Mixing up bagfuls of success
WITH the right marketing strategies, a business can successfully improve their bottomlines by another 20% or so.
Most business owners yearn to know how their business can be improved, revenues increased and relevance to customers maintained.
Even the bigger companies, many entrenched in traditional ways of business forge ahead in the wrong methods, not realising their true potential.
Acquire Sdn Bhd, the brainchild of marketing wizard Ashok Rudy Ratnanesan was conceived to steer companies in the right direction.
“The discussions can become very heated with clients,” he says with a chuckle.
“But we are hired to tell the truth. We always give the facts to our clients based on the marketing studies we carry out for our clients. Our track record has shown that our strategies always work. We have successfully helped all our clients grow their client base and bring up sales.”
Ashok’s early career in a top advertising agency exposed him to multinational companies and his exposure to top management showed him that strategy was always crucial.
“There was plenty of high-level thinking and we were always discussing strategy. I began to see the need for it in many companies.
“While multinational companies always conduct marketing and feasibility studies, many SMEs did not have the resources or a crystallised idea or their strengths and weaknesses even.”
Prior to Acquire, Ashok started an event management company, but became frustrated when he wasn’t able to help clients in the way he wanted.
“I couldn’t help them increase sales or improve their product. I used to come up with proposals for my lighting when I saw clients, giving them the reasons why I chose them, but they had no use for it and just asked for cost. I started thinking if this was something I wanted to do when I was 50.”
Acquire came about in 2009 and its success was outstanding.
“At one point, I had to tell clients that I could not take them in and I felt terrible about it. We didn’t have enough manpower at that time and hiring good staff is always a problem.
“Our focus as a company is to do good work, so we take in just enough work and one company per industry.”
Ashok opines that marketing is an art and science where the correct mixture will help bring success.
“As we take our business seriously and our clients entrust us to ensure their continued success, we always start with defining specific objectives doing the market research, then only coming up with the strategy and marketing plan.
“How we are different from other branding firms is that we can actually improve the product or service of a company.
“Other types of companies work on changing the perception of the consumer, but what if the product just isn’t very good to begin with?
“What if the client doesn’t have a good product, or worse, if they have an overrated image about them- selves? It is our job to tell them. I do not work on gut.
“All that I tell my clients come from the extensive marketing and consumer studies we carry out from them. They may not like to hear it, but it is the truth.”
Ashok emphasises that his company is a marketing team and not a sales team.
“Our job is always to improve the product. If a client we work with has a sub-par product, we work to improve it through ethical marketing.
“In ethical marketing, we give feedback to our client on what they have to do to make the product better.
“Keeping to the same sub-standard product and hyping it with gimmicks no longer work in today’s context. Consumers are smarter than ever and can see through fads today.
“In my gamebook, the best defence is offence. Without a strong plan to move forward and gain market share, you are waiting to be taken over or go bankrupt.
“You must adapt and be confident enough to back your plans all the way through.
“If you have not done enough research or have the experience, it would all be guesswork.”
“It is common that clients are inaccurate in perceiving themselves,” says Ashok.
“Sometimes in areas they perceive themselves to be weak, they are surprisingly strong. And in areas they consider themselves leaders, we are taken aback when studies show they are very much in the middle zone.
“All these are valuable information to get a company to the next level. Only in that way, can success be sustainable. A campaign that assists a wrong strategy will only be short term. It is our objective to help our client defeat the competition and then be sustainable.”
Because of crucial decisions, Ashok sits in on board meetings with his clients.
He deals directly with CEOs and head of companies.
“Acquire has a wide range of experiences in various industries; because of that, we are able to use the best practices across the industries. When a client hires us, we become the guardians of their brand.
With a competitive environment today in almost all industries, profit margins are slimmer than before due to a wide access to information. This has not stopped many people from starting companies and then floundering.
“We have the ‘Malaysia Boleh’ attitude and start businesses even without industry experience or the capability of running a business,” says Ashok.
“Most companies (even the larger ones) work on an ad hoc basis and are very competitor reactive. This does not allow a company to lead in any one area since their goal is that of their competitors.
Some companies who are doing well do not feel a need to market themselves as they are profitable.
But even billionaire Donald Trump says it is better to think like an underdog.
These companies assume because they have been doing a business for a long time they know everything there is to know and are not open to new ideas.
Without mentioning names as an example, the largest mobile phone makers of one time were not even heard of for the last five years. That’s really quick! The difference is when the tables are turned by an economic downturn or bad press, it is very difficult to recover since the first solid impression made was already negative.”
Acquire belongs in the blue ocean and has now expanded to include digital branding to provide customers the total marketing experience.
Ashok says it best: “Good marketing practices generate good word of mouth. Word of mouth delivers sales like how the monsoon season delivers rain in Malaysia. It floods in.”