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And the winner goes to.....Mindy Kaling!

The Challenges in Shifting Cultural Perception

This case hit close to home. Growing up in an Indian household in North America involved so many cultural challenges that were shifting on a regular basis. Western culture and Indian culture as a teenager have surprisingly little overlap. There were many cultural tensions to balance - from going out with boys as a teenager (a hard no), to moving out for college (finally, a yes). In between, there was the constant battle of not going out in the sun too much. As a runner, I was constantly reminded not to run in the “middle of the day” and to this day, as a grown adult, I am still encouraged not to be outside on a sunny day. What the case touches on, is the difficulty of shifting cultural perception. I think India has come a long way in terms of reinforcing all kinds of skin colors. And while I think the progress is much needed, and way overdue, I also feel like there is an entire population that is overlooked - my parents. Indian immigrants in North America have been completely overlooked and under-targeted for these media pushes. And instead, my generation is forced to fend for ourselves. Forced to reconcile with the cultural tensions we face on a regular basis. 

However, I’d like to thank Mindy Kaling. For bringing these issues to the forefront in the US, and allowing a much needed generation (mine) the ability to discuss this outwardly. I think that more focus should be on using celebrities to expose the dark (no pun intended) underbelly of the issue of skin color in India, and should be implemented globally as part of a more widespread campaign.

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Patient Experience is all the rage these days - and some interesting thoughts came up when reading this article. 

Sure I care about Patient Experience....it’s all we talk about at work

- How do we improve the “consumer journey”? 

- How do make them feel like we cared for them? 

- How do we reduce perception of wait time?

- How do we provide regular updates, give them work notes, give them...medication??

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When reading this article about Behavioral science, I have to always wonder, how far is too far? How far are we willing to go to improve the customer’s experience? There is a line between ethical and unethical that can be hard to distinguish. I am reminded of a recent article I read that highlighted this exact issue. Nordstrom recently acquired a liquor license, and the headline below says it all:

Is this ethical? Sure it fits with most of the Principles:

- Customers leave on a happy note, drunk and with lots of new  purchases Principle 1

- Customers give their credit card up front and start a “tab” for all drinks and purchases, therefore pain only happens once instead of twice Principles 2 & 3

But at what cost? Are they encouraging drunk driving? Am I expected to give all my narcotic seekers the drugs they want in order to get a higher rating on my Patient Satisfaction surveys? I sure don’t think so. But when we are exploring new ways to incorporate behavioral science into our company’s service, we must ensure that all incentives are aligned, and that we are encouraging behaviors that are in line with our mission statement, and not blindly promoting DUIs.

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Nudges in Healthcare: “The Nudge Unit”

I am fascinated with the implications of nudges in healthcare and recently discovered that UPenn Medicine has instituted an entire department called the “Nudge Unit”! I think I may have found my dream job. As the design thinking process gains leverage, it is clear that nudges, or the nudge concept, can play a significant role in improving healthcare in this country. 

And the studies show that it works:

Yelp for Prescribers:

This 2015 study showed that by simply placing a dollar sign next to the antibiotic name on an antiobiogram (what physicians use to decide which abx to prescribe), reduced average cost per unit of antibiotics by over 30%! This is something that has never been implemented in my hospital, which I find crazy - things like this should be universal at all hospitals across the country.

Things I want to implement when I am director of my own Nudge Unit:

- Create default options for ordering medications (ones that are cheaper/less side effects should be considered first)

- Automatically schedule patients for their next visit in 2-6 months (instead of saying, you can call back). Must include adequate reminder notifications. This gives patients an actual appointment in the future, and would likely increase rate of follow-ups.

- Develop strategic hospital employee wellness programs that actually work using design thinking/nudges: Start with x funds in “Wellness account” and if you don’t maintain xyz wellness routines, start to lose them.

- Use the Choosing Wisely ACEP Guidelines to encourage safe practices in the Emergency Room --- this could EASILY be translated into specific nudges in the ER, but why isn’t it currently done??

There is clearly room for improvement in our current healthcare system, and I think implementing the concept of nudges is the first step in the right direction. #mytwocents

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Corona vs Heineken

"I don’t know, I just wasn’t a Heineken-kinda guy” - my boyfriend, on why he and his buddies chose to drink Corona over Heineken back in the late 90′s/early 00′s.

He is a man of few words. 

Turns out, he enjoyed drinking Corona with his college friends because it was more “fun”, and reminded him of the beach. Heineken, he thought, was heavier, more “full-bodied”, and too sophisticated. All of which reflects perfectly the marketing choices done by the two brands. 

