‘To satisfy customers’ needs’:

Marketeers should be proactive and customer-focussed

Anuradha Kodagoda

“Even during a recession what we are trying to practise in our company is to be proactive and customer-focussed to satisfy the customer’s needs. If we understand the actual requirements of the customer and cater to those needs it will help to sustain even during a recession,” said Assistant Vice President - Customer Support EPIC Lanka, Shivantha Fernando.

“Unfortunately, during a recession most companies only consider to reduce costs and staff. However, especially in an industry of this nature, the management should understand the areas where costs should be reduced and in which areas it should not.

If we allocate the right resources to meet the correct requirement of the customers, companies can survive even during a recession”, he said.

Here are his down-to-earth views.

Q. What inspired you to select marketing as your career?

A. Basically, if you look at the overall understanding of marketing, it is satisfying the customer with his needs and moreover value addition. It is the psychological nature of the customer’s requirement and understanding the customers’ needs to satisfy them while adding value to the product or the service.

Having known the basics of marketing, it inspired me to select marketing as my professional career. It is also a profession with self gratification.

Q. Being a front-liner in the company, what are the challenges you face in the field of marketing?

A. EPIC Lanka is in to the business of secure automated payments and in the industry there are very few competitors. To understand the actual scenario, in transaction security, it is not just a matter of providing a solution to the customers; it is basically being proactive and how we cater in to a fault-free environment. I have been in the industry for the past 11 years. At present EPIC Lanka is maintaining a network of 10 leading banks in the country and we are the market leader in the industry.

The main reason that we are still the market leader is because of the innovative technology we are using in the industry as well as being proactive to satisfy the customer’s requirements.

This has been our trademark in the industry. The local and international awards we have won in the past few years are one of the testaments of our innovative and proactive work.

Q. What is the impact of the current economic crisis on your company?

A. During times of recession, for the company to go ahead with marketing, the fundamental aspect is customer satisfaction and their support. Even during a recession, what we are trying to practise in our company is to be proactive and customer-focussed to satisfy their needs. If we understand the actual requirements of the customer and cater to those needs it will help to sustain even during this period.

Unfortunately, during a recession most companies only consider to reduce costs and staff. However, especially in an industry of this nature the management should understand the areas where costs should be reduced and in which areas it should not.

If we allocate the right resources to fulfill the correct requirement of the customers, companies can survive even during a recession.

Q. In many companies we often see that marketeers are not represented at board room meetings. What is your view?

A. Marketing is a fundamental aspect in most industries. My basic understanding is that it is essential that marketeers should be represented at board room meetings. In the modern context even most of the board members play a huge role by promoting products or services in the company. In that sense, marketing is not a position which only marketeers do. Marketing cannot survive on its own. It needs others’ support as well.

Therefore, supporting services is a fundamental aspect of marketing. Even if a company has a good or bad product, the beauty of marketing is selling the product.

However, at the end of the day if you cannot provide an excellent support service the end result would be product failure. Therefore, no matter how good the marketeer is, there is a supporting network behind every marketeer to ensure that the product life cycle moves on.

Q. What are the advertising strategies that you employ in the company?

A. Having been in the industry for many years and analyzing the industry very well, we do not advertise on a large scale due to the nature of the business that we are in. However, we have also identified key areas of our market where we have to market it.

We have certain products which we advertise and that is also essential to ensure market sustainability.

We mainly cater to certain niche markets and we employ certain unique advertising strategies to market our products within these niche market segments.

Q. What are the challenges you face when it comes to global branding?

A. Basically, branding is something that is very challenging. To build a brand image is not easy in the current scenario. We are establishing our brand image locally by providing our service to local banks.

In the meantime, we are in to the global market as well by providing the technology solutions for the required industries. We have won several international gold awards for our brands, and our brands are up to international standards to compete with global brands.

Even though Sri Lanka is not well known specially in the international IT industry, our brands have proven that we are up to their standards and we can compete with international brands.

Our main challenge is that when we compete with international brands it is the amount of money that we have to allocate specially on Research and Development (R&D) and also for the initial innovative costs.

However, we have been able to face all these challenges since we have identified the correct market segments where we can compete and moreover there are a very few competitors in niche markets.

That is also one of the advantages we enjoy being in the niche market segments.

If the IT industry is able to get Government backing as well to promote their brands in international markets, there is a huge possibility that Sri Lanka can be the most innovative IT solution provider for the world.

Q. What is your opinion about local marketeers?

A. Local marketeers should be more innovative and they should not only think about the micro economy but should also think about the macro economy as well.

If marketeers learn to think outside the box they will realize the potential in the market.

Also marketeers should not limit their professional capacity only for marketing but they have to sharpen their skills in different fields as well.

Unfortunately, this is lacking among local marketeers. I think this is the best period to think out of the box.