Episode 196 / Diptakirti Chaudhuri / Bajaj Auto Ltd / Vice President Marketing
How to Stimulate Creativity by Going Back to Basics
AI, technology and the metaverse are all great elements of the future of marketing, but for Diptakirti Chaudhuri, nothing compares to a whiteboard and marker pen. “Good old-fashioned brainstorming” – alone or with other people – can stimulate creativity and take us back to thinking first about simple human communication.
Dipta is the Vice President of Marketing at Bajaj Auto Ltd, one of India’s largest two wheeler and three wheeler companies and a world leader in the transport industry. But, he hasn’t built his career in transportation: as he puts it, “whenever I have changed jobs, I’ve also ended up changing industries.”
It is through accumulating a wealth of marketing knowledge from various sectors that Dipta has reached the conclusion that simplicity is best. This isn’t just a reflection on marketing strategy but also a very clear direction when it comes to working methods.
For Dipta, the impact of the pandemic on the workplace has been that there is a flurry of activity upon returning to the office. He finds that people exchange ideas more freely and with more enthusiasm than ever, enjoying brainstorming and working in groups again. This has led to him concluding that the future of marketing is linked to the humble whiteboard and marker pen.
These are Dipta’s Shiny New Objects because they represent simple, unencumbered thinking and creating. Whether alone or surrounded by colleagues, working with the whiteboard, we forget about algorithms and creating messages that perform well with machines rather than with humans. It’s also liberating. By putting all sorts of ideas down, building from them, accepting some and rejecting others, there is more value to gain than from only pushing forward one initiative that you think will do well with the company’s board.
In Dipta’s view, organisations need to push this unrestricted collaboration and encourage all voices to be heard equally. This leads to diverse marketing ideas and to more new ideas coming through. And more senior members should pitch in and push the train forward, even if it’s just with some silly suggestions that give confidence to more junior colleagues to speak up.
Find out how Dipta thinks the whiteboard and marker pen sessions can be done well, as well as what his top marketing book is and what’s the advice he thinks is most pertinent for today’s marketers, on the latest episode of the podcast .
Transcript
The following gives you a good idea of what was said, but it’s not 100% accurate.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 0:00
You want to keep the consumer first, think what she wants to read, give her that interesting content. And if you can make it an ad for your product, then that's just perfect.
Tom Ollerton 0:15
Hi, before we get to this week's podcast, I'd like to tell you that automated creative are releasing a book called How to make it in marketing Volume One, it is a collection of the best marketing career advice we've had from over 200 episodes of the shiny new object podcast, you'll hear from some of the biggest, brightest and best names in the industry showing you telling you how to grow your career, you can reserve yourself a copy at this URL, so get your pens out, it's Bit.ly/MAKEITINMARKETING. It's a great read.
Hello, and welcome to the shiny new object podcast. My name is Tom Ollerton. I'm the founder of automated creative and this is a weekly podcast about the future of the marketing and advertising industries. And I get to interview someone clever, famous, interesting, connected experiences all of those different things. And this week is absolutely no different. I'm on a call with Dipta Chaudhuri, who is vice president marketing at Bajaj Auto. For anyone who doesn't know who you are and what you do. Could you give them a bit of background?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 1:46
Thanks, Tom. Thanks for having me on the show. I am Dipta Chaudhuri. I look after all the marketing functions that Bajaj Auto, which is one of India's largest two wheeler and three wheeler company. And it is the world's most valuable two wheeler, three wheeler company. Little bit of background about what have been doing. I have worked in multiple industries. In fact, whenever I have changed jobs, I've also changed ended up changing industries. So I worked in CPG, newspapers, digital media, tech, and now automobiles. So many of my marketing roles were about setting up systems and processes, which is a common link. And hence I have a bias towards doing new things towards shiny new objects, if you will. And on a personal note, I'm very interested in movies and pop culture. And that has led to be a very durable hobby. And I've ended up writing some seven books on Indian cinema.
Tom Ollerton 2:52
No way! That was a first, in 200 episodes you're on your own in that qualification. So congratulations.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 3:07
My LinkedIn headline says marketing by day movies by night. That's absolutely true.
Tom Ollerton 3:13
Yeah, I noticed that. I like that in the world of LinkedIn BS. I thought that was very honest. I enjoyed that. So you write books, I assume that must mean that you read books, but do you read marketing books? And do you have one that you can recommend?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 3:27
Yes, I read a lot. Though, instead really takes up a lot of my time nowadays eats up a lot of my times, I should say. So I read a lot. I mean, not only marketing, all sorts of books. If I have to recommend a marketing book, I would recommend a very unusual book called "Mother pious lady" by a very popular advertising, marketing and social society, social understanding Guru called Santosh Desai. He basically does a great job of demystifying how the old India which is actually like almost like a continent, how the how habits and mindsets and how the country literally is changing. So this is a book that I read some time back, and I often go back. And because India is so diverse, I recommend it a lot to people because I feel that it's about somebody who's growing up in a large city might be missing out many nuances of the small small town, somebody who's been who's grown up in the northern part of India may be completely fine the south of India alien and so on and so forth. Because India is almost like a continent right. And I feel that this book gives a great insight into India's culture, how the Indian consumer behaves. Incidentally there is nothing called Indian consumer is a very diverse, heterogeneous group of people. So in a series of short essays with a lot of humor, a lot of candor, Santosh Desai does a great job of demystifying India and it is a book I recommend very often.
