synopsis
Setting Standards for Productivity Enhancement & Career Progress
Role of HR department in Retail companies does the line manger get value?
Importance of an Associate to Deliver Customer Satisfaction & Shareholder Value
