Blockchain & Its Application in Marketing - Part 3

This is the third and the last post in the series of three posts on Blockchain Technology and its application in the field of Marketing. While in the first post, we discussed the concept of Blockchain in a very simplistic way along with examples, the second post elaborated the concept of Blockchain while also listing the areas in Marketing where Blockchain can be implemented.

This post takes that application scope further and looks at the application of Blockchain to areas which indirectly affect Marketing. As mentioned earlier, these are not the applications for the year 2100, hence may not be fairly imaginative. The idea is to see what can be done tomorrow!
If you have not gone through the earlier two posts yet, please take time and read them before you come back to this post.

First post: Blockchain & Its Application in Marketing - Part 1. Read time is 10mins.
Blockchain & Its Application in Marketing - Part 1

First post: Blockchain & Its Application in Marketing - Part 2. Read time is 15 mins.
Blockchain & Its Application in Marketing - Part 2

So in this post we straight away jump into the applications of Blockchain in areas that influence Marketing in some way or other.

Area	Application
Supply Chain	Inventory Management  What? – Inventory issues like duplication, dead stock, inventory ghosting and incorrect stock update have resulted in lost sales as well as unwanted inventory carrying costs, which inadvertently affect the top-line as well as bottom0line for any company. How? – Blockchain technology, with its consensus based updates as well as decentralized systems ensure that no change can be made in isolation and hence any incorrect manual update is not possible. This would mean that all the involved computers on the system will show the same inventory and there will be no miscommunication at any point regarding the storage, ordering and stock of any product. Also, the transaction trail will ensure that none of the inventory goes unaccounted for. Asset –Traceability in Value Chain What? – Despite all the innovations and development in the field of asset traceability, it is still very difficult to exactly pinpoint the initial source of the product. Issues like in-transit damage or incorrect delivery as well as a precise understanding of the actual location and state of the asset is difficult. For example, where did the diamond that you are going to buy in a ring, actually come from (previous post) and where is a specific diamond you are supposed to receive right now. How? – Each unit of the asset is assigned a traceable ID or identifier and a block (additional piece of information) is added to it as it passes through each step. Also, the Blockchain technology, with its consensus based mechanism as well as decentralized system ensure that no change can be made in isolation and hence any incorrect manual update is not possible. This would mean that all the involved computers on the system will show the same inventory and there will be no miscommunication at any point regarding the storage, ordering and stock of any product. Also, the transaction trail will ensure that none of the inventory goes unaccounted for.                          Blockchain for Asset Management - IBM
Legal	Artist collaboration and Right-Incentivisation What? – Purchase or license rights from content creators (musicians, videographers, photographers) to use their work in campaigns has not been an easy process. It is generally the artists that loses the battle due to difficulty in proving ownership of their work once it is uploaded in the public domain.  How? – Just like a piece of data or a financial transaction that can be tagged with an identified, piece of art like music can also be stored securely. Unlike a centralized system where the powerful parties can manually play and manipulate the system, with the help of Blockchain, the decentralized ledger helps in the record being present on multiple systems and can only be updated through consensus mechanism. This helps artists to be able to claim their work without interference from the industry biggies.  Employee Background Check What? – Background checks of employees is an ongoing process in any organization for all the new employees as well as for the existing ones in case of special circumstances. A lot of money is spent on the process but the information hence retrieved is seldom accurate and as desired. Also, the companies have to go through external agencies and consultancies to be able to manage this essentially internal function.  How? – Blockchain is known to preserve the history of information through identifiers and create a trail for the information by adding ‘blocks’ to make it traceable. Hence, records that are stored and managed using Blockchain technology are easily retrievable and as accurate as it gets. Hence, Blockchain technology will help in making it easy to retrieve correct records and that too in a much simpler way which will be quicker as well as cheaper. The best part will still be the control organizations can have on the process by internalizing it.
Contracts	Smart Contracts What? – Programs that manage and execute an agreement automatically based on certain pre-set conditions and constraints  How? – Blockchain technology brings in security into the traditional contracts and also reduces the cost to verify and execute contracts since its algorithm based which and it aids in automatic execution without any middleman to execute it
Data Security	Identity Protection What? – Identity protection while being a legal and common issue across countries. It does have its implication on Marketing. The fear of data leak makes people aversive towards sharing information and also restricts them to be more open and engaging. That is dangerous for any brand.  How? – If personal data of consumers could be collected, stored and managed in a more secured way that would not only help in enriching the customer profile information, but will also help customers to be more forthcoming. Blockchain technology has a way out. Its distributed ledger makes it extremely difficult for fraudsters to manipulate or steal personal data without leaving an obvious digital trail. The digital trail makes it easy for the network to identify an erroneous record or an attempt to manipulate data. It can them be easily corrected. Hence the record created on the blockchain concept is as good as immutable, securing the data effectively.

