Ashwin Naiksatam graduated with an MBA from the Sinhgad Institute of Marketing in India before moving to the UK in 2007, working for Tesco, Ogilvy & Mather, Nestlé and Monsoon. He joined Lenovo as Senior Digital Marketing Manager within its eCommerce (direct to customer) business in 2022.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
David Nicholson: Thank you so much for making time to speak today, Ashwin. Tell me how you have seen digital marketing evolve during your time in the industry.
Ashwin Naiksatam: Thank you for giving me an opportunity to share my experiences David, I’m grateful for this chance.
When I started my journey in 2007, digital marketing was gradually developing in a ‘hockey stick’ pattern. Consumers’ mindsets were changing, as they found more diversity and cheaper pricing online than in stores. They would search on Google, then purchase.
In around 2010, social media began growing by leaps and bounds, as first with Instagram, then WhatsApp emerged about six years ago. So we had to move from conversations with customers on search engines to conversations on social media platforms. It used to be Google/Amazon, now it’s TikTok/Meta/Snapchat, then on to Google/Amazon.
For us at Lenovo – when we’re talking about direct sales marketing - social media investment has overtaken online investment. People are making decisions on social media platforms: they don’t have to go out of the ecosystem – TikTok is now operating as a search engine.
DN: What effect has this had on your work in digital marketing?
AN: In the world of digital marketing and advertising, it has had different effects on different verticals. In FMCG, few companies have direct purchasing routes, whereas in the case of Lenovo’s eCommerce business, our customers can buy straight from us.
We used to think we had to be on search engines in order to get customers, but now we need to be on social platforms, where our customers are and where they engage with each other.
People spend two to three hours a day on social media, so having a presence there is imperative, otherwise there’s no top of mind awareness.
DN: What sort of distinction do you make between platforms?
AN: They have totally different audiences, so we address them in different ways. For TikTok, the content is jovial, light, and kind of crazy. For Meta, it’s more natural, more serious. We have to dovetail the different types of content, whereas it used to be one size fits all.
There’s also an imperative to be faster to market. We used to update our content once a quarter, now it’s once or even twice a month.
DN: How do you use Deep Learning applications at Lenovo?
AN: We pay attention to smart metrics: we’ve improved our efficiency through Deep Learning, such as the points where customers experience our website. We use a multiple attribution model. Where we sponsor a specific page, we see a spike of customers making purchases.
I used to work at a telco, where we looked at customers’ lifetime value, using this multiple attribution model, to drive loyalty and to increase profits.
DN: Has this kind of analysis become more important in view of a cookieless future?
AN: Absolutely. Not many advertisers can do this in a cookieless environment. When a customer comes onto your website, if you have no cookies, you have to understand their touchpoint and where they land. From this information, you can work out the probability of them making a purchase – their propensity to buy.
If someone comes onto Lenovo’s laptop site and searches for a processor, we don’t know the customer’s identity, but we can see the value of this customer to our business, because we know what they’re likely to do next. So we can create personalisation. Within a short time, we know what your next action will be, so we will start showing you personalised products, based on a history of purchasing behaviour.
DN: Does AI play a role in this customisation?
AN: Yes it does. We use it to connect an order to the nearest warehouse, so that we can offer a two-day delivery service, instead of seven-to-ten days. We customise goods in ways that you can’t get at bricks and mortar stores. AI adds a layer of personalisation, it increases the speed to reach customers and helps them to make ‘impulse’ decisions.
In a more general marketing sense, we use AI to scan the internet, particularly social media, for positive mentions of Lenovo and create word clouds on the conversations our customers are having.
DN: So what do your customers think of you, and how do you segment them?
AN: We look at Gen Z customers, B2B customers and millennials. We look at what they’re saying about us as a brand. We’re a global leader, so it’s important to us that we’re always improving. We have 24 per cent market share in PCs globally.
DN: How about programmatic advertising?
AN: Programmatic advertising can be helpful, combining the three pillars of data, identity and creativity, then letting the technology do the job for you. The challenge has been that it’s like a blind network. It’s a billion dollar industry and there’s been a sharp increase in costs - it has become harder and more expensive to guarantee that your content appears where you want it to, in the right context.
We prefer to buy online in video and in private marketplaces, because of the better return on investment. We like the Teads platform, with its own safety net and a more sophisticated knowledge of its audience, so we can target customers.
DN: How is AI helping you to deliver marketing content?
AN: AI helps with the speed to market, with creativity and in many other ways – we have a marcoms team evaluating all the new tools – but it hasn’t yet learned brand guidelines. If you think of an ad, there are various layers: there’s the logo, the messaging, the tone of voice. But humans need to add to the smartness and agility of AI, the speed to market and the dynamism.
We call it ‘humation’ – a combination of human and automation. We started on our AI journey about eight months ago, looking at the available AI tools. We created 50 or so inputs, but only 10 per cent met our brand guidelines. We learned that it’s a journey. You have to go from basic, to intermediate, to smart, starting with smaller markets, then developing a structure.
Some of the pitfalls we came across were language – a phrase translated from English might mean something completely different in Italian. Or if we used a phrase like ‘military-grade’, we found it was seen as a negative emotion, so AI had to learn and use different words.
After testing and refining, around 40 per cent of our inputs now meet brand guidelines.
DN: How do your customers benefit from AI?
AN: AI helps us translate content into simple language. Not everyone is a gadget freak or tech savvy. Some of our customers are disabled, so it helps us meet the needs of a wider customer base.
It also helps me communicate with my colleagues, by improving my accuracy and adding more emotions to conversations. For example, if I’m writing about change that’s happening within the business, I write a message in a natural way, then give it to AI, which helps to soften the tone of my language, it helps to land the message.
Then of course AI can analyse data, identify trends and provide insights - things that humans can miss. This helps me communicate with senior management.
DN: Is there a danger of over-relying on AI?
AN: Certainly. If you allow the computer to write everything for you, then you risk humans not clicking on your ads or visiting your site. There are economies of scale from AI, but also diminishing marginal returns. That’s why we need to include human engagement.
I think Gen Z students are already reacting against AI. They’re using analogue phones again and giving up their smart watches. It’s important to understand what students appreciate, rather than just using AI all the time. You can tell a robot chef to cook food, but you can’t tell it how much salt is good or bad. You need human intelligence.
DN: So what do you foresee in the future for AI in marketing?
AN: I foresee AI enhancing marketing by accelerating the pace of work, reducing manual intervention and improving efficiency through Deep Learning, to make better decisions.
On the other hand, I foresee dependency, with people expecting AI to do everything, to create an entire media plan for them. The dynamics of human behaviour are so different, there is a risk of it seeming artificial.
At the moment, everyone is catching the fever of AI, but it will subside. If you become 100 percent dependent, you’ll become a slave and AI will lose its flavour.
