Vodafone IVR – reaching a call center executive

Published May 25, 2015 9:45 am

VodafoneToday morning, I was trying to reach a call center executive regarding my data plan. Vodafone IVR menu is structured in such a way that reaching the call center executive is made very difficult. There is no 9 on the main menu neither it is there on most of the second level menus.

I found it hidden in the sequence 5 -> 3 -> 9 and I am sure many others will be chasing this sequence!

Having a candid conversation is key to building your brand & connection

Published April 20, 2015 10:35 pm

Today I was travelling from Mumbai to Hyderabad through Spicejet. Spicejet recently went through financial issues and lot of flights got canceled couple of months back. It sent a bad public image for the airline. What I saw today in the flight gave me insight into how to salvage/establish a brand.

UntitledThe flight reached before time. That’s ok. but it followed with captain announcing & lead flight attendant talking about it. They used the event to have a conversation with their audience (the passengers). After the flight took off and seat belt sign was off, flight attendants again took a minute of time to thank the passengers to taking Spicejet when they have a choice to pick another airlines. They used the event again to have a conversation with the customers.

I can honestly admit that the conversations did clear up bunch of badness from my perception about the airlines. This tell me that having a genuine conversation going with your customers goes a long way in building, re-enforcing and even salvaging a broken brand image.

It also tell me how much it is important to express self in right words and have that conversation – to build connection – be it in business or personal life.

Claim your second (sim) mobile number in true caller

Published March 29, 2015 11:04 am

I had recent installed a second sim in my nokia lumia 730 and hence, got a second (sim) mobile identity. No sooner I found that true caller is showing wrong identity (name) for my second number.

I asked one of my family members to fix the name using true caller app. He did but still it did not correct it. Today I have posted the request through this link as per true caller facebook page. Will update if that works out!

Direct selling your app (service) to the customer

Published March 15, 2015 11:36 am

When you have embarked on the journey to build your app (and service) in the SAAS world for your idea, sooner or later you go through the experience of direct selling. First few customer acquisitions – you are directly doing or involved. In recent times, I have been going through such experiences. These experiences are valuable for founders especially so if you come from techy background. It helps to appreciate what selling really means?

square310x310logoI have built an app (and service) for the homoeopathy doctors to write & manage their patients’ reviews. It is getting deployed at the first few doctors sites. I am personally going to get it done. Today, it went live for one of the clinics. It is awesome feeling for an engineer to see his software (app/service) used by real users. To see the excitement in the user eyes how it will make his/her life better – is a moment of deep satisfaction & a moment to treasure in your good memories. The excitement is not because I sold it hard. The excitement is experienced by the user since he sees software making his day better.

The software makes busy practitioner life better by by innovating on the experience for his most frequent activity. I saw how he got excited to get armed with the power of the app (bidding farewell to past life) when faced with long queue of patients. It is heartening to sit in the clinic outside the doc room to see how many people life will be impacted by the lines of code you wrote!

The selling involves remote things you can’t think about. I got to sit in the clinic to fix network drive issue on the doc laptop. Does it have anything to do with your app? No. but that is what need to be done. You know. Being techy helps at times during sell!

It was a awesome morning experience!

Can practice alone keeps you perfect?

Published February 27, 2015 3:12 pm

Have you stopped doing things that you used to do 1, 2, 5, 10 years before? Have your moved away from the tasks that you used to do in past & manage a organization from 2, 3 level above? Do you feel insecure that you have lost touch with things that matter?

fit senior man exercising at the beachPractice keeps the man perfect. When we stop doing things, we will lose the skill of doing it. Well it is yes & no. Yes – that it might take time to catch up again. No – I can’t do it again. but only if we have right conceptions.

How do I see the task/ skill?

If I see that as unimportant trivial thing that should be done by someone with lesser experience, it is recipe to lose the skill faster. I have seen that whatever I love/respect, I seem to keep it going or catch up quickly even with a gap in time (when I don’t do it). What I don’t love/respect, it gets out of my mind much sooner. Deep respect – for it even if I stop doing it – matters. It enables me to get it back in practice with less effort in future.

How do I see myself?

wrong view – I do things. Hence, I value myself (self-confidence). This is recipe to lose confidence as soon as I stop doing it. Building self-confidence will require re-doing the things. Putting back it in practice will be slow as lack of self-confidence will cloud the mind.

right view: I am valuable. Hence, I do things. See I am the one who has done all the things so far in my life (& add the past lives also if you believe so). I am the force which is capable & behind everything that is understood & done. Believe in the force unconditionally. Don’t believe in yourself because you cracked that hard problem because in that case it is very easy to lose the confidence when you fail to crack the next few hard problems. Believe in self without any premise because without you nothing moves. You are. Hence, things get done.

Ok. If Believe in self but I am lazy & don’t work. How does it help?

Well. Believing in self does not mean don’t work. Believe in self and Push yourself. Take a break if required but then move. You are lazy for time being does not mean you fetch your value from what you do. There will always be inactivity (recoup) period required to rejuvenate self.

To sum it up, practice keep you warm with the skill. It is the best way to perfect your art. Practice, Practice, Practice. Still you may move on to do something else. When you are away from it, a right attitude will help you remain grounded and ready to pull up your socks again when need be.