Ashish Tiwari
Principal/Director, Ace Institute of Management
While talking about marketing, we say it's not about creating one-time transaction but creating long lasting relationship with different groups of stakeholders, primarily their customers. Another thing that we talk about is providing value and creating costumer engagement. I can recall the companies and brands which I interacted the most in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake. My requirements had changed. I was looking for certain kinds of services which I had never ever thought of going out for reaching the services. I was looking for the services of structural engineers and other strange services which I had never thought of. So this is a tremendous opportunity to reach out during the time of critical time when people looks for more engagement. If marketing is getting engaged, it is an opportunity to take a proactive measure to create more engagement. Consumer behaviors may change after going through this disaster. We may see shift in lifestyle and preferences of consumers after the quake. New markets may emerge and consumers may look for different services and products. They will be highly sensitive to marketing communication -- be it in social media or in traditional media. While deciding on our communication campaign, we have to be careful on what we say and how we say it. The media consumption habits are also going to be changed. However, customers still expect and want to engage and interact with brand. This is not going to be changed. Customers think these brands are like powerful people that they will stand by their side at the time of difficulty. They expect proactive interaction opportunity created from the side of the brand. They still expect value delivery with a touch of empathy and sensitivity from the marketers' side.
Brands with high loyalty have big responsibility
Suman Pokhrel
CEO, IME Ltd
In the time of disasters like these, everybody wants to meet with their family, and rebuild their homes and their country. While talking about consumer behavior from the perspective of a remittance company, I think they want to send more money. More money is flowing into the country. Remittance growth in the ninth month of the current fiscal year is 40 percent, compared to tepid growth over the past eight months. Earlier, their focus was on saving for future. Now, they are sending money for rebuilding their homes. Nepalis living abroad are more panicked than us. They are sending money by collecting donation or borrowing from their friends or employers. People's expectations from brand increases during difficult juncture like this. Like from IME, they want more. They are keeping an eye on what IME is doing for the quake victims. Brands with high consumer loyalty have big responsibility at the times of tragedy. Now, our main focus should be on rebuilding. Spending less and contributing to nation building is what we should do. The role and plan of the remittance companies like ours is to utilize remittance in nation building. If the money sent by workers from abroad is used to pay import bills, our mission of nation building will fail.
Not the right time to worry about brands
Anuj Agrawal
Executive Director, Vishal Group
Businesses in Nepal had experienced similar situation during Maoist insurgency and curfews imposed in different period of time in the past. So, the experience says the businesses and brands will bounce back soon. We believe that the impact on a brand or business will probably be lesser than what people expect. I think we should react proactively to the whole process. We should look internally at our employees and externally to the community and see how we can work with them. I think worrying about brands and businesses right now would be too premature. Being there and serving the country is probably what is required. The main thing is the government has to play crucial role to make the situation normal. The government should work to remove the psychological impact that the earthquake has left on people's mind and convince them that everything is normal. If a company or an individual says this, people may react negatively. But if the government says, the message will go down a lot deeper. We need to get consumption going and business has to run. However, the big driver has to be the government.
Situation in Kathmandu will become normal soon
Prabhakar S Thapa
General Manager, Him Electronics
I think consumers' preferences and priorities will change. For example, priorities on construction materials will increase once rebuilding work is started. As Kathmandu Valley is the largest trading hub in the country, behavior of valley denizens for certain category of products will change. I expect situation in Kathmandu Valley to return to normalcy very soon. It should be noted that the contribution of other earthquake-affected districts to national economy is very nominal. This means our entire economy has not been affected by the earthquake. We should look beyond the earthquake as well. Only Kathmandu Valley and some districts have been affected by the earthquake, business activity in other parts of the country is going on as usual. We cannot ignore consumers in other parts of the country. This is how a brand should respond to this situation.
