Susheel Garg is a marketing visionary who hails from Shimla. Being a Director at FreshBox Media, he has been instrumental in turning this Thane-based startup into a full-service digital marketing company. He comes with a deep-rooted passion for branding, content creation, integrated marketing & video production. From having a firm grip on the pharma industry to pushing the envelope in digital marketing, Susheel has been a marketing expert who is never afraid of thinking out of the box. His leadership quality helps all the teams at FreshBox to deliver path-breaking services in digital marketing and strategy, web and mobile marketing, and corporate communications. Despite being an industry expert, Susheel continues to learn, grow, and implement technologically- backed ideas to create customer centric and memorable brand stories. Susheel’s patience, enthusiasm, and ability to provide creative solutions according to the capacity of a client make him a digital consultant who evolves as you do.
The ongoing crisis of the COVID-19 has forced an unimaginable acceleration in digital evolution and up-skilling across the globe. It’s not just an industry that has impacted our lives but created an explosion of tech awareness that made us realise the importance of going digital. From using video conferencing for staying connected with dear ones to going cashless by paying online for day-to-day transactions, people managed to find a way through the lockdown to do things differently. This led to a rise in digital awareness and helped us to make the most of technology.
With the pandemic situation, digital ecosystems soon became the norm as opposed to being just an exception. Companies began to realign their strategies that were now focused on connecting with their customers on a more personal level, and improving their overall brand experience. Brands even walked the extra mile by taking initiatives that asked and acted on the feedback to create hopeful content and build a closer and stronger community.
As the digital ecosystem grew, there was a dire need to streamline the various processes for customer acquisition and loyalty. These were made possible by the various trends followed by brands which were as follows:
- Adapting by Adding Value to One’s Service
Zomato and Swiggy, India’s popular food delivery aggregators, followed a unique approach giving more to its customers in the form of offering services that went beyond food. This was largely due to the fact that the Coronavirus had paralysed India’s daily life leading to 30% of the restaurants and kirana stores closing down. By doubling as e-kirana stores, these apps added convenience to the consumer’s life in the safest way possible. These apps proved to be a good case study for brands that refashioned their business models by adapting to the evolving situation.
- Attracting the Audience With Premium Offerings
Neestream is a Malayalam platform that engages with the South-Indian audiences through original shows and movies. This platform gained momentum due to its wide range of streaming content. What makes Neestream stand out from the others is that anybody can watch movies for free unlike other OTT platforms where one has to pay for streaming. Neestream allows the viewer to watch entertainment and news for free. One has to purchase a subscription package only if they want to watch the latest movies or newly-launched video content. As the audience can continue to binge on classics for free, the app turned to be a huge hit as it converted the free streamers into premium subscribers- as they now knew what they were in for.
- Adopting New-Age Strategies from the Ground Up
Businesses knew that they couldn’t afford to have employees missing out on important information such as company updates or the latest changes made to projects that the teams were working upon. That’s why, improving one’s internal communication became the need of the hour. With the implementation of the right employee communication technology, leaders and internal communications’ professionals were able to ensure the right flow of data in a timely manner. They were able to efficiently filter their customer base, personalise messages, send push notifications to employees’ mobile phones, and ensure that all the information was available and snackable in a matter of seconds.
- Uplifting Others With a Humane Approach of Marketing
The pandemic crisis affected small scale businesses and many faced huge losses. This led to many brands going out of their way and following a humane approach in their campaigning. Cadbury released an advertisement campaign during the Diwali festivity where they urged the audience to look out for the local vendors and businesses, and support them by buying and using their products and services. Through this initiative, they not only helped others to go digital but also showcased themselves as a brand- which cares for other brands!
As desperate times called for desperate measures, it became vital to understand how digital and physical channels could impact each other and help to drive massive customer opportunities. With the COVID-19 challenges, digital ecosystems aided in adapting to the current trends, adding value-based services, widening one’s scalability, and creating new ways to generate revenue streams. This only led to B2B processes becoming more flexible, and presented an accessible platform that contributed to a digital evolution in business.