Like any new technology or invention, Blockchain has its own challenges which need to be addressed for it to be viable, relevant and scalable. Blockchain is a revolutionary technology which has the ability to transform how businesses are done. However, before jumping in to the fan-fare, top leadership at any organization needs to understand the scope and strength of this technology and be able to map its objectives clearly against the adoption of Blockchain.

In any case, we are set to transact, but not notice may be, with lot of businesses in future which will be using Blockchain as the fundamental concept for much of their operations. Behold!

Cheers,

Amazon - An Innovation Powerhouse!

An annoying interstitial ad forced me to post it on my facebook page as a sign of protest. It is funny how social network makes you feel as if you are actually powerful. I will save a detailed note on this psychological e-phenomenon for future, but I must say that the ad did what it was supposed to do. Discounting the fact that I didn’t end up buying the colourful bagpacks, the ad did manage to attract my attention. It also made me promote it (unwittingly!) to my 500+ internet buddies on facebook.

 

The brand that was advertising vociferously on my daily news website was Amazon. Huh.

Amazon is everywhere these days. It has slowly and steadily, and with a lot of patience and innovation, built a strong-fundamental based business model in India. Many were wondering for the first few months after Amazon made its way into India about Amazon's quiet game plan. The firework that one would expect from the big daddy of online retail was far from visible.

All this while, Amazon was investing in the foundation stone of this to-be e-tailing giant of India. This has helped Amazon India to build for itself an environment and capability to roll out mind-boggling innovative ideas that has kept its customers delighted and rivals on toes so far.

Amazon demonstrated aptly the approach to build a business in a new market by challenging set rivals and even beat them on their own turf. The long experience in its home country and deep pockets though adds to its advantage, none should be taken away from Amazon for being super agile and incessantly innovative.

I wrote some time back on Amazon’s bipolar approach on improving its delivery performance to enhance customer delight. At one end, Amazon had started experimenting parcel deliveries through drones while on other hand, in India it sealed an alliance with India Post to help it deliver parcels in far-flung areas.

Very recently, Amazon introduced a fresh gust of innovative ideas that varies from category expansion to new services and from vendor empanelment to channel expansion.

Back in US, Amazon turned heads last week by inking a $ 300mn-three years deal with HBO to let Amazon Prime members watch old HBO shows. Within no time after giving its customer the HBO delight, it announced launch of the prima-pantry service for its prime members. The service allowed the prime members to shop from more than 2,000 products to fill a four-cubic foot box with up to 45 pounds of goods. The package can then be shipped at very nominal cost to the customers.

These simple innovations have not only added to the product lines it can sell but have also created benchmark for serviceability and customer responsiveness in this rapidly growing industry.

Here in India, Amazon has opened up a bottle of innovations which, with the gush these innovations are ejecting, seems to have been there ‘under-construction’ for some time now.

After collaborating with India post to deliver its parcels in 19,000 pin-codes across country through its Colosseum -like network of 140,000 Post-offices, Amazon has put into action its plan to make it easy for sellers.

Amazon, this week launched two initiatives for sellers to facilitate an accelerated and hassle-free experience. The US-based firm launched the Self Service Registration (SSR) and Amazon Easy Ship for sellers. Amazon SSR enables sellers irrespective of their size, location and size of catalogue, to self-register on the Amazon marketplace and start selling within a day without any third party intervention, making the process quick, easy and transparent.

With Amazon Easy Ship, the seller has to pack the shipment and confirm to Amazon that they are ready to ship. Amazon Logistics collects the shipment and ensures that the product is delivered to customers in 2-4 days.

Jeff Bezos is known to be the driving force of Amazon's
customer first culture and a true admirer of innovation at work

These two services have taken the e-commerce game to a different level in India. A response from the bigger rivals(so far!) Flipkart and Snapdeal is soon expected as the e-commerce industry matures in terms of technology and operational set-up.

The big question is, how Amazon has been able to pop-out one innovation after other, even faster than the TV soaps’ episode run?

The answer is fairly simple – Getting the basic rights and employing Long-term thinking in a new market.

Amazon didn’t rush to lure customers as soon as it entered in Indian market. Instead, it took its time in getting the fundamentals right. It built the logistics network, warehouses and built up a large selection of products that is now bringing in customers for them.

In a recent interview, Amit Deshpande GM of Amazon India said that its strong back-end infrastructure is helping it scale up fast. He further added on that when they decide on areas of focus, they always work backwards from the customer. Selection, delivery experience, logistics, payments and website experience are areas they are super-focused on.

Amazon has been scintillating in terms of its growth, and more importantly in its systematic business approach in terms of all modules of a business organization – Strategy, Marketing, Supply chain, Human Resource development and above all, Innovation.

Truely, Amazon is an innovation powerhouse!