How Online B2B Marketplaces provide an insight about the Economy

After considering the different ways in which our economy can be improved, we can understand the current state of the economies by analyzing the marketing strategies that are undertaken by business houses in a nation.

Marketing strategies will help the business grow in volume and hence is an essential element for an enterprise to survive. When a certain industry is under tough competition, that is if there are multiple players competing for the same prize there shall be an increasing successful marketing industry providing these services. The profits and growth of the marketing industry - be it online, viral or one to one, reflects on the mood of the economy. 

Today, China has an online market place that has also catered to international business called 'Alibaba.com'. 

The USA has various sites like Alibaba (B2B & B2C site) named Ryze that is similar to alibaba but also includes networking in it's gamut. India has various sites, the most popular (popular not successful) is indiamart.com. Comparing the worthiness of these sites - Alibaba.com takes first position among all. US sites come second and the rest follow. 

Why do you think Alibaba.com, a site born in China that caters to the world needs is so massively successful while their counterparts remain to be content with a smaller share? The reasons lie in the economic development of the respective nations. 

China, a post communist regime turned democrat is the home to alibaba. The world largest population offers a brilliant market for businesses that have been given the opportunity to rise with time and cater to the needs of their nation. This has prompted the business houses to compete which in turn resulted in the growth of Alibaba.com as the world's largest online B2B marketplace. 

USA on the other hand has a comparatively tiny population. Unfortunately this population is far more demanding than any other population on earth! Hence business houses - through good capitalism policies have a chance to cater to these demands and use business networking and B2B marketplace portals to promote themselves. Business networking is a more logical approach for USA, because the small market can only be targeted by a personal touch, in stark contrast with China where bold advertisement can be the only way to capture attention. 

India is in a much more complex situation. Tradeindia.com stared out 16 years ago as a B2B marketplace. Many other players followed and today now one knows anything about Tradeindia.com. Marketing and PR of another site called IndiaMart.com has catapulted the company as India's no. one online B2B marketplace. It's understandable. Indian population, being the second only to China is much more diverse than any other country. This diversity results in 2 main outcomes. 

1) Multiple needs

2) Multiple industries

Due to various needs, the amount of business houses that can cater to these needs are extremely limited when compared with China and the US. There is no need to invest time and money to promote a business online using B2B market places. But I may freely say that this is not entirely the final result. 

Due to the increasing variety in demands of the Indians, business houses have begun to reach stagnancy. There is limited growth on such grounds and hence they have started using marketing companies to help them capture more customers. This tells us that in the present Indian economy, there is a chance where standardized products such as soaps, towels and chairs have a bright future ahead and marketing agencies shall be able to profit if their clients deal with such standard goods that cater to universal needs. 

I would say this is a brilliant signal. With growing needs, the only way companies will spend on marketing is when the anticipated demand is high. There is nothing much like it.

It's evident that there should be growth in the economy in the future. The economic policy to keep the kart wheel moving is proving it's self well. 

Do we need Census Towns to spur growth?

Today there is quite a large hue and cry about how great
Census towns are, and it’s a definite sign of growth in our economy. Most of us
do not know much about census towns.

Census towns are actually small villages that used to depend
on agriculture for survival, have now many more opportunities to make a living
due to industrial development that is taking place.  Farmers have turned away from their farms to
work at factories and earn money.

Let’s understand more about these census towns.

• -         
  Factories and large companies from the
  automobile and consumer durable industries have set up their plants in faraway villages
  for gaining the benefit of cheap land and limited but useful connectivity.
• -         
  In the recent past, these villages have not been
  able to earn a decent living through farming.  With their limited education (Class X) it’s
  difficult to make a living in an urban area where there is severe competition.
  There small time villagers have to depend on farming and small cottage
  industries for a day’s meal. Such a population/location is ideal for the
  placement of assembly units and industries.
• -         
  For such companies, they are the ideal workforce
  that can be used at the cheapest wage possible. It’s a lot more economical than
  employing a full robotic process with no other running expenditure and a full
  time working capacity.
• -         
    In cases where there is limited social
  infrastructure, big companies have the ability to create schools and educate
  mass workforce about the job they need to work on. Hence the villages are
  provided with quality education, new infrastructure and above all, value
  creating jobs.
• -         
  Instead of the workers settling in cities to
  work at large companies, these companies have come to the villager to employ
  him.

Looking at these advantages today, I would like to draw your
attention to a man named Kasturbhai Lalbhai, one of the greatest businessmen of
India. Post-independence he saw the need for a dye making industry, and founded
Atul ltd. (Atul means incomparable).  The
fact is that when Nehru was invited to inaugurate one of India’s first free
mills, he refused.
This incident is narrated in a book called “India Unbound” by
Gurcharan Das. It is said that he did this because he opposed capitalism. Atul
ltd had built a small town as well as an urban environment for the villagers
who were to be employed there. This business/economic model that would have
catapulted India into a much needed industrial revolution dominant with Indian
companies was plagued by the government’s red tape and heavy taxation policies.
The outcome of this was a largely successful urban India and a forgotten rural
India coupled with uneven distribution of income.

I strongly believe that the step taken today by the Indian government
to free FDI is a necessary measure for the moment. Yes, if Nehru’s sadistic
hunger for controlling the Indian’s and their growth would have been overrun by
the need for overall growth on the country, there would have been an industrial
revolution, and Indian companies would have accepted foreign investments on
different terms. But today the need is to grow, and foreign direct investment
shall help the rural India become more successful than the urban India.