Brick & Mortar Retailing is here to stay and flourish!

What if, I say brick & mortar retailing is here to stay and flourish more than or at least as much as online retailing? Wondering, is it possible! Thinking, no way, online retailing is the future and brick & mortar retailing is becoming a thing of the past and will die soon.

In my opinion, there is a combat going on between online retailing and brick and mortar retailing. I would say that, while online retailing is young, energetic and full of potential, brick & mortar retailing is mature, experienced and learned one.

For brick and mortar retailing to win over online retailing,  in my opinion, it has to use its decades of experience, learning from itself and learning from what is making online retailing tick.

Here are four points for brick & mortar to take care of for it to flourish and win over online retailing:

1. Keep and enhance the good stuff of brick & mortar retailing (Social aspect, Fun, touch, feel, etc.) - It is an activity and indeed a fun one, to go with friends and family to a retail store for shopping. It should be leveraged by brick & mortar stores to attract and retain more and more of its customers. How about running some fun events to add on to the fun element? Leverage celebrities, artists and others to make sure that th events are appealing to the customer. The touch and feel of a product that a customer gets of a product in retail store is amazing and it’s something that you indeed miss in online retailing. In a retail store, make sure that the products are available in a way that a customer can touch & feel in the most comfortable way.

2. Learn from online retailing and adopt the good stuff - what makes it tick (Variety of assortments, Ease of browsing and locating products, Product reviews) - In online retailing, the best part of it is the variety of products and how easy it is to browse them and find the one of your choice. The features to select products based on price range, size, brands, and other aspects are indeed targeting the right set of products to right customer. The features to sort by price or popularity is another features that online shoppers like and use heavily. So, how can we bring the easy browsing feature in brick & mortar retailing? This is where, we need the amalgamation of technology and brick & mortar retail store, for the experience of browsing and locating the products. Google glass, indeed is an option but google glass and like of it are thing of little farther future. But, going with what we have now, with smartphone users increasing, an app that can be used to browse products for a particular store and locate the products of ones choice, is indeed useful for the customer. With app, tailored for a particular store, you are able to bring the online features of online retailing to a brick & mortar retail store. In addition, the app can show the product reviews etc. On top of this, the app should be able to scan the products barcode to get more details about the product, product reviews, recommendation, checkout-on-th-go, etc.

3. Easy Return, Fast checkout -  When we buy a product, we do want an option for easy replacement and refund. It’s important for a customer and it gives customer that satisfaction and assurance of the purchase. In my opinion, brick & mortar store should definitely, provide a service of easy return by a reverse pickup facility within a city range. It will create an additional brownie points in the customer mind that would make the customers make more purchases and be satisfied of the service of brick & mortar retail store. One of the things, that a customer doesn’t like in brick & mortar store is the wait time at the checkout. To tackle this, there must of a self checkout, kiosk-based checkout, app based checkout on the go option for the customer in the store.

4. Price, Coupons and Freebies - At the end, the price factor matters the most for a customer. The product, in brick & mortar store, must be cheaper or at least be at the same cost as that of in online retailing. The brick & mortar store, hence, should aspire to increase the volume of sales rather than the profit per product if it has to compete with online retailing. The freebies are another factor to attract and retain the customer in the brick & mortar store. The store, with this, could target to advertise/promote third party products and help cross-sell its own product or the products of its partnering third parties. For example, on purchase of products worth more than 1000 INR, if I am given a 50INR worth of voucher of Mac Donald. I would be happy to receive it and most likely, I would buy some more stuff in Mac Donald. And so, Mac Donald gets the more footfall, to whom, Mac Donald can cross-sell its products.

At the end, let us first accept the fact that brick & mortar retailing is here to stay and then, work on the above aspects to renovate the brick &  mortar retailing in order to stay here and flourish more than or at least as much as online retailing.

11/26 - May their soul rest in Peace.

May their soul rest in Peace who were hit by the bullets coming from terrorists' gun.

My wishes & sympathy to everyone who lost their loved ones during this unfortunate act of terrorism in Mumbai in Nov-26.

I believe that terrorism is born from the act of hatred and unwillingness to accept the differences. The terrorist attacks are mere a symptoms of the hatred and unwillingness to accept diferences, developed over a period of time and based on various experiences in life.

When we fight against terrorism, we must understand what is it that we are fighting with. We cannot win the fight if we merely kill the symptoms.

So, to end the terrorism, we must end the hatred amongst ourselves. Irrespective of which religion or ethnicity or color or caste we belong to, we must open our heart and accept each other and each other's differences. It's these differences which make each of us unique and which make the life an interesting and memorable journey.

While we understand and act on it, we can take following actions in our day to day life to help prevent these unfortunate acts from happening in future:

1. Understand and practice the fact that Terrorism does not belong to any religion, ethnicity, color or caste.
2. Do not develop hatred for anyone or any group.
3. Respect each other.
4. Accept the differences amongst each other or the uniqueness in yourself
5. Stay alert for any troublesome act. Report if you observe any.
6. Help spread this message to others.
7. Be happy, content and joyful in life.

