Mark Avenue
A M ONTHLY M AGAZINE F ROM MERCUR i
DECEMBER 2011
Features An interaction with Mr. Shikhar Mohan, Head-Brand HCL Infosystems Ltd.
Prize winning articles from top B - School students.
Mark Avenue Mercur-I Team Nikhil Gupta Kiran Krishnan Srinath Akula Harish Kumar Raju Shashank K Verma EDITORS (Dec Edition) MARK TALK
Ankita Aggarwal Bhavna Sharma Buchalli Varun Deepak Sudhakar Patala Joy Daniel Preeti Gupta Preeti Gupta Patala Joy Daniel Nikhil Gupta Preeti Gupta
AD THAT
Preeti Gupta Patala Joy Daniel
IN THE NEWS
Ankita Aggarwal
ADD GYAN PERSPECTIVE ARTICLE
Bhavna Sharma Deepak Sudhakar Buchalli Varun
MARK QUIZ/TRIVIA
Deepak Sudhakar
DESIGNER
Srinath Akula Patala Joy Daniel
The Team (from L to R): Deepak Sudhakar, Nikhil Gupta, Ankita Aggarwal, Srinath Akula, Bhavna Sharma, Harish Kumar Raju, Preeti Gupta, Kiran Krishnan, Patala Joy Daniel, Shashank Kumar Verma, Buchalli Varun
INSIDE 08 COVER STORY
Ad That: A to Z of Advertising Agencies By Preeti Gupta & Patala Joy Daniel
14 ARTICLE
05 MARK TALK
An interaction with Mr. Shikhar Mohan By Preeti Gupta & Nikhil Gupta
Wanted! Deepak Sudhakar
13 ADD GYAN
The advent of Advertising By Bhavna Sharma
21 ARTICLE
Pricing Strategy for Game Stalls in a Mela 15 IN THE NEWS
Making the Store walk to You! By Ankita R Aggarwal
By Pradeep V. & Deepak Ranjan
17 ARTICLE
Mass Customization: Is it the new communication strategy By Vidhi Jain
16 PERSPECTIVE
Soap or Shampoo? 19 ARTICLE
Tourism Marketing By Himangshu Das
By Buchalli Varun
24 MAR‘QUIZ’
Marketing Quiz
From the Editor Dear Reader, Mercur-I, the Marketing Club of IIM Indore presents to you the December edition of Mark Avenue, our monthly magazine. We strive to bring the best-in-class articles for you which we hope you will definitely enjoy reading. The articles have been chosen to be contemporary, novel and relevant to the world we have built around ourselves in these B-Schools. This month we had the opportunity to interview Mr. Shikhar Mohan, the Head-Brand at HCL Infosystems, providing an insight into the practicalities of marketing strategy. One of the key factors in marketing is advertising, but what goes behind the witty campaigns that we see? We try to bring forth the true picture by explaining the role of advertising agencies. When was the first ad launched? Any guesses? After reading the article on the advent of advertising, we are sure you will be able to answer all the questions about the genesis of advertising. But some ads spark off controversy- here we deal with one such controversy about fairness creams. Did you know that our wish for a luxurious future is soon to be answered with stores that walk to us?! Now you will. We also talk about an intriguing concept- mass customization. Perplexed by the oxymoronic name? It is customization for the masses!! We all know how beautiful North East India is. But the tourism industry statistics don’t justify that. What can be done to promote the North East? Have you ever been to a Mela? Ever wondered how do the stall owners decide upon the ticket prices of their games?
All this and much more, we hope that this issue will open you to many new aspects of the marketing world. Hope to continue this journey of mutual learning and catering to our marketing appetite through the New Year! Merry Christmas and a Very Happy New Year!!
