Canon outlines strategy to boost channel growth

Canon India Pvt Ltd has announced its new channel focused strategy in a bid to achieve its targeted revenue of Rs 700 crore by 2007. As part of the overall strategy, the company has realigned its channel strategy by creating five sales groups in its volume products group, focusing on IT channel, photo/consumer channel, audio visual channel, photo studio channel and professional camera channel.

According to Canon India director and GM Alok Bhardwaj, the sales teams would focus on these opportunity areas rather than looking at individual products. He added that this will also lead to expansion of the company's penetration in all channels and Canon would now be looking at growth opportunities not from product but from channel.

In the IT channel group, Canon has appointed Moin Mushtaque as the national sales manager who will head a team of seven regional business partners. Sales force of 26 people would in turn support these regional heads. The new focus of the group would be the IT corporate channel and the company is planning to appoint 50 Canon corporate partners by December 2004 to achieve this goal.

In the photo and consumer channel group the company is planning to appoint a national sales manager with a team comprising of five business manager and six sales staff. The focus of this group would be electronics, white goods shops, lifestyle malls and shopping malls. 

The audio visual group would be led by a sales and marketing head with a team of four regional heads and five sales staff. The photo studio group will also be led by a sales and marketing head with a team of three regional business heads. The focus area would be the photo studios and the group would not only sell solutions but also explore the consumables business opportunity. The sale of consumables is Rs 60,000 per studio per year. 

In the professional camera segment, the company will appoint one dedicated manager handling the sales of Canon EOS series of professional cameras. 

According to Bhardwaj, with this realignment, the total strength of the volume business will grow to 52 sales people from the current base of 36. With an expanded product marketing and marketing support base, the company is planning to achieve its marketing goal of surrounding the channel and the customers with Canon

CyberMedia News 

New Delhi