NetGenie goes aggressive with demo zone

href="https://www.dqweek.com/dqw-exclusive-netgenie-goes-aggressive-with-awareness-programs">NetGenie

is

all set to go ahead with its B2C approach, with the opening of

experience or demo zones in top-A class cities. The company recently

opened its 81st experience zone in Gurgaon in association with Priya

Communication, a Gurgaon based IT retailer. Moreover, it will

complete the set target of 100 such demo zones by March 15, 2012.

Presently, NetGenie has 17 such stores across Haryana followed by

other cities like Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Pune and Bengaluru.

Speaking on

the opening of demo zone, Bishwajit Sutradhar, national sales

manager, Cyberoam NetGenie said, “Setting up of demo zones is a

part of our marketing investment to promote our products across all

IT retail stores, so that we can attract walk-ins for NetGenie home

routers. With this demo zone, we have now added 81 new retailers,

which will act as a separate entity for our revenue in addition to

our existing 700 master resellers.”

Without

revealing the numbers of NetGenie boxes being sold since its

September, 2011 launch, he said, “By March end, we will disclose

the sold units, as we are tapping the registered and unregistered

device customers count. Having said that, we are catching up with our

targets through our SIs and resellers. Hence, the thrust is to

redefine the experience of demo zones for our partners and customers

with education awareness campaign-'How internet is safe' in the

second phase. For that we are hiring external manpower, who will run

and manage these campaigns.”

According to

Rajan Saini, director, Priya Communication, "We are excited to

add NetGenie into our portfolio. We have been using this device

internally, and are getting benefited. Hence with this partnership,

our customers can buy a one stop internet solutions with features

like for 3G, anti-virus and content filtering, etc."

Although, on

one side the company is quite bullish on the uptake of NetGenie

device, on the other side, its master reseller wants that company

should look at its pricing. Rohit Gupta, a Harayna based master

reseller for NetGenie and Cyberoam, who deals in all brands of

routers commented, “NetGenie is a push device due to its pricing.

Today, a normal router is available at a price point of Rs

1,500-1,800. In contrast, NetGenie's SOHO version comes at Rs 10,000

and home version is available at Rs 8,000. Therefore, end customers

hesitate to buy an expensive router. We want vendor should correct

the pricing by decreasing it 5-10%.”

He also

added, “There is a misconception between normal router and a

NetGenie router amidst the customers. Hence as a partner, we have to

educate customers on its features, which are not available with the

competitors. Even the numbers are slowly picking up, we sell 30-50

units per month. But, the company is aggressively pushing this

product and we will see the numbers will grow in next 2 months.”