State Bank of India: A Journey from Traditional Retail Banking to Consumer Driven Modern Banking

Before writing this article one small confession, “I’m not a Subject-Matter Expert in retail banking & I’m not a huge fan of SBI’s banking service. It is like a tiny experience with a big impact on my perception.”

State Bank of India, popularly known as SBI always claims that – “With you all the way. Pure banking nothing else. The nation's bank on us.” But if you have ever visited an overcrowded SBI branch you might not have experienced these big, catchy taglines. The reasons, you know better than me.

The feeling might be same for the Internet Banking Service (INB) of SBI. You might have tried booking one IRCTC tatkal ticket using SBI INB, you might not have received the One-Time Password (OTP) ever. You might have done some urgent transaction but might have received the OTP, 30 minutes after the transaction. Tons of examples are there and my perception was neither different.

But this Independence day- my perception about SBI INB has changed (but remained same for the overcrowded branches). It was like WOW!! Is it real? SBI INB does have this service?

Let me share this WOW experience with you.

Fortunately or unfortunately my SBI debit card got expired on August 2016 and SBI had sent a new debit card to my home address. I got it and this was a timely service. But there was a catch. Once you receive a new card you have to visit your home SBI branch (in-person) and have to collect the new PIN within 45 days of your card receiving date. I’m staying around 2000 KMs away from my SBI home branch and it was practically impossible for me to visit the branch and collect the new PIN.

I read all the instruction documents which came with the debit card. Nothing mentioned about e-generation of new PIN. The same old stuff… visiting the branch blah blah… mentioned there. I got disappointed and thought how could the largest bank of India with such a robust internet banking facility have no such facilities. I searched in Google- “How to generate PIN for your SBI Credit Card” I thought, I won’t get any satisfactory answer. 

But I did get. Like other private banks, SBI INB has something. (https://www.sbicard.com/en/personal/benefits/money-simplified/atm-cash.page). WOW!! It was so simple and so convenient to create a new PIN even without going to the branch. But it was never mentioned in the documents, such a big MISS. The communication is pretty inconsistent across all the channels. This is not the only example. You might have experienced such instances. For a brand like SBI- it creates a huge perceptual gap in the mind of a conscious customer. 

So, my gentle request to SBI, please be consistent across all the customer touch points- be it the traditional touch points or the new digital e-touch points. It might be a good starting point for the BRAND SBI.     

Re-Branding in Indian e-Commerce Space

As per a study by ASSOCHAM-Deloitte, by end of 2015 the Indian e-commerce industry is set to cross $16 billion. This sector has grown steadily from $.4.4 billion in 2010 to $13.6 billion in 2014. This sun-rise industry is flooded with many startups, whereas some established players are diversifying their business offerings as well as adding new business lines and some has gone for REBRANDING. The recent example is Quikr, the online classified business firm with a new logo and new tag line ‘Aasan hai badalna’. Prior to Quikr the largest Indian e-retailer Flipkart has also undergone for rebranding, similarly with a new logo, new tag line ‘Ab Har Wish Hogi Poori’ and 2 minutes 30 seconds long TV commercial. The real estate search portal, Housing.com also has undergone for rebranding during Holi 2015 with a new logo for LOOKING UP. Having discussed these examples, one question comes to mind- Has the value proposition been changed? Let’s understand that.

What is a Brand?: As per bookish definition brand can be defined as “A distinguishing symbol, mark, logo, name word, sentence or combination of these items that companies use to distinguish their product or service from others in market.” This definition is more from the organization or company stand point, but from a customer prospective, brand is something that is provides confidence, passion, belonging, action and security to the customer. There is a very thin, still very distinguish line between the product (or service) and brand. A product (or service) can be defined as a bundle of benefits but brand as a set of unique values. So brand is always made by the customer, for the customer & of the customer.

Quikr Rebranding: Changing the funky logo to a more formal one Quikr, has gone for a fresh look. New business lines like QuikrHome, QuikrCars, QuikrServices & QuikrJobs have been added to the traditional classified business. During inception in 2008, the company aimed to be a simple, reliable C2C (Customer to Customer) market space and they have very much achieved that. Quikr NXT, the instant chat (between buyer & seller) and free home delivery service is bold yet valuable step taken by Quikr.

