The Exchanges

Q Karan would love to know your journey, where you grew up and how did marketing interest you?

A Um, I grew up in Bangalore. I think, uh, the early years of my life, I spent, uh, quite a lot of time in Mumbai, uh, because that's where my mom is from. And, uh, so the summer holidays used to be there. Uh, but I grew up in Bangalore more or less. Uh, so Bangalore boy at heart. Um, and, uh, Uh, yeah, I, I, I think, um, uh, the early years of marketing I spent, uh, you know, doing events. Uh, so I was into event management, uh, for, for a major period of my career. Uh, you know, I even worked with Viscraft and ran my own company for a short period of time. Um, and, and then of course the transition happened from events to, to marketing, you know, gradually, uh, you know, people ask me, Hey, you're doing events. Uh, would you be up for taking, Uh, more work, you know, in the marketing domain. And I said, why not? Uh, you know, uh, and, and there was of course a steep learning curve, but, uh, but here I am, I think, uh, I figured that it was a lot of fun to take up those campaigns and execute it from time to time. Uh, you know, of course, a lot of failures and learnings along the way. Uh, but I think the transition was not something I planned. Definitely. It just happened, uh, you know, over the course of time.

AI assessment note: “I grew up in Bangalore... the transition happened from events to, to marketing”

Q And how did you and Anacademy decided, you know, to, to partner in 2019?

A Yeah, I, I think, uh, you know, it was, it's, it's a very funny story. Um, uh, and I've never shared this before, but, uh, I think, uh, you know, so I got a call, uh, from an academy, uh, you know, first and, uh, uh, you know, uh, I, I of course did not know about the tech sector of the time. And, uh, you know, I had no clue of, of what the brand, uh, was doing or, or was sort of capable of at the time. Um, so I think, uh, you know, I said, no, uh, I don't want to join, uh, you know, uh, Uh, I'm, I'm happy at, uh, Xiaomi and I'm going to continue, uh, you know, my journey here for whatever period. Um, although I was looking for a change at the time, I wanted, you know, something more challenging and, and something more, uh, you know, exciting. Uh, you know, I'd spent about five years at Xiaomi and, and I'd learned a lot, uh, you know, in the company and I was looking at the next set of challenges. So, uh, an academy did come along and I said, you know, no, uh, you know, let me look at a few more options. And I was exploring a couple of options with a, with a, You know, a couple of pretty well established big companies at the time. Um, and then I got another call and they said, you know, Gaurav wants to meet you. Uh, you know, why don't you just come down, uh, you know, for a courtesy meeting and, and see how things go. Um, and I said, sure. I mean, you know, why wouldn't I want…

AI assessment note: “then I got another call and they said, you know, Gaurav wants to meet you.”

Q And, uh, one, one thing, you know, which, uh, uh, is very, uh, visible, uh, in what you are speaking is, uh, authenticity married with audacity. So where does this audacity come from as a marketer? I have studied your work. It comes out very authentic, right? But the audacity of ambitions and goals

A Uh, you know, I think it's, it's always about building a legacy brand. You know, you don't aim small, uh, and you're never going to achieve, uh, more than your dream of. So, you know, it's always important to, uh, to aim larger than ever. So, I mean, and it applies to most people, right? So, uh, you know, I think, you know, you never set out to say, okay, we're going to build a campaign that should just have one million views or probably just have, you know, one person to reach or just reach, you know, five students or so on. So you always, Aiming to say, okay, I'm going to reach the entire country. I'm going to clock a hundred million views. I'm going to make it viral. So I think it's about dreaming big. It's about dreaming larger than life, uh, having the courage to dream that way and, and, you know, sort of set those milestones for yourself. Um, and, and, and that also comes from a place of belief, you know, of course we have a great product, uh, and, and, you know, that gives us confidence to go out there and, and market, uh, you know, ourselves and, and put ourselves out there, uh, you know, on, uh, you know, For the audience, uh, you know, to kind of decide. Um, but I think, uh, the, uh, more than, more than audacity, I would, I would call it, you know, the confidence to drive these initiatives. Uh, one comes from product, uh, two from, from what the learners keep telling…

AI assessment note: “one comes from product, uh, two from, from what the learners keep telling us”

Q And, uh, you know, uh, this was more on a, you know, campaign basis, but on a personal level, if you have to answer this, how would it be?

