Most of us are living a Digital Life today. We use smartphones, we conduct our business on the Internet, we shop online and the most important of all, we look for any kind of information first on the web. The web’s capacity as an information exchange medium is unparalleled. This Digital Life is most convenient for us but what are the implications of this life on products, brands and companies? Well, they simply have to adapt to this new ecosystem of all things digital. TNS is a pioneering research and Analytics Company that has ventured to find out what drives people in this new digital age. It is being touted as the largest global study on people’s attitudes and behaviors online.
TNS offers the perspective of 72000 respondents from across 60 countries which is frankly very tantalizing for us Digital guys. The study has been done beforein 2010 and covered some 50,000 respondents from 46 countries. It offered us key insights into the behavior of people during the rise of Social Media. But in technology, 2 years is an epoch and things change very fast. Hence, the guys at TNS have taken it upon themselves to keep updating the study and to scale it up. We spoke to Parijat Chakraborty, Executive Director, TNS India and is going to give us a special glimpse into this year’s study only at WATSummit 2012.
Parijat Chakraborty
Executive Director, TNS India
1. Parijit, can you tell us about the goal of this exhaustive study?
Digital Life provides recommendations on how to use digital channels to grow your business through a precise understanding of human behaviors and attitudes online. Based on conversations with over 72,000 people in 60 countries, Digital Life’s size, scale and detail make it the most comprehensive view of consumer attitudes and behavior online, on a global and local level. Across countries and product categories, Digital Life pinpoints the range of growth opportunities available to brands in the online world. Digital Life applies TNS’s long-established expertise and deep consumer understanding to develop insights and address the key questions that inform marketing investment:
- How can I use digital channels to help grow my business?
- Who can I reach through digital platforms?
- How do I build my brand through engagement with new and existing consumers online?
- How do I identify and cultivate brand advocates online?
- How do I target potential customers online?
The study also introduces the concept of Digital Growth Index, a single number score defining the opportunity across product categories and countries for growth through digital channels, and showing the diversity of opportunities available in the online world.
2. What is the importance of this study for brands and marketer?
The Internet has made our world and the way we build businesses more dynamic and complex than ever. Opportunities and threats exist on global bases that were unprecedented just a decade ago. The Internet now impacts all elements of a business’ growth plans. In order to succeed, brands need to embed digital into their marketing strategies. Engaging with customers online requires a deep understanding of their motivations, opinions and attitudes – and their resulting actions and behavior. Digital Life makes our complex environment simpler to navigate, cutting through the clutter to identify the precise strategies, channels and content that make digital a key driver in achieving growth. The study provides recommendations on how to use digital channels to grow your business through a precise understanding of human behaviors and attitudes online. Each market is behaving in a specific manner depending on which phase of online adoption they are.
3. What are your thoughts on‘The Dawn of the Digital Age’ in India?
Digital Age in India is seeing a new dawn. Though it continues to still falter on internet penetration, it presents a unique case study of the haves and the have not’s if we can term those having internet connection as the “Haves”. Accessing internet is not just restricted to internet café and from office or home. PC no longer continues to be sole means of accessing Internet. Mobile internet has enabled this rapid growth of digital in India in the last couple of years. In fact Tablets are the new in-thing and with ever dropping cost of ownership, the penetration of Tablets, at least amongst the urban Indian, is bound to see an exponential rise in the coming years. India’s Netizens are engaging in online activities from a wide range of devices. These activities are also no longer restricted to the traditional online activities – communication and entertainment. Online shopping, Gaming, Personal admin are fast catching up in India. India may be a late entrant in the Digital World, but on many of the aspects, India is rubbing shoulders with many of the developed markets. Digital is getting well entrenched with our media habits and catching up on the traditional media like TV, Radio and Newspaper. Social networking is today the most important digital activity amongst Indian Netizens and today we have the highest active bloggers amongst the global internet users. The opportunity in the Digital Age in India is not to be missed.
Don’t forget to catch Parijat Chakraborty’s speech at WATSummit 2012. He will be giving us a preview into the results of this global study and how it makes a lot of sense for today’s breed of Digital Marketers and Entrepreneurs.
Register Yourself for WATSummit today.
For Speaker/Registration related queries:
Krishney Asnani
krishney@watconsult.com
+91-9967674955
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