SDM PROJECT PART B

UNDERSTANDING SALES AND DISTRIBUTION AT

Submitted To

Prof Kapil Khandeparkar

Prof Manoj Motiani

Submitted by

Group 7, Section CE

Abhijith G Santhosh (2016PGP006)

Akhil Mohammed C P (2016PGP037)
Akole Ruchi Rajendra (2016PGP039)
Alisha Raul (2016PGP047)
Nayan Sharma (2016PGP225)
Sindhuja Gantayet (2016PGP378)
Supriya Karan (2016PGP396)
Shivani Gual (2016PGP361)
Vodafone An Overview

Vodafone Group plc, headquarters in London, is a British multinational

telecommunications company. Amongst other mobile operator groups worldwide,
Vodafone is placed fifth by revenue and second (after China Mobile) in the total
number of connections (435.9 million) as of 2014.
Vodafone possesses and operates networks in twenty-six countries having partner
networks in over fifty other nations. Its Vodafone Global Enterprise division delivers
telecommunications and IT services to corporate customers in 150 nations.
Vodafone India is a 100% subsidiary of Vodafone Group. It initiated operations in
1994 after its forerunner Hutchison Telecom attained the cellular license for Mumbai.
The brand Vodafone was propelled in India in September 2007, once Vodafone Plc.
picked up a majority stake in Hutchinson Essar in May 2007. The business is
presently serving 31 million customers and stretched its operations through the
country to cover all 22 telecom groups.
Vodafone India is the second largest mobile network operator in India by subscriber
base, first being Airtel by a market share of 18.42%. It is headquartered in Mumbai,
Maharashtra. It has about200 million consumers as of August 2016. It deals with both
prepaid and postpaid GSM cellular mobile coverage all over India with improved
existence in the metro cities.

The company is presently directed by Sunil Sood who is the Managing Director and
CEO of Vodafone India Ltd.

Vodafone India has established various awards in the earlier years such as One of the
Best Companies to Work For in India in 2014 according to the national review piloted
by The Economic Times and recognized as the Most Trusted Brand in Telecom
Category conferring to Brand Trust Report in 2014.

Vodafone delivers an extremely linked network system where a complete set of

127,000 spots and 30,000 3G spots, across the nation, are connected. The complete
coverage establishes a full of 84 percent, while the rural dispersion is about 76
percent.
Vodafone has its existence across the nation through 1.8 million recharging stores,
over 9000 exclusive and 34 angel stores.

Vodafone is involved in the CSR events asVodafone Cares which is a platform that
integrates the three columns of Education, Empowerment and Environment. These
3Es bring into line the companys exertions as being a socially responsible
organization.

a. Vodafone Operations:

In India, Vodafone has 700 stores with having 3949 small stores and 293 Wi-Fi
hotspot stores.

There are offices of Vodafone in eight zones of Madhya Pradesh. The zones are
districts of Jabalpur, Indore, Gwalior, Bhopal, Satna, Bilaspur, Ujjain and Sagar. The
circle head office is located in Bhopal.
In Indore district, there are 5 stores, 9 mini stores and 3 Wi-Fi hotspot stores beside
the several retail stores that provide recharge and coupon facilities for Vodafone.

b. Current Market Trends for Vodafone:

By the data of Vodafone India Ltd- Annual report 2016, Vodafone stated a 3.4% fall
in sales income to approximately Rs.13, 500croresas compared to the previous year.
The drag down in the slower data revenue growth is on the account of condensed
data dispersion at the lower and middle ends in the market. Data searching income
growth of 22.3% also reduced because of lesser purchaser growth.

However, Vodafone India had stated 45% growth in data income during financial year
2016 and 55% in the major six months of the previous financial year.

Vodafone India's active data consumer count in the quarter till June grew to 69.7
million from 66.8 million which was in the previous year, and its 3G/4G consumer
count grew 46%, that is 32.3 million.
Vodafone distribution system
Vodafone believes in the importance of communication and helps its users with its far-reaching
network made for uninterrupted network and clear conversations. Vodafone follows the approach
of More is better! Vodafones high-speed 4G services in Kerala, Karnataka, Mumbai, Delhi &
NCR and Kolkata today contributes to 30% of industry revenues and close to 50% of Vodafone
India data revenues.

