How to become a 'Chatter-Box' in a GD?

Take sides.

If you are one who talks very less (no entry or max 2 entries) in a Group Discussion (GD) then this tip will work wonders for you. To start talking more right from the next GD, start taking sides.

Narrowing your focus, putting yourself in the shoes of a person who just wants to talk about one side of the arguments will get you more ideas, you will talk more.

This recommendation is based on observations in the GD training classes I take in Hyderabad. Take the case of a GD wherein the topic is "Nuclear families are better than Joint families." You can speak both for and against, but if you do take a side, then you can generate more content and passion to talk more. Enter more times. Do a better job.

Try this technique in your next GD and see a drastic change in the number of times you speak. Try it.
Taking sides does not mean a 'debate' situation wherein you disagree with all that's said against your point of view. You need not counter all the opposite argument. Taking sides only means, take a side, speak for / against and speak with more passion.

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Big Bazar's Exchange Offer: Making You Spend More?

(courtesy:FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

Big Bazaar is positioned as 'isse sasta aur accha kahin nahin' (nothing is cheaper and better than this). It has come up with another offer which is currently running across all its stores.

You can exchange your old clothes, newspapers, plastics, bottles and tyres, etc for eye-poppingly high prices. Newspapers for Rs.25/kg. Clothes Rs.200/kg.

That's awesome man! was first reaction to the newspaper ad. Later I started analysing and came to the conclusion that it's another good business strategy by Big Bazaar.

Let's do the maths.

Case 1: You take your 10 kgs newspaper and sell it in your neighbourhood. You get Rs.60 cash with which you can buy 3 kgs of rice and come home.

Case 2: You take your 10kgs newspaper and exchange it in Big Bazaar. They give you a coupon of Rs.250, but you need to buy goods worth Rs.1,000 to avail the offer. Purchase worth Rs.1,000!!!

Ok, what can you buy?
You can't buy anything and everything. You need to choose from the list Big Bazaar gives you. After having spent Rs.1,000 you come home tired. You also spend on travelling to and fro to Big Bazaar. Do you realise that you are Rs.1000 lighter on your pocket?

What does Big Bazaar gain out of it?

1. Customer acquition at a low cost (very smart)
2. Get rid of stocks they want to push
3. Word of mouth publicity

It does not hurt the customer who anyways comes every month to shop worth Rs.1,000 or more.

Why does Big Bazaar do this? Here is the math.
Big Bazaar's loss on reselling newspapers = Rs.250 (value of coupon) - Rs.100 (selling price of newspapers) = Rs.150
(assuming Big Bazaar can resell newspaper at a higher price of Rs.10/kg)

Big Bazaar's gain on selling merchandise worth Rs.1,000 = 30% of 1000 = Rs.300
(assuming a margin of 30%, as Big Bazaar would not let you exchange goods where they do not make money)

Big Bazaar's loss on the exchange coupon = 70% of 250 = Rs.175
(You get a coupon of 250 to buy goods. If 30% is profit margin, then BB pays 70% to the supplier of the goods)

Net loss to Big Bazaar = Rs. 25

We can look at this cost as the 'Cost of Acquiring New Customers'. Many people because of these offers will enter Big Bazaar for the very first time. That's also a reason they are running a 3 week long campaign. It's also a cost of 'Building Brand Awareness.'

By the way, if we assume a marging of 35%, then Big Bazaar actually makes a profit of Rs. 37.50 from every customer who walks in with 10 kgs of newspapers. This looks like a more probable case. At 40% margin, they would make Rs.100!

Conclusion:
If you mind spending the additional Rs.1,000 then stay away. When you are forced to spend Rs.1,000 you will end up with 50% impulse purchase items. I wonder what's happened to the the famous long queues at Big Bazaar. They must have gone even longer now-a-days.

What do you feel about this offer? Have you exchanged any of your old stuff at BB? Write to me and share your thoughts.

