In conversation with
Mr Kulbhushan Seth
Vice President – Casio India
As a company , what did you do to engage with your customers through the lockdown ?
At Casio India , we have always strived with our best foot forward to deal with this unprecedented problem . Since the lockdown meant that no academic or music schools are operational , we felt the need to give everyone an opportunity to learn from home . Fortunately , we have a series of Keyboards called Casiotone , which when paired with our app Chordana Play has played an exceptional role in helping people learn music from Home . We also know that technology can ’ t replace a good teacher , therefore we put efforts in making a series of videos for young kids along with anyone else interested in learning music at home by just following the tutorial videos . We often held webinars to interact with our audience and pass on tips for efficient learning at home during these times .
Tell us about any new product launches during this year
The pandemic has not been able to stop Casio to help aspiring musicians . Due to limited avenues of teaching & learning keyboards , we launched a Casiotone model called LK-S250 with lighting keys . This keyboard builds upon the existing Casiotone series and does much more in terms of providing a more efficient way of learning . As the keyboard ’ s keys themselves light up guiding the learner to press the next note , it makes hand-eye coordination much easier thereby making learning any song much faster .
Challenges you faced in terms of educating / reaching your customers
There ’ s no doubt that this year has been the most challenging since decades , but where there ’ s a will , there ’ s a way . Reaching out to customers the way we used to couldn ’ t have been done now . Any Musical Instrument buyer believes in experiencing the sound of the products themselves before purchasing one , hence we had to work a lot on developing such content which helped our consumers make this decision digitally .
How do you think the industry can recover from the pandemic hit ?
At Casio we really feel for the artists , musicians & teachers who ’ s businesses have been hit pretty hard . However , humans are also the fastest to adapt . We really appreciate all music teachers who have moved their classes online or who are doing online concerts . They have also been able to reach out to a wider audience as compared to being restricted to offline methods . We feel that as soon as the vaccine is developed , things would start moving back to usual .
In terms of revenue , what percentage was impacted when compared to last year vs this year ?
We have tried to look at this pandemic situation with an optimistic vision . Fortunately , the lockdown didn ’ t hit us as hard compared to other products & nonessentials . As people finally have more time being at home , we have seen a rise in the number of people taking keyboard / music learning as a hobby . We hope this trend will continue as people get to further share their joy of learning music .
How did you leverage digital media to your advantage during the lockdown ?
Digital Media has been a boon in these trying times . We were striving to reach out to our customers and interact with them . Digital Media has helped us do that as we have made Video tutorials for learning keyboards for all ages along with conducting a series of informational Webinars .
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