Preeti and Joy
Mark Talk
Feature
An interview with Mr. Shikhar Mohan by Preeti Gupta & Nikhil Gupta Left brain strategy & right brain creativity finally, the twain meet. Shikhar, is Head - Brand at HCL Infosystems and an MBA in Marketing & Strategy from IIM Indore. Surprisingly, he is also an accomplished, multi-award winning Creative Director, ranked among the top creative talent in the World. As Head of Brand at the $6 Billion HCL Infosystems, Shikhar leads on brand strategy, brand communication, consumer insights, media planning, product aesthetics and retail environment for all verticals. The verticals include a range of FMCD Products and Services including the Me Tablet product line, Me Laptops, Gaming, Desktops, Servers, HCL Learning, System Integration & HCL Touch. His unique multi-disciplinary experience means that brand strategy is informed by both a business perspective and a creative one. You have previously worked in the advertising world. Now you are managing the portfolio of Brands under HCL Infosystems. In your opinion, how do the skill sets required for advertising and brand strategy differ? Good question. Advertising and Brand Management aren’t very different and the skill set required is similar. That’s why you see great mobility between the two fields with many ad professionals often flitting between the two fields.
Where they differ is here - the canvas in Brand Management is larger. Brand Management includes managing many other aspects of business such as ensuring a Product line consistent with your brand ethos, ensuring a Retail environment in tune with your brand personality, mining consumer insights, tracking brand and advertising scores, managing the Brand Architecture for your DECEMBER 2011
product line and strategy decisions such as which brands to build and which to not, when to spend and when to not, evaluating brand associations and ambassadors and managing the Brand budget. Also, in Advertising no matter what role you play, you tend to work in a silo. You are either a Creative Director (like I was), a Client Servicing executive, a Brand Planner or a Media planner. A Brand Manager is all these roles and more.
In your opinion, what are the unique (and exciting) aspects of marketing consumer electronics? Well, it’s a fast and dynamic world for one. With the current pace of technology, the product life cycle is short and you have a short window to communicate to customers why they should buy your product.
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Also often the differentiation between competing products isn’t huge. USP’s are often difficult to find and when found are often replicated by a competitor in a flash. For example, Android developers had a Siri alternative out for public use exactly one day after Siri was launched. Majel – android’s rumoured official Siri alternative -- is around the corner too. From a brand management perspective, it’s an exciting situation as it grants a bigger role to you as a Brand Manager. When product differentiation is low, you could say you get to play both Brand Manager and an R&D engineer as the USP being sold is often the story and imagery you create around the product rather than one created in the research and development process. Also, given a short shelf life, building a mother brand (for example HCL rather than ME Tablets from HCL) gains importance to hold on to customer loyalties gained by your product brand building beyond the life span of the product. Building a corporate brand is different from building a consumer brand and offers a different challenge. In the past you have worked on a wide range of successful brands. What issues should be kept in mind while deciding on launching a completely new brand from scratch? First – Should you build a new brand at all? Often the old brand has a following that’s difficult to replicate in a short time. Would you rather do a brand extension for the new product? How many of you have wondered for example about BenQ as a brand? You will be surprised to know its parent company is Acer. Being at an arms length from the parent brand has meant it has found establishing a position in the consumers mind a challenge – something it still struggles with. Which brings us to the second point – Will you invest in the new brand? If not, don’t do it. A brand becomes a brand if the consumer says it’s a brand – not when you decide to launch one. So expect to spend substantially to achieve this goal. DECEMBER 2011
In the absence of requisite spending you will have a tough time establishing the new brand. Third – Delivery. If you are launching a new brand it’s a good idea to ensure its not a marketing gimmick and there is differentiated value that will be provided to the customer. This is more important from a durables and electronics perspective where the purchase is a high ticket item and post purchase dissonance can easily set in if the product doesn’t deliver on the promises set out in its marketing efforts. Fourth - Brand Architecture. This is related to the first point and is a decision regarding whether you will leverage the mother brand or will you go it solo? Leveraging the mother brand is a difficult decision because the reason you are launching a new brand is often to distance the new product from associations around the mother brand. However going solo poses challenges as discussed . Fifth - In case you go in for an endorsed/ mother brand strategy for the new brand, make sure the old brand is powerful enough to make the recommendation. Don’t leverage the mother brand unless it is strongly established in the consumers psyche as there is a strong chance that the new brand instead of basking in the mother brands glory will instead end up confusing the mother brand itself in the mind of consumers. (Diesel jeans at one point of time launched wines. They faded away much faster than their usual product line) Sixth – Be consistent. A brand is an invitation to your customer to have a relationship with your product. As a brand, you need to be clear on what you will offer in this relationship. Leave it confused and you are asking for trouble as there are enough brands vying for the customer’s attention. Don’t change your tonality, imagery and behavior for short term sales gains. A brand yields gains over a long term and if short term spikes in sales rather than long term sales is the objective, refer to point one above.
