What Jayati Singh teaches about AI in marketing

You know one of the big things about MSMEs is that it is as close as you can get to the end user and end customer. Hi Jayati, from several years in the FMCG and the B2C space to B2B today, tell us about the journey. Yeah, so in fact I have spent a considerable number of years in FMCG, then in FMCD as well. So primarily a B2C space and I felt that it was time now for me to explore the other side also, which was at B2B.

And I thought that Tally would be a good stepping stone to get into this because it's also as close as it can get to conversing and talking directly with the customers. Only by the fact that it targets the micro, small, medium enterprises, which are small in nature. And the whole, you know, the purchase journey and the decision journey is sort of similar to how it works in FMCG or FMCD domain. So in that sense, yeah, it's been a fascinating journey taking learnings from B2C and applying them in the B2B domain.

And, you know, that's what's been working for me. So B2B marketing trends tend to focus a lot on performance rather than brand building. Do you think that is poised for change? I think that definitely is something where most companies are focusing towards. Because specifically in B2B, you know, the brand is synonymous with the company or the product that you're selling with. But end of the day, more and more companies are realizing that they need to stand for something.

Right. So even if you're a product purely from a functional aspect is not going to yield much in the long run. They have to build a brand which gets associated with certain attributes, you know, the purpose that the company stands for. And taking that purpose live to, you know, the customers or their consumers, that is a challenge. But at the same time, something that most companies are recognizing and they're working towards it. So we talked about the fact that you have brand building along with having a thought leadership in the domain.

These are now critical aspects where most B2B companies are working towards. What is the role of content and storytelling and increasing consideration among B2B clients? In B2B, content plays a huge role. And for Tally particularly, I think it plays an important role in three aspects. One is, of course, the whole brand building. So the things that I already stated with respect to communicating your purpose and how engaging you make it in a very storytelling sort of manner.

The second thing is because it's a very domain specific, you know, product category that we're talking about. So through VAT, through GST regime, now the new returns are coming in. So there you, you know, to be seen as a thought leader, the content around the domain expertise becomes of great value. And the third aspect is purely about the product. So which is more about the usage, you know, how it simplifies things for you, etc. Tally focuses on the MSME sector. But where is the sector in terms of the digitization journey?

And what innovations especially have you developed for MSMEs? Okay, so, you know, there are roughly, what, 60 million MSMEs in the country today. And out of that, only about 35% can be called digitally connected or enabled. So it's really the other 65% which is not there, either automated or not on Internet. And they're not using that as a business or as a form of helping their own business grow or to interact with vendors, etc. Right. So that says that there's a huge scope in really digitizing, you know, the businesses.

So I think from a government policies level also, there's a lot that is being done. You know, there are various schemes. And if you look at all the, you know, the hardware product companies also, they're focusing on MSMEs in a big manner. Because driving automation and digitization is a big thing. This whole chunk of the MSMEs, they're really the backbone of our economy as well. And unless we get them, you know, up to a point where they digitize, I think, yeah, there will always be an impediment into the growth.

The other thing is also being that a lot of these MSMEs are influenced by the, you know, the influences like CAs or their tax practitioners, etc. So having a strong connect with them, you know, being in touch with what, you know, what the latest trends are or what the government policies, etc. are coming on board. I mean, that relationship has also been helping both Tally and the businesses in a big manner, in a, you know, joint partnership sort of manner. How is marketing to MSMEs different from doing that for other larger companies?

And what are the growth levers there? So, like I said, you know, one of the big things about MSMEs is that it is as close as you can get to the end user and end customer. In larger enterprises, what you see is that obviously the cycle is pretty long because there are very many layers and very many touch points that you have to go through. So, you know, depending on the profile of the company and the size of the company, obviously, the whole closure of, let's say, a deal can take a very long time.

That is much lesser or smaller in a MSME environment, right? Because it's more personalized. Yeah. So, while we do account-based marketing for larger enterprises and you keep, you know, touching base with them, with the trends and larger, both macro and micro topics. With the MSMEs, the thing is that you can reach them directly. But having said that, reaching them directly also means that your network has to be strong enough to be able to reach them.