The increasing use of smart phones, mobile internet and new age technologies has resulted in
changing customer needs. Vodafone India has introduced Global Design Store which is an
industry first retail format, offering a uniform and consistent, internationally benchmarked
customer experience through 200+ stores in urban centers in India.
With the on-going information revolution in rural India, Vodafone has already marked its distinct
presence through its rural mini stores, popularly known as LalDukaans. These LalDukaans are
entrepreneurial ventures located in 5,000 plus villages in the near vicinity of all circles. As they
are managed by local community members they act as key relationship hubs for the brand.
Vodafone is strict while choosing their dealers. They judge potential dealers based on the
following criteria:
Dealers must be financially sound
Dealers should have good reputation track record in market
Good market penetration by the dealer
The coverage for the dealer must be high
Vodafone strives on building customer loyalty and hence they leverage their dealers for building
customer relationships. Apart from distributing Vodafone products to retailers they have
following responsibilities:
To run company sponsored promotional activities
To conduct recruitment under company guidance
Training of manpower
Providing post sale services
Channel Structure

Vodafone

Indirect Exclusive Direct Modern

Retail B2B Business
Channel Channels Trade

With a focus
Primary focus Chain stores Enterprise
Focused on on postpaid
on postpaid, for future services,
prepaid and meant to be
terminals, growth of including
mass market sold directly
data, sales data, 3G, 4G fixed line and
reach to end
and service and services data
consumer

1. Indirect Distribution:
The extent of indirect distribution varies between markets. Vodafone uses third-party service
providers, independent dealers, agencies and mass marketing. A competitive tariff structure is
maintained wherein technical and other training is provided to the staffs and financial incentives
to service providers, dealers and sales people. This channel also provides assistance for
advertising campaigns and supports the development of both special retail outlets.

a. In Tier-1, urban areas:

The retailer outlets perform as unique electronic top-up outlets, activating outlets and data selling
outlets. The distributor sales executives work for more than 60 outlets.

Vodafone

Distributor

Distributor sales executive

Retailer
b. In Tier-2, rural areas:

Main Town

Direct distribution to village clusters within

20km

Cluster of villages serviced by associate

distributors(35km-40km)

Migrant workers and a large percentage of prepaid users in these areas prefer to have a face to
face interaction for availing services. Within 20km distance, direct distributors serve the village.
Associate distributors serve cluster of villages which are in a span of 35km-40km.

2. Exclusive Retail:
Majority of Vodafones sales happens in retail outlets. Vodafone have 700 stores and 3949 mini
stores across India. Following are major activities for which customers an outlet:

Postpaid connections
Prepaid connections and recharge cards
To get information on various plans
Bill payment
Demos and activation of different value added services
Queries and SIM replacement

Vodafone
exclusive retail

Vodafone mini
Vodafone mini
Vodafone Store store(Urban and
store(rural)
Semi Urban)

Experience Convinience Service and trust

 Experience:
The stores are redesigned in every single aspect with new sales and service attention models,
new role definition and new back office processes are developed. A store manual with all the
information, documentation and detailed design specification for the new store experience is also
shared to the customers.

Convenience
This is based on entrepreneurial model aimed for low costs. Vodafone has been focusing
aggressively on closer engagement and enhancing customer experience in an endeavor to be
ready for future.

Service and trust

Vodafone has emerged as a differentiator in rural market with its LaalDukaan concept. Since
commencing operations in 2007, they have consistently been awarded for their best-in-class
network, powerful brand, unique distribution and unmatched customer service.

3. Direct Channels

This channel consists of direct sales agents who sell the services on feet by cold calling. An
outbound tele-calling setup is used too by feet for street fulfillment model.

In super call center, calls are transferred from inbound call centers, upselling to existing
customer base. An immediate transfer is made to the DSA (Direct selling associate) in this
tele calling setup.