Tom Ollerton 5:23
Can you pull out one or two things from that book for someone who isn't going to read it, who would like to get the benefit of having heard read it, what were their standout points that you remember most often?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 5:36
It talks a lot about for example, the Indian woman customer, the and how there is a very wide range of you know, how she sees various products. And there is a sort of a there are certain stereotypes about the Indian consumer being very price conscious, the book does a great job of breaking that we can say that actually it is value consciousness that the Indian and often the woman customer is looking for. So, therefore, that's often an eye opener and that you see that if you are able to create a great price value equation, that Indian customer is willing to pay a lot more than what she is usually given credit for. There are actually lots and then again, you know, how transport is changing in India, which is relevant for my current job, how eating habits are changing in India? How did for example, instant noodles of certain brands of instant noodles become extremely popular in India. So, those are very nice, very nice earthy nuggets that keep popping up throughout the book. And you know, more often than not, you will find something very relevant for your work, even if it is not connected directly connected to what you do.
Tom Ollerton 6:59
So, outside of the the advice in that book, what is your top marketing tip, what's your silver bullet, but of marketing advice that you share with your teams or friends or connections?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 7:11
Something that I keep saying a lot is that there is this quote which says that nobody reads ads, people read what generally interests them. And sometimes that is an ad. I think this is a very important tip, which I keep repeating every once in a while. Because, you know, we often make marketers we often make the mistake of thinking that entire consumer is like almost waiting for our communication. They are like they will engage as it says, with the ad or the piece of communication or a social media copy. I mean a social media post or something as intently as we probably created it. So this quote I think it's by Howard Gossage, who's this advertising Maverick it brings one down to earth and it makes one wonder that you know, one shouldn't get one should keep the consumer first, think what she wants to read. Give her that interesting content and if you can make it an ad for your product then that's just perfect.
Tom Ollerton 8:30
I think you can replace the word ad for PowerPoint slide in that sentence.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 8:36
Absolutely, love that.
Tom Ollerton 8:49
This episode of the shiny new object podcast is brought to you in partnership with Madfest. Whether it's live in London or streamed online to the global marketing community, you can always expect the distinctive and daring blend of fast paced content startup innovation pitches and unconventional entertainment from Madfest events, you'll find me causing trouble on stage recording live versions of this podcast and sharing a beer with the nicest and most influential people in marketing. Check it out at www.madfestlondon.com.
So we're gonna talk about your shiny new object, which is one we haven't had before, and I respect this, I can't wait to hear what you have to say. But your shiny new object that you think represents the future of this industry is a whiteboard and marker. I know what those things are. But why is that your shiny new object?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 9:42
I think I place a lot of weight on creativity. The plain human creativity, if I may call it that, because nowadays we tend to get a bit distracted by these talks about algorithms and what Facebook pushes up and what Google pushes down. And we try to write content as a machine would perceive it, as opposed to a human would perceive it. So I'm a great believer of that "human talking to a human" kind of creativity. And the best way to generate that creativity is, I believe, with a whiteboard and marker, you could be alone, you could be in a group, you could keep throwing ideas at each other. And from which those collision or merger of ideas, more creative ideas emerge. And I think that what has happened in the last couple of years is that people are slowly realizing the value of this, huddle around the whiteboard, where you know, you, a group of people get together, that human interaction, they throw up some ideas, brainstorm, reject some of them, accept some of them, make them bigger, and then they may even go back to their respective homes and, you know, to execute or fine tune those ideas, but I believe that when they come together, and you know, around the whiteboard marker, it is that an old thing, but it is finally suddenly become shiny and new, when we are now realizing the power of getting together and putting on one's thinking hats and doing some old fashioned brainstorming.
Tom Ollerton 11:42
So that's lovely. How do you know you're right? What's your data point? And secondly, how do you do whiteboard and pen effectively? How do you do it?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 11:51
Well, how do I know it's right? I think what I realized over the last few months that we have been back in office, without any interruptions, touch wood for that, I have realized that people are increasingly seeing a balance that they want some alone time where they do their uninterrupted thinking, but they also value bouncing off of ideas. So I see a more animated much more animated set of discussions a much more much higher frequency of ideas coming in much higher frequency of ideas, seeing the light of day, when one is around a whiteboard, and there are three or four people kind of discussing. So I think this newfound flexibility, newfound ideas, the ideas that we have taken to market in the last few months or so, that is my data point. That is what gives me confidence that this is something that will keep on giving us dividend. As a leader, what I would want to do is to keep this excitement fresh, I mean, keep this excitement going. Because let's say in another year's time, when we are slowly forgetting the impact of the pandemic, we shouldn't get to a position where we lose the excitement of brainstorming. So as a leader, my challenge would be to keep these ideas that people pick up the marker and throw out their ideas, however silly they might seem, at first glance, they should openly share it because something bigger and better might emerge from that. So that's my challenge as a leader, so that I hope to keep this habit going.