Flipkart Rebranding: (#AbHarWishHogiPuri) The story is bit different for Flipkart. In 2011-12, this home grown e-retailer used to be a undisputed player in the market but now, the intense competition from global player like Amazon and also from other desi e-retailers like Snap Deal and PayTm making its difficult for Flipkart. Various strategies have been tried and tested for Flipkart- new category addition, digital music, cash on delivery, from a e-retailer to e-market place etc. The current strategy is rebranding. It has came up with a new refreshing look- the logo of a shopping bag with "F" on it and also the new catchy tag line- "Ab Har Wish Hogi Puri". It's very difficult to say anything about the tag line (Har Wish...), but as per industry experts, this logo is mobile friendly and Flipkart is trying to go mobile-only. So the question remain same- has the value proposition been changed for Flipkart or this rebranding is an answer to Amazon's Aur Dikhao (#AurDikhao) and Snap Deal's Dil Ki Deal (#DilKiDeal) campaign?

Rebranding is not just to change the logo or tag line or changing the TV campaign. There must be some visible changes in the offerings. So let's see which e-commerce company in India will go for the change in offerings at the first place, rather than going for changing the logo or tag line. 

Brand Equity Study of Motorola

“Motorola exists to invent, build and deliver the best mobile device on the planet, improving the lives of millions of people”

-Vision Statement of Motorola

1.      RESEARCH OBJECTIVE:

This research project is carried out to evaluate the Brand Equity of Motorola mobility.

2.      RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:

The research was carried out in two stages. The first one is secondary research, followed by the in-depth interview with the Moto G users. 10 in-depth interviews were conducted where the questions are asked about the brand identity of the Moto G and about the customer perception.

3.      ABOUT MOTOROLA MOBILITY:

Motorola is an American telecommunication device manufacturer based at Chicago. They created the world’s first commercial portable cellular phones. On August 2011 Google acquired Motorola mobility division for US$12.5 billion. During 2003 to 2007, worldwide Motorola was one of the leading mobile phone manufacturer. But due to lack of product innovation, continuous improvement, Motorola lost its significant market share. Apart from Moto Razr, Motorola failed to cater the changing need of the customers. But in the late 2013, the introduction of moto G, moto E and moto X (the android versions) resulted some eye-catching results for Motorola. Moto Razr was the biggest success for Motorola. Around 130 million units of moto Razr was sold during 2003 to 2006. 

4.      GLOBAL MOBILE PHONE MARKET:

The global mobile phone market is one of the most competitive and highly volatile market. And in the era of smartphone, technologies change very rapidly as well as the customer preferences. The current valuation (2014) of the global smartphone market is around US$150.3 billion. And the following shows the market share wise breakup for the major brands:

A current report on the ranking of smartphones as per the brand preferences reviles that Apple stands out as most preferred brand for smartphones followed by Samsung and Nokia. Motorola is the number eight in the brand preference list.  

Once pioneer and market leader of mobile phones, Motorola is way behind its competitors to attract the tech savvy customers. The following figure shows the perceptual map (by June 2013) for the global smart phone brands:

We can clear observe that Motorola is catering to the mass market and the durability is unquestionable but it lacks the feature end as well as style and design to attract the youth. Whereas Sony, Nokia and Apple phones are more stylish and trendy and the market leader Samsung is highly equipped with many features.

To analyze the problem, let’s look at the consumer buying journey for any budget smartphone.    

      5.      CONSUMER BUYING JOURNEY:

The following shows the funnel for consumer decision journey for any product.

It all started with customers awareness set of brand, followed by Familiarity set of brands, then the consideration set and purchase set. Finally the consumer moves to loyalty. If we follow the above funnel method for any budget smartphone buying, then a hypothetical funnel may look like as given below:

The awareness set of budget smartphone contains eight models from Samsung, Micromax, Nokia, Motorola, Asus, Xiaomi, HTC and Lenovo. Moving along the funnel, the purchase set contains three brands: Nokia, Samsung and Motorola.

The customers always consider any brand in their purchase set when they have a clear and strong imagery for the brands.

       6.      NEW MOTO SERIES:

The new moto series of smartphones are launched in the later part of 2013. Moto X was unveiled on August 2013, followed by Moto G on 13^th November 2013 and Moto E was launched on 13^th May 2014. The sole objective of introducing these low end budget smartphone is to tap the growing price sensitive young segments. These models are initially launched in developing market like Latin America and South-East Asia, subsequently they are launched in the developed markets.    

       7.      THE TRINITY OF BRAND STRATEGY:

The current brand strategy of Motorola can be analyzed by using the trinity of brand strategy.

       7.1   VALUE PROPOSITION:

“Value for money” is the value proposition for Moto G.