4. Modern Trade

The modern retail stores of Vodafone features 3G Zone, Vodafone Red Zone, Self Service
Kiosks, M-pesa Zone, Zoo Zoo merchandise and a Go Post-Paid Zone. Vodafone have been
opening their global design stores as a part of Vodafones Retail Of Tomorrow initiative.
Vodafone supernet 4G services has been launched in places like Saharanpur, Agra,
Dehradun, Bareilly and many other locations which serve as cultural, educational and
tourism hubs. After UP west and Uttarakhand the services were rolled out in Mumbai,
Kerala, Karnataka, Kolkata, Delhi and NCR, UP east, Gujarat, West Bengal, Rajasthan,
North East, Maharashtra, Haryana, Tamil Nadu and Punjab Circles. To provide seamless
customer experience Vodafone has introduced instant 4G SIM exchange at all Vodafone
stores and selected retail outlets.

5. B2B Business

Vodafone helps businesses that cater to a pan-India audience by bringing their

communication systems on par with global standards. Vodafone prepares the companies by
providing them solutions to face the challenges of today and prepare for the future. They
provide voice and data, wireless and wireline services to help businesses harness the power
of total communications.
 In B2B business, Vodafone has set up an advanced system of GPRS enabled biometric
devices with the systems integrator to track attendance on a daily basis through thumb
impression or card swipe for a government body to monitor the attendance of employees.

For connecting global audience in businesses, companies must ensure that their employees
have the freedom to interact with customers across the globe. Vodafones National and
International Roaming plans enable employees to stay constantly connected, no matter where
they are, with low cost and quality services.
Sales Management at Vodafone
The discipline of Sales Management caters to the process of forming a sales force and
application of sales techniques in sales operations in order to achieve the sales target fixed for a
company. The importance of this discipline lies in its functioning as an interface between the
company and the customers where the latter may include end-users or retailers as the case may
be. Effective sales management helps the company to generate revenues and gain profits and
often, is instrumental in pushing the company from mere surviving to flourishing. Understanding
the sales process is equally important in staying in sync with the industrial developments.

In order to have a clear understanding, the sales process is divided into three broad umbrellas,
namely Sales Operations, Sales Strategy and Sales Analysis.

1. Sales Operations:

The sales team forms the backbone of a company and function as point of interaction between
the product companies and the customers. Hence it is of utmost importance to recruit the right fit
of employees as a part of sales team but also provide them with required training from time to
time. The important aspects of sales operations are explained below:

a. Sales Team Composition

The overall structure can be divided into three levels:

Senior - involved in decision making process

 Middle - comprises of professionals of various fields acting as an interface between the rest
two levels
Lower - direct dealing with the customers

The hierarchy of the sales department can be broadly categorized as:

National sales Department

Zonal Sales Department
Regional Sales Department
District Sales Department
Territory Sales Department

Confining the scope to the last two categories, the sales team consist of following positions:

Relationship Manager: The responsibility of a relationship manager (RM) broadly includes

handling customers and corporate clients and resolving their complaints.
Area Sales Manager: ASM is responsible for overseeing sales operations, ensuring targets
are met and managing sales team his/her region
District Sales Manager: DSM has the responsibility of developing new direct business and
mentors the Sales representatives for sales achievement.
Daily Sales Executive: He / She is the main point of contact between an organization and its
clients. Major responsibility involves answering queries, offering advice and introducing new
plans.
Sales Representative: Sales representative works with distributors and customers to
communicate the product/ service information and conducts a smooth sales process.
Sales Person: His/her duties are majorly customer/distributor communication, assistance,
demonstrating products and completing transactions.