Tom Ollerton 13:44
And the other half of my question is, how do you do it well? So sure, it's easy to get a whiteboard and a pen for a few quid and it's easy to get a room full of people, but it's easy to let the loudest voice or the highest paid person have most of the say. So what technique do you use to make that brainstorm session produce the goods?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 14:02
Yeah, I mean, I completely agree with what you said. As you said, the highest paid person's opinion often tends to steamroll something else so what I personally do is that I, I mean, I encourage the whole process with a lot of silly ideas of my own, just to keep it going so that people kind of start realizing that if I, if we don't stop this GenX guy, he might talk more bad ideas, and we have to kind of stop him so they come up with nice ideas of their own.
Tom Ollerton 14:42
Can you give me an example of a deliberately stupid idea that you've shared?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 14:45
Oh, I, I mean, I'm not trying to struggle to remember which one without embarrassing myself.
Tom Ollerton 14:58
I'm a big fan of the stupid idea from me, so I'm just kind of trying to work out to what lengths you go.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 15:05
Yeah, can I pass? Because I'm...
Tom Ollerton 15:08
Of course you can. So, so what I hear is that you, you will throw some, as you say, Gen X ideas out there just to get the ball rolling. So people kind of then chip in and say, look, we've got to improve on this. Absolutely.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 15:22
Yeah, what are the techniques? I think the other technique includes a bit of using some of the new age technology, etc, the fable thing called AB testing that often we reach a point where we say that, okay, we have only this much time and this much resource. Which of these two ideas should we try first? And my answer to that, usually, let's do both on our sort of scaled down version, and run it both now we have enough technology. Now to kind of, you know, try out two three different ideas and test them out and figure out which works best. So this is important that so that somebody who's a little maybe a little less confident about his or her thoughts. I mean, you know, by doing this one can actually prove it to them that you know what, you don't have to be under confident about your thoughts and because it did quite well in the real world.
Tom Ollerton 16:26
So what advice would you give to someone who wants, who embraces your shiny new object of whiteboard and marker? What advice would you give to someone who thinks that actually, the best ideas come from a really creative person sat on their own in the period of contemplation?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 16:48
I would recommend having a no preconceived notion as flat, and or as flat a ground as possible for everyone the literal round table. So it is important for everybody to give an idea sometimes what happens is that, quote, unquote, creative person may have many ideas in the associated areas, whereas somebody who's coming from a different perspective, or a different function, or has a view of a different business, is likely to come up with a more radical thing. So it's important to take that on. So as non judgmental, as equal footing that you can put everybody around the table, the better this shiny new object works.
Tom Ollerton 17:33
Well, unfortunately, Dipta, at we are at the end of the podcast, but I thoroughly enjoyed that, that was a lot of fun. And I get to keep an eye on your work and see if I can spot something that came from a from an embarrassing GenX-er or someone from somewhere from the periphery with a radical idea. But if someone wants to get in touch with you about this or anything else, where is the best place to do that? And what kind of outreach message gets your attention?
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 17:59
What kind of outreach message if they can say that what interests them? Or what connects me that interest to me that works usually the best? I'm available both on LinkedIn as well as on Twitter. I have an unusual first name so and that is usually enough to find me on both these places. I'm usually talking more about movies on Twitter and a little more about marketing on LinkedIn as the two platforms demand.
Tom Ollerton 18:36
Do they though? I'm not sure I think LinkedIn is gonna it's gonna go under under a change I think in the next few years I think that
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 18:44
I hope so I maybe it's time to do some AB testing myself to see whether movies worked on LinkedIn and marketing works on Twitter.
Tom Ollerton 18:54
Well as the guy or come up it was he was a guest on the show Duarte Garrido who was at Coke, but now he's moved and he he uses like comic books, and that's his point of reference. You're like pull a page out of like a Marvel comic and then about leadership and then use that as the quote and which I really liked, you know, shows it shows his personality a bit, but it lands the point in a different way. So you know, that maybe we're gonna see some Bollywood or Indian movie quotes to inspire the next generation of marketers.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 19:25
Okay. Now, I have the problem of plenty. There were too many bad ones. Now there are too many good ones. So okay, I'll go with one which is a very famous quote by Shahrukh Khan, who is probably India's biggest star right now and for several years now. So he says that, that every film must have a happy ending. And he follows it up by saying that if the ending isn't happy, it isn't the end. So, you know, I think it's a great way of looking at life, universe, marketing campaigns, everything that if it isn't happy it isn't the end.
Tom Ollerton 20:09
Wow, that's big. what a wonderful way to finish the show. Thank you so much for your time.
Diptakirti Chaudhuri 20:15
Thank you. Thank you so much, Tom, for having me.
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