N=1 .. Does it work across the world?

In an interesting discussion with a friend of mine during this week, came an interesting thought. I was explaning about what i really appreciate in England.
-- N=1, customer and his requirement are heard to and marketing is core to this economy
-- Innovation for comfort and luxury has had a huge market
-- Educating people on products, process and invention is their way of honest branding
-- Quality is of extreme importance
-- All pros and cons are well thought through and incorported
-- Customer Service might not be high, but enabling customer is on higher side

I was generally quite impressed by the feel good factor that this consumer driven economy brings to people. It is so structured towards what will make one spend more. The success of business in here lay in the amount of populist support the product gains due to its features and mapping to direct consumers. Look at iPad, Europe is alway the first to experience and finds market instantaneously.

I started discussing on how this kind of market is now picking up in India and aiming at young earners and middle class. I was convinced about the focus of moving to N=1, but i wasnt convinced if it was as detailed as that in England and if Quality matched. This thought led me and my friend to enter into a new debate which proved that India is a unique market, sheer variety of customer, number of customers, culture, efficiency and negotiation power of even 2 year old kid.

-- Population and culture of India does not demand N=1
-- The market with all its increasing consumerism is still looking at balance in prices
-- People in India still like the "human" touch to services, a large population is still not educated or even if it is, reading does not excite many
-- India is a real tough market with a mix of all kinds of customers and buying cultures
-- Between volume and margin, volume at this stage is an easier target. The difference in revenue earned by targetting volume sales and premium margin sales, is high enough to justify volume market
-- BOP is a huge market in volume game and interestingly will grow in magin way by product differentiation



We concluded that marketing, business innovation and entrepreneurship in consumer driven products is very local.. strategies for GTM and hence even the product features weightage should vary for different geographies. The word Glocal made perfect sense.. processes, material producrement, management experience, may be labour and production can be leveraged across geographies, but ideas and innovation have to happen locally.. The Tata Nano, Zandu balm, Hero cycles.. they are all there to stay till someone nails the mindset of value vs price negotiation power of Indians.. :) So, if you are the marketing guy, you know India will challenge all your principles and learnings, as there are mutiple sizes that might fit one, but one size might not fit all..