How do you reach a billion new customers? 'By Listening To Them'
This article appeared in the The Financial Daily newspaper in The Netherlands on the 5th November 30, 2020.
The Rotterdam professor Payal Arora wrote the book 'The Next Billion Users', about the billion people in Africa, Asia and South America who have been connected to the internet in the last ten years. She wants to help entrepreneurs, investors and web developers understand this market.
Arora sought her answers in the slums of India, Chinese games factories and the favelas of Brazil. Photos: Renate Beense for the FD
Who is Payal Arora?
Payal Arora is an anthropologist. She was born in India and is currently Professor of Technology, Ethics and Global Media Culture at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Arora is also the founder of Catalyst Lab, an organization that helps companies bring social issues to the public's attention.
Her work focuses on the global South, and in particular digital culture, inequality and data management.
Arora has written several books and gave a TEDx Talk about the future of the internet.
In 2017 she received the Education Prize from Erasmus University.
She attended Harvard University and Columbia University.
Payal Arora and her father live on different continents. He lives in India, in the metropolis of Bangalore, where there are so many IT companies that it is compared to Silicon Valley. With his two brothers he runs the family business, a chain of photo shops.
She was born in India. She left the photo business and Bangalore behind. She went out into the world, made street art in California, studied at the top American universities Columbia and Harvard, and eventually ended up in the Netherlands. At Erasmus University in Rotterdam she is professor of Technology, Ethics and Global Media Culture - a kind of anthropologist of the digital world. She lives in Amsterdam, in a renovated apartment close to the harbor.
She still often speaks to her father, by telephone, about matters that keep the entrepreneur awake: refusing rent during the lockdown, innovation, economic policy. They rarely agree. Sparks fly when they talk about Donald Trump and his aggressive approach to Chinese competition.
'Trump has balls, my father thinks. He can appreciate that he doesn't care what people think. He would never support him, but he understands him. China has been getting away with foul play for so long, he says. And now there is someone on it who says: screw it. '
She totally disagrees with him. “If you have no evidence of Chinese espionage,” she says, “and you punish an entire country with a trade war, then you have no respect for your own rules of the game. This is how we create the new Wild West. '
We speak at the open balcony doors.
Before Corona, she lectured extensively on her book The Next Billion Users. It's about the behavior of a billion people in Africa, Asia and South America who have been connected to the Internet in the last ten years, especially with a cell phone. How is it possible for young women in the Saudi capital Riyadh to organize a fashion show on YouTube? Why are young Indians trying to become Facebook friends with anyone in the world? And why don't they care that the government is following their digital trail?
She looked for answers in the slums of India, the games factories in China, the favelas of Brazil. Since then, she has been polled daily by companies, she says, who want insight into the consumer of the 'global south' (another term for the third world). Now she is working on her next book. She wants to help entrepreneurs, investors and web developers understand this market.
"They have become my core target group," she says. 'Since my last book I have been getting ten to fifteen requests a day. Sebastiaan Vaessen recently contacted, chief strategist of tech investor Prosus. It invests in the Chinese internet company Tencent, in the Indian meal platform Swiggy. Prosus wants to understand better what drives the users. So that they not only throw capital at the entrepreneurs, but also advice. My readers want to know how they make something that is ready for this market segment. How they can treat consumers as unique, as extraordinarily different. '
Is that the right question?
'No! That is the wrong question! Take Facebook's failure with Free Basics, their free internet for India. They thought: we should give people with a very low income, who are partly illiterate, simple things. With little data usage, so without images. Which is immediately contradictory to their idea that they are dealing with illiterate people. What did work? Audiovisual content. That eats up enormous amounts of data. My point is, humans are not robots, and platform designers need to get off their pedestals. They can only know what people want if they are more humble and listen. '
Can you give an example of what people want?
'In the poorest countries, children are often the intermediaries for new technology. It's always: hey '- she snaps her fingers -' buy vegetables for your mommy, arrange that for your grandmother. In reality, you can serve the children with a good platform. '
How do you reach them?
'Via the platforms they already use. That is why Asian apps like TikTok and WeChat came up with all kinds of extra services. Practical things, such as a payment function. '
WhatsApp has done a trial with this in India and now offers the payment function in Brazil.
'The European Spotify is struggling with the transition from music platform to social ecosystem. It is also very difficult in India. '
A successful app in an Asian country is almost the opposite of an app in a Western country.
'You have to understand how fundamentally different life is in the global south. As an app user, I take the greatest risk. If I get scammed with a duplicated QR code, no one will compensate my damage. I live in a country that can be chaotic so I am desperate for good governance. Where can I find that? In this neat world of apps, where everything comes together seamlessly: share videos, chat, buy, pay. They are small ecosystems of good governance. Here, in Europe and the US, we generally have trustworthy governance. We can break everything down into separate services. We want the opposite. That is why we as individuals like to look for raw edges. The festivals, the spontaneous. '
So your advice is: make sure every app can do everything?
'It's more complex. Non-Western users often want to do something that Western designers can never imagine. Take Taiwan. In the capital, on Taipei 101, a kind of Times Square with those sky-high illuminated signs, you see girls on video screens. There are all kinds of virtual stickers whirling around it. When I first saw them I thought they were pop or movie stars. But they are popular bloggers. People buy emoticons to send to those girls as virtual flowers, giving them a sense of intimacy with the blogger. This is relatively unknown to Europeans and Americans. We take it for granted that we look for our partners ourselves. But most of the world's population has some form of arranged marriage. Most boys never touched a woman before marriage. '
The Digital Fashion Week in India. Arora says it receives ten to fifteen requests per day from companies that want to know what drives users in these types of countries. Photo: Manish Swarup / ANP
So what is your message to internet companies?