Vodafones sales persons take care of visiting the different distributors in his territory and
communicating product and service information. Not very often, the Area Sales Manager or
Zonal Manager accompanies the agents.
A sales person has the following items in his sales kit:

Leaflets on products and services information, in large numbers

 List of prospects and their addresses
Details on competitive scenario in his territory
Price information on various services Vodafone offers compared with prices of similar offers
provided by competitors

b. Recruitment/Hiring Process:

Vodafone has certain skill sets they look for in a candidate enrolling for sales role. The important
ones are:
Good communication
Pro active
Quick learner
Have fair understanding of his/her territory
People friendly attitude
Focused and self motivated

c. Training:

Sales person undergoes initial training sessions soon after his recruitment. This training impart
knowledge on what to do out in the field and how to go about achieving targets.

d. Roles Performed:

Key Performance indicators or KPIs are instrumental in gauging the progress of individuals and
the team and the extent to which the business objectives are achieved by the company. In
Vodafone management considers around 35 KPIs as major ones for evaluation from among a set
of 75-80 KPIs allocated to the Sales Team.

5 major tasks of distributor team in a day

New Activation Drivers:

It is the responsibility of acquiring new customers. It is one of the most important KPI for the
salespeople. It goes through 3 stages where firstly company issue and bill new SIM cards to the
distributor at the rate of Rs. 5 which were then forwarded by the distributor to the retailer at the
same rate. The retailer then decides customer price on the basis of their first recharge (Market
Offer Price).
 Primary:

This is the first stage where companies issue the free top ups and paper vouchers when
distributors transfer them the money. This can be done by both the on roll and off roll
employees. The margin distributor get for this is 1.5%. Vodafone generated around 20-25 %
revenue in MPCG area from paper vouchers while the revenue generated from other states was
around 35% in India.

Secondary:

The distributors then distribute the top ups and vouchers to the retailers. The margin retailers get
here is around 2.5%.

Daily Activation Outlets (DAO):

These are for generating better quality of new activation (new customers). This signifies the
quality as the higher the DAO, better the quality of new customers. The better quality is
ascertained by deciding the target percentage of the DAO. Vodafone generally target that
minimum 20% Unique Acquisition Outlets (UAO) should be DAO. Thus making sure that
minimum 20% of outlets deals with one activation on a daily basis.

Distribution:

This is one of the major responsibilities of the Sales Team where they need to distribute the SIM
cards and various vouchers in their regions or territory. This process follows various levels as
described by the primary, secondary and tertiary stages. The primary and secondary are already
explained above. Tertiary stage involves selling from the retail store. This process involves the
customers coming to the retail store and making a purchase. This generally follows a push
strategy.

SALES STRATEGY:

A series of tasks and processes help a company to make sure its products and services reach their
users by following a sales pipeline. Appropriate sales strategies facilitate in positioning of the
company ahead of its competitors. Proper strategy formulation comes from awareness of the
industry, market trends and competitors moves. Therefore, sales strategy includes careful setting
of targets, dealing with the customers, product placement and promotion plans. The sales
strategy followed in Vodafone is outlined below.

a. Schemes Offered to Retailers:

In order to maximize the reach, every telecom player offers variety of lucrative schemes to the
retailers to establish a long-term relation with them and retain them. Retailers decide their
Market Offer Price (MOP) according to what they want to charge for. In the schemes offered to
the retailers, the incentives are decided on the basis of different slabs set. For the initial number
of activations (1-10) per day, they are given Rs 10 per number. For the next slab (11-30 number
of activations), they are given Rs15 per number which subsequently increase to Rs 20 per
number if the count of activation crosses 30.

b. Incentives to distributors:

In order to push the services to ensure a wider reach, Vodafone gives various incentives to the
distributors on the basis of following factors:

c. Acquisitions:

Acquisitions involve acquiring new customers. A specific target is given to the distributors and
on achieving that target incentives are given which could be Rs 5 per new acquisition.

d. Distribution:

There are 5 parameters on which distribution is judged. The incentives also depends on the
market-DPL (Dealer per leg) which involves the population of a geography.

Unique Recharge Outlets (URO):

Unique specifies the unique target count. Theses outlets involves having minimum 500 Rs
recharge done for a customer. These outlets sell paper vouchers and coupons. On achieving a
targeted number of URO, 4 Rs per acquisition is given as incentive.

Any Unique Acquisition Outlets (UAO):

These outlets have minimum one acquisition per month. The incentive given is same as URO- 4
Rs per acquisition.

