A PROJECT REPORT ON Submitted for the partial fulfillment of the requirement of Paper BBRP- 601 for the degree

of BACHELOR OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION (BBA) SESSION 2008-2011

Under the guidance of: Mrs. RUCHIKA SHARMA Lecturer (MMIM) MM UNIVERSITY SUBMITTED BY: Ankush Sharma Roll No. 1208006 BBA- 6th Sem.

SUBMITTED TO

MAHARISHI MARKANDESHWAR INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT (M.M.U) MULLANA (Ambala) HARAYANA 133203 INDIA DECLARATION
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I hereby declare that the dissertation entitled Permission Marketing: An Analysis of Indian Market submitted for the degree of Bachelors of Business Administration (BBA) is my original work and the dissertation has not formed the basis of award of any degree, diploma, associate ship, fellowship or similar other titles. It has not been submitted to any other University or Institution for the award of any degree or diploma.

Date Place

Ankush Sharma 1208006

CERTIFICATE
Certified that the research project entitled PERMISSION MARKETING: AN ANALYSIS OF INDIAN MARKET as per my knowledge is an
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original piece of research work done by Mr. Ankush Sharma, Roll No. 1208006 during the period of his study under my guidance for the award of the Bachelors of Business Administration (BBA) degree

Date: Place Designation

Mrs. Ruchika Sharma

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Gratitude

is not a thing of expression; it is more a matter of feeling.

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There is always a sense of gratitude which one express for others for their help and supervision in achieving the goals. I too express my deep gratitude to each and every one who has been helpful to me in completing the project report successfully. First, of all, I am highly thankful to Dr. Amit Mittal, Principal, M.M. Institute of Management for allowing me to pursue my Project Report on PERMISSION MARKET. I give my regards and sincere thanks to Mrs. Ruchika Sharma who has devoted his precious time in guiding me and helping me it with in time. I feel self-short of words to thanks my parents and friends who had directly or indirectly instrumental in the completion of the project. MARKETING: AN ANALYSIS OF INDIAN

Ankush Sharma

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Permission Marketing is an approach where marketers obtain permission from consumers before progressing to the step of buying. As the Indian
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market is a competitive market and where marketers are trying to attract more and more customers , here Permission marketing act as a best tool in making the relations with their and customers and maintaining it for a long term. Our goal in this paper is threefold:First, a critical analysis of the concept of permission marketing and its relationship to existing ideas in the marketing literature is provided. Secondly, its current position in the Indian market, and Thirdly it tells about the facts the further scope of Permission Marketing in the Indian market. Secondary data is collected for the research purpose and there data is collected from books, websites, journals and articles. The research is totally exploratory in nature and convenience sampling method is used to collect the data. The Summary Report proposes the scope of permission marketing in the current and in the future scenario that is grounded in the findings of the study.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapters Title Page No.

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 Declaration Certificate Acknowledgement Executive Summary 1. Introduction 1.1 Meaning 1.2 Features of Permission Marketing 1.3 Channels of Permission Marketing 2. Review of Literature 3. Research Methodology 3.1 Selection of the Topic 3.2 Objective of the study 3.3 Nature of the Study 3.4 Methods of Data collection 3.5 Analysis and interpretation of the data 3.6 Scope of the study 3.7 Significance of the study 3.8 Limitations of the study
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II III IV V 1-4 4-5 6-13

14-18 19-23 20 20 20-21 21 21-22

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4. Latest Developments in the Topic 5. Analysis and interpretation 5.1 Current Scenario of Permission Marketing in India 5.2 Scope of the project

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50-51 6. Findings and conclusion 7. Suggestions and recommendations 54-58 Annexure(s) Bibliography 52-53

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Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 PERMISSION MARKETING

Permission marketing is a term coined by Seth Godin used in marketing in general and e-marketing specifically. Permission marketing is also called
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invitational marketing. Seth Godin was the Vice President of Direct Marketing at Yahoo in his book of the same name, recently translated into Spanish ("Permission Marketing", Ed Granica, 2001), and is a concept truly original and which fits with the philosophy of Customer Relationship Management (CRM), . It's trying to maintain a relationship with the clients that allow a Firm to obtain a particular permission level, which resulted in a win-win development parties. This is more or less possible depending on the type of product or service, the intensity of the relationship, perception of value, etc., but what is clear is that is necessarily a long-term orientation, which is separated enough from the marketing prevailing at the moment. He also founded Yoyo dyne, the company who invented Permission Marketing via e-mail. So why has his work in those companies led him to coin the term Permission Marketing? In Godins words, Permission Marketing is an approach where marketers obtain permission from consumers before progressing to the step of buying. The ones who have checked boxes in email replies to receive information on special offers, they have definitely come across Permission Marketing. Readers are first introduced to the concept of Interruption Marketing, the traditional way of getting consumer attention. This commonly practiced marketing approach is based on huge advertising budgets, and is all about capturing consumers attention. All these generate what is seen and hear today on the television, radio and newspapers. They are termed as clutter. The undesirable opposite of permission marketing is interruption marketing. Marketers obtain permission before advancing to the next step in the purchasing process. This form of marketing requires that the prospective customer has either given explicit permission for the marketer to send their promotional message (e.g. an email or catalog request) or implicit
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permission (e.g. querying a search engine). This can be either via an online email opt-in form or by using search engines, which implies a request for information which can include that of a commercial nature. Permission marketing means any marketing communications that offer optin or opt-out opportunities to recipients so that further marketing communications are only received by those who wish to receive future emails (Pickton and Broderick, 2005, p. 144).Its purpose is to reduce unwanted commercial messages online and it has become standard practice of interactive marketers. Permission marketing has brought a solution to the problem of electronic message clutter spam, which means customers need to give permission for the company to send e-mail messages to them (Cross, 2003) Permission e-mails can take the form of newsletters, or a checkbox in the registration process on various websites giving the marketer permission to deliver product updates or other marketing information to the consumer. These e-mails have higher success rates than spam, both in terms of ROI and in preserving a company's reputation (Davis, 2002). Permission e-mail can take the form of acquisition or retention e-mail which means mailings whose primary objective is to prospect for customers or whose objective is to forge a relationship with an existing customer base (Davis, 2002). The weakness of permission marketing is it does not provide full protection for the privacy consumers want to maintain, nor it does give the full benefits marketers want. The debate is about the choice for consumers to opt-in or opt-out of communications started by the company and giving their contact information to third parties (Cross, 2003). Opt-in means signing up for the companys database to receive promotional e-mails and discounts about product or service customer is seeking. The customer has also the option to opt-out,
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which means the client has the choice to remove their address from the companys e-mail list, which leaves the decision for the customer whether they want to receive more similar messages. (Macpherson, 2001, p. 14-15).

