Market dynamics and consumer touchpoints have always been evolving and the pandemic has only accelerated this process, said Shirish Agarwal, Head – Brand and Marketing Communications, Panasonic India, at the Pitch CMO Summit 2022 Delhi held on Wednesday.

Agarwal was speaking on the topic ‘Converging the non-linear consumer journey’.

He started the session by talking about market dynamics and consumer preferences changing from time to time. “Market dynamics and consumer touchpoints have always been evolving. The pandemic has accelerated this whole process of change and evolution. There is so much information available and so much demand for our attention that we can hardly focus on a particular trend for a short time. Oracle ID graph shows that an average consumer owns five devices in today’s time. Imagine the kind of information they are exposed to. The challenge is the more information you are exposed to, the more it creates a paradox of choices. You are not able to decide what you want as it creates more confusion.”

Moving further in the session, Agarwal explained how the consumer journey is evolving in today’s time. He noted, “The challenge is immense for marketers today to ensure that you deliver the right message to a consumer at the right time. If you look at the consumer journey, it has evolved over the years. Earlier, it was linear. There was a narrow marketing path. But in today’s time, it is extremely nonlinear. Consumers are interacting at multiple points and the moment of truth can happen at any point. If a need arises today, the first and foremost thing I will do is go to YouTube, Amazon or Flipkart and start checking their reviews and ratings. Digital is playing an important role in this journey today.”

“When we look at our customers, we divide them into different buckets and it is extremely important for the brands who are probably not the leaders but challengers, because you will always have a situation where you will be running short of budgets. So, you have to make certain smart choices. We ensure that the most important consumers for us are the intent audience who are already there in the market looking to buy a product,” he added.

Concluding the session, Agarwal elucidated, “The whole intent is don’t stop your communication right after the purchase but enhance that experience as a consumer. We need to work on our sales service as that is one of the biggest priorities for any consumer durable industry because nothing beats your own experience of a particular brand. Service plays an extremely important role as far as the consumer durable industry is concerned.”