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Feature How different is it to launch a brand practically from what we read in theory? I would say IIM Indore is doing a good job of plugging the gap between theory and practice. A lot of the tools I remember learning in the Brand Management, Consumer Behaviour classes are tools I use regularly. But to answer your real question – ‘Can I be the next big thing in brand management as soon as I am out of IIM (or for that matter any other college)?’ I would say no. There will always be a gap between reading a cycling manual and riding one. It’s this aspect, which you really can only get on the job. What great education can do is give you a dashboard which you can use to judge the speed, tyre pressure, the gear engaged currently – balancing all these aspects comes on the job. In retrospect, what has challenging task for you?
been
the
most
Professionally? There is a new challenge everyday and that’s how it should be if you want to progress. One recent one that was fun tackling was the launch of ME Tablets which involved recrafting the Me Brand from HCL to appeal to the young target audience in a more engaging and meaningful manner. What do you think will be the future trends in Branding? Co-creation as a way to engage the customer before the product even hits the shelf is gaining ground and will continue to do so as today the consumer is no more satisfied just being an audience for your product – he can and wants to be the director, producer and choreographer too. This is all a part of the larger scope for selfexpression for today’s consumer, given tools like twitter and facebook where the smallest voices are often creating the biggest change. DECEMBER 2011
As the economy shows signs of trouble, cobranding in advertising will also rise as a way to save marketing costs. Media money will continue to get further consolidated with Online and television rather than print to save on costs. Also on the horizon is the rise of the small agencies such as Taproot (Pepsi –Change the game) and Law & Kenneth (Hum mein hai Hero) which are now competing head-on with large networked agencies. I see more companies using these smaller and hence more agile setups for their advertising needs, as time to market gets crunched further to keep pace with market demand for newer and better products faster than ever before.
You have seen life at IIM Indore as a participant as well as a Visiting Faculty and a Guest Lecturer, what would you like to recommend to the marketing enthusiasts regarding “learning beyond classroom”? I would sincerely recommend (at the risk of drawing censure from faculty) that one should think beyond grades in a Post-Graduate environment. However, this is not a recommendation to take studies lightly and should not be quoted the next time a professor asks you for your assignment submission. This is about not getting fanatical about an extra few marks here and there when the same extra effort would yield far higher returns through visiting retail shops, interacting with industry experts, participating in workshops or just researching what interests you in the library and online even though there aren’t any marks associated with these activities. What you have is precious – 2 years (for PGP participants) or 1 year (for One Year Full Time EPGP participants) to experiment and explore before you go back to a work environment where chances of experimentation are far lesser. I would suggest to everyone to use this time wisely.
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Cover Story
Ad That A to Z of Advertising Agencies A
by Preeti Gupta & Patala Joy Daniel
dvertising world never ceases to surprise us. Ads capture our imagination, ads enthral us, and ads make us spend money on products which we don’t even require. That leads us to our cover story: Advertising Agencies. Before we begin, we would like to give an overview of the Indian advertising world. The Indian advertising industry is worth more than Rs 30 thousand crores and runs because of one thing - the creative minds behind the ads. Since they are in the tertiary service sector, the agencies have meagre monetary assets, and their work defines their value. Therefore, the ads an agency makes are reflective of their expertise and hence helps them reinstate their brand prowess. Thus, every ad that an ad agency makes for each client is an ad for the promotion of the agency itself. Some of the advertising agencies in India which conceptualize and create advertising campaigns that give new definitions to innovation are as follows. Most of these agencies have a huge global presence.
1. Oglivy & Mather Limited – One of the largest advertising agencies across the globe and with highly successful campaigns in India like the Asian Paints’ – ‘Har ghar kuch kehta hai’, Cadbury Diary Milk’s 'Kuch khaas hai' and not to forget the Vodafone Zoozoo campaign. The Godfather of Indian Advertising, Piyush Pandey is the Executive Chairman and DECEMBER 2011
Creative Director for South Asia Ogilvy & Mather India. Over the years the agency has earned a name for building brands and improving the brand – customer relationship.
