Why does a  company like Wipro have its presence on Second Life...?! To stay Ahead of course......

Vinod Harith, Head - Marketing Communi-cations, Wipro Techno-logies speaks about the new trends in Internet marketing.  A marketing professional with over 15 years of global marketing experience, he has handled leadership roles in marketing and communi-cations for some of the most visible brands and organizations including iGATE Global Solutions, Hyundai Motors and SSI. He is currently the global head of marketing communi-cations for Wipro Techno-logies where he leads the company's brand, PR and influencer relations, world-wide events, CRM, global alliances marketing
and thought leadership initiatives.

Excerpts from Mr.Vinod's Talk....

The way we currently use the internet is like we use our brains, we only use a small part of the potential of the net. The net holds so much potential, we just need to pick up what works for us and use it optimally. We need to first assess what our advertising strategy is, using our own judgement and go about it, not by others opinions, since we know our product or service and our target audience.

How many of you have heard about second life, it's the most popular virtual world. It's a great place, you should go there, It's pretty much like doing what you do in the real life, you can work, you can go for a party, you can have a girl friend and so on. Apart  from that , it's a great opportunity to transform your brand, to change people's perception about your company.

There are 10 million people who live on second life and the number is growing. Wipro is the first Indian company to have a presence on Second life.  Once we started exploring second life, we realised that it was not just fun, lot of serious things happen there. New product ideas are thrashed out, new products are evaluated and test marketed here. It is a very powerful platform, but you need to separate the Wheat from Shaff, identify what works best for your company and product or service and work on it.

80% of our marketing activities are still the traditional methods like hoarding, email marketing etc. At the same time Wipro evaluated and integrated 4 areas on second life, where 10 million people can see the brand. Most of these people are young and yuppy, young professionals, students and entrepreneurs. So to match this the experience on second life should be interesting and it's a great platform to showcase your uniqueness. You need to build your brand afresh or change perceptions e.g. From a ‘Boring company' to a ‘YO brand'

It's a forum for Thought leadership and Innovation and the hotbed for test ideas. Open your minds to new possibilities, explore new ways to promote your product or company on virtual world. Wipro has Downloadable brochures, presentations, papers, and Applied Innovation T - Shirt that can be worn by any avatar that visits Second Life, it is also used effectively as a recruitment tool. The visitor can load his resume after going through the presentation.

The online presence can't be a one off effort. The presence on Second Life should be integrated with your online marketing strategy; it should be a part of the eco-system, and not the eco-system itself. The Messages or theme should be integrated with your online strategy. The branding should be different and interesting, don't mirror your real life brand. Create an engagement and not just a presence, If people are bored they will go away. Here you can dare to be different and interesting !!

Promote usage by your employees - they are your best brand ambassadors, Wipro has used about 200 brand ambassodors to promote the brand on second life. Focus on what works for your brand.

We use internet as a powerful medium to push ideas to our target audience. We can change the Brand perception, the way people look at our organization. The boring campus on Madiwala road can be made to look interesting. CIO's actually come to India and buy based on their perception; here we create a creative perception. Our presence on Second life is still a work in progress.

Second life is also a forum to raise awareness, align with and contribute to Social causes like Global warming. Social networking is very effective, not many people use networking as a marketing media or as a brand building media in India, but is soon catching on.

He was speaking at a Panel Discussion organized by Businessgyan and TASMAC on the topic ‘Internet Marketing'.  

Compiled by Ms. Mangal D Karnad for Businessgyan

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