If one is credited with having contributed to putting the Indian IT industry on the global map, chances are that one must be good, very good in whatever one does. For that matter, Jessie Paul worked as global brand manager at Infosys and, later, as chief marketing officer of Wipro’s IT business. Paul helped build great brands on frugal budgets, and in this book she presents her learning and experience.

Most successful marketers need to control communication variables to the maximum possible extent, and this is what No Money Marketing tries to teach us to do — with virtually nothing (in relative terms), if you are an upstart brand.

Paul goes about her task in a very methodical manner. She first talks about leveraging the flat world, educates us on how to define brand identity, and takes us to her final, interestingly titled section, ‘The Practitioner’s Playbook’. In this section, she tells us of the economical ways to build upstart brands.

Paul builds up the background with short interviews with achievers such as Anupam Mittal, founder of shaadi.com, Shelly Lazarus, chairman of O&M Worldwide, Vijay Mallya and Nandan Nilekani. The book also contains some interesting anecdotes from the author’s own days at O&M — some interwoven in the narrative and some boxed in.

And just as in the corporate world where one gets an executive summary along with every report or white paper, the last chapter is a summary to reinforce all that Paul has recommended in the preceding 15 chapters.
The book explores the existing dichotomy in today’s business scenario, where the cost of global brand-building has come down dramatically, thereby easing it a little for companies. But the ways to build a brand have also become extremely complicated in the meantime. Paul urges the marketing practitioners of today to focus on mapping and, then, influencing the ecosystem, and cites Wipro Mandala (customers’ meet) as an apt example.

The ecosystem is defined as the universe of people and the media that could potentially impact the decision maker. The sections on award marketing, along with the one where the author details out a programme on leveraging the new media, are something most marketing students would find interesting. Not only is the approach contemporary, it appears attainable as well.

The author makes a few pertinent references to the Indian context, which are significant if you are an upstart brand. Her take on executive branding as a ‘brand lever’ is interesting, and is worth active consideration, particularly for Indian managers and firms. Paul observes that American and European business cultures are more self-promoting than the Asian ones.