‘Change your view of a platform. Do not force users to do what you have in mind. Give them flexibility to do what they want. '
You are very interested in entrepreneurship. Was it difficult to leave your own family business?
'If I hadn't entered the scientific world, I would have entered the business world. But as a teenager I was unruly. My father said if you were a boy, I would have kicked you in the bottom and said take over the company. But I was not a boy. It sounds ironic, but that was very beneficial for my development. '
Is that typical of India, that a boy takes over the business?
'It did when I was a teenager. The pressure on boys in India is still very great. You are an extension of the family heritage. People don't think about what guys could become without all that pressure. The average progressive family in India is more open to what girls can do with their education. Of course there is still great pressure on them to comply with social norms. '
So soon your brothers and cousins will be in the business?
‘It's much worse for my father and his brothers. None of the kids wants to take over the business. Everyone thinks it's boring. '
Do you appreciate the conversations with your father?
'You bet, they are very interesting. We could start a YouTube channel with it. In my progressive Western bubble, I don't easily hear a different view. Moreover, Western business administration almost always revolves around the multinational. Little attention is paid to the local family business, the core of the daily innovation in the global South. '
Can you move in his position?
'I understand my father. He recently advocated protectionism. That sounds strange coming from a businessman, right? He says, "I'm a small business owner, how do I still sell cameras if I have to compete with Walmart or Amazon?" That is why he asks for a certain protection by the government. He says you should see the country as a person, and right now that person is sick. And sick people have to protect themselves. '
Do you disagree with him?
‘Protectionism has a negative connotation. As a safe environment for small businesses that suppresses new ideas. But it's about the execution. A government can offer temporary protection. Every country is in a weak position because of the covid epidemic. With subsidies, we put the enormous unemployment ahead of us. What matters to me is what we do when this crisis is over. Are we using this as an opportunity to come up with new, fairer rules of the game? Or are we doing what the Americans are doing now? Namely their rules and otherwise get out. '
“You have to understand how fundamentally different life is in the global south. You live in a country that can be chaotic, so you desperately seek good governance. Where can you find that? In the neat world of apps. In the safe west we look for the raw edges”
Doesn't every country have a natural appetite for protectionism? Towards the preservation of companies that are seen as national heritage? Also in the Netherlands, which is dependent on open economies, a commotion arises from the possible sale of 'crown jewels' such as KPN and NXP.
‘Like my father, I believe that we are driven by sentiments. Look at the Indians. They can be very proud of products that they believe are Indian. Even if in reality they are not. Such as the nasal spray from Vicks VapoRub, from Procter & Gamble. Ask any Indians, and they will remember this as something passed down from generation to generation. '
When large companies are sold, control over employment, research, investment, austerity disappears.
'The reason I keep coming back to India is that we in the Netherlands think there is something unique here. We create a myth around typical Dutch entrepreneurship, as if there is something pure in it. Also in science. But at the same time, we celebrate the Netherlands as an open economy, which constantly takes in people from outside, which buys up companies itself, which spreads its wings. Because the reality is that the Dutch are very practical. They work together across national borders, creating a global value chain. '
That doesn't have to be mutually exclusive, does it, foreign ambitions and admiration of national successes?
‘But the myths can become reality. With influence on policy. It is difficult to get large Dutch and European grants for my research. Because if I want to research a country outside of Europe, I have to demonstrate that the data will benefit the EU and the Netherlands. '
Is that an unreasonable requirement?
‘It's a close look. It is difficult to make it clear to people here that countries like India or Brazil have a lot to offer when it comes to innovation and sustainable business models. Check out the latest EU reports on the future of artificial intelligence. They only revolve around European norms and values, as if they were different from universal ones. Europe sees itself as the global arbiter. But that's not a carrot, that's a stick. And no one gets inspired by a stick. People get inspired when you say: what can I do for you? Let me understand what motivates you. And let's think about how we can make things better together.’
How does your father feel about this? Is the American entrepreneur an example to him?
‘He appreciates the American can-do mentality and their tendency to take risks. But when it comes to reliability, Germany wins. What is much more important for your national image is your reliability. Germany has been able to maintain that. When you talk about role models in Indian manufacturers, they don't mention American companies. Then they call them German. '
Which companies are then mentioned?
'No specific. Germany is a brand. If you show an Indian a German newspaper, it is immediately a quality newspaper for him. With a track record in quality and attention to detail. For my father, national sentiment does not have to be an obstacle to growth and mobility. It is precisely the fuel for entrepreneurship and innovation. He says: when Hitler came to power, he initially gave the country back his pride by boosting the car industry. That's how Volkswagen became big. '
Isn't Hitler a loaded name?
'My father doesn't justify Hitler's atrocities. He is concerned with the reasons why people initially chose him. Indians had an obsession with the Second World War and could empathize with the Germans. Because we were colonized by the British. So the enemy of our enemy is our friend. Of course we are not talking about the Holocaust, but about the idea that we as a nation were completely crushed. All natural resources had been drained. There was little pride about it. National sentiments can be channeled into country building. '
Does your father look like a German company?
‘His ambitions are more humble. He wants to be a brand in Bangalore. Not a copy of anyone else. He wants to have more satisfied customers. If you want to become someone else, you forget what your own customers want.‘