GD: Do's and Dont's

To crack a GD, you should know what you have to do and what you have to avoid at any cost. This useful list of Do's and Dont's comes out from my personal experience of scores of GDs as a student and as an instructor:

Do's
1. Remain constantly involved in the GD (speaking + listening + body language)
2. Let others talk (GD is not one-way traffic)
3. Make a meaningful contribution to the GD (make 2/3 solid points)
4. Maintain good eye contact and body posture
5. Interact with other students prior to the GD (makes you comfortable during the GD)
6. Examples to explain your point (examples clarify your point well and also get remembered)
7. Talk at some length. Do not make a 15 sec point and disappear. It wont even get
noticed.
8. Be ready to make your point in 30 secs. No one would be ready to give you more time than that.
9. Keep listening, thinking and trying to generate new content even while the GD is on.
10. Try to bring in a new thought into the GD atleast once. A perspective.

Dont's
1. Look at the moderator
2. Let your hand over-shadow your neighbor
3. Try to boss around
4. Make points in isolation (GD is not a dart competition where you keep throwing in your points. You have to either go with the flow or give the group a new direction)
5. Go round and round. Say your main thing (core idea) at the start of the point and then explain it. Others will intercept you if they don't see substantial content.
6. Don't give up if others are not letting you talk. Persevere, keep trying to enter. Perseverance always wins.
7. Don't talk very fast. When you get an opportunity make the most of it. Talk slow, loud & clear. Ensure you are heard well by the moderator.
8. Don't switch off after you have made your point. Stay in the thick of things always. (Similar to point 1 of Do's)
9.Do not get over excited and point fingers at others. No one is an enemy in the GD. Keep your cool.
10. Don't talk in a fish market. Your point might get stolen and remade by someone else later.

Hope that helps!
If you need any clarification on any of the points, leave a comment.

How to Enter in a GD? Part II

How to enter a GD is perhaps the most common problem most of the students face. I offered one solution in my earlier post today:

Throw in a catchy phrase (an example).
That will make people curious, make them stop and listen to you.

Here is one more technique:

Say this to the person whom you want to intercept; "You have made a brilliant point, I would like to add to it by..."

Once you say, "you have made a brilliant point" the other speaker has to stop and let you have the way. I have seen it working in real life. However, know when you should say this. When (1) he actually has made a good point, and (2) he is nearing the end of his point.

Remember this Golden Rule:
You should never intercept when someone has just started to make a good point.

Advani@Campus

LK Advani is doing what Obama did in the US; a blog, a website, google ad words campaign and social media networking (facebook etc). He has been doing this for 3/4 months now.

He has now taking the next step to targetting the youth of the country.
Brand Advani is now going to campuses. To spread Advani's thoughts BJP is sending speakers to more than 5000 campuses in India. Speakers people identify and relate with. A doctor to a medical college and so on.

I believe so much of smart strategy and initiative is a definite USP of BJP. They have always been ahead in this game. This time they are replicating Obama's successful model to Indian conditions. Marketers should keep a close watch. It never gets bigger than this. One man branding himself to appeal to the youth of a country as big and as diverse as India.

Mr. Advani the marketers are watching you!

How to Enter in a GD?

After having conducted so many GD sessions for MBA entrance students and having gone through the grind myself, I realise that making an entry in a GD is perhaps the toughest problem a candidate faces.

You have points to make, you are a good communicator, you want to speak but you just can't enter. Every GD has 2 or 3 great guys who keep talking and talking. How do you make these villains stop and listen to you?

The answer surprisingly is simple. There are many proven ways to enter a GD. In this post, I will talk about what I like the most. My favorite method.

Thrown in a catchy phrase to begin with.

You are discussing a topic on "Managers are born not made." Everyone has points and people are talking all the time. Amidst all this, you chip in a name...

Rajiv Gandhi...

No one can restrict to know what you are going to say. Human minds are very curious and always wants to find out what it does not know. If you say, Dhirubhai Ambani, we know what you are going to talk about. He as a born manager. That's cliche. I know that. But Rajiv Gandhi?

Someone else says, "Friends let me tell you about Babur." Your mind fails you, "Babur" how did he come here? You are forced to listen. And if the point is good (remember, the content is king) the speaker has done his job.

The moral of the story is: Once in a while, start with a catchy phrase. Immediately after the catchy phrase you need to say your core message in not more than 20 seconds. Post which, if you are allowed air time you can substantiate your point.

