‘I am thinking of taking a loan of ten thousand to buy a mobile,’ said the courier guy who I knew could not read even Hindi properly.
‘Loan for a mobile?’ I asked, surprised, ‘Why do you need ten thousand to buy a mobile?’ You can browse around this web-site for more information.
All he wanted was a mobile to keep him connected, click a few pictures, listen to the radio, and… well, subscribe to a caller tune.
I am generally surprised to find consumers behaving more and more ignorantly and ending up buying devices that they do not really need. Look at people who need mobiles with some basic camera functions, a screen that doesn’t make output look like an amorphous lump of jaded colours, audio and video output that doesn’t distress the eyes and the ears, the ability to connect to the internet, and a battery that isn’t whimsical. These are the sort of buyers you come across in tier 2, 3, and 4 towns and they are taken in by all the advertising and PR hype and end up spending far more than they really need to.
These are the buyers who need to understand that devices are designed with intended use, economic use, tech use, and functionality use in view and they need not go for those devices that top the charts and have a superlative performance from every angle. Thus, if your sort of usage requires buying a device that gives the functionality you need, go ahead and buy one that costs just 4 thousand or 5 thousand, without bothering to even consider those that cross this price limit. I simply hate to see simple folk taking loans, paying EMIs for buying a mobile and then making only voice calls and clicking a few pictures when the family goes out to attend a family wedding. Come on, you do not ever need to spend more if this is all you want to do. Yes, you can have a reasonably good audio too to listen as you travel in a local bus.
India is a fast growing consumer electronics market and smartphone sales are expected to grow to over 650 million by 2019. Around sixty percent of our buyers are under 35 and are fascinated by all the hype in the media that companies create through advertising and PR. However, this is no reason to burden yourself with a device that you are not going to use to its full potential. All that most of these small town and rural consumers need is a phone that is sturdy enough to keep going and give the sort of service that they need.
iVooMe devices too have a segment to cater to…
I told the courier guy, ‘You must consider buying a phone like the iVooMe ME1 or ME1+.’ And then I told him that this phone would give him a reasonably good service without hurting his pocket. After all, 3,999/- for the ME1 and 4,999/- for the ME1+ is far less than 10K and the phones have a high resolution screen, a good memory, and a battery that lasts. This was a brand that was any day better than the Gionee P7, Xolo Era 2X, Oppo A371, and the Vivo V53 that would cost more. A job well done is better than a job well done at a higher price point. I told this fellow that the phones were also available through Shopclues dot com and that he could even opt for an EMI there. Well, even Radhika Agarwal, Co-founder & Chief Business Officer, ShopClues.com has said, ‘It gives us immense pleasure to partner with the iVOOMi team for their mid-level smartphone range. With the penetration of internet throughout the country and with more and more consumers from tier 2, 3 and beyond cities coming online to shop, it is definitely the right time to launch such a feature-heavy smartphone at a competitive price like the ME series.’
Jessy Liu from iVooMe India told me that the company was fully aware of ‘the price sensitive aspect of the Indian market and had worked on world class technology to bring smartphones with advanced features in the minimal price range.’
‘This is precisely what the masses in India should be looking for,’ I replied.
Shopclues, for those who are unaware, is headquartered in Gurgaon and was founded in 2011 as a preferred e-commerce destination for Real India – Buyers and Sellers in tier 2, tier 3, 4 cities and beyond. This organization has more than 100 million monthly visits, over 20 million listed products, 5,00,000 + merchants, over 7000 online brand stores, ShopClues services 30,000 pin codes across India.
The truth is that even low price point buyers are constantly looking for more in their device and the ME1 and ME1+ phones have a 5 inch HD screen with a resolution of 1280×720 pixels and come primed for 4G and a dual SIM. The difference between the two devices is that one has an 8 GB internal memory whereas the other has 16 GB, with both having the facility of adding a Micro SD card of 128 GB. both devices come with a 3000 mAh battery and a fast charge advantage. Both have Android Marshmallow 6.0 as the OS and a 1.2 GHz Quad core processor. Both have front cameras of 5 mega-pixels and the rear camera, obviously is 5 MP in the cheaper variant and 8 MP in the one costing a bit more.
It is time for the Indian consumer of electronic goods to be wary of spending money where it isn’t needed. They need to learn to see what they really want and then decide on the kind of money they want to invest. This logic is true for every kind of gadget that the Indian market is now flooded with. Mind you, I am not recommending that the Indian buyer must deprive himself of technology and the benefits that are perceived… just evolve into a sensible consumer.
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The launch of iVooMe in Delhi
Specifications_ME1_ME1+
From left to right Mr. Kartik Aggarwal, Ms. Jessy Liu, Mr. Ashwin Bhandari, Ms. Radhika Aggarwal, Mr. Nitin Kochhar
Product ivoomi Me1+
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Arvind Passey
08 May 2017
