22 Ocak 2009

Miles To Go - An interview with Miles Young, new CEO of Ogilvy

I flew from New Delhi back to Goa last week on Kingfisher Airlines, which has free newspaper service even in domestic economy service. I picked The Times of India, which is the Indian equivalent of FT. In their supplement named "Brand Equity" there was an interview with Miles Young, who is the new and the first non-American CEO of Ogilvy.
The headline was; "On his first day as global CEO of Ogilvy, he chose to be in Mumbai (Bombay) - a clear indicator of where he sees the future" Well, it may be correct because how many of you know that Global Hub for Digital Production of Ogilvy is in Bangladesh? ;) Anyway... let's have a look at some highlights from the interview;
  • His immediate priority is Ogilvy's clients instead of financial issues during the global meltdown.
  • His second priority is to set a longer-term business plan for Ogilvy. He believes in 5-year plans. He states that; "We have had some success in countries like India with five-year plans, which some say are rather communist-like. Annual plans tend to be quite short in terms of horizons. So I introduced five-year plans initially in China, then in India, and also in Japan. Now, I want to do a global five-year plan"
  • Lessons (which I also agree with) from his Asian experience, in his words, are; "One thing that I am taking from here is the optimistic and pragmatic way of approaching life" and "Patience. Asian cultures on the whole are more patient. The Goldman Sachs's way of life is kind of impatient. Sometimes be prepared to wait, be prepared to argue through to get to a consensus are important techniques of the business, that our colleagues in the West don’t have"
  • He defines the digital medium in India (including online marketing and I think) as a conundrum. Well, to be honest, this is the truth :) There is a huge potential along with lethargy.
  • He thinks that arrogance is what ultimately destroys an organization.
I think it is good to read the whole interview to understand him more and see his global vision. Here is the link for Times of India - Brand Equity
Congratulations and good luck, Mr. Young...

19 Ocak 2009

Kingfisher & Vijay Mallya

Vijay Mallya, from my point of view, is Richard Branson of India, yet he is not holding sir title. He has an airline, Kingfisher Airlines which is ranked as 5 star by Skytrax (like Virgin Atlantic), he has Kingfisher Beer (no website as ad of alcholic beverages are not allowed in India) which is the market leader in India, some pharma companies and he also has a F1 team (Force India) and so on so on...

I like his way of promoting his products. His brand use almost every medium (check picture) including online medium. Their online marketing tools are various. Just for this, Kingfisher has a website named Kingfisher World. However, it is a shame for me but recently I have discovered another online marketing tool of Kingfisher! It has also a calendar, like the famous Pirelli one in Europe ;)

For the ones who is interested; http://www.kingfishercalendar.com/2009/ Or get your own Swimsuit Special widget here. As they say; Share the Good Times...

08 Ocak 2009

06 Ocak 2009

Nil following Nil inside Nil's mind...

Nil Karaibrahimgil's official website is live...

She is following her life in her mind. She is the stalker of herself ;) Visit http://www.niltakipte.com/ for Nil's real world... She also wrote about her website in her last article at Hürriyet :) Unfortunately it is in Turkish but for the ones who is interested click here!

iGOA - Let's GOA!