Chapter-I: INTRODUCTION

Company profile Marketing deals with identifying and meeting human and social needs. One of the shortest definitions of Marketing is Meeting needs profitably. When eBay recognized that people were unable to locate some of the items they desired most and created an online auction clearing house as when IDEA noticed that people wanted good furniture of a substantially lower price and created knock-down furniture. Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relations in ways that benefit the organization and its stoke holders. Four Basic Features of Modern Marketing Modern marketing is consumer oriented. Modern marketing starts and ends with the consumer. Modern marketing precedes and succeeds production. Modem marketing is the guiding element of business. Importance of marketing: A high level of marketing activity is a prerequisite for a high level economic activity. It has been aptly remarked. "Nothing happens until somebody sells something. At present the urgency is for increased marketing and not merely for increase in production. This

alone shows the importance of marketing as a potential force that commands high significance for society as a whole. What Is a Brand? Perhaps the most distinctive skill of professional marketers is their ability to create, maintain, protect and enhance brands. Marketers say that "branding is the art and cornerstone of marketing. The American Marketing Association defines a brand as follows: A brand is a name, term, sign, symbol, or design, or a combination of them, intended to identify the goods or services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competitors. In essence, a brand identifies the seller or maker. It can be a name, trademark, logo, or other symbol. Under trademark law, the seller is granted exclusive rights to the use of the brand name in perpetuinity. Brands differ from other assets such as patents and copyrights, which have expiration dates. A brand is essentially seller's promise to deliver a specific set of features, benefits, and services consistently to the buyers. The brands convey a warranty of quality. But a brand is an even more complex symbol. It can convey up to six levels of meaning: 1. Attributes: A brand brings to mind certain attributes. Mercedes suggests expensive, well-built, well-engineered, durable, high-prestige automobiles.

2. Benefits: Attributes must be translated into functional and emotional benefits. The attribute "durable" could translate into functional benefit "I won't have to buy another

car for several years". The attribute "expensive" translates into the emotional benefit the car makes me feel important and admires.' 3. Values: The brand also says something about the producer's values Mercedes stands for high performance, safety and prestige. 4. Culture: German The brand may represent a certain culture. The Mercedes represents

culture: organized, efficient, high quality.

5. Personality: The brand can project a certain personality. Mercedes may suggest a nononsense boss (person), a reigning lion (animal), or an austere place (object). 6. User: The brand suggests the kind of consumer who buys or uses the product. We would expect to see a 55-year-old top executive behind the wheel of a Mercedes, not a 20-year-old secretary. BRAND AWARENESS Brand, the hip, catches all word of the New Economy. It suggested all a company needed succeed was awareness. Image, as they say, was everything. Pat Harpell saw it up close as the CEO of Harpell Inc., an integrated marketing firm in Maynard, Massachusetts. Over the past few years, many entrepreneurs have called on her to create branding programs, and she could see that old-fashioned branding strategies had gone astray. Thats not a branding program; that's a logo." she says. "Basic business principles fell apart."' Branding turned into a game of being seen for the sake of being seen, without giving consumers a reason to buy.

"Branding is about more than the sock puppet. It's about the total customer experience," says Kelly Dixon, co-author of the study and director of e-branding at Accenture in Chicago. "Companies haven't focused on the entire package." Brand Awareness: In developing brand, it is important to design communication messages that reflect the brand's unique value for specific audiences. Med stat helps healthcare providers strengthen their brand awareness efforts with those customers likely to use their service as well as determine the most effective media for communicating their brand value to the target audience based on lifestyle and media preference. DEFINITION:
u