Unique Acquisition Outlets:

These outlets have minimum 3 acquisitions (Activations) per month. The incentives are kept
same i.e. Rs 4 per acquisition.

Data Selling Outlets (DSO):

The Data Selling Outlets are places where the incentives are based on the amount of data
provided. Data Selling involves the data recharges and vouchers.

Mobile Number Portability Outlets (MNPO):

These outlets deal with specific request of mobile number portability.

SALES ANALYSIS:

Analysis of targets set and targets achieved help in determining the success of the company.
These are the indicators of the performance of the sales performance team in particular and
company in general.

a. Targets Achieved: Sales persons and even the employees in managerial roles like ASMs and
ZMs are evaluated in the basis of monthly Target achieved.

b. Average size of deals: Deal size is another metric in which performance is evaluated. The
average size of the deals each sales person brings in is compared across others and based on
that he/she will be incentivized.
Competitor analysis
We consider Bharti Airtel for the comparison of sales and distribution of Vodafone.

Bharti Airtel Company Profile:

Name Bharti Airtel Limited.

Bharti Airtel Limited is a leading global telecommunications company

with operations in 17 countries across Asia and Africa. Headquartered in
New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top 3 mobile service
providers globally and largest in India in terms of subscribers. In India, the
Business company's product offerings include 2G, 3G and 4G wireless services,
description mobile commerce, fixed line services, high speed DSL broadband, DTH,
enterprise services including national & international long distance
services to carriers. In the rest of the geographies, it offers 2G, 3G, 4G
wireless services and mobile commerce. Bharti Airtel had over 364
million customers across its operations at the end of December 2016.

Established July 07, 1995, as a Public Limited Company

Proportionate Rs.233,357million (ended December 31, 2016-Audited)

revenue As per Ind-AS Accounts

Proportionate Rs. 85,705 million (ended December 31, 2016-Audited)

EBITDA As per Ind-AS Accounts

India: 265,853,000 GSM mobile; 2,102,000 Homes customers and

12,588,000- Digital TV Services
(status as on December 31, 2016)
Customer base
Africa: 80,356,000 GSM mobile customers, SA: 1,938,000 mobile
customers
(status as on December 31, 2016)

(Source- Company website airtel.in)

a. Supply chain of Airtel

Airtel divides its territories into circles on the basis of regions. If a region is huge it is allocated
one circle, e.g. Mumbai circle, else a cluster of regions maybe allocated to a single circle, e.g.
Karnataka circle. Each territory has a Territory Manager (TM). The prime task of the territory
manager is distributing products to the distributors as per the demand of the region. Further the
distributors handle the provisioning of documents, operation back up and distributing the product
to the Field sales officers (FSOs). The FSOs in turn supply it to the retailers. The FSOs have to
visit the retailer every alternate day and check whether the stock is adequate or not. Due to this,
the retailers never go out of stock. In urban areas, the distributors margin is 1.3% and that of the
retailer is 2.7%.

The marketing and sales teams in each circle form regional organizations which are responsible
for the sales and marketing strategies and expansion plans for their territories. They also provide
inputs and reviews of the corporate strategies and product direction. The following figure shows
the hierarchy of supply chain of Airtel:

Territory
Manager

Urban Rural Super

Second degree Distributor Distributor
distribution
Via FSO
network Third degree
Rural distribution
Retailer
distributor network

Via FSO

Retailer

Urban Distributors (UDs):

The Urban Distributors (UDs) are located at the District Headquarters. They distribute the
products, easy balance services and promotion material to the retailers in the designated urban
areas of their district. They are responsible for the distribution of SIM, Easy Recharge, RCV
(Recharge Vouchers), GSM Pay Phones, Replacement SIM to the retailers without encroaching
into other distributors territories. All the retailers SIM falling under the UDs belt is mapped
with a corresponding FSO SIM and this FSO SIM is mapped to the distributor (UD) SIM. This
system is used for balance transfer. The UDs also activate customers SIMs within their territory
after verification from the documents received at the retailer and send them to the Circle Head
Quarter. They also distribute promotional materials received from the company among the
retailers according to the allocation of TM and forward retailers claims and complaints to TM.