       7.2   POSITIONING:

The Brand Mantra for Moto G is “Exceptional Phone, Exceptional Price”. Like many other smartphone it has various common features like Android OS, Dual SIM, Feature loaded, google play enabled etc. The PODs of Moto G is the only phone as of now provides latest android OS (ver. 4.4.2/KitKat) Ergonomic design and Google OK in a very attractive price. If we look into the substantiator: 1million Moto G are sold in India in 5 months.      

       7.3   BRAND IDENTITY:

The above depicts the brand identity prism for Moto G. The rallying cry for Moto G is “Good things come in small packages”. The Capabilities of Moto G are the aesthetic, up to dated OS, good user interaction. The personality (human traits) of Moto G are young, resourceful and honest. The shared values are “value for money” and “Express Yourself”. The aspirational self-image that Moto G has smart, up to date and efficient. The Noble Purpose is “Access to all” and the Internal Culture and Value is “Uncompromised value & quality”  

8.RAND ELEMENTS:

The above shows three brand elements of Motorola. The slogan “Intelligence Everywhere” the brand name and the new logo.

A recent survey reviles that the association of Motorola with Google created a hype in the market and positive response from the market.

        9.      VERDICT:    

Brands are intangible. They are difficult to isolate, hard to measure. There are no simple formulas for measuring a brand’s “return,” or—when cared for poorly—measuring its drag on financial performance. But a brand’s intangibility is also what makes it so valuable (and in turn makes a sensitive measurement tool for brands all the more valuable).

Differentiation is the catalyst for action in brand development. It’s the first step to the other Pillars of the Brand. Motorola believes in making fewer-but more differentiated-Android devices

The second step in brand development is Relevance. If a brand isn’t relevant, or personally appropriate to consumers, it isn’t going to attract and keep them. Differentiation can lead to a fling, but without a belief that there is a relevant connection to one’s own life, a consumer won’t engage in a serious long-term loyalty. Relevance means Motorola standing for something. Rather than trying to become everything to everybody with a “game changer” handset as per old Motorola’s strategy, the new strategy is to be relevant to the consumer’s everyday needs .Motorola currently focuses on giving consumers better tools to tell their own story. Motorola’s mantra currently is “Doing common things uncommonly well”.

The third key measure identified is Esteem— the extent to which consumers like a brand and hold it in high regard. Esteem relates to how well a brand fulfills its implied or overtly stated consumer promise. It doesn’t occur without Differentiation and Relevance having preceded it, but it can outlive those Pillars by many years. In regards to this dimension being one the oldest brand in the field and being known for its uncompromising quality puts Motorola on a positive stead.

If a brand has established its Relevant Differentiation and consumers come to hold it in high Esteem, brand Knowledge is the outcome. High Knowledge means consumers understand and have internalized what the brand stands for. Motorola has reached this stage in the mind of the customers.

       10.      REFERENCES:

• Chawla, D. & Sondhi, N. (2011). Research Methodology Concepts and Cases. New Delhi: Vikash Publishing House Pvt. Ltd.
• Kotler, P. & Keller, K.L. (2012). Marketing Management. Fourteenth Edition. New Jersey: Pearson Education Inc.
• Motorola (n.d.).Company Profile. Retrieved August 21, 2014 http://www.motorola.com/us/About-Motorola/Corporate-About-Motorola.html
• Motorola (n.d.).Company Profile. Retrieved August 20, 2014 http://www.motorola.com/us/consumers/about-motorola-us/About_Motorola-Corporate_Overview/About_Motorola-Corporate_Overview.html
• TOI Tech. (2014, Feb 07) Moto G vs top three rivals Retrieved August 19, 2014, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/slideshow/moto-g-vs-top-three-rivals/itslideshowviewall/30003600.cms
• http://www.flipkart.com/motorola?otracker=hp_nmenu_sub_electronics_0_Motorola
• http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/smartphones-market.asp
• http://phys.org/news/2014-02-nokia-blackberry-motorola-lost-glory.html
• http://www.labbrand.com/knowledge/labreport/brand-positioning-strategies-rising-chinese-smartphone-brands      
• http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/marketing_sales/the_consumer_decision_journey
• http://www.brandamplitude.com/blog/item/value-proposition-brand-identity-and-positioning-why-your-brand-needs-all-three
• http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/Flipkart-sells-1-million-Motorola-phones-in-5-months/articleshow/38093792.cms
• http://www.amzer.com/blog/2013/06/motorola-mobility-gets-colourful-new-logo-with-official-google-association/           
• http://web.pdx.edu/~sbaweb/faculty/ahutinel/Read/5.pdf