The act of creating public awareness of a specific brand in order to maximize its

recognition, successful brand awareness strategies should define a company's uniqueness and set it apart from competitors". Quite simply, if potential customers do not know about a company, they will not purchase from it. Therefore, one of the preeminent goals of any business should be to build brand awareness, albeit, in cost-effective manner as possible. Consumers tend to make purchasing decisions based on peer recommendations and direct experience, as well as traditional advertising methods. This is why it is necessary to build brand awareness strategies out by instilling trust among consumers. Thus trust must be achieved through credibility, rather than just a catchy advertising campaign. Promotional marketing involving a one-to-one component is proving increasingly effective at building trust and acquiring new customers. Online brand awareness strategies are used frequently, albeit with differing levels of success. These online brand awareness strategies can include the use of advertising 4

including banners, sponsorships, and email/newsletter advertising, online PR, affiliate marketing, etc. WIRELESS MEDIA Cellular Telephony:The technology that gives a person the power to communicate anytime anywhere has spawned an entire industry in mobile telecommunications. Mobile telephones have become a business/economy, The most prevalent wireless standard in the world today is GSM. The GSM association (Global System for Mobile Communication) was instituted in 1987 to promote and expedite the adoption, development, deployment and evolution of the GSM standards for digital wireless communications. The GSM association was formed as a result of a European community agreement on the need to adopt common standards suitable for cross border European mobile communications. Starting of primarily as a European standard, the group special mobile as it was then called, soon came to represent the global system for mobile communication as it achieved the status of a world wide standard. GRM is today, the worlds leading digital standard accounting for 68.5% of the global digital wireless market. The Indian government when considering the introduction of cellular services into the country, made a landmark decision to introduce the GSM standard, leap fogging obsolescent technologies/standards. Although cellular licenses were made technology neutral in September 1999, all the private operators are presently offering only GSM based mobile services. The new licenses for the 4' 1 cellular licenses that were awarded in July mobile services. CELLULAR WORLD 2001 too, have opted for GSM technology to offer their

Cellular telephones have revolutionized the communications arena, redefining how we perceive voice communications. Traditionally cellular phones remained out of hands of most consumers due to their high cost. As a result, cell phone carriers have invested time and resources into finding ways to give the systems higher capacity and thus lower cost. Cell systems are benefiting from this research and starting to develop into large-scale consumer products. Today, cellular phones are truly consumer electronics devices with over 75 million subscribers. Since cell phones have ceased to be an exclusive status symbol of high-powered lawyers and are now in the hands of million of consumers. They are now incredibly cost sensitive. Specifically it is not the cost of the device that counts, but the cost of using the device. Today, more than ever, cellular companies are looking for ways to bring down the call cost to attain even higher market penetration, especially in metropolitan areas. CELL PHONES An Overview It is common knowledge that cellular phone? (Referred to as "cell'' phones from here on) are wireless phones; however, many of us have confusion about how a cell phone works. Essentially, cell phones use high-frequency radio signals to communicate with "cell towers" located throughout the calling area. Cell phones communicate in the frequency range of 806-890 MHz and 1850-1990 MHz for the newly allocated "PCS" frequency range. When the user wants to make a call, the cell Phone sends a message to the tower, asking to be connected to a given telephone number.

 If to the tower has sufficient resources to grant the request, a device called a "switch" patches the cell phone's signal throughout to a channel on (he "Public Switched Telephone Network"(other\vise known as P S T N). This call now takes a wireless channel as well as PSTN channel that will be held open until the call is completed. This channel cannot be used for anyone else's call until the cell phone call is discontinued. The above simple description of how ceil phones work, we will add technical details about various facets of cell phone systems throughout the remainder of this section. CELLULAR PHONES As the name implies, cell phone systems are made up of many small "cells". Each cell in a cell phone system represents the area served by one cell phone tower, The concept of cells is key behind the success of cell phones because by spacing many cells fairly close to each other, the cell phones may broadcast at very low power levels (typically 200m\V 1W, depending on system). Since the cell phones may broadcast at low power levels, they use small transmitters and small batteries, and thus are able to tit in a shirt pocket, unlike amateur radios can occupy a tabletop. Cells are typically spaced around 1-2 miles apart but can be spaced up to 20 miles apart in rural areas. In loaded areas with many obstacles (such as tall buildings), the cell sites may be spaced closer together, some technologies, like PCS, require closer cell spacing due to their higher frequency and lower power operation. Additionally, buildings interfere with cell signals coming from outside so many buildings have their own "micro cell1'. The Kingdome and New York subway are two examples of where micro cells are used. Micro cells may also be used to increase overall capacity within a heavily

