Have you forgotten your internal customers?

So much press (online and offline) has been given to marketing to customers, that businesses tend to forget one of the most important customer segments – their employees. While traditional marketing focused on the “Customer is king” agenda and trained employees to serve customers, today’s marketing has to focus on “Customer, Vendor, Employee, Stakeholder, Partner, and Colleague is king.”

The reason for this change is simple. Websites, blogs, social networks, online videos and whole host of other channels offer unprecedented exposure of a company, and its people to the customer. She can dig deep online and learn about what they think, do, or stand for. This helps her judge a company, its products and services.

So if your employee writes a blog, has an account on Facebook, or is active on LinkedIn, he is the perfect ambassador for your company. Hence internal marketing….

Internal marketing is all about the relationship an employer forms with its employees. Businesses should understand their employees are the ones who connect with the customer and build its reputation. Internal Marketing is all about communication and transparency and making sure employees are aware of the overall vision and goals of the company.

So when you plan your marketing strategies, and budgets(!) for the year, don’t forget your internal customers. Invite their views and blogs, create a private group on Facebook for them to post shared moments and personal glories, and talk about them on your newsletters and emails. Let your internal customers take care of the external ones….

The Curious case of INDI COMMANDOS

While surfing through my social networking sites, suddenly one name was hitting through and creating a buzz, it is INDI COMMANDOS, was wondering what it is, and as usual my only solution for all my doubts is www.google.com.

Given below the real time search screen shot,

Surprised to see a name that is totally irrelevant to Kochi or Kerala. I was closely following Kochi IPL team facebook fans page and they were doing an amazing job by engaging their fans, and have built a good number of fans base.

I’m sure by now there are different opinions and comments flooding around the social networking sites, hope and believe INDI COMMANDOS team are watching it.

--'INDI' stands for an independent #Indian #cricket team that will go ahead to win a billion hearts. –

Courtesy INDI COMMANDOS official twitter page

At the time of IPL auction, Kochi IPL franchise didn’t have any branding exercise, I was thinking they had a good strategy, since they can build the brand with the auctioned players, I was expecting something different, but it went totally different.

And there LOGO, frankly, no comments, one thing that immediately strikes my mind is, the car and bike stickering shops, where they make a design whatever comes to their mind, and somehow they find takers for the design. Look down, and let me know your thoughts. All the best INDI COMMANDOS!!

Facebook India – They came, they saw, they conquered

Keynote address by Kirthiga Reddy, Director – Online operation, Facebook India at India Social 2010 at New Delhi on December 17, 2010

I attended the IndiaSocial Summit at Delhi two weeks ago. (www.indiasocial.in). The excitement, energy, and enthusiasm for all things “social” had to be seen to be believed. One of the most impressive speeches I heard came from Krithiga Reddy, Director of Online Operations for Facebook India.

Kirthiga Reddy’s keynote address was focused on long term goals for Facebook India, and the amazing response they got in this country since their launch. They came to India in March with 8 million users and grew to 15 million in 6 months! This clearly illustrates how Facebook had created a space in the mind of internet users in India. RIP – Orkut.

Social Media is all about the fundamental shift in the way we share information. Ms. Reddy gave additional statistics that speaks volumes about the extreme networking that is happening in India through Facebook – 50 million friend requests and 50 million connections daily.

This is probably why top Indian brands like Mahindra and Lakme are choosing Facebook as an ideal platform to generate insights through conversation with their customers. So what are you waiting for? Connect with Content Crossroads and generate content for your Facebook pages, apps and conversations to take your brand to the next level.