Issue 09 - Weekly Newsletter
On sustainable living and boring digital marketing stories
19-year-old Sahil Lavinga published the first chapter of his planned book - Building A Billion Dollar Company in 2012. Today Sahil 27-year-old has never built a billion-dollar company. Nor would he. Speaking to Wired he candidly said, “I think I had a bit of an ego problem. Hopefully, I was realistic about my chances. My thinking was that if it worked, I wanted to have it documented.”
Today Sahil is Gumroad founder, stays far away from Silicon Valley and measures success on different parameters. “Where before, his goal was getting to $1 billion, he found other ways to measure success, like the millions of dollars he says the company has paid out to creators.”
Sahil chose to try for sustainability, not VC-style growth. Not every company needs to be a Unicorn.
Basecamp CEO Jason Fried is another example who has chosen a different path of building the company. Unlike Silicon way, he prefers to take it slow, give importance to personal life and treats employees like humans. In a seamless conversation with Shane Parrish, Jason stresses the fact that he is quite ignorant about the trends in the industry and who’s doing what and competitors and what their products are doing.
I find that the more I pay attention to that, the less free my mind is because you’re just colored by what everyone else is doing and then you don’t have as much space for your own thoughts.
You might wonder that “Sustainable Living” is a cool thing but it was always there in our culture. I am not judging anyone. It’s a choice we all make. Because there comes a point in life when peace is crucial. At least for me.
Don’t listen to me, listen to your mind.
Now that I have given my weekly gyaan, let me share the stories that I have written this week.
Brands are running behind your “Smile”. In 2016 when Selfies were cool, HappyDent wanted you to share them but now it is asking you to share your candid smiles. In return, it has continued its old association with Smile Foundation. I share about the campaign, the missing piece of the cause campaign and the struggling business.
Colgate wants you to believe in your smile and for this, it is sharing inspirational stories. One such story is about Divyanshu Ganatra who lost his vision at the age of 19. Today he is no more dependent on anyone and is also India’s first solo paraglider.
His philosophy in life: “When you smile it is a problem solved. I never lost my ability to imagine, my ability to smile.” In the below video, Divyanshu shares his journey with a big smile and the story ends with Colgate’s brand message “Smile karo aur shuru ho jao”.
I share my thoughts on the campaign, the digital and offline integration, and most importantly how Colgate-Palmolive India is transforming its advertising with the ongoing marketing initiative.
2019 was a defining year for TikTok - the second-most downloaded (non-game) app worldwide across the Apple App Store and Google Play. The majority of the growth has come from India but revenues are a concern for the app. How should it keep the creators happy? According to BrandEquity, the company is already speaking to Indian agencies, creators and brands to understand the problems and how things can improve.
I am a fan of the app that has suddenly unearth the creative talent of T2-T3 cities in India. And Facebook is concerned. In my last article for this week, I share two ways of revenue creation for TikTok creators in India.
Hello, TikTok India do you like the ideas? Even if you don’t I will still use your app :)
That’s it for this week. Enjoy your weekend, find time for yourself and read when you have time.
P.S. (I have started creating small shitty videos to get more views for my articles. Right now I am posting them on LinkedIn. I love the camera and I am in a good mental space to create more such boring videos.)
Peace and Happiness,
Prasant Naidu.