populated area such as city's core downtown area. In fact, homes may have "Pico cells'' connected to the home's PSTN connection to allow the eel] phone to be used as a cordless phone. FDMA FDMA stands for "frequency division multiple access 1' and though it could be used for digital systems, is exclusively used on all analog cellular systems. Essentially, FDMA splits the allocated spectrum, in many channels. In current analog cell systems, each channel is 30 KHz. When a FDMA cell phone establishes a call, it reserves the frequency channel for the entire duration of the call.The voice data is modulated into this channel frequency band (using frequency modulation) and sent over the airwaves. At the receiver, the information is recovered using a Band Pass Piker. The phone uses a common digital control channel to acquire channels. FDMA systems arc least efficient cellular system since each wasted analog channel can only used by one user at a time, not only are those channels larger than necessary given modern digital voice compression, but they are also whenever there is silence during the cell phone conversation. Analog signals are also especially susceptible to noise and there is no way to filter it out. Given the nature of the signal, analog cell phones must use higher po\ver(between 0 and 3 watts) to get acceptable call quality. Given these shortcomings , it is easy to see why FDMA is being replaced by newer digital techniques. TDMA TDMA stands for "time division multiple access". TDMA builds on FDMA by dividing conversations by frequency and time. Since Digital compression allows voice to be sent at well under 10 kilobits per second(equivalent to 10 KHz). TDMA fits three digital conversations into FDMA channel(which is 30 KHz) by sampling a persons voice for say

30 million seconds, then transmitting it in 10 milliseconds; the system is able to offer 3 timeslots per channel in a round-robin fashion. This technique allows compatibility with FDMA while enabling digital services and easily boosting system capacity by three times. While TDMA is good digital system, it is still somewhat inefficient since it has no flexibility for varying digital rates( high quality voice, low quality voice, pager traffic) and has no accommodations for silence in a telephone conversation. In other words , once a call is initiated, the channel/timeslot pair belongs to the phone tor the duration of the call. TDMA also requires strict signaling and timeslot by synchronization. A digital control channel provides synchronization functionally as well as adding voice mail and message notification. Due to the digital signal , TDMA phones need only broadcast at 600 milliwatts. CDMA CDMA stands for "Coded Division Multiplexed Access11 and is both the most interesting and the harden ro implement multiplexing method. CDMA has been likened to a party; when everyone talks at once, no one can understand, however, if everyone speaks a different language, then they can be understood. A CDMA system hay no channels, but instead encodes each call as a coded sequence across the entire frequency spectrum. Each conversation is modulated, in the digital domain, with a unique code(called a pseudonoise code) that makes it distinguishable from the other calls in the frequency spectrum. Using a correlation calculation and the code the call was encoded with, the digital audio signal can be extracted from the other signals being broadcast by other phones on the network. From the perspective of one call, upon extracting the signal, everything else appears to be low-level noise. As long as there is sufficient separation between the codes (said to be mutually orthogonal), the noise level will be low enough to recover the digital

signal. Each signal is not, in fact, spreads across the whole spectrum (12.5MHz for traditional cellular or 60MHz in PCS cellular), but is spread across 1.25MHz "passbands." GSM: GSM stands for "Global System for Mobile Communication." GSM is mostly a European system and \is largely unused in the US. GSM is interesting in that is uses a modified -and far more efficient version of TDMA. GSM keeps the idea of timeslots and frequency channels, but corrects several major shortcomings. Since the GSM timeslots are smaller than TDMA, they hold less date but allow for data rates starting at 300 bits per second. Thus, a call can use many timeslots as necessary up to a limit of 13 kilobits per second. When a call is inactive (silence) or may be compressed more, fewer timeslots are used. To facilitate filling in gaps left by unused timeslots, calls do "frequency hopping" in GSM. This means that calls will jump between channels is used to communicate the frequency hopping and other information between the cell tower and the phone. To compare with the other systems, is should be noted that GSM requires 1 Watt of output power from the phone. ii) OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY The study was conducted to know the brand awareness regarding Airtel cellular