Catchy Phrase (The bait) --> Core Message --> Description/ More Examples

How to Talk More In Your Next GD

I have taken a lot of GD sessions for MBA entrance students this month. During every GD I get a lot of ideas on how students can make a bigger imapct in the GD.

Let's focus on a problem.
Many students who do not enter often come back saying they did not have enough points to make in the GD or that their points got exhausted (as someone else said it before they could). What do you do in such a situation? When you are running out of points?

You generate more points.

In one GD session, I and my students came up with this mnemonic "PIG SHEDS". In the next class, I added one more 'S' to it. It is now called "PIG SHEDSS."

This will help you look at a topic from different angles, perspectives and generate more points to talk about. Use it well and see the result on your own.

Let's take a topic and see how PIG SHEDSS helps.
"Advertising is bad for the society."

P - Pros/Cons - You think for the topic and against the topic.

I - Instances or Examples. Think of real life examples. How important AIDS advertising is.

G - Geography. Come out of India, talk of the US, Europe, SE Asia etc.

S - Stakeholders. You, Your family, society, country, advertising company, ad agency, government. Think from each of these stakeholders' point of view and you get more ideas. For a company planning to launch a new product, advertising is so crucial.

H - History. Go back in timeline. Think 50 years back, 25 years back.

E - Economics. Can you relate it to business and economics?

D - Definition. Define each term in the topic. What is advertising? What do you mean by society?

S - SWOT analysis of the topic

S - Statistics (any numbers, survey you can think of?)

Use this Mnemonic and do share how it has helped you crack your next GD.
Best of luck!

Unfair & Lovely - The Problem of Counterfeits

An article in Business Standard mentions that the 113,000 crore FMCG industry loses around 5,000 crores of revenue every year due to counterfeits. The counterfeits are everywhere. The top two brands in any category face the brunt more.

Other than loss of revenue, it's the loss of brand value which hurts more. Imagine a customer who buys a fake Fair & Lovely and gets skin burn. He would blame HUL because he is unaware that the product he bought was a fake one.

The article mentions that fake products go by the name "Sunslik" instead of "Sunsilk" (just an interplay of words). Having worked in FMCG, I have seen an even more severe case where they use the same logo and will manufacture a "Sunsilk" itself and sell. They don't even change the name.

The solution to this problems can be many:

1. Train the sales force to detect counterfeit better
2. Better R&D to produce packs which are tougher to counterfeit
3. Regular raids by the legal team in suspected areas
4. Strengthen relationships with channel intermediaries. Wholesale is the channel which counterfeits will also use to sell their product. The manufacturer of fake products might be unknown but the seller (the wholesaler) is known to all.

Attack the problem where you have more control!

The Secret of Success in MBA GD/PIs - Start Selling Yourself!

It's GD/PI time.

Students are going through their n-th GD at their coaching institute and they have had z stress interviews till now. Each interviews looks like a stress interview. After every GD the moderator says, talk more. If you talk more, he says talk sense. There is utter chaos. Will somebody tell me what's the secret to succeeding in all this mess?

Relax guys! The secret lies in 3 letters of the alphabet

USP

True, its your USP (unique selling proposition).
What is in you that differentiates you from the rest? If you are able to show it to the institute then you are through.

Why is USP the secret mantra?
Because there is competition.
After the written tests normally 1000 students would be chasing a mere 100 seats. Are you 1 in 10? The ones which stand out from the rest, will get selected. The institute wants students who will enhance the brand value of the institute and hence they will always choose the best.

What is best?
What looks best, what seems best, what feels best. Remember, perception is reality. You might be the best, but if you are not able to present yourself that way then you will not be able to succeed.

Compare yourself to a salesman. You are selling yourself in the GD/PI. The buyer will not ask what's great in you. You need to say it. You also have to justify your USP with examples.

What is your USP?
Do you know the 5 things which separate you from the rest? Trust me there would be 5 such things. Dig these out.

How to drive your USP?
Know the 5 things that are your USP and plug them in whenever you get a chance in the interview.

