Aanchal Arora | 1702Digital
Ms. Aanchal Arora is the Founder & Managing Director of 1702 Digital. She pursued her Bachelor’s in Law and graduated from University of Delhi.
As a Capital Market and Investment Banking lawyer, she has had an enviable number of eminent corporates listed on the stock exchanges. The Bombay Stock Exchange also elicitated her contribution as a distinguished visiting faculty in 2016.
A woman of many talents, Aanchal is a Gold Medalist in English Literature, an editor, a columnist, and even an ex journalist with Tehelka who went on to work in the field of
law. Three years ago, she sought a new challenge and shifted gears by founding 1702 Digital, a marketing agency that plugs in business acumen, hardcore ROI, and an analytics-driven approach to digita marketing.
Her go getter attitude has taken her from performance marketing to enabling one of the country’s largest campaigns and solutions in digitalization. Within a remarkably short span, Aanchal has guided the team of 1702 Digital to create spectacular work for giants like Adani Wilmar Limited, IDFC FirstBank, Edelweiss Tokio Life Insurance, Adlabs Imagica, Bajaj Finserv, Mastercard, Aakash Institute, Cipla, Airtel, Welingkar School of Insititute, Smaaash, and Marico among others.
In 2019, Aanchal was bestowed the “Exceptional Women of Excellence” award by the WEF for her growth hack leadership.
In terms of absolute revenues, her efforts have led to 1702 Digital be labeled as one of the top 10 Most Promising Mumbai Marketing Startups by Silicon India in 2019. She is fond of building businesses and has frequent presence on panels and forums on entrepreneurship. Her radical stands on capitalism, feminism, and famous aversion to the phrase “women empowerment” always makes her stand apart from her peers on these panels.
We want to maintain 1702 Digital as the fastest growing digital marketing agency in India and solve even more challenging business problems.
Tell us about 1702 Digital.
1702 Digital loves to solve business’ marketing-related problems by providing integrated marketing solutions.
What inspired you to start your 1702 Digital?
I knew that digital marketing agencies can provide a more personalized solution to business problems by adopting correct marketing techniques. This is what inspired me to start 1702 Digital.
What were the initial challenges faced by your business?
At the beginning, we faced the classic chicken-egg challenges of getting good clients and good bandwidth to service them. Both ends of the recruitment and sales funnel had to go hand in hand and that coupled with understanding the full-service operations of a sector were the challenges we faced in our early days.
To begin, how is your brand-defining “trust” in the market? What stands behind its uniqueness?
Clients usually do not know what is right for them, especially with the advent of newer technologies in the digital world every day. We take out the time and effort to educate them about the best possible solutions so they can achieve their unique goals.
What are the offerings (services/solutions)?
We have 3 major practice areas at 1702:
- Creative Design, Content, and Brand Strategy (to generate conversions and engagement for the brand)
- Performance Marketing & Analytics (for conversions and lead generation)
- SEO and UX (for Optimization and sustenance on search platforms and website wireframes)
In an age of mistrust, are you seeing an evolution in how consumers trust brands, or are they still for the most part doubtful?
The fact is that companies today have been really innovative in their product offerings and their advertising. So consumers wouldn’t mind moving from their age-old trusted brands towards more disruptive ones.
How did you make your mark in the industry and the heart of the customers?
In the past 3 years, we’ve helped brands with their marketing needs and got them excellent results. This helped us make a soft corner in our customers’ hearts.
What is a customer for you?
A customer is a business partner for us. We want to help them achieve their business goals with effective marketing strategies crafted especially for them.
How well are the clients connected with your brand?
We believe in building long-term relationships with our clients by having conversations with them via emails, giving them some specific and useful lead magnets, sharing our knowledge, or give them a discount offer for trusting in us. We exceed their expectations and acknowledge them as an individual. This helps us to convert our one-time clients to retainers.
What are the most effective marketing initiatives or programs you have used to promote your initiatives/offerings/services?
I have enjoyed contributing as an author for reputed companies like Your Story, Huffington Post, BW, and Women Economic Forum. This has helped us attract a number of quality CEOs and CMOs we want to partner with.
Any new categories or changes this year?
Instead of onboarding a lot of new clients, we put our growth strategy primarily behind embettering our delivery to existing clients, by developing vertical-specific expertise.
Have you measured how much trust consumers have in your brand?
At 1702 Digital, we always take constructive feedback from our clients in the form of quarterly NPS (Net Promoter Score) forms that we circulate to all.
What’s the first thing that enters a consumer’s mind when they see your brand?
They notice that 1702 Digital has a strong work culture. Other than this, they also notice our exponential growth, the premium clients we have onboard and our feeling of empathy for them.
What is the future plan connected with the brand?
We want to maintain 1702 Digital as the fastest growing digital marketing agency in India and solve even more challenging business problems.
How has been your journey as an entrepreneur?
Just like any other entrepreneur I have had my share of challenges in the past. Well, tough times build your character, don’t they?
What do you hope to accomplish within the next year from a personal as well as a professional point of view?
Personally, I have a goal to spread more awareness regarding great marketing tactics, and leadership. Professionally I want 1702 Digital to solve even more challenging problems.
A piece of advice for young entrepreneurs
My advice for young entrepreneurs is to stay focused on your goal and keep failing but learning fast.
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