providers from the customers of different cellular service providers. He study totally revolves around the opinions and feed back from the users. An opinion survey with the help of questionnaire was conducted to know the users' view on the services provided by Airtel with special emphasis on the other cellular users.The study was also done to estimate the performance of the Airtel mobiles with the other cellular service providers, and to whether the customers know about different services provided by the Airtel mobiles.Understanding the level of customer satisfaction with : 10

Reference to Airtel Coverage Call centers Billing

1. To understand the concept of Brand Awareness of Airtel Cellular. 2. To find the awareness strategies of the Airtel brand. 3. To know how many cellular users know about the services provided by Airtel. 4. To find out the reasons for the retention of the Airtel customers. 5. To collect the suggestions and complaints of customers of other cellular service providers. 6. To know the customer preferences. 7. To understand the problems of mobile customers. 8. To study the basic need of the customer for switching from one Cell Company to another. 9. To compare the service of Airtel with that of the other market players.

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iii) RESEARCH METHODOLOGY METHODOLOGY This study is done using the following primary and secondary data: Primary Data: The primary data was collected by a market survey in Visakhapatnam. Questionnaire was prepared and administrated by taking a sample of 100 consumers, which contains different categories of consumers like students, businessmen and employees. Secondary Data: The secondary data comprises of various Books, Journals, Periodicals and other published magazines are included in the study. Data was also collected from the company's records and from the websites "www.Airtel.co.in"'. Sampling Deliberate sampling: Deliberate sampling is known as purposive or non-probability sampling. This sampling method involves purposive or deliberate selection of particular units of the universe for constituting a sample, which represents a universe. When population elements are selected for inclusion in the sample on the basis of access it can be called convenience sample. Simple random sampling: This type of sampling also known as chance sampling or probability sampling. Where each and every item in population has an equal chance of inclusion in this sample and

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each one of the possible sample, in case of finite universe, has the sample probability of being selected. Systematic sampling: In some instances the most practical way of sampling is to select every 15 th name of list, every 10th house on one side of house of street and so on. Sampling of this type is known as systematic sampling. Stratified sampling: If the population from which a sample is to be drawn does not constitute a homogeneous group than a stratified sampling techniques applied so as to obtain representative sample. Quota sampling: In stratified sampling the cost of talking random samples from individual strata is often so expensive that interviewers are simply given quota to be filled from different strata, the actual selection of items for sample being left to the interviewers judgment. Cluster and area wise sampling: Cluster sampling involves grouping the population and then selecting the groups or the clusters rather than individual elements inclusion in the sample. Multi-stage sampling: This is the further development of the idea of cluster sampling. This technique is meant for big enquires extending today considerably large geographical area like entire country. Sequential sampling:

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This is somewhat a complex sample design where the ultimate size of the sample is not fixed in advance but it is determined accordingly to the mathematical decisions on the basis of information yielded as study progress. A) THEORITICAL DESCRIPTION What Is Brand Equity? The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a name, term, sign, symbol, or design, or a combination of them, intended to identify the goods or services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competitors. A brand is thus product or service that adds dimensions that differentiate may be functional, rational or tangible related to product performance of the brand. They may also be more symbolic, emotional or intangible related to what the brand represents.