Thank You, All!

InnovateSF

When I look at different cities across United States or or in other countries such as Japan, China, India, United Kingdom, Australia, etc. San Francisco always comes ahead in innovation. San Francisco - Silicon Valley, the hub of technology, the hot-bed of innovation, the home of Inter-Galactic Ship, Enterprise, is perfect.

But I think, the city does have some problems, we do have some problems. We see it everyday when we leave the our apartment and drive on the road or walk on the pedestrian or ride the bike or take the bart or muni in the city. Yes, it’s the problem if homelessness. There are more than 5000 homeless people amidst this highly advanced city of San Francisco.

Innovation is defined as a new or more effective thinking or process or product or services to solve the known or unarticulated problems to create or develop the values for the customers.

So, yes there are areas such as such as Public Transportation, Safety & security, creating more jobs, creating better platform for innovation, along with the mammoth problem of homelessness, which are seeking some innovation.

We, You and I, as an individual and as a group need to come up with the innovative solution in these areas if we seek to innovate SF. It doesn’t matter which area you are in, whether you are a techie guy or a realtor or an attorney or businessmen or a designer, whichever profession you are in, you can contribute towards innovation.

I look back to find what does it take to be innovative. Based on my experiences and out of retrospection, I came up with following 5 things to keep in mind to become innovative.

1. Immerse to understand the problem.
2. Don’t settle to think different
3. Be curious
4. Dare to Try what you think of
5. Embrace the failure, because it’s not failure but it’s a learning which takes you closer to innovation.

At the end, Innovation is not an end but the means towards solution, better life

So, let’s together innovate SF for better solution, better life.

TPAR - Think, Plan, Act, Retrospect

After giving a speech, what comes to your mind? Do you feel that you gave a wonderful speech? Or, it could have been little better?

Right after a first date or the exam or a speech or a meeting with your client, you would probably think the same...uhmmm, I could have done little better. Many a times, you may spend quite amount of time simply thinking about it.

Approximately few months back, after the Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contests, I felt something similar. AS a contest chair of the event, I felt that I could have done better. Right then, I felt, am I going to dwell on it? Yes, I try to be conscious about my thoughts. And So, I thought of what went well and what could have been better and told myself to move on.

In our life, we cycle through TPAR for every task that we do - Think, Plan, Act, Retrospect, unless you are a thinker (In which case, you just think!). Whether it is about going on a date, taking Exams, working on project or giving a speech, we follow TPAR. We first think. We think of whether I should give a speech this week or next week, whether I should give an informative speech or a humorous speech and so on. Once we have thought about it and made a decision, we plan for it - plan for the content, resources, time etc. And then, we act on it by preparing for it, practicing it and ultimately giving a speech. Then comes the retrospection, wherein we look back to see how we did. Retrospection is very important as it helps you get better at what you do in future. Unfortunately, when we look back, we mostly see and think about the things that went wrong. Often a times, we dwell on it and we are so caught up in it that we don’t start the next cycle of TPAR. Spending time, more than what’s needed for retrospection, doesn’t yield any value. It sometimes harms us, instead.

What did I do, when I told myself to move on - I signed myself up for different roles for the next two weeks.

So, Retrospection is important but we shouldn’t spend much of a time in retrospection and The retrospection should include both what went well (give yourself a pat on the back) and what could be improved. After which, move on with the next cycle of TPAR - Think, plan, act & retrospect.

Thank You!

Bell the CAT

It's not the ordinary CAT. And to bell this CAT you need to be smart, hard-working, having the quality of good time-management, planning, perseverance skill. One more thing that you you need to have is LUCK. Yup, it's very important because, luck could put you in either side of the fence.
Till now, you have never been tested on LUCK. But, this time it's one of the factor and you have no control on it.
Yup, i am talking about the CAT 2009 - a prestigious exam to get into IIMs - the world class business school. There are more than 2 Lakhs of candidate writing the exam every year, and only few get through it. It's not the end, you need to clear the interview as well, wherein there is no dimension defined against which you might be tested. I would like to restrict myself with the CAT, 1st round only.
CAT went online this time and you have mouse to bell the CAT. It's very first time that the government body initiated the technology adaption in one of the biggest event. Kudos to the CAT Management and Govt. of HRD. CAT, always known for it's management skill, did experience few hiccups during the event. The paper was saved or should i say greenery was preserved but, a lot of pressure and luck was put upon the cat aspirant writing the exam.
The technology part of it was outsourced from India to the US firm prometric. Prometric, who conducts the exam for GRE and TOEFL and many other bodies, is one of the best in this. It happened to be a bad luck for prometric as well this time. Things went wrong starting from filling up the form to writing the exam. There were so many glitches in the software.
I think, it's ofcourse the management failure. I really appreciate the way the process was defined and being executed throughout the process in the event. What went wrong was the collaboration with the Prometric, which caused all this. Few glitches scared the Lakhs of people. The other reason being, there is no good infrastructure here to support so many candidates writing the exam. One needs ample amount of time to closely look at different to promise that, the show will go on perfectly.
The candidates during the exam are into so much pressure and any small thing could put one into trouble. Even if the re-schedule happens, the candidate doesn't feel comfortable and get into a huge amount of pressure.
What could have been better is the Organizer's planning and forcasting would have been better so that they get ample amount of time to get everything ready and nobody runs into trouble. I hope, CAT and rest all learn from the mistakes done and do care for the sentiments of people attached with the event. I wish best of luck to CAT organizers and prometric.