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An modern-day comparison:

It brings to mind a similar comparison of Perrier vs Bubly. The products are similar but their campaigns are vastly different.

Perrier targets older, more sophisticated consumers. Their ads show black and white images, emphasize “classic”, and have more recently included their est. date of 1863 to highlight the fact that they are the original classic sparkling water. This drastically differs from Bubly ads. They are full of color, smiles, fun, and happiness. 

As a Perrier drinker myself (their flavors just taste better), I can’t see Bubly winning the market share by continuing their current marketing campaign. It works with a particular demographic -  Gen Z’s (Younger millenials), however isn’t as successful for older millenials, Gen X’s, and Baby Boomers. Bubly would need to tone down their ads to market to different consumers.

Bubly will never be Perrier, just like Corona will never be Heineken. However, by incorporating unique strategies, Corona could adjust their campaigns and help improve their brand perception. 

In order to gain market share, Corona needs to adjust their marketing campaign. I think they should stick with the “Fun, Sun, Beach”, however, they should be more aggressive with regional campaigns, to target areas like Colorado/New Mexico/Arizona, where they have a high Hispanic population, therefore a high likelihood of capturing more market share.

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Intel Inside

I can hear the jingle from the commercials in my head right now - its iconic. The symbol was on every computer my dad owned (and we owned a lot). 

Obviously, their branding campaign worked.

Interesting takeaways:

- They got buy-in from the computer manufacturers (OEM). Without securing the buy-in to have their logo placed on their computers, they would have never succeeded. They used the same tactic as NutraSweet to leverage major manufacturers to jump the bandwagon - NutraSweet got both Pepsi and Coke to put their logo on the outside of cans, and eventually, it became so popular both companies were reluctant to remove it as it would have been beneficial to their competitor. 

- Also, their product had substance. You can’t run as successful of a campaign without the backbone of legitimate, functioning technology. 

- When a flaw was noted in one microprocessing chip that affected only a few people, they spent $400M to replace ALL of them. They didn’t have to, but they were facing bad publicity. Interesting approach to pay close attention to the customer experience and provide superior customer service, at a large cost.

Challenges with launching a high-tech product - (very brief brainstorming): 

- Short-term challenges: will people care about your brand/idea/ad? Will they buy in to what you are selling?

- Long-term challenges - will any future product cannibalize your existing product? How quickly will the technology evolve? Will you dilute your brand?

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Case #1 Black and Decker 3/31/2020

In summary, the case describes the dilemma faced by Black and Decker with a particular market segmentation that is doing poorly. B&D has produced high quality tools and is known as a leader in the Power Tools industry for several decades. It has been very successful, capturing the position as #1 in market share for both Consumer and Professional-Industrial segments, but only a dismal 9% in the Professional-Tradesman market segment.

Why?

- Makita is outselling B&D 8:1 because B&D did not market itself for Tradespeople adequately and Makita successfully promoted itself in different, more profitable channels despite being more expensive

- Tradesmen typically bought tools at Home Depot and Home Club, as opposed to the Warehouse Home Centers, and Makita had promoted their items there more successfully. These centers also offered cheaper items and superior customer service. 

- Customer perception makes a huge impact - B&D essentially cannibalized their Tradespeople market segmentation when they promoted their Consumer segment. Tradespeople are not the same as the people in the Consumer segment and the surveys clearly show that Tradespeople were almost embarrassed to use B&D tools at work: the colors were the same, and they didn’t want to be seen with a B&D tool at work because their “wives used it home”. 

- Makita gained market share by appealing to customers who did not mind paying the 5% premium. Customers perceived their products as being of higher-quality, more durable, and people were proud to own them.

- B&D also suffered from bad reports of their products failing at the job site

IN SUMMARY:

- B&D did not invest time or money into marketing for Tradespeople and it clearly hurt their market share. They did not do due diligence before launching their consumer products. It is clear that their strategy to promote Consumer goods resulted in the cannibalization of their newest market segment. They should consider a whole new line of a different color - I like the idea of Yellow, but perhaps Red AND Yellow (to compete with Milwaukee) along with a new label (DeWalt, or just another line). They must separate the image of domesticism - i.e. no more popcorn makers or dust busters. 

- However, an entirely different approach is to scale up consumer products and Professional products to gain >50% in each and to ignore Tradespeople entirely. I think that B&D has already captured so much of the consumer market, and can expand to other household goods much more rapidly than power tools.  Power tool SKU’s are limited - there are only so many drills. However, there are almost an unlimited amount of household goods available (vacuum cleaners, washing maching, etc), and if B&D has already established itself as a reputable household name, they may ultimately be more profitable in this area.