6: How brands are built with Ambi Parameswaran

Ambi Parameswaran brings with him over 35 years of experience in a marketing, sales and advertising. He is an alumnus of IIT Madras and an honour roll graduate of IIM Calcutta. He has a PhD from Mumbai University and has also done the Advanced Management Program from Harvard Business School. He is the author of seven books and more than 100 articles. Ambi has been involved in the building of brands such as Tata Indica, Santoor, TCS and more… actually I would tell the listeners to check his website given in the show notes below. It’s quite comprehensive which documents some of his work.  How dependent is brand building; is it based on a good product / service or good marketing strategy or media buying? Is it possible to make great brands if the product or service is substandard? What is difficult to brand? Service or a product? Why? In one of Steve Jobs interview, he said, marketeers will have more say in companies which seldom change their product line. For eg: Coke or Pepsi. While marketing may not be really required for tech based companies where the product it self is solving user needs. How would you respond to that? Do you think Tech companies need marketing? With growing chaos of brands, especially in India, what are the few challenges which brand experts are facing? Brand like “Khaitan-Sabse Tej" or "Asian Paints-Her ghar such keheta hai” are memorable because of the media buying or profound copywriting and design of the campaign? What is your response to especially e-com brands hurting them and user by incessantly harping on discounts