Rural Super Distributors (RSDs) and Rural Distributors:

Rural Super Distributors (RSDs) and Rural Distributors have similar roles and functions as the
UDs except that they cater to the rural markets. Rural markets have third degree distribution and
hence the RSDs have RDs under them. Under one RSD there are maximum 12 RDs.

Field Sales Officer (FSO):

Field Sales Officer (FSO) acts as the intermediary between the UD/RD and the retailers. They
sell the SIM, RCVs etc. and transfer easy balance to the retailers on behalf of the distributor i.e.
they are responsible for the secondary sales. They are the point of communication between the
distributor and the retailers for conveying of information to and fro.

Retailers:

Retailers are at the end of the supply chain from where the customers can buy Airtel products
and Services. Some retailers have the provision of transferring balances to customers via the
retailer SIM mapped with a distributor SIM (via FSO SIM). For activation of SIM, the retailers
obtain customer documents and forward them to the distributor after proper verification. They
must also utilize and display the promotional materials sent by the company appropriately and
communicate to the customers about the schemes, new offers and benefits. The retailer also has
the responsibility of purchasing products from their respective distributors only.

Second Degree Distribution Network:

In urban markets, demand is generally obscurely driven. To handle this, Airtel makes invoices of
SIMs, GSM Pay Phones and RCVs (Recharge Vouchers) of various denominations to the UDs
and RSDs. Easy balance is also transferred to them. Now the UDs distribute these items to the
retailers depending on the demand and transfer the easy balance to them through the SIM of
Field Sales Officers (FSOs).

Third Degree Distribution Network:

In rural markets, a three degree distribution network is generally used due to lesser population
density and the large geographical spreads. In contrast to the UDs, the RSD distributes the above
items first to Rural Distributors (RDs) and transfer easy balance to the RDs SIM. Now similar to
the UDs, the RDs distribute these items to the retailers depending on the demand and transfer the
easy balance to them through the SIM of Field Sales Officers (FSOs).
b. Selection of channel members/dealers

Airtel follows a stringent policy in the selection of its dealers. The following pre-requisites are
mandatory to be an Airtel dealer:

The dealers must have a decent financial background. It is on the discretion of the company
officials to gauge the financial capability of a dealer.
The dealer must have a good market reputation, since he/she acts as the face of the company
to the customer.
The dealer must have a clean previous track record, for example, on-time payment, no
criminal background etc.
The dealer must have superior market penetration. This ensures that the company can reach
out to maximum customers.
The dealer must cover a minimum geographical area depending on the company policy.

c. Responsibilities of the dealers:

Airtels prime focus is in maintaining customer loyalty. For this, it expects its dealers to perform
the following functions apart from selling its products:

Sales promotion via regular promotional schemes, campaigns etc. The expenses are incurred
by Airtel if the promotion is for the company and not of the dealer himself.
Training and development with assistance from company officials
After sales service
Customer relationship management activities like keeping in touch with the customers,
obtaining feedback and ensuring maximum customer satisfaction.
Promotion of other products of the company apart from those assigned to the dealer.

d. Comparison of sales and distribution strategies of Vodafone and Airtel

Airtel and Vodafone are one of the top players in the Indian telecom market. The distribution
systems of both companies are also similar in terms of the methods and modes of distribution
and channel management, though Vodafone has a better structure and coverage than Airtel in
terms of its distribution hierarchy. The dealer selection criteria is also similar for both
companies. Airtel does not market its products separately in the urban and rural markets, whereas
Vodafone has distinctive sales management strategies for its urban and rural markets. Airtel
specifically follows the second degree distribution system in its urban markets and third degree
distribution system in its rural markets. Vodafone generally follows third degree distribution
system throughout. Both companies make use of intermediaries between the distributors and the
retailers. In case of Vodafone, they are called the Direct Sales Executives whereas for Airtel they
are called the Field Sales Officers. The hierarchy of the distribution channel is greater in case of
Vodafone and Airtel. Thus, in terms of distribution, Vodafone seems to be better structured and
extensive than Airtel.

