What is a leaf flying in the breeze, drying out at the edges, likely to teach anything to anyone? The answer is many things to even an MBA graduate. Traffic signals and the urchins that populate them have always been the subject of erudite discussions and works of art – a majority of them treated with a patina of woefulness and pity. But the truth is, it is an industrious world out there, working on their own crude marketing principles, drawing lessons from each customer interaction leading up to more revenue generation and diversification that is capable of putting the biggest corporate think tanks to shame. It is fascinating just to see these intuitive marketers put their skills to test. A red light that may be irritating to you, is a source of livelihood for them. Do not underestimate them. They have more to teach than one can ever imagine.Fourteen-year-old Mahesh, dressed in a smart tee and three-fourths, recalls that day when he managed to sell all the 22 magazines to a single customer. That was when he realised that timing in sales is more important than the 150seconds he was taught to optimise on, before the signal turns green. He advises sagely, “Ek to badi gaadi wala ho toh achcha hai. Madam ho toh aur bhi achcha - phir mera selection ussey pasand aaya – us din subah mainey fashion wali, ghar sajane wali or shaadi ki sari wohi magazines ki khareedi ki – business wali nahin lee…Sunday ka din tha…us din mereko Rs 3,500 ek jhatke mein mil gaye. Madam ke kuch tourist log aa rahe the – unke liye usne saari magazine le liye.” Mahesh now sells more light reads like fashion, home interiors, colouring books, optical illusion books etc. He guns after tourist cars coming out of the airport and focuses on those who have foreigners in them – especially women and kids. He earns far more than what he used to when he was selling umbrellas and tissue boxes. In effect, what Mahesh taught me was a very basic marketing lesson - learn to recognise who your real customer is, what she really wants and what problem of hers are you addressing effectively. A lesson which most start-ups these days are happy not to acknowledge. These suits-turned-entrepreneurs begin with an idea they are in love with without adequate understanding of what the real problem is that they are addressing and for which aggrieved customer.Or look at how the unassuming 11-year-old Deepa thinks -  she revels in wearing shorts, especially in summers, and knows that a few years later she may have to dress up in salwaar kurta. Right now she is happy pairing it with a 3 Idiots tee and adorning it with a beaded necklace. She enjoys her job and is best at it from amongst the gang of four. She too believes in making a beeline for the bigger cars – but for her big cars mean SUVs. She believes SUV owners are mostly celebrities and more large hearted than the sedan owners. She remembers how Arjun Kapoor gave her a thousand rupee note without buying anything and how Kajol and Ajay Devgn did not. Even Parineeti Chopra gave everyone a hundred rupee note. She showed her loyalty to Arjun by watching Aurangzeb although she did not understand much of the film. She calls her signal the ‘lucky signal’ and goes to Gaiety/Galaxy theatres in Bandra when such a windfall happens. The entire gang then takes a three-days break. They usually eat at the ‘ghetti’ where dal chawal is available only for Rs15. According to Deepa, the business requires an understanding of what sells the most at what time – summer time sees most families with kids as the schools are closed, hence lots of colouring books, toys and optical illusion books sell well. The colouring books have characters like Superman, Noddy, Tom and Jerry – characters which all of them are not just aware of but are fans of. During the monsoon, obviously it is the umbrellas – sold not to the big car owners but those in autorickshaws. Winter is more for roses and she looks forward to the winter season as she has a passion for roses.Loving what you do and knowing your product inside out is another basic marketing principle which has made them stick to their jobs. And yes, the way they display their loyalty to their customers gives us a lot to chew on. They spend half their earnings on those customers whom they value the most. Is that not going way beyond what current marketers do for their valuable customers? The flexibility to adapt to changing contexts and the ability to walk away from a bad customer – the two most crucial sales and marketing dimensions that most experts have not been able to assimilate well – are handled with a smooth panache by these kids as they have learnt to understand customer behaviour and read their body language well.And true to any salesman’s closing spiel, they almost make you believe that their job is a lot better and lots more fun than yours could ever be! “Hum school, nahin jaatey, bahut boring hai. Teacher bhi pitayee kartey hain. Ap apne office mein baith ke kahan kissi actor ko dekh paoge… humne toh bahut saarey dekhein hain.”Is it not fascinating that Kotler’s principles are being practised so well by these intuitive ‘illiterates’?(The writer is a managing consultant at The Key Consumer Diagnostics Pvt Ltd, a Mumbai-based qualitative research company)

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