Freelance Consultant's Diary

What is common (and of interest to businesspeople) among Brangelina (the relationship of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie), TomKat (the relationship of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes), Revenge of the Sith, Paris Hilton & Paris Latsis , and Carrie Underwood (the latest American Idol)? Well, these popular culture "events" can actually throw your business planning into chaos due to the enormity of their impact. While businesses can plan for certain events, for instance, release of a movie or the finale of a TV program, but the divorce of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston was totally unexpected and no one could predict when Paris Hilton would accept a proposal from Paris Latsis? While people are affected by political and economic events, the engagement is less powerful than cultural events. President Bush would love to get the kind of audience Michael Jackson received the day of his verdict for his proposal to privative Social Security . What does it mean for you? Have a contingenc...

In terms of an effective product recall strategy , I have argued that there need to be two fundamental elements: Development of a strategy at the same time the product is launched so that in case of a problem, everyone knows what to do. Be proactive in recalling rather than dragging your feet. Guidant Corporation did neither of the two. When first report came out that that the company continued to sell defective cardiac defbillators, the process of delays and denials started. Only now the company has finally decided to recall a series of devices (Ventak Prizm, Contak Renewal, Vitality AVT, etc.). There is a very important reason why we at iProceed insist that our clients have a product recall strategy in place and always demonstrate the highest ethical values - the impact of lawsuits. A few recent examples of drugs like Vioxx, Bextra , Tysabri , Adderall , etc. show that when companies delayed their recall process, they were hit with more class action lawsuits and attorneys find it ea...

In March this year, I had a chance to have lunch with Sanjay Behl (at the conference on India and its neighbors at the Harvard Business School ), the head of marketing at Nokia India. It was quite exciting to hear about the rapid growth of mobile phones in a poor country like India and how Nokia has been creative in customize its offering to the local situation. In other words, Nokia is an excellent case study for all those companies that have huge businesses in the developed world but are struggling to grow because of the mature nature of the market. Countries in Latin America, South East Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Central and Eastern Europe are among the fastest growing new markets for mobile services, according to new consumer research by Nokia. The study found that brand, handset quality, and network service quality are strong market drivers in New Growth Markets that sometimes outweigh the cost factors that industry watchers typically expect. I have even come across studie...

When I had argued that our healthcare system is ready for structural changes (as a result of a collapse due to it being totally dysfunctional), I did not know that the problem was even worse. Apart from 45 million uninsured Americans (US is the richest country in the world), there are as many as 16 million adults that were underinsured in 2003, meaning they did not have enough financial protection to cover their health care expenses. (Related article: Business opportunity in providing healthcare to uninsured Americans ) In a study, "Insured But Not Protected: How Many Adults Are Underinsured?" The Commonwealth Fund's Cathy Schoen, Michelle Doty, Sara Collins, and Alyssa Holmgren find that inadequate coverage — much like no coverage at all — creates obstacles to care and other burdens. Underinsured adults are almost as likely as the uninsured to go without needed medical care and to incur medical debt. Lower-income and sicker adults are most at risk of having inadequate c...

An unconfirmed report by The Wall Street Journal says that Procter & Gamble is sharply cutting its advance purchases of television commercials. My reaction was "So some advertising folks are finally getting it!" In fact what surprises me is that there are still so many ad executives who continue to spend their dollars on television advertising - what is clearly a very low ROI channel . The report says that P&G will reduce its spend with cable channels by about 25 percent. So where is the money going? Product placement is clearly happening. I had talked about this in the past in the context of what you need to do when traditonal advertising is not effective . The approach that I like is what you see on a program like the Queer Eye for the Straight Girl. I had used the example of Crest Whitestrips placement by P&G . If P&G were to do what the Journal is reporting, it is nothing surprising to us here at iProceed . However, since it has become public knowledge n...

There will be occasions when your website might be thrown out of a search engine for no reason at all. Actually you may not even have done anything wrong at all and you may still be thrown out. Why would that be? If you follow standard web design practices and a substantial number of websites start to employ the same tricks, it is not uncommon for search engines to penalize all websites so that they can control search engine manipulation. In other words, you are simply a victim of search engine algorithm change. (Related article: How to do marketing for your website? ) What can you do if a search engine blacklists your website? You can write to them. However, except for Google , do not even expect that your email will be read by a human being. You might simply receive an automated response. With the huge number of websites on the Internet and the number of emails that the search engine staff might receive, it is unreasonable for you to expect that someone will actually read that email....

For the longest time, I have been arguing that there are enormous business opportunities in the healthcare sector - more specifically, in providing healthcare services to the uninsured . During last couple of days, two more interesting pieces of data were made available that make the argument even stronger. Health insurance premiums will cost families and employers an extra $900 on average during 2005 to cover the costs of caring for the uninsured, according to a report released by Families USA, a non-profit, non-partisan organization. With the added cost, the yearly premiums for a family with coverage through an employer will average $11,000 in 2005. By 2010, the additional costs for the uninsured will be $1,500, and total premiums will hit $17,000. In 11 states, the costs of the uninsured will exceed $2,000 per family. General Motors is reporting that its huge healthcare commitments are primarily responsible for its problems ($1,500 comes out from the profit of each car to pay for he...

When General Motors' Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rick Wagoner announced that it will reduce its manufacturing employment level in the U.S. by 25,000 or more people in the 2005 to 2008 period to generate annual savings of approximately $2.5 billion, my reaction was, "Too little, too late." When a business leader uses layoffs and plant shutdown as the only ways to create shareholder value , it is time for her/him to stop leading that enterprise. It is the easiest way out. Even an idiot can cut costs by doing this and make the business look profitable. It does nothing to improve the overall, long-term outlook of the business. (Related article: How to implement cost-reduction programs? ) Let us briefly look at what GM's competitors are doing while it is trying to cut costs and shut down plants. Hyundai has recently invested approximately $1.4 billion in North America and has now facilities in Alabama, Michigan, and California. The company does not stop talking ...

On the heels of eBay's acquisition of Shopping.com , which I did not think was an excellent strategic move, comes the announcement by E.W. Scripps that it is acquiring Shopzilla.com . In my opinion, this acquisition makes perfect sense as does the acquisition of About.com by The New York Times . Why these acquisitions make sense? Steady decline in newspaper subscriptions. Loss of interest among 18-34 males in watching television . Explosive growth in online advertising and search related to shopping Particularly for Scripps, which owns some of the hottest online properties in its portfolio, acquition of Shopzilla is an excellent strategic fit. As Scripps will face challenges in its newspaper and TV stations business, investment into its online business will provide it with the resources for a gradual business model transformation . What does it mean for you? The world of advertising is undergoing structural changes with greater emphasis on pay-for-performance. If your business m...

I have been scratching my head all day today to figure out why eBay , a great company that I admire immensely, will acquire Shopping.com . Not that Shopping.com is not a good company, but somehow I do not see a business model fit between the two. eBay has been very successful in its niche and so has Shopping.com, but the two types of shoppers that they attract are so far apart in their approaches to shopping. While eBay is characterizing the acquisition as a way to provide more opportunities for its sellers, I believe that eBay wants to tap into the pool of 50 million visitors to Shopping.com website. With its 60 million users, eBay will have access to approximately 100 million visitors allowing it to become even a larger player in attracting online shoppers - the people that Google , MSN , Yahoo, Amazon , and many other websites are chasing. The other reason why eBay is interested in diversification is the modest growth rate in the auction business. Through its aggressive strategy, e...