Gauravonomics Blog

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Read about how a soft-hard-soft leadership style works best in an environment that is constantly changing.

Management literature is littered with debates on what is the right leadership style. Most of these models recognize that there is no right leadership style, that different leadership styles work in different environments.

Based on my own experience over the last few years, I have found that a soft-hard-soft leadership style works best in an environment that is constantly changing.

Simply put, a soft leadership style is focused on people and a hard leadership style is focused on targets and processes.

According to my Soft-Hard-Soft Leadership Style Model, managers need to adopt their leadership styles to how easy or difficult their environment is.

There are three stages in the Soft-Hard-Soft Leadership Style Model model –

Stage 1 - Soft-Soft

When the environment is soft and targets/ processes are not under pressure, managers should adopt a soft leadership style to maintain the feel-good factor in the team.

Stage 2 - Hard-Hard

Quick Summary: Read about the five levels in the Marketing Chain of Being, and the three laws that govern how brands move between them.

In an earlier post, I had written that, like the Renaissance Chain of Being, there is also a Marketing Chain of Being.

In this post, I’ll explain the five levels in the Marketing Chain of Being, and the three laws that govern how brands move between them.

There are five levels in the Marketing Chain of Being –

1. Commodity Hell, in which brands basically focus on price and channel promotions to sell more (think groceries).
2. Differentiation, in which brands highlight product features and benefits to command a price premium (think automobiles).
3. Engagement, in which brands use service (in both its customer service and conversation meaning) to develop relationships with customers (think Dell).
4. Cultural Currency, in which brands become shared social objects and help customers define their individual and group identities (think Nike+iPod).
5. Meaning, in which brands become the tools that customers use for self-realization or restoration (think Google).

Quick Summary: Read about how engagement is only the middle level in the ‘Marketing Chain of Being’ and how social media and customer service are only tools to create engagement.

The topic of the week in the marketing and public relations blogosphere is whether customer service is the new marketing, so much so that there’s even an upcoming event on the topic.

Most of the posts on the topic have focused on how social media is causing customer service and public relations to merge into each other to form the fabric of a new marketing paradigm.

I’m a brand manager, not a PR practitioner, and I can’t but feel that the above statement is rather simplistic. Yes, customer service is important. Yes, word of mouth is important, and, by association, public relations is important. Yes, good (or bad) customer service is an important factor in creating favorable (or unfavorable) word of mouth. Yes, social media gives customers the tools to amplify word of mouth. Yes, yes, yes and yes. But that’s only part of the story. Let me tell you the real story by going back to my post on the Marketing Chain of Being.

Quick Summary: Read about a new brand-centric business model for mobile advergaming.

At yesterday’s Mobile Monday Mumbai session, as I watched Jump Games CEO Salil Bhargava present a case for mobile advergaming, I kept asking myself why it didn’t (yet) make sense for Indian marketers.

Later, as Salil was joined by Anant Rangaswami from Campaign India magazine and Nidhi Taparia from Tata Indicom for a panel discussion moderated by VeerChand Bothra from Netcore Solutions, I actually asked them –

So, why exactly should mobile advergaming become an essential part of my media plan?

As I expected, the discussion quickly turned to how marketers expect too much from digital media.

However, since I think of myself as a digital media evangelist — I want mobile/ online advertising to work — I told myself to not think about all the reasons mobile advergaming won’t work for me and instead think about the set of conditions under which it would work for me.

Quick Summary: Read about The Xeta Shootout Contest, where you can make your own Xeta TV commercial in a video or storyboard format and win an Indica V2 Xeta.

Winning a car is now as easy as 1-2-3.

Step 1. Visit the Xeta Shootout Contest and watch the Indica V2 Xeta television commercial.

Step 2. Create your own Xeta TVC in the form of a video or a storyboard.

Step 3. Upload your entry on the contest website.

The best entry will win an Indica V2 Xeta.

You can also watch the entries submitted by others and comment on them, participate in a slogan contest on the message board, or tell your friends about the contest.

If you are wondering why I’m promoting The Xeta Shootout Contest on my blog, this is what I do in my Indica Brand Manager avatar, when I’m not blogging about being the next marketing guru.

Quick Summary: Read about the M20 list of top ranked blogs written by client-side marketers and my profile on the M20 blog.

I had always wondered if all marketing blogs were written by agency people, until I came across The M20: Top Marketer Blogs.

The M20 — maintained by Peter Kim — is a list of the top ranked blogs written by client-side marketers.

Apart from maintaining a list of the top twenty blogs, Peter also does regular profiles of client-side marketers who blog. Here’s mine.

By the way, here are the top twenty blogs by client-side marketers in November ‘07 –

Quick Summary: Read about how your following/ followers ratio is a foolproof indicator of your position on the blogging chain of being.

Today, I found myself Twittering about the following/ followers ratio, that is, the ratio between the number of people whose blog you read/ who you follow on Twitter and the number of people who read your blog/ follow you on Twitter. Then, as I compiled my updates into a Twitter thread, I had a Eureka moment — I realized that your following/ followers ratio is a foolproof indicator of your position on the blogging chain of being.

If your Following/ Followers ratio is > 2 or < 1/2, you are listening or talking, but not communicating. (Twitter)

That signal to noise (Following/ Followers) ratio rule holds for Twitter/ Pownce, but it also holds for blogs/ RSS feeds. (Twitter)

When you start communicating via a new medium, your Following/ Followers ratio will be typically > 2. (Twitter)

If you are good at using the medium, over time, you will build a following and the Following/ Followers ratio will fall between 1/2 and 2. (Twitter)

Quick Summary: Read about the marketing and blogging chain of being.

Have I ever told you why Grant McCracken is brilliant — because he often makes me think. Like he did today when he asked –

Could there be a great chain of being in the marketing world?

Of course, Grant, there is a great chain of being, not only in the marketing world, but also in the blogging world.

The Renaissance Chain of Being

The Marketing Chain of Being

The Blogging Chain of Being

By the way, here’s the inside story on why most bloggers blog — blogging allows the world to find out how brilliant we are, individually and collectively.

If you think I’m totally brilliant, do let me know via a comment or an e-mail.

David Armano on the importance of being an office influential –

Make no mistake, office influentials are self-educating themselves in ways that can be beneficial not only to themselves but to their organizations. Being an active participant in social media means you learn how to custom design web pages and profiles, manage your personal brand, network and communicate with people from all business and backgrounds.

That sounds a lot like yours truly, but I don’t think my Technorati rank will be a factor in deciding my annual bonus anytime soon.

Quick Summary: Read about how we have moved from corporate communications to the communications marketplace and, therefore, need to measure share of credibility instead of share of voice.

I was recently tagged by Connie Bensen on the social media measurement meme started by Geoff Livingston.

I have uploaded my response to the meme in the form of a presentation.

My presentation answers the question of how to measure returns on social media through three key insights –

- We have moved from corporate communications to the communications marketplace.
- Credibility is the currency of the communications marketplace.
- Therefore we need to measure share of credibility instead of share of voice.

The meme has resulted in some excellent posts and I would strongly urge you to spend an evening reading them — Geoff Livingston, Kami Huyse, Connie Bensen (2), Clay Newton, David Jones, Beth Kanter, Valeria Maltoni, Peter Imbres, Kelli Matthews, Bill Sledzik and Greg Cangiolosi.

Instead of tagging five people, I’m sending out an open invite to all my readers this time — do pitch in with your own insights on measuring social media ROI.