Business activities should be continued
Rohit Gupta
Executive Director, Lucky Group
In this situation, brands should keep calm and do business as usual. In Nepal, we have two markets -- Kathmandu Valley and outside the Valley. The main thing is to have a normal working environment in office because many employees are still scared to come to the office because of the psychological impact of the earthquake. We need to continue providing our services and products to clients and customers. If we want to make the situation normal, we shouldn't stop our day-to-day business activities.
We should take lessons from disasters
Dikesh Malhotra
President, Integrated Mobility Solution (IMS)
Though it is not the appropriate time to seek opportunities, businesses can learn different things from this situation. Because most of businesses and companies have lost their data due to the earthquake, they have not been able to resume their normal businesses. We should learn from this loss and start work to decentralize our data and adopt cloud storage system so that we can operate our businesses from other areas if natural disasters affect us in one place.
We should provide services even during crisis
Subash Chandra Sah
Deputy Manager -- Business Development, Nepal Telecom
Our first priority after the earthquake was to assure that people's communication does not break. And we succeeded in our mission as all our services resumed full-fledged operation within couple of hours after the earthquake. Likewise, we immediately offered free call and text services to our customers for limited period. Currently, we have been offering free Wi-Fi service at different temporary camps. Our primary aim was to reach out to people regardless of the circumstances. This is to say that all of us should do what we are destined to do during such period of crisis.
People have appreciated our efforts
Dilliram Adhikari
Deputy Manager, Nepal Telecom
The major need in the immediate aftermath of the disaster is communication. One needs to communicate with the family member, relatives and other friends immediately after the quake. Communication network plays instrumental role in providing such service. What we did immediately was to provide all services free of cost, realizing that people may run out of balance and may not be able to purchase recharge cards and top-up services during such crisis. General people have open-heartedly appreciated our efforts. This is how businesses should help people in the time of crisis. We also contributed to relief works as a brand and a national carrier. We have already decided to contribute Rs 3 billion over the next three years for rebuilding of cultural heritage sites and public entities destroyed by the quake. Corporate houses should not work with the motive of brand promotion only.
Our business has already become normal
Pranaya Ratna Sthapit
Senior Manager, Samsung Electronics Nepal
The entire country or a brand will stand soon. Despite loss of thousands of lives, I believe that people's lifestyle and that of society has not changed to large magnitude because of which the nation re-building process will be easier. Similarly, the socio-economic dynamics of the country has not been affected to a larger extent. Coming to the brand, our business was also affected for some days. However, it has almost come to normal these days. We probably are 10-15 percent beyond our normal business. The business was not affected much probably because majority of population was not affected by the earthquake. Also, mobile is a necessity means. But as a company, we decided not to promote our brand immediately. We, as a brand, have to contribute from our side at such period.
Our activities can help quake-hit people
Binod Gyawali
Chairman & Managing Director, Nepal Republic Media
People react to the situation in different ways. Initially, I was also in a dilemma. I didn't know how to respond to this unexpected situation. However, I immediately realized that one should give continuity to what s/he has been doing. If we continue to provide our services at this difficult time, it can be a matter of great help to people, especially the quake victims. Realizing this, we immediately decided to focus on problems resulting from the earthquake and the ways to overcome them. If corporate houses focus on these two aspects, it will be of great help to the earthquake victims.
Branding is about building relationship with customers
Sambridhi Gyawali
Corporate Affairs Manager, Nepal Republic Media
The earthquake has affected many people in one way or the other. Our staff members have also been affected by the earthquake. As a corporate house, we have to look after all our stakeholders -- from our family to clients, partners and customers and the entire nation. As a media person, what I came across was that it was not about making business. So what we decided immediately after the earthquake was that newspaper has to be published because it is our responsibility toward the nation. Publishing newspaper the very next day of the earthquake was not about branding or selling the paper. Despite difficulties, we gave the nation and our stakeholders what we were supposed to give. Branding is not all about selling copies or making money. It is about building relationship with the customer and the loyalty you can keep with them.
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