Seth Godin – Permission Marketing Guru, shared a video on his blog. This is an amazing example of how things become viral.
Here is what I see – observe[and the equivalent for a startup like LifeMojo]
When there is just 1 guy doing it – it’s weird.[When founders, close friends and family uses the product or service]
When the 2nd guy joins him – then they start to get attention.[When the early adopters join-in]
When the 3rd guy joins in – it becomes something worth trying out.[When the first few customers join-in because of the early adopters]
And then the crowd joins in – it becomes something socially acceptable and it becomes worth doing.[When people start appreciating the product or the service and start bringing in more customers – this is the time when you build reporting as part of your product or service to start counting customers and sales ]
I wanted to wait for a month and ride it before I write a review on my bike. It has been close a month now and I have ridden close to 300 Km on it till now.
The Lot: Before buying this bike I had considered Trek 3700 and 4300, Marida Sub V10 and V20, Cannondale F9 (All around INR 17 – 23 K) and finally settled on RockRider 5.2 because of the following reasons.
What’s good?
Suspension – it is better than most of the bikes I tried out.
Cost – it costs least amongst the lot I was considering.
Brakes – better than the rest.
Frame – I have absolutely no idea how people judge the quality of the frame. I guess you have to take manufacturer’s word for it. Decathlon claims to have same quality of frame as others.
Gear Shifters – I have seen trigger shifters, wrist shifters and thumb (push) shifters on a MTB till now. Of these 3 I personally prefer the thumb shifters because the fingers are busy braking, wrist is busy supporting me and thumbs are free, so it is great that 5.2 has thumb shifters.
Looks – If this is something that matters to you, 5.2 comes in a rocking grey and black and looks slick!
Chain Stay cover – 5.2 is the only bike of the lot to have a rubber + form covers over the chain stay to prevent scratches on the frame. To me this shows they have cared enough to bundle this essential but most often overlooked accessory along with the bike.
What’s not so great?
Gears – I tried playing with them and I think I screwed them a bit, but overall, I think the entire gear assembly could have been a bit better. It is a bit noisy.
Weight – it weighs around 13.5Kg and is a bit heavier than some in the lot but when I look at how much I weigh, I can’t complain
Everything else I guess is similar to the other bikes in the same range.
Overall: Great value for money (In Bangalore, India it costs INR 15.5K if you are a reseller)
Today I got a call from Citibank ( nothing new ), but the call started with “Hi I am XXX, I am calling from Citibank. How is the service of Citibank ?”, after I told him a couple of concerns that I had, he said “I am sorry to hear that, please call up XXXXXX (gave me a Bangalore number) and they will solve your problem immediately”. Then the sales pitch for a health insurance policy started like this “Sir we have a health policy that we have launched specially for Citibank customers …” and the pitch went on. I tried to stop him by telling him that I already have a policy from some other insurer, but as he began to explain the differences b/w my policy and what he had to offer, I kept on listening because he had listened to my problem and somehow left hope of resolving my problem.
Although with me, he couldn’t close the sales, but he sure got my attention for a while. I am sure this will help Citibank and that insurer to close more calls this way.
Nice to see someone taking a different approach than just calling up and saying “We have a policy / scheme etc. for you.” (to which my response has always been “Thanks, but sorry I am not interested”)
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