Branding has been around for centuries as a means to distinguish the goods of one producer from those of another.
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The earliest signs of branding in Europe were the

medieval guilds requirement that craftspeople put trademarks on their products to protect them-selves and consumers against inferior quality. In the fine arts, branding began with artists signing their works. Brands today play a number of important roles that improve consumers lives and enhance the financial value of firms. The Role of Brands Brands identify the source or maker of a product and allow consumers either individuals or organizations to assign responsibility to a particular manufacturer or distributor. Consumers may evaluate the identical product differently depending on how it is branded. Consumers learn about brands through past experiences with the product and its marketing program. They find out which brands satisfy their needs and which 14

ones do not. As consumers lives become more complicated, rushed, and time-starved, the ability of a brand to simplify decision-making and reduce risk is invaluable.3 Brands also perform valuable functions for firms. First, they simplify product handling or tracing Brands help to organize inventory and accounting records. A brand also offers the firm legal protection for unique features or aspects of the product. The brand name can be protected through registered trademarks; manufacturing processes can be protected through parents; and packaging can be protected through copyrights and designs. These intellectual property rights ensure that the firm can safely invest in the brand and reap the benefits of a valuable asset.

II) Chapter-2: Data Reduction & Presentation

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2.1. Kind of Service

90

90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Male Female 10

Figure-1:- showing number of respondents using the kind of service. Kind of Service Prepaid Postpaid Number of Respondents 70 30

Table 1:- Showing number of respondents using the kind of service.

2.2. Occupations of the Respondents Occupation Number of Respondents

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Public Sector Employee Private Sector Employee Business Men Students Others

5 30 20 40 5

Table-2:- showing occupations of the respondents.

40 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 Public Sector Private Sector Business Men Employee Employee Students Others 5 30

20

Figure 2:- showing occupations of the respondents.

2.3. Factors Considered while taking cell connection Factors Considered Number of Respondents 17

Brand Image Services Call charges Availability All the above

05 25 30 10 30

Table 3: showing factors to be considered while purchasing.

30 30 25 25 30

20

15 10 10 5 5

0 Brand Image Services Call charges Availability All the above

Figure 3: showing factors to be considered while purchasing. 2.4. Services Provided by the Current Service Provider Rate of Satisfaction Excellent Good Satisfied Not Satisfied Number of Respondents 11 20 44 25

Table 4: Showing the service satisfaction for the customers.

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44 45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 Excellent Good Satisfied Not Satisfied 11 20 25

Figure 4: Showing the service satisfaction for the customers. 2.5. Are you aware of Airtel Services Awareness Airtel Yes No about Number of Respondents 60 40 Table 5: Showing the awareness about airtel services.
60

60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Yes No 40

Figure 5: Showing the awareness about airtel services.

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2.6. Have you used Airtel Connection Before Usage of Airtel Yes No Number of Respondents 28 72

Table 7: Showing number of respondents who has used airtel connection before.

72 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Yes No 28

Figure 6: Showing number of respondents who has used airtel connection before. 2.7. Interested in using Airtel In future Usage of Product Yes No Number of Respondents 64 36

Table 9: Showing the interested user of airtel in future.

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64 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Yes No 36

Figure 7: Showing the interested user of airtel in future. 2.8. Rating for the Customer Care: Customer Care Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied Number of Respondents 10 35 10 5

Table-8:- showing number of respondents with satisfies customers.

35 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied

10

10 5

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Figure 8:-showing number of respondents with satisfies customers. 2.9. Rating for the Call Charges: Call Charges Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied Number of Respondents 1 24 30 5

Table 9:- showing rating for the call charges.

30 30 24 25

20

15

10 5 5 1

0 Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied

Figure 9:- showing rating for the call charges. 2.10. Rating for the value added services in Airtel: Value added services Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied Number of Respondents 4 30 16 10

Table10: Showing the rating for the value added services.

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30 30

25

20

16

15 10 10 4 5

0 Excellent Good Satisfied Un Satisfied

Figure 10: Showing the rating for the value added service.

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Chapter-III : Data interpretation

ANALYSIS OF BRAND AWARENESS OF AIRTEL SERVICES TO THE CUSTOMERS OF OTHER SERVICE PROVIDERS
Number of samples collected: 100: Out of the samples chosen, maximum respondents were male and minimum respondents were female. All the respondents were in the age group of 20-55 years.

Sex Male Female

Number of Respondents 90 10

From the tale it is incident that the number of male respondents who are considered for the survey are 90%. It is incident that 10% of the respondents were female.

