Mango Frooti Fresh and Juicy roaches

How easy it is for a consumer to walk out on a brand. How easy it is for a brand to lose a consumer? Just one mess up and a bad one at that. What does it tell me? It tells me to be extra careful, extra clean, extra passionate and ensure the experience with my clients is of the top notch and uncompromising. 

Blame it on the guy who stores it before it is handed over to you - the retailer. Blame it on the poor condition of his shop or the pathetic transport system you use but I am blaming you - the brand: Parle Agro!

I got Cockroaches in my pack of Frooti and I am shocked. I usually pick up packs of 8 that you send in one plastic bag and yes I use these straws to consume it. It is one of my childhood's best memories when long unending train journeys from North India to South were punctuataed by the five rupee Frooti packs that came our way to quench our thirst. This nostalgia makes me buy your drink though I don't want to. All these years you built a brand and in one single silly move you committed suicide.

I don't care who does what and who is to blame, I see that you haven't packed my drink properly and these cockroaches crept out of my packs, all eight of them, and they made me go crazy. I felt pukish and sick. You not just spoilt my day but also killed my expectations and as of now you are history for me. Oh yes... Parle Agro's Mango Frooti is fresh and juicy. Don't know about the drink but the cockroaches are!

Trusting your gut?

Most marketers in the US are trusting their gut to determine the marketing spends finds out a survey. And the importance of using data is growing. Hail marketers.

There is a growing awareness of the need to use data in decision-making. According to the Adobe survey, which was conducted by ResearchNow, 39% of respondents used consumer data and behavior more last year to shape their marketing strategies. A larger share – 45% – hope to rely more on these data in the coming year. What’s more, 76% of marketers agreed that they need to be more data-focused to succeed.

Not surprisingly, those respondents from companies with high digital spend (25% of their budgets) are more likely than those from companies with low digital spend.

There seems to be a consensus among marketers that they need to reinvent themselves to succeed, particularly as the vast majority believe that marketing is undergoing a revolution. But few of those who want to reinvent their role know how to go about doing so. Part of embracing a new approach to marketing also involves experimentation, and 54% of respondents believe that the ideal marketer should take more risks. That risk-taking extends to new technologies, but marketers were twice as likely to agree that they are more comfortable adopting new technologies once they become mainstream (65%) they they were to agree that they make use of new technology even before it’s proven (31%).

With that in mind, some 6 in 10 hope to try more new things (59%) and learn new skills (58%) in the coming 12 months, while half are looking to experiment more and test and evolve their marketing strategies. Perhaps most significantly, while only 29% took more risks last year, 45% hope to this year.

The online survey was conducted February 19-27, 2014 by ResearchNow among 1,004 US marketers. The results have a margin of error at the 95% confidence level, for the total sample, of +/-3.1%. Some 465 companies had high digital spend, while 153 had low digital spend.

What costs?

The three biggest expenses of most endeavors (the energy to make it, the people who create it and the marketing that spreads the idea).