On the customer facing front, Vodafone has a better customer relationship management
system with its exclusive Vodafone stores, Vodafone mini-stores and Laal Dukaan explicitly
for the rural areas. But in terms of schemes and promotions, Airtel leads Vodafone and provides
greater incentives to the retailers and customers for buying their products. Vodafones promotion
strategy has been mainly via the Zoo-zoo advertising which have been a hit among the
customers. Airtels promotion strategy is more of connecting with their customers through
stories about their everyday lifestyle. For example, their Har ek friend zaroori hota hai
campaign, the vast Airtel 4G campaign covering different parts of India, the recent All India
Coverage campaign. Thus we can see that both companies use pull strategies to promote their
products more than push strategies. Airtel also has the first mover advantage in most of the
technologies and schemes, which makes it easier for them to push their products to the
customers.
Suggestions to Improve Channel Management

The traditional revenue for operators has dropped (sms, voice) and now operators are not
able increase the data revenue as most of them are prompted to offer unlimited usage at a
flat rate due to competitions. To keep up the revenue and profit, operators now have to
look at alternate revenue streams. The service providers have to come up with new
differentiating offers than the traditional voice, sms and device bundles. Skype, Google,
Whatsapp forced many operators to reduce prices further. Users spend a mere 16% of
their time on phone calls and the other 84% on activities like browsing the email, using
social apps, watching videos or gaming. Operators will have to venture into non-
traditional services like Media/Entertainment, Health, and Cloud Computing in a
collaborative pattern with IT Service companies and strategic alliances with diverse
industries. Enterprise and Small & Medium Business (SMB), Government & Public
Sector etc. are the promising area to generate revenue. The key is to capitalize on the
existing customer base and use that as a propeller to offer them a variety of services like
mobile banking solution, Medication Reminder Services, Digital Classrooms, Event
Management Systems, Mobile Payment solutions etc.

In rural areas, Vodafone along with LaalDukaan can also introduce vans services. As
people in rural areas prefer face to face interactions, van service can be of great help. A
van will carry photocopy machine, camera and a representative to help villagers with
documentation process and solve their queries in the process further. If a sim card is not
activated, stopped working or get blocked, customers can go to these mobile vans and get
their problems solved in less time and better clarity.

Distributors often follow shortcuts method to ensure the target number of acquisition or
activations is achieved. This can be done when Opening the sim cards happen at the
distributor or retailer point only. Opening the sim card means that new connections are
taken without any customers. The retailers than sell those cards at lower price when they
are under the pressure to achieve the target number of customers. The customers purchase
those cards, use it and then throw away. This method ensure the target number to be
achieved but the quality of the acquisitions is not very good. To improve the quality of
acquisitions, the dealers focus on the DAOs.
References
1. Primary Research - Major sources of our report are the ASM of Vodafone, Mr. Anshul
and field visits
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vodafone_India
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vodafone
4. https://www.vodafone.in/about-us/
5. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/53346612.cms?utm_source=contentofi
nterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst
6. http://www.vodafone.in/documents/Pdfs/Pressreleases/Press%20Release%20-
%20Vodafone%20H1FY17%20Results%2015th%20Nov.pdf
7. http://www.vodafone.com/content/annualreport/annual_report16/downloads/vodafone-
full-annual-report-2016.pdf
8. http://www.indiainfoline.com/article/news-business/vodafone-is-now-one-of-indias-
largest-retailers-115090300032_1.html
9. http://www.indiainfoline.com/article/news-sector-retail/vodafone-is-now-one-of-india-s-
largest-retailers-115090200133_1.html
10. http://www.thehindu.com/business/vodafone-india-turns-into-a-larger-
retailer/article7612331.ece
11. http://www.airtel.in/partnerworld/Partner_Process_Selection.htm
12. http://www.airtel.in/about-bharti/equity/
13. http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/interviews/better-network-distribution-to-
mark-airtel-in-rural-indian-market/articleshow/48690242.cms