``Our budgets are increasing every month,'' says KLG Systel managing director Kumud Goyal, who claims that: ``Since the launch of our ad campaign on January 13, 2000, page views have shot to 70,000 a day up from 5,000 a day.''

Jaldi.com plans to spend over three-fourth of its A&P budget on advertising, which will be handled by Euro RSCG. The promotions will involve media-driven contests and tickets for film-shows on a regular basis.

Says Asutosh sharma, associate account director, Euro RSCG: ``The full page launch ads aimed to position Jaldi.com as a comprehensive site for information, comparison and quick purchase at a convenient pace; while the 200 cc brand ad reinforces these features and also conveys theextent of choices available at the Jaldi.com.''

The creative exercise will be designed to project Jaldi as an umbrella brand for things associated with jaldi-ness (fast, speed and swift). ``You want to do things with hyper speed and yet have quality time for something meaningful in life,'' says Goyal. Goyal added that just as Satyam Online stood for ``market capitalisation'', Jaldi.com will also connote `Jaldi' brand attributes.

Jaldi.com is also broadening its focus from the upper echelons of society to a large middle and lower middle class consumer base. ``Our ads are presently more upmarket with lovely models etc, but now we want to make it mass-centric,'' says Goyal.

Kiosks model
Jaldi.com's communication strategy will also be in sync with its strategy to set up cyber kiosks in order to make virtual shopping accessible to as many people as possible. With an investment of around Rs 50,000 on a kiosk, Jaldi.com will set up 300 such kiosks, (including 20 kiosks in each metro), at variouskinds of retail establishments across the country before April 2000.

Jaldi.com expects that the kiosk-driven model would bring mainstream buyers into the e-commerce fold, apart from upscale consumers who have easy access to Internet. Jaldi.com has already set up 10 kiosks in upmarket as well as mass-market locales in Delhi and in the next two weeks five will be operational in Mumbai.

While in the US, the business-to-consumer (B2C) models focus on dis-intermediation, Jaldi's business model is built on franchisee development: here, the shop-owner interfaces with e-shoppers. Says Goyal, ``We have undertaken an extensive exercise to train manpower and convince franchisee retailers about the promise of our kiosk model.''

Goyal claims that in this model the franchisee is viable from day one, as machine and manpower are provided by Jaldi.com. Other incentives: the shop owner makes money by selling e-mail services; gets on to the e-commerce bandwagon; and also secures commission on every transaction through hisshop. Jaldi claims that another unique feature of its model is that it will not charge any commission on sales from the brands that it showcases.

Though initially business is coming from toys, gifts, durables and semi-durables, Jaldi expects newer categories like FMCG to drive volumes. Between August 1999 and mid-January, 2000, Jaldi claims to recorded transactions of Rs 15 lakh.

Linking up
Jaldi has recently tied up with Indica Research to mine its consumer databank. Using a specialised software to track a consumer's buying pattern, Jaldi will generate consumer behaviour analysis reports which could be sold to marketers. Jaldi has also tied up with ICICI, Pai Group and Saturn to offer online consumer loans.

According to Jaldi.com, the banks will adhere to well-set parameters-for example, having two kids gets 3 points, a government job 5 and a credit card 10 points in terms of the credit-worthiness of the consumer-to facilitate speedy credit clearance. To make the transaction through creditcards secure, Jaldi has also signed an MoU with ICICI for on-line transactions.

Finally, Jaldi.com has tied up with Gati courier service to guarantee a home delivery within 6 to 48 hours in 300 cities.