1.2 FEATURES OF PERMISSION MARKETING

1. Create Powerful Communications in Minutes Wizard and eye-catching templates make it easy for on to create and send professional electronic communications - no technical or design expertise required. For pros, the advanced email editor lets the customer easily use their own custom designs. 2. Build Email List Your customer and prospect list is one of your most valuable assets. Build it and keep it up-to-date with Constant Contact. Easily import the existing permission-based customer and prospect lists and grow the email list by adding a visitor signup to companys website.

3. See Campaign Results To Learn how effective the email campaigns are, and use that information to improve the results. See who opened email and who

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clicked on each link - real-time as clicks happen. And, compare the results with those of other small businesses. 4. Manage Subscribers and their Lists Constant Contact does all the heavy lifting. From our unlimited list categories, to real-time bounce management and our Safe Unsubscribe feature, permission marketing makes it easy to manage email lists of all sizes. 5. Delivering the Emails Customers rely on Constant Contact to get their email delivered. Permission Marketing handles all the details - from formatting the emails to ensuring the highest email deliverability.

1.3 CHANNELS OF PERMISSION MARKETING 1.3.1 SMS (Short Message Service) 1.3.2 Websites
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1.3.3 E-mail
1.3.1 SMS (Short Message Service):A significant addition to the increasing list of communication carriers is that of SMS, Short Messaging Service. SMS has become the fastest, easiest and the most convenient way to communicate today. For reasons personal or professional, SMS works across purposes. The most recent application of SMS has been to reach out to the consumer offering him products and services just as any of the other mass media would. Be it in the form of promotions or advertising or even sales, the functionality of SMS usage is crossing all barriers. Here is a list of the SMS websites in Permission Marketing: 1. M- Ginger 2. SMS2.0 3. 160by2.com 4. WAY2SMS

M-Ginger (Make Money, while your mobile beeps!):

Recently launched service, mGinger pays users to receive ads on their mobile. Users, after registering to the site, need to specify their interest and start receiving relevant ads Where is
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the money then? Well, for every ad that they receive, the user earns 20 paise and 10 paisa for referring their friends (no wonder why all of yahoo groups are being spammed with such emails). Once you accumulate Rs. 300/, you will receive a cheque; and as per this date, highest single earning has been Rs. 99.40 (i.e. 497 ads!!). [Free VAS, if you say 'yes' to ads]

SMS 2.0:
Pretty much on the lines of freemiumfree mantra, i.e. give away the basic service for free, charge for the premium ones; and again, make the premium free (supported by ads).Launched by Bharati Airtel and Apple partnership (currently offered in Delhi region only), SMS2.0 platform enables free delivery of news headlines, movie trailers and promotions. When a subscriber turns on the mobile phone, SMS 2.0 is launched by default, but the handset can still be used in the same way when sending or receiving text messages. At the bottom of the mobile phones screen is an array of content banners from news to astrology, travel and video that the user can choose from if he or she wants to do more than just sending or receiving an SMS. With this feature a user can key in a word or phrase just like composing an SMS message, click Search instead of Send, and be directed to a search engine such as Google or Yahoo. SMS2.0 is a win-win situation for end users as well as operators The character (less)fight One of the concerns with the above mentioned service is that they dont rely on the existing usage of the user (and arent really a as-you-use kind of a service). You need to change your usage behavior to use services like mGinger or

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SMS2.0. But, following companies have taken a radically different approach with respect to permission marketing

160by2.com
Using 160by2, one can send free sms to any mobile number in India, the only constraint being the 80 characters usage, i.e. one cannot send messages more than 80 characters in the length (since the next 80 characters will be utilized by advertisers for delivering contextual ads). The good thing about 160by2 is its amazing UI and the clean interface. Its a delight (and a possible case study) for any designer. The overall experience is really awesome, compared to the other services.

WAY2SMS
Quite similar to 160by2, way2sms also provides free text messaging absolutely free of cost (except that they allow 92 characters of message and the rest is used for ads). Way2SMS has a wider reach and boasts of a million user base. really appreciating feature about 160by2 and way2sms s approach is that apart from delivering ads, they are also providing a great service for free, i.e. sending free SMS across the country! 1.3.2 Websites:Today everyone knows about websites. Websites are the best examples of the Permission marketing. For login into a web site, and e-mail id is required to know about the features of the company about the website, and about their products. So in this case users create an e-mail id. While creating the e-mail
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id the user fills the information and click on submit and mark I agree checkbox, it means the user have given the permission to the owner of that website to use his information to contact him or telling him about the products. Here the marketer ask for the permission by redirecting the user to login page and making e-mail id and the customer is giving the permission by making e-mail id and submit the information by accepting all the terms and conditions of the company.