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3.1.Kind of Service Out of the 100 samples chosen, maximum people were using the Prepaid Service. Out of the chosen samples the minimum number of respondents are using the postpaid services. 70% of respondents have chosen prepaid service since they want to be economical and can have an idea on the amount being spent. 30% of the respondents have chosen postpaid service since they had confidence of controlling their bill amount. And of them used Postpaid because their respective offices mostly provides them. 3.2. Occupations of the Respondents Maximum number of respondents were students. They were mostly satisfied by the services offered by Airtel to its customers, mainly its SMS and its value added services. From the table, the survey regarding the occupations of the employees it is incident that: a) 5% of the total Airtel customers belongs to Public Sector. b) 30% of the customers belongs to the Private Sector. c) 20% of the customers are Business Men. d) 40% of the customers belongs to Student Community.

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e) 5% of the customers are comprised with the other type of category. According to the survey the student community comprises other maximum customer proportion i.e., 40%. 3.3. Factors Considered while taking cell connection Out of 100 respondents, maximum respondents will look in for the services and the call charges the service provider is providing to them. Some of the respondents looked in for all the factors like Brand image, services, call charges and availability. Only very few respondents looked in for the availability and the Brand Image individually. From the table the following factors are observed regarding the Factors that are considered while taking a cellular connection. i. 5% of the respondents will consider Brand Image as the main criterion while taking a cellular connection. ii. 25% of the respondents will consider Services Provided by the service provider. iii. 30% of the respondents considers Call Charges as the main criterion while taking a cellular connection. iv. 105 of the respondents considers the Availability factor as the main criterion while taking a cellular connection.

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v.

And finally 30% of the respondents considers all the above stated factors while taking the cellular connection.

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3.4. Are you aware of Airtel Services Many of the customers are aware of the Airtel Services and offers. These

respondents know about Airtel through various means and mainly through friends. Very few of the respondents do not know about the Airtel services and offers. From the survey it is incident that only 60% of the total respondents are aware of the Airtel product and its services. 40% of the respondents are not aware of the Airtel product and the services being provided them. 3.5. Have you used Airtel Connection Before Many of the respondents said that they havent used the Airtel connection before. And only few of them have used Airtel before and have shifted from Airtel to other service provider. From the survey it is incident that only 28% of the total respondents have used Airtel connection in the past. 72% of the respondents have not used the Airtel connection before 3.6. Interested in using Airtel In future Many of the respondents want to use Airtel in the future if any customer related benefits are provided.

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 They also said that if the call charges have been reduced they will be definitely using Airtel. The Post-Paid customers who have shifted from Airtel said that it is the wrong billing in Airtel which made them toshift from Airtel. Some of them dont want to shift from their current cell service provider. From the survey conducted regarding the usage of the Airtel cellular in the future the respondents have responded in the following way: a) 64% of the total respondents have said that they are interested in using Airtel in the future. b) 36% of the total respondents have said that they are not interested in using Airtel connection in the future. 3.7. Rating about the services provided by Airtel

Out of 100 respondents only 60 respondents know about the Airtel services an offers. Many of the customers have accepted that the services provided by Airtel are excellent regarding the Network coverage and signal quality.

Some of them have stated that the customer care and the call charges are satisfied and.

They have stated that the value added services provided by Airtel are good. On an average the customers rating for the services provided by Airtel are good when compared other cell service providers.

3.8. Rating for Network coverage: 30

From the above table the following interpretation is made regarding the network coverage of Airtel.

Out of the 60 respondents who are aware of Airtel product 40 respondents have said that the network coverage of Airtel is Excellent.

15 respondents of the total respondents have stated that the network coverage of Airtel is Good.

05 of the respondents have stated that the network coverage is Satisfactory. There were no Unsatisfied customers regarding the Airtel network coverage.

