It is a true incident about, how a cookie shop messed up its sales!

CookieMan is a fast growing cookie brand in India. They have a small outlet at Chennai airport. Till recently, before boarding the flight, I used to buy some delicious cookies from that outlet to keep myself indulged for the evening.

Now, the real shocker! On my recent visit to Chennai, the store guy told me - "that the minimum you can purchase is 250 grams!"

I could not help, but smile at this "strategic" move of the company!

This is how they are messing up their own marketing:

• They are losing an opportunity to connect with their consumers and wow them! An airport lounge can be the best place to get into their minds.
• They are missing an opportunity to identify which product has high shelf-appeal. In fact, they can utilize this opportunity to implement interesting means to do market survey among the middle and upper-middle class of consumers who will be the most frequent buyers of such confectionaries.
• Above all, they are losing sales.

I fail to understand the reason. The only obvious reason that come to my mind:

• They were trying to reduce the work load of their sales guy (Who was sitting idle!)
• They were not interested in consumers who buy less than 250 grams. (Unfortunately, trust is won one step at a time. In fact some of the biggest customers of Indus Net Technologies initially signed up for a simple logo design service and then they kept increasing their exposure with us. Targeting for large sale does work, but nothing works like small experiences that builds relationship one step at a time.)

Besides fixing the obvious issue, this is what they could have done (some random ideas):

• Put a mail-order form and hand it over with every money receipt they give out. Most travelers who experience the cookies might like to mail-order the cookie (in fact on a subscription basis - every month). This can give them an opportunity to sell in decent quantities every month.
• Put a "self help" literature on "history of cookies" & "interesting combos". Indians like to eat in combination (mostly). When people have leisure time at an airport lounge, it is best to make them interested in the product (if not the brand).

And I hope you never repeat this mistake in your business. Give your prospects to try yourself out, one step at a time. Give them great experiences and build relationship one step at a time. They last longer.

BTW, if you have more ideas for them, do contribute. I will update my post with your input.

I am not a very stock market savvy person. But in recent months, I did some stock investments. I made good investments and bad investments. I learnt few basics from my mistakes (I may be still wrong, IMHO) which I would love to share with anyone who cares. My opinion may change with time as I learn more. If you feel like contributing or contradicting, feel free to do so:

1. Do not listen to your "Investment Managers" or so called "Investment Experts" appointed by banks and brokers. They may get you some quick profits, but you will ultimately loose what you earned if you trade on their tips. In the current scenario, you get any guy with a MBA in Finance becoming a stock market expert in a reputed stock brokering firm. They use you to make their own money. If you really need advise, check out business channels like CNBC, etc. Listen to opinions aired by various experts and take your pick.

2. As Robert t. Kiyosaki of Rich Dad Poor Dad fame says - People make profit when they "buy". This means it is very important when you buy. Most people run away from markets when it crashes. But if you see from a positive perspective, the stock market is on a SALE! So it is the best time to buy, just as you rush to the shopping mall when there is a sale. So buy when the SALE is ON!

3. If you are a small time investor who is investing for long term capital gains, look for established companies with proven management. Try to keep your investment in blue-chip companies. Before you choose the blue-chip, look at the sector it works in and its near-term and long-term possibilities. Look how they have performed in past and what kind of guidance their management have given for future. Monitor selected companies and know how they behave with market dynamics. Your investment is safe and will multiply with time.

4. If you do not have time to manage your money, mutual funds are the way to go. Mutual funds has major entry load (as much as 2-3%). Sometime they also have exit load (0.5-2%) and minimum lock-in period. If you are investing in a mutual fund, do not forget to ask about the debt-equity ratio. You should try to understand the kind of portfolio the mutual fund will hold. Convince yourself with past performance of that mutual fund. Dont rush. Your broker earns up to 4% commission on sale and is highly motivated to give you wrong advise to sell the scheme. Be very cautious and make sure that you understand everything before you invest anything.

5. Average out your purchase. You may see volatility in the market. If you buy in one go, you might enter in a high price or a lower price. To smooth out the risk, buy at regular interval at various price levels.

6. Take a long term view. Dont indulge yourself in day trading and short selling. Do not go for short term capital gains. It only makes your broker rich and you remain where you were. 

7. Do not hesitate to negotiate. You will be amazed that you will get cash-back-discounts on your mutual fund investment from your broker (afterall he earns upto 4% of the total investment). You can also negotiate the brokerage rates and service charges.

I will keep updating this list as I learn more.

Abhishek

I feel this is a usability flaw in Gmail’s "Mark as read" contextual menu item.

For all the contextual actions, once the action is done, the checkbox status is turned back to default - i.e. not-checked.

However when you "Mark as read", the mails remain marked i.e. checked, even after the action has taken place. This means the user has to manually un-check all the mails before he takes another action. Thus he is always at a risk of taking wrong action on the un-intentionally checked mails.

I think, once the "Mark as read" or "Mark as unread" is done, the checkbox status of the mails should be turned back to the default. This will provide users a predictable and expected system which is consistent with other options of simmilar nature.

Abhishek