2. Mudra Communications Private Limited – With a history of 3 decades Mudra Communications specializes in reaching out to both the urban and the rural mind. A client list which includes international bigwigs like PepsiCo, Shell, Phillips, Volkswagen, UNICEF and also Indian players like Amrutanjan and Future Group. The group believes in a ‘Can do’ attitude and recently underwent a rebranding exercise.
3. J Walter Thompson India – JWT a subsidiary of the WPP group was formed in 1864. The agency is known to have produced the first ever TV commercial in 1939. JWT India, its Indian division is popular among the clients for its creative style and approach of advertising brands to the ever evolving customer.
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Cover Story just turns anonymous names into huge brand equities but is also known to be a turnaround specialist.
4. Lowe Lintas - Lowe Lintas is one of the oldest Indian advertising agencies and has a history which dates back to 1939 when as Lintas (Lever International Advertising) it advertised the products of the Lever brothers. Advertising campaigns from this agency leave a lasting impact on the viewers mind through the innovation. Few successful campaigns are What an Idea! – Idea, Daag Ache Hain – Surf Excel and Jaago Re –Tata Tea.
5. McCann Erickson India Limited – Headed by advertising’s jingle genius – Prasoon Joshi, McCann Erickson India is known for its ridiculous yet funny taglines. From Thanda Matlab Coca-Cola to Chlormint’s Dobara math poochna the agency has created several hit campaigns. Like in India, McCann Erickson has presence in 130 other countries.
6. DraftFCB - Ulka Advertising Private Limited India’s third largest advertising agency known to transform unheard of names into leading brands of their sectors. IClients like Santoor, and Naukri.com which have successfully overcome tough competition in their segments have been advertised by this agency. This not DECEMBER 2011
7. Leo Burnett – They say that the pen is mightier than the sword, but for Leo Burnett, the pencil is the mightiest. An ad agency which revolutionized print advertising both globally and locally boasts of association with brands like P&G, Samsung, Mc Donald’s and Fiat. Leo Burnett , the person behind wellknown advertising mascots like Pillsbury’s Doughboy, the Marlboro Man, Tony the Tiger amongst others setup this agency. Few other famous agencies are Rediffusion DY&R Private Limited, RK Swamy BBDO Private Limited and Grey Worldwide (India) Private Limited. Why do firms hire advertising agencies? Wouldn’t it be better if they just designed their ad campaigns themselves? After all, the firms understand themselves, their products, their customers and their target consumers better. Why do they need an external agency to design their campaigns? An external ad agency brings fresh perspectives to the table. They employ extremely creative people who can think ‘beyond the box’, uncluttered by the constraints that the client firm might face. Ad agencies have been in the business for years- they design campaigns for a wide spectrum of sectors, and understand the nuances- they are not bound by the limitations of a particular sector. Just land up with an ad agency with the perfect chemistry and life becomes smooth!
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Cover Story The creativity is bounded in many respects. Ad agencies have to work within the limitations of well defined guidelines provided by their client firms. Their scope of work is generally confined to scripting, storyboarding, pre and post production for TV and Radio commercials and infomercials; creative, production and engraving for Print Advertisements. But these are not hard bound rules. Sometimes the client firm expects much more from ad agencies than simply designing the ads and commercials.
It is quite intriguing on how advertisers can find the correct media agency to advertise their products. One must understand that this process defines the life and death of a brand and one wrong step can lead to a loss in crores of rupees. Let us delve deeper into how this process is carried out in real life.
frequent the promotion must take place. With this information the advertisers make a pitch. Also a list of agencies which fulfil the above needs from the company is prepared. The pitch covers details of the company, context and the selection criteria by which they would be finalising the agency. An effective campaign’s pitch has clear objectives, provides equal opportunity for all agencies participating and also the rules for future collaborations with the agency. The advertisers provide ample time for the agencies to react to the pitch. The information present in the pitch is kept highly confidential and revealing it would have serious legal implications. Before moving ahead let us now look at what all services do these agencies offer to the advertisers. An advertiser may not use all the available services but it is important to know the wide spectrum of services available. An agency provides the advertiser strategic media advice as to which channel to use for advertising, how much effective each channel would be, how much to allocate for each campaign, how to optimize the reach of the campaign, the frequency of promotion, how to negotiate with various media vehicles which would carry the promotion, follow up that has to be done once the campaign is launched, post analyses of the campaign and sharing of information it gets from the campaign.