3.9. Rating for the Customer Care: Out of the 60 respondents many of the respondents have said that the customer regarding Airtel is not so good as other cell service providers do. From the above table the following interpretation is made regarding the Customer Care of Airtel: a. 10 respondents out of 60 respondents have stated that the customer care regarding Airtel is Excellent. b. 35 respondents have stated that the customer care regarding customer care is Good. c. 10 respondents have stated that the customer care is Satisfied. d. 5 respondents have stated that the customer care of Airtelis unsatisfied. 3.10. Rating for the Call Charges:

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Out of the 60 respondents many of them have said that the call charges in Airtel are somewhat high when compared to the other cell service providers. Only one responded that the call charges are excellent in Airtel. From the survey regarding the rating of the customers towards the call charges the following points are noted:

Only one respondent have stated that the call Excellent.

charges of Airtel have been

24 respondents of the 60 respondents have stated that the call charges of Airtel are Good.

30 respondents have stated that the call charges of Airtel are Satisfied. And 5 respondents have stated that the call charges of Airtel are Unsatisfied.

3.11. Rating for the value added services in Airtel: Out of the 60 respondents many of the respondents have said that the value added services provided in Airtel are good but the SMS offers are satisfactory when compared to the other cell service providers. From the above table the survey revealed the following factors regarding the Value Added Services provided by Airtel. a. 4 respondents of 60 respondents who are aware of Airtel have stated that the value added services provided by Airtel are Excellent. b. 30 of the respondents have stated that the value added services of Airtel are Good.

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c. 16 respondents have stated that the value added services are satisfied. d. And 10 respondents have stated that the value added services of Airtel are Un satisfied.

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Chapter-IV: Summary & Conclusions

4.1 SUMMARY

Total number of samples collected are 100. Out of the 100 samples chosen, maximum number of respondents were male (90) and minimum respondents were female (10).

Out of the 100 samples chosen, maximum people were using Pre~ Paid service and minimum number of people were using the Post-Paid service.

Out of the 100 respondents 70% were using Pre-Paid Service and 30% of them were using the Post-Paid service.

Out of the 100 respondents 5 are public Sector Employees, 30 are Private Sector Employees, 20 respondents are Businessmen. 40 respondents are students and 5 respondents are others like un employees, Auto drivers.

Out of the 100 respondents, 30 respondents considers the Brand image, services, call charges, availability while choosing a cell connection. 30 respondents consider only call charges, 25 respondents consider only the services, ID respondents considers the availability of the services and only 5 respondents considered the Brand image of the cell service provider.

Out of the 100 respondents, 44 are satisfied with their current cell service provider. 25 respondents are not satisfied with their current service provider. 20 respondents have said that the services of the current service provider are good. Only 11 respondents have responded that the services provided by their current cell service provider are excellent.

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Out of the 100 respondents, 40 of them have said that they are aware of various cell service providers through friends. 36 respondents are aware of the services through the advertisements. 20 of the respondents are aware through the newspapers. Only 4 respondents are aware through hoardings.

Out of the 100 respondents, 60% of the respondents are aware of the Airtel services, only 40% of the respondents are not aware of the Airtel services.

Out of the 100 respondents only 28 respondents have used Airtel before, and 12 of the respondents have not used Airtel connection before.

Out of the 28 respondents who used Airtel have shifted. 15 respondents have shifted due to the high call charges. 10 of them wanted to shift in order that they want to try a new operator. 3 of them have shifted due to other reasons.

Out of the 100 respondents 64 of them are interested in using Airtel in the future, 36 respondents are not interested in using Airtel in the future.

Out of the 60 respondents who are aware of the Airtel services, 40 people have stated that the network coverage is excellent, 15 of them have said that the coverage is good, 5 of them have said that the network coverage is satisfied.

Out of 60 respondents who are aware of the Airtel services, 10 of them have said that the customer care in Airtel is excellent, 35 of them have said that the customer care is good,. 10 were satisfied and 5 of them were dissatisfied with the customer care in Airtel.

Out of the 60 respondents who are aware of Airtel, only one have said that the call charges in Airtel are excellent, 24 of them have said that they are good, 30 of them were satisfied and 5 of them were dissatisfied with the call charges in Airtel.