1.3.2.1 Permission Marketing and the Web

Because the companies can easily interact in real time with prospects and clients, the Web is ideal for building one-to-one client relationships. If they consistently identify what their clients want and notify them that they can meet their needs, they can turn those Web site visitors and one-time customers into loyal long-term clients. The key to one-to-one marketing on the Web is effective use of permission marketing getting the potential clients to volunteer their attention? Opt-in e-mail, online communities, electronic newsletters, and Web-based client support services are powerful tools for one-to-one marketing, but only if the companies have the permission and participation of the prospects and clients. The first step is to figure out the characteristics of prospects that would be most able, willing, and ready to buy, often using online forms to gather the information. Once the target market is defines, they target their sales and service messages based on the demographics and interests of the individual.
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The delivery may be in the form of special Web page content or a targeted newsletter or an e-mail offer. Why would a prospect or customer supply you with the information you need to make one-to-one marketing on the Web work for you? The answer: value and trust.

Value
Does the offer meet your prospect's needs? Whether its customer support on the Web site or a new product offering sent via e-mail, it must have value to the prospect or customer. Keep in mind that the target audience is continually barraged with barely meaningful banner ads, Web sites, and email that compete for their attention. The offer must stand out from all the competition by offering value to the recipient. Otherwise it simply goes in the trash and relationship has come to a dead end.

Trust
Target audience trusts you to: 1. Adhere to privacy policy. 2. Not sell their information if they haven't given permission to do so. 3. Avoid offers and communications that are too frequent, too loud, too long, and too insistent.
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4. Be honest. 5. Nurture the relationship and interact with them, providing information, education, and products and services of value.
6.

Provide the option to opt out of the promotional activities.

As they build relationships their with customers and prospects, they'll provide more and more information that can use to be of better service to them. Developing and sustaining one-to-one relationships is an ongoing process. As one learn more about their customers, more he can serve them better, make inroads for maintaining profitable, loyal, one-to-one relationships resulting in increased business. Implementing an effective program of permission marketing on the Web is a step in the right direction.

1.3.4

E- mail:-

Email marketing is one of the most effective weapons in a small business owner's arsenal. It allows you to market to large numbers of potential customers for a fraction of the cost of traditional direct mail. However, there's a fine line between sending effective email messages and spamming your client base.

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Whether you buy, rent, or compile your own email lists, keep these four points in mind when developing your opt-in strategy:
1.

Make sure that the names on list belong there:Don't add the names of people who haven't agreed to receive messages from you. Sending unsolicited e-mail known as "spam" creates a negative impression of company. The ISP can even shut down for this. For guidance on how to develop an e-mail list, read Developing E-Mail Marketing Lists.

2.

Let the customers decide the format in which they'll receive promotional mailings:Not everyone has an e-mail account that can process HTML and richtext messages, and some people prefer plain text.

3.

Give customers a chance to opt out of future mailings:Customers come and go, so don't be alarmed when someone wants to be dropped from an e-mail list.

4.

Give fair notice to visitors, if they harvest names from the Web site:Re-assure customers that their personal information is safe, and that wont be sell or distributed. Develop a privacy policy, post it prominently on the site, and stick to it. Read for guidelines on developing privacy policy.

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Chapter 2 Review of Literature

The concept of permission is a relatively new concept; it originated with the theoretical research of Milne and Gordon (1993). Then, these beginnings
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followed up in the " marketing of the permission ", studied in the an ager literature (Godin, 1999; Krishnamurthy, 2001); to occupy, today, a big importance with the development of the new information technologies such as the Internet, the mobile phone (Rettie and Brum, 2001; Barnes, 2002; Barwise and Strong, 2002; Kavassalis and al., 2003; Dickinger and al. 2004; Bamba and Barnes, 2007). According to Milne and Gordon (1993), the permission is a means to create rights protecting the private lives of consumers (privacy): by giving its permission for the sharing of personal information with the marketer, the individual must be protected against the phenomenon of spam. Milne and Gordon (1993) discuss the role of customer permission along with volume, targeting and compensation in the context of direct mail. However, their reference is to an individual's providing a direct marketer the permission to share his or her personal information with others. In other words, they see permission as a tool to establish privacy rights rather than to enhance targeting. Moreover, the privacy issue is different now since an infomediary (Hagel & Singer, 1999) retains all the personal information and supplies ads based on that information; the advertisers never see the information. Whereas Godin (1999) sees that the permission goes beyond this definition, to be a means which aims at improving the targeting. Although the term permission marketing was coined by Godin (1999), the general idea of customer permission in direct marketing had surfaced earlier in the marketing literature, mainly in the context of privacy issues in direct marketing. Recently, Sheth, Sisodia and Sharma (2000) have proposed the concept of customer-centric marketing, which includes what they call co21 | P a g e

