Significant Achievement Creates Historic Importance Nationwide

The latest copy of Oxford’s dictionary may well fall short of an apt word to describe the scintillating performance of the master blaster. One word clichés help no more and are further banal. Iconic legends are a class apart; they flounce through the very roots of considered opinions often enough, tenaciously overwhelming the most accomplished critics’ abilities. My contention is juxtaposed with a billion other indulgers of cricketing bliss. The sheer pleasure of watching the emperor of the game play bit-by-bit, ball-by-ball tempered the heart beat of every Indian with one single wish – a double ton to relish and cherish. The master with unflinching modesty went on to create history tantalizing a billion eyes with a-never-after visual treat.

It is said that humility breeds inspiration and pure success, even such sacrosanct statements need manifestation at times to pacify cynics. Mastering modesty, to the extent where it becomes difficult to ascribe the person mere mortality, is an audacious feat accomplished only by such a man of substance. Records are possible only for people with perseverance, but not many record holders are adulated in a way that God too becomes proud of his creation.

Mr. Ramesh Tendulkar probably wanted his son to fit in the footsteps of SD Burman, whose name he shares, but the cricketing maestro filled the hearts of millions of his fans with everlasting music albeit in a different way. Gwalior must have been waiting for its time to be referred in the annals of history again with golden letters and this arduous task had been perfected to excellence by this one great Indian.

India owes a lot to Dennis Lillee, but for him, we would have missed a legendary batsman. If Dennis would have not asked this budding cricketer to focus on batting instead of bowling… a thought which nobody would want to reel on now. But this is a moment in the history of cricket where every fan must be thanking Mr. Ramakant Achrekar for building a foundation that shuns shaking for years to come.

Everybody goes through a rough phase in life at one or the other point and he is no exception, almost for four years starting with West Indies series in 2002 he had seen the unnerving trough of his career. Thanks to the tennis elbow that almost jeopardized his return, but people with tough determination do bounce back undeterred. There is however a difference though in the way this master revived; his determination to excel and on a consistent basis from then on is beyond the logical comprehension of time tested cricketing pundits. It is befitting to quote BBC here which says “Beneath the helmet, under that unruly curly hair, inside the cranium, there is something we don’t know, something beyond scientific measure. Something that allows him to soar, to roam a territory of sport that, forget us, even those who are gifted enough to play alongside him cannot even fathom. When he goes out to bat, people switch on their TV sets and switch off their lives.”

I bow with respect to this great Indian called SACHIN TENDULKAR.

       

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What Marketing really is not… and is.

The term marketing is abused now more than ever, it has become a synonym for all sorts of sales activities. A product or a service has to be marketed keeping the solution, it provides to the customers in mind. Most marketers are hell-bent on highlighting the features and other promotable specifications of a product. Convincing a prospect that the product can fill a void that now exists or may exist in future is the most ideal way to market. Or is it?

Diving deeper, a question that constantly pesters the mind of a common man is, when this deafening shrill of so called marketing will stop. True to its nature, today every other person is drowned in the sea of marketing through a new form of media, literally one, emerging everyday.  From the day marketing of baked products emerged in the form of a poster in Philadelphia in 1870s to this day of  advertising on every imaginable media, marketing has come a long way. It is now time to halt a little and diagnose the brittle tracks that may no longer carry the burden of aimless train of marketing. Luring customers is the single most objective of prying marketers and has indeed become the order of the day.

Market products, but with a purpose to solve a customer’s problem, is a statement that is shouted by the academia from the rooftops. The element of luring customers has deteriorated to a stage where the fundamentals of economics go for a toss. For instance, discounts given on certain products baffle the most eminent marketing gurus. The strategies formulated to market products are fundamentally flawed. Customers are overwhelmed, artificially inspired, and are made to buy products impulsively, those, which are generally complex high involvement products. This phenomenon usually leads to cognitive dissonance. This incautious lurch to gain competitive advantage boomerangs with a resultant fracture of the product positioning strategy that is beyond repair.

It is an accepted tenet that an unsatisfied customer most normally never returns, but a disgruntled one makes sure the product is abused at every opportune step. A disgruntled customer is born as a consequence of a bitter interaction with the marketer at any of the post purchase stages. Such a customer usually unleashes power that endangers and cripples the very survival of the marketer.  Many- a-product have fallen flat this way, when marketers underestimated and took customers for granted.  Such customer propaganda is on par with wild fire and can never be contained in time, without causing irrevocable damage to the marketer.

In a blistering pace to outsmart competition, marketers tend to highlight features of their product or service as indomitable and attractively unique. Even when customers succumb to such titillation and accept these products, they cannot eventually withstand the reality when it dawns on them and their frustration simmers, waiting to explode flat on the marketers’ faces.

So, gravitating to the core concern, it is but very true to summate that a fundamental shift in the perception of marketers can only save the customer from drowning in the sea of marketing clutter. Let’s hope that someday transformed marketers do help customers sail smoothly in this very sea, letting them pick and pluck the products of their choice at their free will.

 

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