Pakistan among top priority countries: Nokia

[LahoreEstate]

Sunday, June 28, 2009
By Faryal Najeeb

KARACHI: Country Director of Nokia for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Imran Khalid Mahmood has said that Pakistan is amongst the top priority countries for Nokia as it is now very much on the global map and up to the mark on everything that is happening in the world.

“Therefore, in Pakistan, the price band for mobile phones may be slightly smaller but there are people who have both the money and the desire for expensive gadgets and that is what we are targeting,” he said.

Head of Go-to-Market NSeries Sales for the Middle East and Africa, Henri Mattila stated that present era is all about who has the information first. Therefore nowadays people are spending a lot of time online and since they are globally connected at one time, information is at their fingertips.

The Nokia officials were exclusively talking to The News. Mahmood said that they based their strategies on consumer needs and as marketing strategies were an evolutionary process, Nokia also constantly evolved their techniques based on what the consumers were focusing on.

He believed that the new technologically advanced and expensive products were not creating an undesirable demand in the society but were rather catering to already existent needs of the consumers. “If we don’t do it, somebody else will,” he further expressed.

Mahmood said at Nokia they ensured that their products were meaningful and had context rather than being just another expensive product in the market. He said that all their staff was trained in advance to provide after-sales services and customer care.

Interestingly, both Mattila and Mahmood labelled Pakistani consumers as image seekers or style followers. Mattila elaborated that deep inside all consumers were the same with the same desires which he termed as being: “they want the latest technology, they want to have it first and that they want to show it off to friends and relatives.”

He said that yet consumers in Middle East and Africa are very conscious about the look of the mobile than the features that were available in it. He voiced that in Pakistan, consumers were more into colours being vibrant due to the bright traditional cultures here, while he added that in Europe, consumers preferred more conservative colours such as black and white.

Mahmood also put in that since Pakistan was an emerging market, bulk of the consumers segment were those who purchased low cost mobile phones whereas there was also a significant segment that did nothing except make or receive calls.

“Pakistan is following the trend of any emerging country but this time with the launch of N97, Pakistan is ahead of more developed countries,” he added. The country director also spoke about the pirated versions of their mobile phones that cheated the consumers of their money.

“I feel very passionate and hurt when loyal customers get deceived which also damages the company’s name,” he said. “Because the government has imposed taxes that make no sense, consumers are paying the price, for this country is infested with the grey market,” he added.

Mahmood said that they did not have the mechanism to stop piracy or stop the retailer from bringing in fake products and selling them into the market. He stressed that all their manufacturing units follow the same standards and quality checks all over the world.

Nevertheless, he informed that to identify an original cell phone, mobile dealers have a number displayed in their stores which reads ‘SMS warranty check’. A consumer can send in the mobile’s IMEI number to the stated SMS number which would reply back saying that it had original warranty in Pakistan, which in turn help the consumer to identify an authentic mobile phone.

Henri Mattila said that Pakistan needs to reduce duties on cell phones to encourage original products to enter the country. He also said that one way to identify a fake was if the product was being sold for half the price, then consumers should be wary of it.

To a question regarding Nokia’s investments into the country, Mahmood stated that Pakistan was a very important portfolio for the multinational company as with a significant population, it made a lucrative consumer market.

However, Nokia already had nine plants all over the world that were fulfilling their mobile phones demand in the market.

Mahmood said they had seven care centres, a level-3 repair factory in Lahore and 9,200 plus Nokia sales points in Pakistan. Other than these, they employed a large number of manpower and invested into training them.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=185382