Customer Service can be a sustainable advantage: FMS Marketing Conclave MarkeITrend

eminent industry insiders talked about how customer service can be a sustainable competitive advantage provided innovation is attached to it. The conclave was focused on The New Indian Consumer: A Conundrum to Solve? and was organized by the MBA (Management of Services) students of FMS, Delhi.

Speaking at the conclave Mr. Chinar Deshpande, CIO, Future Group, said, Customer service is a definitive competitive advantage but is very difficult to emulate. It has to be part of the DNA of organizations. Further, he talked about customer service as a service to customers before, during and after the purchase of a product and said, If you are differentiating yourself from others, create a customer experience that is competitive and sustainable and brings in long term loyalty. He spoke about the use of technology as a tool to create a unique, high-class and intelligent consumer service.

Other speakers included Mr. Rakesh Aggarwal, COO, Moser Baer and Mr. Ravi Bhatia, Marketing Head, Maruti Udyog Limited. Mr Aggarwal in his message said, Managers are required to come up with innovative ideas by breaking the boundaries to create customer satisfaction that gives sustainable results. We need to differentiate between different customers having different mindsets.

Mr. Bhatia, in an interactive session, shared his experiences at Maruti and said, Loyal customers are those who report failures and also help in the co-creation of products and services.

As a result of globalization and changing life styles, new market segments are emerging in India and the second half of the session attempted to discuss how todays marketers are gearing up to meet the new challenges. The first speaker of the session, Mr. Alok Mehta, Marketing Head, Nokia, talked about the need of properly segmenting the market to make most of the confluence of technology, knowledge and complexity arising in the globalized world. His advice to the future marketing leaders was, You may not find a new customer, but you may find unmet needs; working on meeting them will lead to more customers and hence your success.

Mr. Harish Narula, President, Lupin (Pharma), delved more into innovation and invention as a means to excel in the market. Citing the example of Singapore, a trade economy, he said, Today, the world is one market and you should build your personality to be a brand since consumers are ready to pay for a brand. Mr. Dev Amritesh, Vice-President, Dominos Pizza and Mr. Shashi Kant, Head (Manpower Operations), Subhiksha Retail, shared their experiences and shared practical instances of how segmentation of the market, choice of catchment areas and identification of potential customers are done in the industry. Mr. Kant said, Customer is still the King. The speakers also delved into CRM (Customer Relationship Management) as a viable means to attract more customers and create brand loyalty.

The session was tactfully moderated by Ms Pallavi Bharadwaj, Marketing Head, NDTV Convergence, who ensured an active participation from the audience.
Indias leading management portal MBAUniverse.com was the media partner of the FMS Marketing Conclave.