Do you face these marketing challenges?

Marketing challenges faced by startups…

While startups are demonstrating the true spirit of Indian entrepreneurship, the lack of marketing support has started to hurt the sector as a whole. With global companies now venturing into India to take advantage of the huge Indian domestic market and get their share of growth revenues; our country people are facing the heat since they are unable to match the marketing campaigns of their global peers and rivals.
Here is a look at five major marketing challenges faced by Indian startups across the spectrum.

Lack of buyer behavior understanding:
Marketing is all about understanding the consumer behavior and anticipating the change before it arrives. Indians have been notoriously slow in the past and do not spend adequate finances and time on understanding the changing behavior patterns of their customers at large.
A majority of Indian entrepreneurs still have a simple web presence with a website or listing in business directories.
While global companies entering India are using innovative Octopus advertising campaigns, Indians are yet to wake up on the advantage of having a dedicated and focused marketing program. Indian entrepreneurs have been slow in building brands for their products while competing with well known global brands making them lose their market share.

Limited HR network:
India has a young workforce with fresh graduates in all streams being churned out every year. But the startups in the country have been unable to take advantage of this workforce. Either multinational companies absorb a large number of marketing graduates or they start up their own ventures.
They thereby miss the services of fresh marketing graduates. They should start looking at employing a team of marketing professionals from reputed institutions to help them weave their dedicated marketing plan rather than having the top management dictate the marketing campaigns.

Over reliance of traditional marketing strategies:
While the world has moved on from traditional marketing techniques like print and television to digital and mobile marketing, Indian entrepreneurs on an average still rely on age old methods of marketing. What was right a decade ago may not necessarily be the right thing today. Indians have failed to look ahead in terms of adopting new age marketing techniques. One of the major reasons for such a behavior is the lack of finances available for marketing programs.
They find it difficult to raise money for day- to- day operations like working capital and technology upgradation, leave alone marketing and branding. Indian banks and financial institutions need to come up with a financial plan aimed at promoting marketing facilities of SMEs to raise funds for marketing and brand building exercises.

Non compliance of latest technology:
Most Indian entrepreneurs are technology backward when it comes to manufacturing; they are also equally stiff in adopting new technology tools for marketing. The world has moved on to digital and mobile marketing with cloud based marketing plans through various SAAS being the future.

Not employing professionals and marketing consultants:
When it comes to marketing programs, it is usually the entrepreneurs who take a call depending on their budget and what they perceive might work for the enterprises. The lack of professional approach not only hurts the marketing plan but also leaves the finances in disarray when things go wrong. Entrepreneurs need to at best keep a bird’s eye view on all departments and always let the professionals handle the work rather than owners doing everything from production to marketing to packaging, sales and customer support.

What kind of marketing challenges have your startup faced? Please share your views.