Rajesh Lalwani – Brand consulting India, social media and social business strategy, messaging

The Economic Times did a story on Blogworks’ 4th edition of India’s Most Mentioned Political Leaders index analyzing the Top 20 Most Mentioned Political Leaders online for July 2013.

You can read the full article here

Afaqs has quoted Rajesh Lalwani, Founder and Principal, Blogworks on a  feature which talks about Tata Nano’s new ad. The article also mentions Blogworks IndiaAuto Social Index June 2013.

Read the full article here

Jeremy Wagstaff, Chief Technology Correspondent, Asia for Reuters, spoke with me briefly about Facebook’s India prospects (opportunities, obstacles and what they are doing in this market).

Here are some points that I shared with him:

People usage

1. Facebook has seen aggressive growth and now stands at around 51 million users from India making it an important market from that perspective
2. How Facebook moves forward to keep the users glued to the channel in terms of usage would be important. It will go on to become a utility as initial euphoria has/ will give way to day-to-day usage from connecting > sharing also giving way to buying (holidays, virtual goods and real goods) to paying taxes? and more
3. I do not see Facebook go the Orkut way, for the simple reason that I have always maintained
   • Facebook is Facebook’s primary business, Orkut was not Google’s primary business
4. How Facebook replicates the rich PC/ Tablet experience for the mobile user (without fancy handsets) would be important as mobile internet is seeing faster growth

Marketer and advertising

1. Marketers who are spending more money on the channel are now also looking for ways to measure, and also what more can be done on Facebook
2. Facebook’s own marketing team and efforts are fairly nascent in the India market, though they are reaching out their conferences and direct outreach to marketers
3. Facebook might need to co-opt a larger network of partners, such as Blogworks and others, that have been working in the market to sell the medium, to expand it’s reach and value into the India market
4. I believe that post IPO, the focus will shift to monetization and offerings like ‘Reach Generator’ will focus on large advertisers and organic reach for brand pages might come down. Hence a scenario might emerge where marketers at opposite ends of the spectrum might only be able to harvest the channel well – the very small businesses/ brands (lots of time, personal involvement, reach through engaging the personal networks); the large brands/ organisations (monetary spends on ads, apps, content and engagement). Medium sized businesses may not have the time, or the money, to really achieve massive success
5. It would be interesting to see if this is the direction that Facebook eventually takes where organic reach will become more difficult and reliance on money spent will increase.

Here is  Reuter’s piece that has appeared in several publications today: Facebook can’t take Asia growth for granted

Exchange4Media, 8 April 2011

Top 3 mistakes brands make

Rajesh Lalwani, Founder and Principal, Blogworks, said, “They don’t always think about how their social media presence connects with the consumer.” This connection is what provides value to social media in the first place, he added.

Deccan Chronicle, 5 April 2011

The social way to sell

Rajesh Lalwani, of Blogworks, a social media consulting firm, concurs, “There has been a dramatic shift in the dynamics of business, thanks to social media. Now, irrespective of what the brand is claiming about its credentials, the consumer himself can go on a social media platform and share his experiences. There is much more to social media than just generating a buzz. It is also about striking a chord, creating a resonance with stakeholders.”

This interview of mine was published by India Triple Play.com – a project to talk, debate, discuss and learn about triple play (voice, data and video) and other related technologies like broadband and IPTV, in India – in it’s entrepreneurs series.

Tell me what you think