Marketing is a kind of personal communication that, when done effectively, can create a bond for a lifetime, believes Vinita Hirani, the PR & Marketing Manager, Baituti Home at BinHendi Holding. In her words, “What truly captivated me about marketing wasn’t just the discipline itself, but the transformative power of storytelling through beautiful spaces and objects.”

Growing up in Bangalore, Vinita was magnetically drawn to the luminous storefronts along MG Road and Commercial Street—each window a carefully orchestrated narrative inviting passersby into a world of possibility.

An Unconventional Journey

Her path hasn’t been conventional. She started literally at street level, distributing pamphlets at the age of 13, to earn her first pair of Nike sneakers—a small but significant personal milestone. That hunger for connection evolved through her work, with her first job being at a young, dynamic radio station, representing brands like Yahoo and Kingfisher, then advancing to luxury lifestyle brands like Harley Davidson and Aditya Birla Group. The common thread throughout has been her fascination with how brands create emotional resonance.

In her current role overseeing PR and marketing for Italian luxury interior brands at BinHendi Holding, Vinita navigates a fascinating duality. Each day requires moving between artistic sensitivity and strategic precision. “When working with heritage brands like B&B Italia, Maxalto, Louis Poulsen, and Flos, there’s a profound responsibility to honor their design legacy while translating their significance to our regional context.”

Rather than seeing analytics and creativity as opposing forces, Vinita has found they amplify each other. Her “59 Seconds with Baituti Home” podcast for design luminaries (architects, interior designers and design icons) exemplifies this approach—she created an intimate format that respects their audience’s sophistication while remaining accessible and shareable. Its growing virality wasn’t accidental but emerged from understanding both the qualitative aspects of compelling conversation and the quantitative metrics of digital engagement.

Adaptive Authenticity

Evolved rapidly over the past decade, Vinita says that the marketing landscape has undergone seismic shifts, particularly in luxury sectors where exclusivity now coexists with digital accessibility. “I’ve embraced this evolution by developing what I call “adaptive authenticity”—maintaining the integrity of luxury narratives while leveraging new platforms and technologies.”

What’s transformed her approach most significantly is recognizing that luxury consumers no longer want to be spoken to but rather invited into meaningful dialogue. “This shift from monologue to dialogue has reshaped everything from our event architecture to our digital strategy.” Today’s luxury marketing requires creating experiences that transcend transactions, offering genuine cultural and intellectual value to audiences increasingly defined by their discernment rather than just their purchasing power.

The Proud Moment

Sharing a campaign or project that she is particularly proud of, Vinita cites: The Microsoft Co-pilot laptop launch stands out as a particularly rewarding project where she pioneered a decentralized influencer strategy. Rather than pursuing obvious tech personalities, Vinita carefully mapped influencers to specific retail partners, creating an ecosystem of authentic voices that amplified their message without diluting it.

What made this approach revolutionary was its rejection of the one-size-fits-all influencer paradigm. By tailoring each partnership to align with both the influencer’s authentic voice and the retail partner’s unique positioning, Vinita says they achieved something rare in today’s saturated landscape: genuine differentiation and meaningful engagement across diverse consumer segments.

This experience reinforced her belief that true innovation often lies in thoughtful curation rather than pure creation—knowing precisely which voices will resonate with which audiences and orchestrating those connections with strategic precision.

The High-Low Equilibrium

Customer behavior is always changing. When asked how she stays attuned to her audience’s needs and what tools or approaches she relies on to keep her strategy aligned, Vinita says that in luxury marketing, particularly with design-focused brands, the danger of ivory tower thinking is ever-present. She has developed what she calls a “high-low methodology” that balances executive insights with frontline observations. While strategic planning happens in boardrooms, the most valuable consumer intelligence comes from being physically present in their showrooms, observing how clients interact with their pieces, and engaging in genuine conversation.

“Digital analytics serve as vital confirmation rather than primary discovery tools in our sector.” The richest insights emerge from synthesis—watching a client’s expression when they first encounter a B&B Italia piece, “Then correlating that with broader engagement patterns across our digital ecosystem. This integrated approach ensures we remain connected to both the emotional and empirical aspects of our audience’s evolving relationship with luxury.”

Storytelling – An Absolute Essential

When asked what role storytelling plays in her marketing philosophy and how she ensures that her brand’s message resonates across diverse platforms, Vinita says that storytelling isn’t just important in luxury marketing—it’s absolutely essential. But in today’s sophisticated market, particularly for a brand like Baituti Home, storytelling must transcend conventional approaches and create meaningful connections across cultural landscapes.

“Our recent Salone del Mobile campaign perfectly illustrates what I call “glocal storytelling”—where global design excellence meets local cultural relevance. Rather than simply reporting on Milan’s design innovations, we created a dynamic narrative bridge between two design capitals.”