creation marketing. Co-creation marketing envisions a system where marketers and consumers participate in shaping the marketing mix. In the authors own words, Co-creation marketing enables and empowers customers to aid in product creation (e.g., Gateway computers), pricing (e.g., priceline.com), distribution and fulfillment (e.g., GAP store or GAP online delivered to the house), and communication (e-mail systems) (Sheth, Sisodia & Sharma 2000, p. 62). Hence, permission marketing can be viewed as focusing on the communication aspect of a larger concept called cocreation marketing. Gilmore and Pine II (1997) had also earlier identified collaboration between marketers and consumers as one form of one-on-one marketing. Krishnamurthy (2001) considers the marketing of the permission a communication taken on the initiative of the customer. The permission of the consumer consists, then, in giving its explicit agreement and in revealing information corresponding to its profile and to its centers of interests, allowing him it to be a marketing target and to receive marketing offers (Godin, 1999; Krishnamurthy, 2001; Rettie and Brum, 2001; Bamba and Barnes, 2007). The direct marketing literature has also pointed out the importance of consumers controlling the terms of their relationship with marketers. Phelps, Nowak and Ferrell (2000) point out those individuals like to control how personal information about them is used by marketers, the kinds of advertising mail and catalogs that they receive and the volume of advertising mail they receive (p. 29). In this literature, direct mail is viewed as a social contract between the consumer and the marketer (Milne & Gordon, 1993).
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Moreover, there is recognition that what is necessary to improve direct marketing relationships is not just a reduction of privacy concerns of individuals, but rather an improvement in the consumers trust of the marketer (Milne & Boza, forthcoming). Marketing scholars have long been disenchanted with the marketer-initiated approach to direct marketing. For example, in a critique on database marketing, Schultz (1994) noted, If the database works for the consumer and not just the marketer, duplicate mailings should never exist. For the database to have value for customers, it should simplify and improve their personal lives, not just complicate them with unwanted offers or ridiculous solicitations. Also, if the database was really working for the consumer - and not just the marketer - privacy would not be the issue it is. Perhaps the greatest concern about the value of the database is the one-way marketing systems that are being developedsystems that favor the marketer and are disincentives to the consumer (emphasis added). Hence, it is not surprising that several marketing scholars have begun to indicate their acceptance of permission marketing as a viable concept. For example, Petty (2000) proposes shift(ing) property rights for soliciting and selling information about consumers to the consumers themselves thereby reducing the marketing costs imposed upon consumers without their consent(p. 52). Further, he argues that by bearing the costs of identifying disinterested customers, marketers get an audience interested in their message. Consumers get fewer messages and only ones that they are interested in receiving (Petty 2000, p. 52).Similarly, Sheehan and Hoy
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(2000) also suggest that permission marketing may be a technique to reduce privacy concerns of individuals. Even though they do not use the term permission marketing, Milne, Boza and Rohm (1999) propose that opt-in methods (can act) as a trust-building alternative to more effective information control.

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Chapter 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 SELECTION OF THE TOPIC

As the current scenario the Indian market is growing very fast. Today the companies are in the competition of making good relations with their customers instead of making new customers. The purpose behind selecting this topic is that the concept is new and very few studies are done in the
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favor of PERMISSION MARKETING. The results of the studies are limited and by seeing the current position of the India competitive market this method helps a lot to maintain good relationship between the customers and the company. The motive behind the topic is to tell about the current position of the permission marketing in the Indian market and as well as to search out the future of Permission Marketing in India in the coming years.

3.2 OBJECTIVES OF THE TOPIC

To understand the concept of permission Marketing. To analyze the current position of permission marketing in India. To identify the scope of permission marketing in India Market.

3.3 NATURE OF THE STUDY This research is exploratory in nature. Very few studies have been done on
this topic. So the main objective of the report is to explore the facts of the permission marketing and to know its position in current Indian market and the future of permission market in the INDIAN industry.

Exploratory Research: - Exploratory research is a type of research

conducted for a problem that has not been clearly defined. Exploratory research helps determine the best research design, data collection method and selection of subjects. It should draw definitive conclusions only with extreme caution. Given its fundamental nature, exploratory research often concludes that a perceived problem does not actually exist.
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Exploratory research often relies on secondary research such as reviewing available literature and/or data, or qualitative approaches such as informal discussions with consumers, employees, management or competitors, and more formal approaches through in-depth interviews, focus groups, projective methods, case studies or pilot studies. The Internet allows for research methods that are more interactive in nature

3.4 METHODS OF DATA COLLECTION

As concerned to the research of the project Secondary sources are used for the collection of the data. Data is collected from the past researches and the journals, articles, books and the websites.

3.5 ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION:The report is based on the secondary data collected from different articles, journals and the websites. The research is totally exploratory in nature and the results are drawn on the basis on citing the graphs, the books and the websites and the past researches by different authors. After citing the facts it is concluded that the Permission Marketing plays a very great role in maintain and building relations with new and the existing customers. In todays world it plays a great role and helps the marketers to generate more and more revenues and profits. If the permission marketing is properly used in the Indian market it results in great profitability in the international market

3.6 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

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India has been an attractive destination for marketers because of its growth potential as an emerging market. The average Gross Domestic Production (GDP) growth rate of India is 8.37% which indicates that future consumption will increase. The affluence level of the average Indian household has increased significantly. The per capita income has doubled from the 2002 2003 level of Rs. 18885 to Rs. 38084. Education level has reached to 79.9% in 2009 from a meager 34% in 1971. The research findings of McKinsey Global Institute indicate that the Indian consumer market is expected to quadruple by 2025, making it the fifth largest consumer market in world. Indian market is the competitive market and is growing very fast. To run up with this world organizations have to use best technological methods to get competitive advantage .this project helps us to know about the scope of permission marketing in the INDIAN market and its impact on Indian market in future

3.7 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

India is a fast developing economy in the world and it is getting developed very vastly. Permission marketing is used by many organizations. It is growing with a great speed and its helping the organization to grow in aright and profitable manner. Like yahoo Asia! , Rediff mail and hotmail are using this concept as a relation building concept. It can be the best strategy for getting in touch with
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your customers and also add new customers with the organization. If the permission marketing concept is use in the different sectors it can be profitable. The SMS companies like 160by 2, way2sms etc are some of the major players in the field of permission marketing, just like this permission marketing can also be used for the other sectors too.

3.8 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

While doing the research the there should be some limitations are there which are as follows1.

Time shortage:The time period for the research is very small.

2. Non- availability of Data

As very few researches are conducted on the specific topic so thats why the data is not easily available and it is not possible to collect the data from company to company and all the sectors

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Chapter 4 Latest Developments in the Topic

After studying the facts and the figures it is come to know that internet users are growing very fast in the world and the Permission Marketing plays a great role in the development of the Business organizations. It helps in maintain good relations with the existing customers and upgrading them with the latest products and services. Permission marketing and the technology have positive impacts on the business organizations and the customers. It helps in building good relations with others organizations too. Today many companies in India are thinking to use the Permission Marketing as a communication tool with their customers and many

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companies are using the same concept such as Club Mahindra (CM), Yahoo! Asia, Rediff and Hotmail.

