Feb 12
7
Indian SMBs are ready to ride the online wave with the likes of Google offering buoyancy. Heena Jhingan explores the various options that are available in the market for entrepreneurs intending to take a business online.
Jan 12
9
With the total number of Internet users expected to cross 120 mn, the question is old or new, how are the Internet users driving businesses?

NEW DELHI: When cartoonist Aseem Trivedi’s friends told him that his website could not be accessed anymore, he initially brushed it off as a connection issue. The 24-year-old Kanpur-based professional cartoonist was busy exhibiting his political cartoons in the anti-corruption protest at the MMRDA grounds in Mumbai.
It was only on Dec 27th, the next day, when he received an email from BigRock, the domain name registrar with which his website was registered, that he realized what was wrong. “We have received a complaint from Crime Branch, Mumbai against domain name ‘cartoonsagainstcorruption.com’ for displaying objectionable pictures and texts related to flag and emblem of India. Hence we have suspended the domain name and its associated services,” the mail read.
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..By multiple estimates including reports published by BCG and McKinsey, India will reach somewhere in the vicinity of 250-350 million Internet users by 2015. I took a liberal interpolation of those estimates to arrive at a number of 30 million new users that we will add in the coming year. That’s a staggering number – and larger than the entire population of Australia if you like those kinds of comparisons. However, to truly deconstruct this number and get a sense for what the potential impact this will have for a business looking to leverage this user base, we need to look carefully not just at the users but also at the following ‘inverted iceberg’- where there is more than that meets the eye below the surface.

A jazzy, flashing interface with lots of visuals and colors on a website are not sufficient to draw traffic, retain visitors, sell products, and build relationships. Here are ten things you must have on your website.

As I started to reflect on this question, my first thought was to look at all the amazing trends that we have witnessed in the Indian internet landscape in 2011. Here are just a few for context. The total number of internet users crossed the 120 million mark; ecommerce is now in excess of Rs. 40,000 crores annually; the Indian Facebook population is touching the 40 million mark; there are 50 million mobile data subscribers; new companies and eco-systems are being created around cloud computing, online advertising, mobile applications, web infrastructure, online travel, and much more

We’ve grown organically and brought in new business. Our recent campaigns for Rustomjee, BigRock and Gelusil have created quite a stir, and we are being invited into several new businesses. BigRock is on air right now and hovers between the 13th and 18th most-googled on the net in India (It is also the only brand in the ranking list). Vettel and Webber have also been doing an outstanding job for ideas@work, refer RedBull and the first Indian Grand Prix. Yeah, things are looking up.

BigRock has launched its new integrated advertising campaign in order to promote their new offer, with the tagline “Got a Business? Get a website” so as to drive home the message that every business needs a website. BigRock had earlier announced a Rs. 10 Cr. advertising budget for this year. BigRock ran a highly acclaimed TV campaign early this year, which won an Abby for its ad creatives and was recently nominated for Best Internet Business at the World Brand Congress.