Firstly the advertisers of the brand introspect. They look at where the company stands at that particular moment and also the changes to be made if any for a better future for the company. Then they think on what that particular offering holds for the company and how it fits into the context. If they are launching a new product they decide on the target group, the points of parity and the points of difference the product offers, the positioning of the product, the channel through which the promotion would be done and how DECEMBER 2011
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Cover Story Now that the pitch is completed and a shortlist of the advertising agencies is done the advertisers meet the agencies and chose the one which would be the most compatible with the project.
The second role is of analysing and selecting communication vehicles and optimising the final plan according constraints and opportunities within each medium.
It is important to choose the agency that would match the pitch rather than choosing the best agency. An agency which would fit the bill and also with which there is proper chemistry is selected. This is because the relationship between a client and an agency would go on for years and developing relationship with an agency that completely understands the client’s needs.
The third role is to leverage its purchasing power and the next is to present a detailed post-analysis giving actual versus objectives of media, negotiations and efficiency. This whole process benefits the advertising agency because of increased exposure to the marketing world. The customer insights gained help them in designing the work better. A media agency can be provided remuneration on the basis of fixed percentage, or fixed fee, or a part of the fee could be performance incentives based on simple and measurable criteria.
We will briefly describe the different roles a media agency can play depending on the contract with the client. A media agency can be assigned the task of developing the strategic advice on brand image, targeting, media usage and phasing, media used by competition; detecting niches, definition of targets, contribution of media plan to overall communication strategy, setting marketing and sales objectives, investment analysis, recommend media mix and multi-brand coordination. The whole process of researching the client’s customer base and deciding upon the message that should be conveyed through the campaign, i.e. helping the client with the marketing problem analysis before the advertising stage begins is called account planning. DECEMBER 2011
Each ad is a piece of art. It requires extensive brain-racking to create a masterpiece that is short, conveys the whole message, attracts the customer, and doesn’t become boring even on repetition. All traditional pieces of art are protected by copyright laws. Plagiarism is illegal for paintings, sculptures, music compositions, screenplays, stories and what not. Ad world also has its own copyright laws. The U.S. Copyright Act protects copyright protects original works possessing at least some minimal degree of creativity.
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Cover Story According to the Supreme Court, “the requisite level of creativity is extremely low; even a slight amount will suffice.” If the ad is ideated in house by the advertiser’s employees, and ad agency is just hired for creating the ad, then the copyright stays with the advertiser itself, else, if the ad agency is the creative head, then the copyright rests with the ad agency.
A dangerous territory is comparative advertising. It is when a brand tries to defame a competitor by comparing and proving the competitor to be inferior through an advertisement. Care must be taken that any laws are not broken, and that there must be proof of the shortcomings of the competitors which are pointed out in the ads, or else both the advertising agency and the advertiser might fall into trouble. Such comparative advertisements might spark off an ad war. A war just as lethal for a company and its brand equity as a nuclear bomb is. In recent times we have seen brand wars turning into ad wars, examples being Tide v/s Rin, Pepsi v/s Coke, Nike v/s Adidas, HUL v/s P&G etc.
Moving on to various other laws in the advertising world, there is a law to protect consumers when an ad is either false or misleading. Also, any testimonials appearing in any sort of ad must be approved by the person who gave the testimonial. Thus, an ad agency has a lot to consider! They have to show their genius by bounded creativity! Now since the ad agency works in such close ties with the company and gains knowledge about their products, the advertiser company might feel insecure about information leak if the ad agency takes up the project of the advertiser’s competitor. Thus to protect the advertiser from such issues, an advertising agency should take up the work of only one company from a category- a norm nowadays known as ‘category exclusivity’.
What is the future of ad agencies? Critics say that ads are losing out to trade and promotions. Brands like Apple believe that good products don’t need an advertisement for sale. The same money could be spent to produce and sell more. Yet we see an overdose of advertisements. They are here to stay.
