Global brand? 'Build it locally, again and again'

The inaugural ceremony saw corporate India's finest minds come together to share their respective experiences in building India's most powerful brands.

The speakers included ICICI Bank's executive director, Chanda Kochar; Star News president, Ravina Raj Kohli; Ashok Wadhwa, managing director, Ambit Corporate Finance; Darshan Mehta, president Arvind Brands; Ganesh Natrajan, deputy chairman and CEO, Zensar Technologies and Bhaskar Ghose, MD, IndusInd Bank.

The summit was kicked off by Sachdev laying down four fundamentals of building a successful brand: A brand should create sustainable value for the product, it should be embedded in cultural values, it should be on its way to becoming fundamentally timeless and a brand must deliver clutter-busting ideas in terms of execution.

Taking from where Sachdev left off, Ashok Wadhwa, emphasised on core importance of innovation and excellence in brand building, other than factors such as passion and ownership.

He said, "Innovation is not a bastion of one or two people but a result of teamwork. And excellence can't be at a point of time. It has to be a habit."

Bhaskar Ghose, on a lighter note, highlighted the importance of humour in building a brand. According to him, humour cuts through the clutter and makes people like the brand. But he also cautioned against danger of it getting in the way of the message.

He said, "People remember the joke but not the message, which can undermine the brand. Thus humour should not compromise on the basic rules of advertising."

The evening ended with the announcement of IndusInd Bank Awards for Leadership Excellence. The roll of honour included C K Ranganathan, MD, Cavin Kare (marketing professional of the year), Prasoon Joshi, national creative director, McCann Erickson (creative professional of the year), Naina Lal Kidwai, vice chairman and MD, HSBC Securities and Capital Markets (outstanding professional of the year) and Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman and group MD, Bharti Enterprises (CEO of the year).

The lifetime achievement award honour was conferred upon D B Gupta, chairman and MD, Lupin, Verghese Kurien, chairman Gujarat Cooperative Milk Society, Prem Mehta, MD, Lowe and Ranjan Kapur, MD, Ogilvy & Mather.