When I was given the opportunity to interact and engage with Piyush Pandey at the ASCENT Conclave ’24, I was thrilled.
To top it, Anuradha Sengupta was going to moderate his session, so it felt like a live episode of Storyboard and I had the front seat.
When I met Piyush in the speakers lounge, there was a causal yet very strong presence one could feel around him. But Anuradha did mention, that one should not be fooled by his laugh and moustache because behind that is a person who has a real good sharp mind on human emotions.
The meeting started with some really funny jokes, an insider view on a soon to be released TVC for Marico, talk on cricket, the advertising industry, what is ASCENT, and about the conclave and a few pictures… the amazing part was how he could crack a joke on anything…
Before I knew it, we got the call that it was time to get on stage…
Piyush started his talk on dispelling that B2B marketing is not – Boring to Boring.
He told us how he created brands like Pidilite and Asian paints which were B2B brands and how he made it into the iconic brands they are today.
Every brand is an opportunity to build something great, and it doesn’t matter if its B2B, B2C, D2C or any other (or in healthcare B2D – Business to Doctor)
He said,
Brands are built from the heart not from spreadsheets.
Brands are built with magic and not just logic.
Brands are built playing on the front foot and not back foot.
Brands are built with guts
Brands are built without fear
Brands are built like how birds build nests. Twig by Twig.
And business are built by investing time, effort and love.
So starting today, measure the success of your organisation by the laughter in your corridors.
One of the things that hit me the most was that he was getting applauded for work done 20 years back, and here I am already shy of some work I have done last year.
After his talk we spent some more time back in the speakers lounge we were talking about smaller details… and then he said something that will stay with me…
Chotti Chooti Baatein dekhne lagoge, toh badi badi cheezein dikhney lagegey
(The more you notice the small things, the bigger things will start getting clearer to you)