A I think this is at a personal level to that. So it's something that I followed time and again, and through my, uh, you know, career, and I've had debates on this, uh, with people and time to time, you know, standing on these beliefs, look, you know, you're, you're, you're responsible for, uh, spending companies money. You're responsible for, for crafting, uh, you know, the image that you do out there for a brand. I mean, any liver that you pull on a marketing front today would, Directly impact the imagery of a brand tomorrow, right? Uh, instantly, uh, good or bad. Um, and so, you know, if you don't answer these questions, uh, you know, be it at a personal level or a, or a brand level, uh, you know, it's very difficult to sort of, uh, uh, you know, differentiate and I take my work very personally. So I think, you know, hence the, hence the seamlessness overall, uh, you know, from a decision-making perspective, um, I think it's very critical to keep, Uh, you know, the learners or the consumers, uh, at the heart of everything that you do, uh, you know, maintain honesty in your communication and at the same time, uh, you know, delivering that message that the business wants to deliver, uh, you know, with absolute honesty and transparency. So it's, it's very critical to marry all of these things and hence to answer those three questions. And as long as you don't have those clear ans…

AI assessment note: “I think this is at a personal level to that. So it's something that I followed”

Q And, uh, I have seen in an academy office, one of your leadership principles or the tennis that you follow, uh, that, If someone is unlearn, learn, unlearn, learn, and that keeps on repeating. So what is that you have unlearned, you know, when, since you have joined an academy and what are the three key things that you have learned?

A I think it's going to be hard to put it, uh, in that way. I think one of the things I unlearned, uh, you know, was, uh, You know, it, it's, it's not, uh, what you can do. You know, it's not about, uh, or what you've done. It's always about what you can do next. Right? So I think that's one of the things, um, I learned. So it's not about, uh, you know, uh, uh, You know, everything that you've done, uh, you know, in the past or, or everything that you sort of put out there, um, it's always about what you do next. Right. Um, and, and this is, uh, this is something which is very important. I mean, no, one's going to remember, you know, the number of games you won till yesterday, but they're going to talk about how you perform today or how many games you're going to win in the future. So I think it's also an unlearning and also learning in many ways than one, uh, where did, you know, you, you, You, you kind of, uh, learn to keep everything that you've done aside and, and just look at the, the, the tasks on hand that are, uh, you know, in the future or coming up for yourself. Um, another, uh, you know, principle that we strongly follow is, you know, we're not a sports, you know, you're not a family, you know, most people, uh, by leading a team, uh, you know, they say, okay, we're a family. We're going to get together and work. Well, you're not a family. Uh, you know, we're a sports t…

AI assessment note: “one of the things I unlearned, uh, you know, was... what you can do next”

Q As a marketer, at one point in time, you're busy juggling meetings, managing teams. At other point in time, you know, you have to find creativity within you. Where do you draw your inspiration from and what's the process of tapping into it?

A Um, I think, uh, you know, it's, it's pretty, uh, simple and I've, I've kind of answered this in the past. You know, we always ask ourselves three questions, you know, uh, why are we doing this campaign or why are we going to do a specific task, right? Uh, once we know the why, then we ask, okay, what are we going to do? Uh, okay. And then the answer is, okay, we're going to do A, B, C, D. And then ultimately it's about the execution. So then we say, okay, how are we going to do? What are the people who are going to work on it? Do we need a celebrity? Do we go in normally? What's the thought process? So, um, and, and all of these things are usually, uh, keeping and in all cases, keeping the learners, uh, at the heart of everything that we do. Right. Uh, so I think, uh, uh, it's pretty simple when you, when you talk about perspective or, or how we define or choose a campaign, uh, and, and why would we execute a specific task? Uh, you know, we ask ourselves, uh, these three questions as to, Why are we doing it first? And if the why doesn't stand out, uh, if it's not important enough, uh, you know, you have 50 tasks that you're chasing, um, uh, you know, and, and if it doesn't stand out, if it's not good enough, then we don't pursue it. So this applies to everything that we do, uh, you know, uh, out there. Uh, so why, what, and then ultimately how you're going to, uh, execute.

AI assessment note: “we always ask ourselves three questions, you know, why... what... how”