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Out of the 100 respondents 54% have given first place for Airtel, 30% for Hutch, 8% (or Idea, 5% for BSNL, 3% for reliance and none of them gave first place for Tata indicom.

4.2 FINDINGS

Many of the respondents who are using cell phones of various service providers other than Airtel arc aware of Airtel Brand; it's features and the various other services of Airtel.

Some of the respondents who are dissatisfied with their current cell service provider wanted to shift to Airtel if they provide low call charges and better customer care.

Some of the Hutch Post-Paid customers have complained about the wrong billing which is less in Airtel when compared to the other service providers.

Airtel brand has attained a good awareness mainly due to its advertisements, which clearly explains about the offers they are providing.

In many rural areas also Airtel has its network coverage and due to this aspect it gained lot of importance as well.

It is also found that the areas of Rishikonda and Seethamadhara have less coverage. The company has many parts in the same city or in the same region having low frequency of signals due to which the customer are facing problem.

4.3 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY The sample size was comparatively very small compared to the population and there are chances that it may not represent the whole population.

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 The time and cost factors affected the size of the sample. A few of the questions asked were ranking based and hence there was every possibility of biased user opinion. There were only three open ended questions, which were comparatively low when compared to the number of the number of closed ended questions in the questionnaire keeping in the respondent's precious time. Most of the samples were collected during the office time. So there is a chance of receiving some wrong responses due workload from the respondents. Many of the respondents gave oral complaints, but hesitated to write those complaints in the complaints column.

4.4 SUGGESTIONS

From the Survey reports the suggestions that can be made are: Awareness programs: Still more awareness programs have to be implemented in order to attract more customers like: -

1. Increase advertisement campaigns. 2. Increase Electronic media usage for the awareness programs. 3. Establishment of Hoardings in rural areas also. 4. Bringing awareness through issue of pamphlets in the newspapers. Consumer Retention: Airtel has to implement some more retention programs like: -

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1. Extra talktimes should be given to the potential customers who are there for more than 2 years in the subscriptions.

2. Some festival offers should be given in order to retain the customers. 3. If more messages and extra talk time benefits are given then it can help for the retain for the potential customers.

Airtel has to increase the customer care centers in order to concentrate more on the customers queries and their problems.

The reduction in the call charges can still attract more number of customers who are willing to shift to Airtel from other service providers

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BIBLIOGRAPHY
1) MARKETING MANAGEMENT - by Philip Kotler 2) RESEARCH METHODOLOGY - by C.R. Kothari 3) STATISTICS FOR MANAGEMENT - by G.C Beri 4) LESSONS ON SERVICES MARKETING - by Ram mohan rao 5) GLOBAL MARKETING MANAGEMENT - by Keesan warren J Web Sites: http://www.Airtel.co.in http://www.Baniboovvcb.com http://www.netmba.com http://www.coai.com

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QUESTIONNAIRE
Name Age Address : : : Sex: Male/Female

Occupation: a) Public Sector Employee c) Business e) Others (please specify) Mobile No._______________________

b) Private Sector Employee d) Student

1) Which ceil service are you using currently a)Airtel b) Hutch c)idea d) BSNL e) Reliance f) Tata Indicom 3) What factors do you consider while taking a cell connection ? a) Brand image b) Services c) Call Charges d)Availability e) All the above 4) How are the services provided by your current cell service provider a) Excellent b) Good c) Satisfied d) Not Satisfied 6) Are you aware of Airtel services and offers. a) Yes b)No 7) Have you used Airtel connection before a) Yes b)No 8) If yes which type of Airtel connection have you used before ? a) Pre-paid b) Post-paid 10) Are you interested in using Airtel in future ? a) Yes b)No
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12) How do you rank different cell service providers? Airtel ( ) Hutch ( ) Idea ( ) BSNL ( ) Reliance ( ) Tata indicom ( ) 13) Complaints if any: . . 14) Suggestions: . .

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