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Chapter 5 Analysis and interpretation

After the research of the facts and the figures, it is to be concluded that Permission Marketing plays a great role in maintaining the relationships. Some of the facts which are to be studied in the report. Analysis of the different channels of the permission marketing is as follows:-

5.1 Current Scenario of Permission Marketing in India 5.1.1 Permission Marketing and Travel & Tourism business
Tourism business is growing day by day and selling of travel tickets online is the latest trend these days due to various positive reasons associated with it. The main requirement of travel industry is to understand the need of the
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customer. Understanding customer is always been a complex thing but for travel business it is must. The travel industry is well structured and always aims for customer satisfaction. With the gaining popularity of travel business, it has added to various advance level of business and one of them is making the use of internet marketing to sell travel tickets online. Selling travel tickets online is really becoming more and more popular these days due to the factor of providing convenience of reviewing and comparing various travel options on just one website sitting in the office and without going to the travel agent. It provides a user friendly experience in purchasing tickets online as it is easy to use. But, simply presence on internet does not provide with customers and does not guarantee the sale of travel tickets online. To sell travel tickets online it is very important to smartly market on internet to promote the services offered by the company. (Quote some examples of web links of travel Agents)

Permission Marketing by Club Mahindra (CM)

A good example of permission marketing is the one adopted by Indias leading holiday company Club Mahindra (CM). CM believes that any form of mailers or calls can only be done after permission has been taken from the prospect, and that spamming is an absolute no-no. Their form of permission marketing goes like this they post people at places where their target audience is likely to turn up petrol pumps, highway toll booths, high-class cinema halls, etc.
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These people approach the audience that drives up in cars (a key criterion used by CM to qualify its prospects) and asks them for permission to talk to them. If this permission is granted, then a lead generation form is handed over to them, where the prospect mentions his / her contact details and basically confirms that he would like a sales call about CMs products. As incentive to do this, the prospect could be offered a free holiday or a crack at a contest or some such sweetener. Now, when the sales representative does get in touch, he does it in the full knowledge that the prospect has expressed interest in learning about the product.

As govt. starts tightening noose around the advertisers, permission marketing seems to be the most viable options for advertisers to monetize the subscriber base the next question is how one gets the permission to send ads? Well, companies have come up with very smart initiatives to lure the customers to receive ads.

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Another ingenious form of permission marketing is carried out in many websites such as the ones offering free webmails-Hotmail, Rediff mail, etc. Most of us would have been through this; when registering to get an id, there will be a small set of check-boxes asking us for our interests. If we tick, say, cricket and science, then the service provider will take it as consent to
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bombard us with emails and newsletters. If we dont recall that we ticked some boxes, we could well end up thinking that this is spam; well, it is not.

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Yahoo! India portal may do online auction too

Priya Ganapati at Pragati Maidan

Yahoo! is hoping to launch a Yahoo! portal for India in the next 12 months. David Mickler, director, sales and marketing, Yahoo! Asia, told Rediff "Our strength has always been our search and directory services. We hope to capitalize on that. In addition to our other services the India portal will help readers search for Indian Web sites more effectively." Mickler clarified that
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Indian Web sites would include sites whose servers are located in India and sites whose content has an India focus but whose servers are not hosted in this country. "Our Indian portal will provide content like news from a variety of Indian and global content providers. We want to leverage our global advantage to deliver content to a local audience," Mickler said. Yahoo! plans to offer other services like auctions and India specific information like content on cricket and quotes from the stock exchanges. Mickler is also keen to start an auction service at the Indian portal. He told Rediff that the content on the portal will not be localized. "Most of the Web users in the country speak and read English. I believe that this is not likely to change in the next couple of years," he said. Mickler also delivered a presentation on extending business to the interactive media. Dressed in casuals Mickler stood out among the grey suits of the delegates. The session was scheduled to be addressed by Savio Chow, managing director, Yahoo! Asia. "Savio had to drop out at the last minute and he called me up at the eleventh hour when I was on a vacation. That explains the casuals," grinned Mickler. He said that the growth of the Internet has produced a shift in the way marketing is done. Mickler calls this new form of marketing "permission marketing".

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Listing out the advantages of permission marketing as opposed to traditional forms of marketing Mickler said "Permission marketing is invited and its avoids the clutter that traditional forms of marketing overwhelm the consumer with." To clarify the term for the audience Mickler elaborated, "Permission marketing is like dating. You select a desired prospect. Then provide the prospect with an incentive to volunteer for your service. Once that is done, you use the attention to educate about your product or service. Then offer additional incentive to gain further permission for updates. This example is kind of crude but it is a really good way to explain." Mickler listed out the four principles that should be used for direct marketing over the Web. 1. Be clear. Use seven words or less to explain your product to your customers. Remember users skim through their mails. So make it clear where you want the readers to click if they wish to know more about your product. 2. Be easy. No technology is a good thing. Do not ask for more information than what you need. And what you need is only an email address and the permission to send further information on that address.

3. Make it selfish.
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Tell the user upfront what is there in it for him. Present to him the benefits he gets out of the product and give him incentives to share personal information. 4. Test it. Test multiple audiences and remember that the market is more right than you are.