Thank You.

Sachin R. Tendulkar & Rahul Dravid

I remember those days, more than 5 years back, when i used to appreciate Dravid, Mr. Wall, a lot. I was a big fan of Dravid. He was and is a class player for sure. Sachin is the God of Cricket and anything talking about him would be less. Those were the days when people used to appreciate the team and the members of the team for what they were good at.
Of late, i have been hearing a lot about something like...Dravid not getting recognition as that of sachin. Dravid always gets overshadowed by Sachin. Media covers dravid more than Sachin. There are more no. of wins for India, when dravid scores century than when sachin scores century. Media covered a lot when sachin completed 20 Years in crecketing career and they didn't, when Dravid scored a century and brought India in a good position from the worst position just the other day. Where is it coming from? Why are we linking dravid with sachin for every event, especially when we see that Dravid is not getting much appreciation? They are two good players, playing there bit for themselves and the country. I would never think that, they would have ever felt of being in competition with each other. But, what are we doing? We are saying that sachin is the reason for Dravid not being as famous as he could have been.Hearing all this a lot, to be frank, my support for dravid has decreased, because, to me both were and are the great player. But, when you keep saying that because of one great player, the other great player is not getting recognition and all, it actually decreases the popularity of the other great player.
I would request you guys to please get out of this mindset. Look at the root cause. It's not like dravid is not getting much recognition because of Sachin being there. What i feel is, it's the media fault to an extent. But, you don't always agree to media, for whatever they say. So, listen to media and have your opinion with you. I also believe that, to an extent it's the fault of IPL as well. You know, the IPL brought in the regionalism feeling in the Cricket and also in the People attached with cricket. Cricket, which used to unite the nation. Nobody ever wanted to know, from which region Dravid or Sachin belong. We just knew that they are Indian, playing for India. I loved it, Cricket brought the nation together. But, after the IPL, we have been sparked with the feeling of regionalism. Delhi folks would favour Shehwag, Karnataka folks would favour Dravid or Kumble and so on.
I think, we should respect both the players. We should respect all the players, whatever region they belong to. Don't start favouring dravid a lot at the favour cost of sachin, because of Media or the IPL fault. And please, don't start finding out faults in sachin, just to show that dravid is better than sachin for so and so thing. In someone, your extreme favour for dravid at sachin's cost might reduce the favour for dravid. Let's take them as the national player, playing for nation. Either sachin does well or dravid, if the Country wins, we win. That's all.

Wish you Good Positive Luck !!!

India & China - The Road dispute

Hello Folks,

Recently, there was a hot news on India stopping the road construction in Laddakh, inside the Indian Border, because of Chinese Army's objection. My room-mate told me about it. I replied back saying, there might be some concern from our neighbour, it's our duty to listen and clarify if there is any doubt from the other side. I have seen it happening in villages, where the land for eveny man is not clearly defined and hence, whenever, once creats some boundry or house, the neighbour might have an objection saying if you are capturing any bit of land. So, one needs to clarify with the neighbour and get it sort out. I extended this concept to a nation and thought china might be having some doubt on land getting captured or any other things such as military deployment.

Later after reading some news and getting into the depth of issues, i found out that, the road construction which was going on, was completely inside indian territoy and it was not for the military deployment. The village, where it was being constructed was the last village in indian territory. The raod was being constructed under National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, under which, the villages are getting connected through good road, which solves the problem of commute as well as the Employment. But, china might not be aware of the policies that india has and that too at this level. So, to an extent, i didn't feel that bad about china's concern. And, as a neighbour it's our responsibility to keep a good understanding between china or any other neighbours.

Later, after reading some more articles about previous relationship with china, i found out that, Chinese have these concepts of concentric circles from the early days. Wherein, they consider the immediate neightbour (Circle) of Chinese (king's) territory as the enemy and the next to the neighbour (next circle) as an ally. And, this cause China to always have a suspicious relationship with India. I agree, that China has no rights to stop any work which is going on, in India's territory. Some say, India should have kicked them out using our great army. But, i believe, war is not the solution and words is. From my perspective, the reason for Indo-China relationship, a little bitter, is the perception that is there in both the countries about each other. I hope, we (especially China) could think in a fresh perspective and understand each other better and live a better life than to live with suspicious mind for each other and keep the relationship bitter.

Wish you all the best India & China.