If you get a question like "Why should we select you?" consider yourself lucky. What the interviewer is asking is "What's your USP? How are you different from competition?"

The next GD/PI you attend, plan to differentiate yourself from the rest. In the interview, give the interviewer enough reasons to select you. Show him what's great in you. Don't wait for the buyer to ask. Start selling yourself!

Best of luck!

Look Who's Celebrating

Saw an ad by Future Generali Insurance today which shows a man who has just got a double increment. He comes home. Gifts something to everyone and nothing to his wife. The wife looks at him curiously. Finally, he reveals that he has bought life insurance for himself and made her the nominee.

The ad ends something like this
Future Generali: Ek shagun zindagi ke naam

A very emotional ad indeed. But wait, there is something wrong. Did you get it?

It's the increment man!

Just tell me who is getting an increment in this recessionary market. When almost every other company is right-sizing, down-sizing, cutting jobs and pay, you come up with such an ad. I wonder did the guys fail to realise or something. Was the ad shot 6 months back when all was well, and then they thought "chalo dikha dete hain, nuksaan kya hai."

If you have an answer as to how this ad suits today's times please drop in a comment.

1 Dollar CEO

Vikram Pandit, CEO Citi Group is going to draw only a salary of $1 and no bonuses until he brings the group back to profitability. Read this interesting news in ET today.

I am impressed. A great step, mark of a leader who wants to set an example.
Ya, I agree it comes after Obama let his anger out at CEOs of bailed out companies in the US. But, atleast it has come! Atleast somebody is picking up the gauntlet.

Wish Mr. Pandit all the best.

How to crack an MBA Interview?

I have started teaching. Last sunday I took some interviews of students who have been shortlisted from IIMs, XLRI etc. These guys commit the same kind of mistakes that I used to do 5 years back. And I thought the world had gone smarter! Nothing against them, these chaps are young and bright!

This is the inspiration behind this post. Let's begin the interview.

Why MBA?
Student 1: I want to start my own business. Which business? I will decide later... (come on!)
Student 2: I want to lead a campus life (like 5-point someone)... (are you kidding me!)
Student 3: I want to start my own FM radio station. This is my positioning, this is my content.... (I am impressed)

Moral of the story (MOTS): Prepare this question well. What would be the follow up question and what'll be the next question after that?

What are your hobbies?
Student 1: I have no hobbies. (Don't tell me all day you sit at home doing nothing. Couch potato!)
Student 2: Reading. How many books have you read in your life? 50? No sir, only 3 (save me!)
Student 3: Reading. Ayn Rand, fountainhead... talks of this... I like this and not this.. (ok ok, even I am yet to read Fountaihead... pass:)

MOTS: You might have 1 hobby but defend it well. Prepare on the possible questions and go. If you have no hobby you can defend, then cook up one!

Why should I take you?
Student 1: I am hard working (so, do you think others are not?)
Student 2: I am passionate (I said why you, I am not asking your strengths)
Student 3: blah... blah... blah...

MOTS: Expecting an answer from me? No way, its your life, you know better. This is the best question you can ever get. Capitalize on it. You have to tell them in what ways are you different and better from others.

What are your strengths?
Student 1: Honest. I asked what are your real strengths? hmm... Hard working (you know nothing about yourself?)
Student 2: Passionate (how?)

MOTS: Know your strengths, ask your friend and family. Stick to your answer and do not change. Back it up with examples. Asking for your real strengths was just a googly.

What is practical application of derivative?
Student 1: If you have a chart, then dy/dx means... (chart, where did this chart came from?)
Student 2: I dont know.

MOTS: If you do not know an answer you have 2 choices. 1. Say you don't know. 2. Ask the interviewer if you may guess. It's perfectly fine not knowing a few answers.

An interview is where a person sells himself to the interviewer. You have to think like a marketer. What's your USP (unique selling proposition)? Why should I buy you? You are saying 100 things about you, but what is the evidence you are giving me to believe you? For example, when you say your strengths are X & Y, you should have good examples to back it up. Think like a marketer and prepare a sales pitch for yourself. Assume you are a product and not a person. Difficult? Not at all.

My success mantra for all interviewees: Your preparation and confidence will help you succeed.