5.1.2 SMS (Selling made Smarter) Nature of Usage

From a simple message to a friend, to confirming/ canceling meetings, perhaps okaying deals, having confrontations without having to face the person, keeping conversations short and simple, finding your soul mate, sending across greetings, to downloading jokes, tunes, pictures, songs and so on, SMS has emerged as a multi-usage communication mode across ages and purposes. Apart from these, the usage of SMS has broadened its dimensions due to the constant up gradation in technology, which in turn is a result of the increasing competition amongst both the mobile handset providers as well as the service providers. Be it the ability of allowing to click pictures through a mobile phone and sending the same across to a friend, or requesting a certain facility (cricket scores!), or wanting to make a purchase, or sending group messages, or promoting a brand, SMS (and MMS) does it all.
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The Media Clutter

Amongst the sea of communication channels hitting the consumer constantly, the actual message usually gets lost. Many a times, the possibility of the right message reaching the right target is also dwindled, not ruling out the fact that this has a direct impact on the costs shelled out for such activities. Unlike the mass media, SMS enables micro targeting, which ensures that there is no spillover of the communication. The use of this medium also allows the consumer to react to the communication on the spot, which helps measure the effectiveness of the campaign. Then there is always the option to explore the possibility of this medium being used to propagate word-of-mouth. Every single target that the communication is being sent to carries the potential to be the originator of a new chain of targets. It just depends on how interesting and actionprovoking the message designed is for the chain to remain continual. Reflecting this idea are 2 case studies; one BBC Worldwide, which successfully boosted circulation of 'Top of the Pops' magazine through an ongoing text service and the other of East West Records, which successfully promoted a UK dance act Oxide & Neutrino with a wireless marketing campaign. Another interesting aspect is that ownership of a mobile phone is individual in nature. For many, it has an emotional connotation, which is an important factor while considering using SMS as a communication channel. Also the possibility of an SMS not being read (in comparison to a promotional E-mail

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not being opened) is quite negligible. Even a message that does not interest the consumer will at the most go unanswered but hardly unnoticed. Apart from E-mail, SMS is the only medium that allows Permission Marketing, the term itself depicting the fact that the marketer can obtain the permission of the consumer before the latter is made part of or exposed to any promotional/ marketing activity. To summarize it, SMS as a medium is all pervasive (makes the consumer reachable at all times), personal, allows Permission Marketing, interactive, generates impulsive responses and direct as far as approaching the right target is concerned.

Growth of SMS usage

In a very short span, the usage of SMS worldwide has reached competitive figures. The volume of SMS in India grew more than three-fold during the last year. From 80.6 crores the figure touched 24,500 crores by the end of 2002. In 2002 each cellular user in India sent around 26 SMS per month on an average. SMS has graduated from a mere add-on service into a communication channel alongside voice calls in India. (Gartner Dataquest report) Another survey done by IDC shows some interesting figures on SMS usage in certain metros and also compares the incidence of calls against SMS.

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The growth of SMS usage world over is quite phenomenal. Especially noteworthy is the growth in comparison with Internet usage. It is getting an acceptance across ages owing to its multi-faceted applications. In a very short span it has overtaken Internet figures in quite a few countries. According to a research conducted by Gartner G2, 41% of European adults use SMS as compared to 30% who use Internet/e-mail. Last year this figure was 28% for SMS users and 29% for Internet. In UK, 49% of adults use SMS while 39% are online. Germany poses 43% of adult SMS users as against 29% of Internet/e-mail users. In France the SMS usage is 30% as compared to 25% who go online.

Current promos using SMS

Given this strong value of SMS as a medium, a host of companies are using SMS as a chief medium for their promotions. And the response Awesome. It could be a Brand Promotion or a sales activity, or an offer by the service operator, SMS seems to be an answer to all types of communicational requirements. Amongst the many examples of SMS related exercises taken up by marketers, one is that of Kinetic engineering who tied up with Yahoo to generate awareness response via SMS. The idea was to create awareness for Kinetic Nova among the target audience and to increase brand recall via various offline and online activities. The promotion was devised by Yahoo for Kinetic's 4-stroke wonder scooter Nova - which received a record one million responses.

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Cadbury India tied up with BSNL mobile for SMS enabled vending machines. About 30-35 user-friendly machines would be placed at select congregation points in Mumbai. With the introduction of m-cash, the country's first mobile payment solution, BPL Mobile has introduced cashless payment using the mobile phone. BPL Mobile subscribers can buy a Cadbury chocolate, for which the payment would be reflected in the bill. A similar tie up has been initiated by BPL Pepsi for SMS enabled vending machines. In another scene, Lufthansa German Airlines in association with Mobile2Win organized the first-ever, live ticket auction through SMS in India. Service operators also see SMS as the most feasible solution for communicating many of their value-added services. For example, Airtel allowing recharging of SIM card via SMS, BSNL offering assisted SMS services on landline, Bharti Teletech providing SMS enabled telephones to BSNL. The participation of mobile service operators in this exercise only benefit in increasing the availability of SMS being used for all practical purposes. Radio Mirchi broke new grounds in FM Radio interactive programming by auctioning a date with Kareena Kapoor. Listeners had to SMS their bid to 8888. The auction could be played by anyone with an access to a mobile phone. The bidding for the lunch date began with Rs 5,000 and on the first day of the two-day auction, there were already more than 1,800 responses and the bid has crossed Rs 85,600 in Mumbai alone.
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The proceeds of the auction were donated to Nav Nirman Foundation, a home for the poor, addicts and the mentally challenged. Discovery and Star Plus also have used SMS to increase their programme viewership. Though on an experimental stage, Star Plus used the SMS medium to track the curiosity of television viewers about their serials. The channel started with Kyunki Saas Bhi Khabhi Bahu Thi, to check the percentage of people who send SMS to Star Plus at 7827 to know about the next episode of Kyunki, the response to which was surprisingly huge. Discovery Channel used the SMS medium to promote its new programmed, Berman and Berman, where viewer interactivity was an integral part of the programmed plan. Escotel and NDTV tied-up to provide a News Service called "NDTV Wireless" to all Escotel-Haryana customers via mobile. Indian Express associated with the Arab news channel, Al-Jazeera, to provide the breaking news from US-Iraq war on SMS. The Indian Express readers got the latest updates by SMSing 'AJ' at 3636. Active Media Tech was roped in by Indian Express to provide the backend technology to power the service. All kinds of promotions seem to have taken SMS as a must route of communication. Keeping abreast with the latest, let us not miss out the recent promotion taken up by the 'most talked about soap' on television, Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahi which also used SMS as a medium to provoke responses from viewers asking them to send across their views on its episodes.
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On one hand where a threshold is achieved wherein the consumer can be reached at any given point in time, let us be careful not to invade his personal space or lower his threshold of irritation. This otherwise, will lead to another case of arousing the need of a system that does away with junk SMS just as today we can Spam junk mails.

