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Kishore Biyani has a new idea to endear himself to the minds of customers. He has pooled together a team of people from diverse backgrounds such as social sciences from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, mythologists who understand and in terpret popular folklore and mythological characters, pundits who read charts to de termine auspicious and in auspicious days to study co mmunities and their religious festivals to make targeted offers at Big Bazaar.In east India for instan ce, the group is trying to und erstand the festival of Jamai Sasthi (puja for well being of one's son in law) to work out ways in which this can be celebrated in Big Ba zaar. The communication and merchandise in stores too will be modelled according to the almanacs, for instance an accent on selling gold and gas stoves on Aksh ay Tritiya. "We want to be se en as Ma rwari for the Marw aris, Bengali for Bengalis by understanding the nuances of the communities in the catchment area of our stores and being seen as part of the community," said Ashni Biy ani, director, Future Ideas and Kishore Biyani's daughter.
"We want to engage with consumers to win their hea rt share not just mind share and market share. To do this we have a team of sociolog ists, anthropologists, myth ologists and even pundits whom we use, to study consumers by way of linguistic groups and religious groups. We also study consumers by way of profession," said Biyani.
India's largest retailer is using food as the route to the customers hearts. By providing local delicacies Big Bazaar hopes to attract non-homogenous customers. "We want to apply our learnings from the multi disciplinary team studies to food first and then depending on the response will apply it to other merchandise catego ries," she said.
http://www.mydigitalfc.com/companies/social-targeting-future%25E2%2580%2599s-strategy-974