The campaign architecture was intentionally multidimensional. In Dubai, they laid strategic groundwork through meticulously crafted photoshoots that captured Italian craftsmanship through a distinctly Middle Eastern lens. They engaged the local press and developed digital content that respected cultural nuances while highlighting universal design principles.

Simultaneously, in Milan, they positioned Baituti Home within the global design conversation. Working closely with their brand ambassador, Massomeh Hilal, Vinita and her team curated a selection of B&B Italia’s most forward-thinking pieces specifically chosen to resonate with their discerning UAE clientele. “This wasn’t about simply showcasing what’s new—it was about identifying which innovations would translate meaningfully into our regional context.”

The culmination was their exclusive Milan Morning recap event in Dubai, which became unexpectedly validating when several international competitors attended—perhaps the sincerest form of strategic flattery. This moment crystallized what they had achieved: creating a narrative so compelling that even their competitors wanted to understand their approach.

What distinguished this campaign was its rejection of the typical one-way “report back” format that treats local audiences as passive recipients of global trends. “Instead, we created parallel storylines that converged to demonstrate how global design excellence finds unique expression within regional contexts—a narrative structure that honored our audience’s sophistication while offering genuine cultural translation.”

This approach reinforced Baituti Home’s unique position as more than just a retailer of luxury Italian brands but as a cultural interpreter that understands both European design heritage and the aesthetic sensibilities of its Middle Eastern clientele. Through this storytelling methodology, Vinita insists they’ve discovered that successful luxury marketing isn’t about choosing between global appeal and local relevance—it’s about masterfully integrating both into a cohesive narrative that resonates across diverse platforms and cultural contexts.

A Foundationally Agile Leader

To foster innovation within her team, Vinita believes in effective marketing leadership that entails what she calls “foundational agility”—the ability to establish stable frameworks that nonetheless accommodate rapid iteration. With her teams, she emphasizes building robust strategic foundations that provide security and clarity, then deliberately creating space for experimental thinking within those structures.

True innovation emerges when team members feel both the confidence of clear direction and the freedom to challenge conventions. “I’ve found that micromanagement destroys precisely the creative tension necessary for breakthrough thinking.” Instead, she focuses on articulating clear outcomes while empowering her team to discover their pathways to those results.

The most valuable trait in contemporary marketing leadership isn’t technical expertise but rather intellectual humility—the recognition that no single perspective can encompass the complexity of today’s market dynamics. By cultivating diverse viewpoints within her teams and creating psychological safety for constructive disagreement, Vinita says they develop marketing approaches that reflect multidimensional understanding rather than a singular vision.

A Major Challenge that Helped Her Grow

Talking about challenges, the most profound one she has faced was voluntarily leaving what many considered a dream position—a prestigious role that provided security but increasingly limited Vinita’s growth. This decision required confronting not just external expectations but her attachment to an established identity.

What this deliberate pivot taught her was that sustainable career development often requires strategic discomfort. By stepping away from the known into entrepreneurial uncertainty, Vinita discovered capabilities she couldn’t have developed in her previous environment, regardless of its prestige. This experience fundamentally reshaped her understanding of professional value—teaching her that growth potential ultimately matters more than positional security.

This lesson continues to inform both her personal decisions and mentorship approach: true career fulfillment comes not from external validation but from continuous expansion of perspective and capability, even when—perhaps especially when—that expansion requires moving beyond comfortable success.

AI – A Profound Invitation to Deepen Our Humanity

According to Vinita, another lesson is her belief that the emergence of AI is not an existential threat to marketers but rather a profound invitation to deepen our humanity. “As algorithmic solutions increasingly handle procedural aspects of our discipline, our distinctive value will increasingly lie in the domains that machines cannot readily replicate: ethical judgment, cultural sensitivity, emotional intelligence, and creative intuition.”

In luxury marketing particularly, Vinita anticipates a renaissance of thoughtful human curation as AI democratizes basic marketing functions. The marketers who will thrive in this evolving landscape won’t be those who resist technological change but those who leverage it to create more space for distinctively human contributions—developing the conceptual frameworks that guide AI applications rather than competing with algorithms on their terms.

An Advice of Principled Adaptability

Finally, to emerging marketing professionals, Vinita offers precious counsel: develop what she calls “principled adaptability.” Ground yourself in timeless marketing fundamentals—understanding human psychology, crafting compelling narratives, and delivering genuine value—while maintaining the flexibility to express those principles through ever-evolving platforms and methodologies.

Most importantly, don’t confuse technical proficiency with strategic insight. Anyone can master the latest platform or tool. However, the marketers who truly shape our industry are those who maintain a clear perspective on why these tools matter and how they serve fundamental human needs and desires. Learn to swim in the deep waters of human motivation rather than splashing in the shallows of tactical execution.

Finally, embrace failure as your most efficient teacher. Every misstep contains within it the seed of a breakthrough if you dare to examine it honestly. The marketer who never fails is the marketer who never explores the boundaries of what’s possible—and in today’s rapidly evolving landscape, those boundaries are where the most significant opportunities invariably reside.