5.1.3 OCTANE:Octane is committed towards evangelizing permission marketing in India, especially permission email marketing. Purely because it makes good business sense to build relationships and to stop spamming. Lets take you as an example. You are a producer and a consumer of goods and services in the society. As a consumer, you like certain brands, categories of products and would like to know more about these on a regular basis. If you agree to receive updates from companies, brands, stores that are your favorite, you will see this as service provided by the supplier. On the other hand, if you are not interested in silk curtains or cultural tourism or cheap travel tickets or the likes, and you start receiving unsolicited intrusive email spams on such products and from companies you dont know or trust, you would be angry, annoyed and worried about your data privacy. For a producer or a marketer, this is an opportunity lost to make a connection and build on the relationship. Then why is it that most email or online marketers, especially in India, dont want to invest in permission or opt-in-list building activities. Simply, since
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buying an email spam list is cheap and easy. Second most marketers do not mechanism to track the lost opportunities and adverse impact spam marketing creates on the marketing campaigns.

Customer Acquisition Facts

Permission marketing yields 30% increase in conversion and a 10% increase in return on investment. (Permission Marketing, Seth Godin) Traditional direct marketing costs $1.50 per item, while online direct marketing averages 15-30 cents. (Andersen) Traditional direct mail averages 1-2% response rate. Permission marketing averages 10-15% response rates. (Direct Marketing Association)

80% of your visitors will never return to your website. (e-Marketer) odds of selling a product to an existing customer are 50%.

The odds of selling a product to a new customer are 15%, whereas the Email click-through measure 3-10x that of banner ads at 2-20% CTR. Internet users represent over 72% of the U.S. population and greater than 25% spend their time online using email. (UCLA Report 2001)

Customer Loyalty Facts

It costs 5 -10 times more to acquire a new customer than it does to retain an existing one. (E-marketer)

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 If you trail your competition by 20 points in customer loyalty you are out of business. Improving customer interactions is one of the single largest impact areas, across all industries. (Accenture) A 5% increase in customer retention yields an increase in profits between 25 -100%. Customer Loyalty Fact - Repeat customers spend 67% more; After 10 purchases, a customer has referred up to 7 people. (Bain & Company) Online promotions generate 2 to 5 times the customer response rates of traditional promotions. 70% of complaining customers will do business with the company again if it quickly takes care of a service snafu.

5.2 SCOPE OF PERMISSION MARKETING

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Permission marketing is not so popular are INDIA today and very few companies are using this type of permission marketing. Some of the International case studies of the Permission Marketing:-

Kestler Financial Group

Kestler Financial Group is a national Field Marketing Organization that serves and supports more than 5,500 independent insurance brokers. The firm specializes in annuities, long term care insurance, life insurance, and securities.KFG sends bi-monthly emails that:provide product information and selling tools enable a broker to request an immediate quote

Baxter Pharmaceuticals
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Uses permission-based email to establish and maintain dialogue with patients, care-givers, family members, physicians and sales force personnel. Uses Dynamic Content to deliver relevant information to key constituencies through The Baxter Factor.

Baxters integrated e-Marketing Strategy E-mail is a key component

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 Delivers information at regular intervals Drives traffic to disease state site Drives traffic to product site Increases demand for complementary materials

Key Constituencies
1. Patients 2. Family of patients 3. Friends/partners of patients 4. Nurses 5. Healthcare professionals 6. Sales force

Email Execution Process

Baxters permission-based email strategy has been pivotal in making Advate the leading product with more than 80% market share.
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Sherwin-Williams www.exacttarget.com Simple. Smart. Powerful.

Sherwin-Williams were losing core Do It Yourself Customers to competition. Fewer new customers were being acquired. Customer acquisition cost was rising. Optiem created a Preferred Customer Program to deliver promotional offers and advice for Do It Yourself customers.
2.

1.

Used indirect communications to attract customers to the Preferred Customer Program micro site and invite registration.

3. Used permission email to deliver relevant offers, provide projectrelated information and drive traffic to Sherwin-Williams store. Like these international companies the permission marketing strategy can also be use for doing businesses in INDIA, because we know that Customer is the king of the market and the benefits of the customers increase customer loyalty and helps in maintaining good relations and here the permission marketing act as link between the customer and the company.

Customer Registration Micro-site

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Sherwin-Williams obtain permission to send email offers and information.

Sherwin-Williams obtain productrelated project interests for relevant messaging.

Case Study Sherwin-Williams

Results Sherwin-Williams knows exactly how much they have invested in their Customer Affinity program and what sales have been generated.

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The Preferred Customer Program is now nationwide and is incorporated into the annual marketing plan.

Net Revenue exceeded cost by a factor of 12 to 1!

Sherwin-Williams have built a Preferred Customer database of more than 300,000 active customers and have a closed loop system for tracking program performance.

Permission Based E-mail across the organization:The Enterprise Email Challenge How to:

Meet worldwide requirements for email marketing by business units, regional sales offices, and local dealers?

Develop and enforce email communications / list management processes and policies to ensure privacy and legal compliance? Provide an easy-to-use email system that enables marketing to control branding and messaging at multiple levels?

Gannetts Enterprise Email Business Model Strategy

Provide Enterprise-wide Access to Email Technology Maintain Central Command and Control for Branding and Messaging Regional Administration for Locally Relevant Programs
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Divisions
Publications TV Stations Radio Stations

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Chapter 6 FINDINGS AND CONCLUSION

After studying the concept of permission marketing now becomes an International Marketing Strategy and it is to be noted that Permission Marketing is used by different domestic companies and in the international Market and it is also resulting as a beneficial strategy for maintaining good relations with their new customers as well as existing customers.
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Permission Marketing is now fully used by all the companies but by seeing the customers loyalty facts and the customers acquisition facts it can be said the with in a half decade, the concept will be used by many of the companies and helps them in generating the profits.

Conclusion:If in all the sectors such as advertising industry, retail industry, travel and tourism, banking, internet, pharmaceuticals, mobile companies permission marketing is used then it will be beneficial in generating revenues and increasing sales and it helps to know about the customer behavior towards their products and if and helps the companies to expand their business worldwide.

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Chapter 7 Suggestions and Recommendations

SuggestionsAs the Pharmaceuticals companies like Baxter pharmaceuticals is using the permission marketing as a relationship tool. It can also be use in India and at large scale. Because the India market is growing very fast and is now a
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competitive market. And this could be the best way to build the best relations with the customers and helps in the growth of the organization Kestler Financial group is also using the same strategy. So by seeing this, I suggest that if permission marketing is to be used at such massive scale it increases the companies profitability.

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ANNEXURE(s)

BIBLIOGRAPHY Books: Source: The Preference Service Joel Book e-Marketing Strategist Exact Target, Inc.Indianapolis, Indiana
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clickz.com PHILIP KOTLER & KEVIN LANE KELLER, Marketing

Management, 12th Edition, Chapter 9, Page 285

JOURNAL OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING VOLUME 16 / NUMBER 4 / AUTUMN 2002 Published online in Wiley inter science (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/dir.10041

McKinsey Global Institute, 2005, The Bird of Gold: The Rise of Indias Consumer Market

Journals: Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication JOURNAL OF INTERACTIVE MARKETING

Websites:

www.google.com www.exacttarget.com
http://www.ie.edu/enrique_dans http://www.clubmahindra.com/register.asp http://www.clubmahindra.com/register.asp http://email-marketing-india.blogspot.com/ http://register.rediff.com/commonreg/index.php https://edit.europe.yahoo.com/registration?_intl=uk http://www.inc.com/articles/2000/01/18635.html

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permission_marketing http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/01/permissionmark.html

http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol6/issue2/krishnamurthy.html

http://www.rediff.com/computer/1999/sep/22priya4.htm http://www.esalestrack.com/CRM/Education/Permission_Marketing.h tml

http://tejas-iimb.org/articles/69.php?print=true http://mewsgroup.com/permission%20marketing.pdf

http://mashable.com/2011/02/03/permission-marketing-social-data/

http://translate.google.co.in/translate? hl=en&sl=es&tl=en&u=http://profesores.ie.edu/enrique_dans/downlo ad/pmktabc.pdf

http://www.ibimapublishing.com/journals/JMTKS/2010/166310/1663 10.pdf

http://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/publications/india_consumer_market/s lideshow/main.asp, Last accessed on September 24, 2010 http://www.google.co.in/imgres? imgurl=http://image.absoluteastronomy.com/images/encyclopediaima ges/r/ra/radiomirchi.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.absoluteastronomy.co m/topics/Radio_Mirchi&usg=__DAp1dZ0DWG6vSMcqxMOLrXDU 97s=&h=93&w=180&sz=5&hl=en&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=eu1vku

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9lfxqEAM:&tbnh=74&tbnw=144&ei=1mupTbz2AoaOvQONyJ2RCg &prev=/images%3Fq%3Dradio%2Bmirchi%26um%3D1%26hl %3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls %3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw%3D1024%26bih %3D576%26tbm %3Disch0%2C80&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=641&vpy=379&dur =1228&hovh=74&hovw=144&tx=55&ty=32&oei=LWupTeqgE9HPr QfM_inCA&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:13,s:0&biw=1024&bih=576

http://www.google.co.in/imgres? imgurl=http://www.bharathowto.com/wpcontent/uploads/2011/02/clubmahindra.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.bharathowto.com/tag/clubmahindra/&usg=__LvSQGX9-_q6vLhyZa5T357VwxA=&h=149&w=194&sz=9&hl=en&start=0&zoo m=1&tbnid=PqBakQb5dS8W5M:&tbnh=113&tbnw=151&ei=Hmep TYuDNMTorAfF3pWPAg&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dclub %2Bmahindra%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a %26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw %3D1024%26bih%3D576%26tbm %3Disch0%2C114&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=164&vpy=196&du r=3348&hovh=119&hovw=155&tx=85&ty=69&oei=HmepTYuDNM TorAfF3pWPAg&page=1&ndsp=13&ved=1t:429,r:3,s:0&biw=1024 &bih=576

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Godin, Seth (1999), Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends, and Friends into Customers, Simon & Schuster. Milne, George R & Mary Ellen Gordon (1993), Direct mail privacyefficiency trade-offs within an implied social contract framework, Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 12(2), 206-.

Sheth, Jagdish N., Rajendra S Sisodia & Arun Sharma (2000), The antecedents and consequences of customer-centric marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 28(1), 55-66.

Krishnamurthy (2001), A Comprehensive Analysis of Permission Marketing , Copyright 2001 Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, JCMC 6 (2) JANUARY 2001

Phelps, Joseph, Glen Nowak & Elizabeth Ferrell (2000), Privacy concerns and consumer of willingness Policy to and provide personal information, Journal forthcoming. Public Marketing, 19(1),

Gilmore, James H & Joseph B. Pine II, (1997), the four faces of mass customization, Harvard Business Review, 75(1), 91-101.

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