The authors are PGP participants at IIM Indore. You can reach them at p11preetig@iimidr.ac.in, & p11patalaj@iimidr.ac.in
DECEMBER 2011
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Add Gyan The advent of Advertising A
by Bhavna Sharma
common consumer today, tired and overexposed; constantly bombarded with advertisements and promotional gimmicks. But it wasn’t always like this. In all my findings, (read leisurely reading sans any academic benefit whatsoever), I never once came across an anecdote where some history’s great mentions that his brilliant innovation was actually the endproduct of some blaring advertisement he saw. There were peaceful times, long ago maybe, but there were. An age where word of mouth was the only way to sell, where advertising was on one-toone basis, and as personalized as it could get. So how did this multitudinous demon - experiential advertising, advocacy advertising, persuasive advertising, informational advertising and what not, come about? They say there is no smoke without fire and damn were they right! After all it was the Great fire of London in 1666 which proved to be the birthing grounds for the first ever newspaper advertisements in England. In fact, it is claimed that in ancient Egypt, papyrus was used to make sales message and wall posters. But that’s another story. It was the advancement in the printing press that opened the avenues for cheap and effective advertising in local newspapers. In June 1836, French newspaper ‘La Presse’ included paid advertising in its pages. Not only did it augment revenues but also helped extend its readership. Now that the stage was set it was time for the players to enter. Sometime in 1840, Volney B. Palmer lay the foundation of what was soon to become a modern day advertising agency. He bought large empty space in various newspapers at a discount and then resold the space at escalated price to advertisers. He was something of a space broker. The actual ad - the copy, layout, and artwork - was still prepared by the company DECEMBER 2011
wishing to advertise. However, in the late 19th century another advertising agency called N.W. Ayer & Son offered to plan, create, and execute complete advertising campaigns for its customers. By 1900 the advertising agency’s main business was creative planning, and advertising was firmly established as a profession. TVCs were a long way off then but they were an inevitable phenomenon waiting to happen. Advertisers needed a bigger battlefield and television proved to be the perfect solution. In United States, the first TVC was broadcasted in 1941. A 20 second display of ‘bulova’ clock superimposed on a map of US that was aired just before a baseball game, with a voice over “America runs on Bulova time”. In UK the first advertisement was that of Gibbs SR toothpaste in 1955. Another half a decade later, Philippines bore audience to Tide detergent powder.
Rest is history! Advertising soon proliferated into more and more aspects of a consumer’s being. They splurged across various channels of media and surrounded an ever-perplexed consumer. Choices between increasingly similar products with so called differentiating factors continue to be made every second of every day. If one is to call consumerism a plague, I’d say that the pied piper did his rounds centuries ago. The author is a PGP1 participant at IIM Indore. You can reach her at p11bhavnas@iimidr.ac.in
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Article
Wanted !
Fair skin, IIM ABC degrees optional
I
by Deepak Sudhakar
f the Indian advertisements were to be believed, this would be the way Mc Kinsey would recruit in the future. There are a whole lot of ad agencies spewing a whole lot of stereotypical venom. This was not what ‘Subliminal marketing’ was meant for (PS: it isn’t subtle anymore). Agreed, that the standard definition of marketing is ‘profitably satisfying a customer’s inherent need’. But, there’s a point at which one’s campaign becomes ‘racist’ and promotes untouchability. There has to be a point where all’s not ‘Fair in love’ and advertising. From time immemorial Indians have been fixated with lustrous glowing skin (read fair). The monarchs and their partners in crime would drink to their hearts content in their palaces while the ‘poor’ Indian would earn his daily bread in the hot sun. This stratification created a socio-economic divide and the British just reinforced our beliefs that ‘fairer people are better’. The Dravidians, when they were driven down south were exposed to harsh climates. All these point to the genesis of the divide. The whole mess started with the Fair & Lovely campaign where they showed an aunty giving gyaan about how the groom was looking for a fair girl. There line and brand extensions have just tried to reinforce the belief that in order to get married you need to be fair. This created a huge spurt in sales of Fair & Lovely products. The icing on the cake was when they showed a ‘fair’ Juhi Chawla morphing into a ‘fair’ lady by using Fair and lovely. They piled on the agony in Genelia’s version. One thing that has changed for the better (relatively!) is that at least now they have changed their equation from fairness = beauty to fairness = confidence. I mean how could a fairness cream help Genelia fulfil her life long DECEMBER 2011
ambition of being a commentator? Is one of the attributes of a good commentator beauty? Laxman Sivaramakrishnan, Harsha Bhogle and Ian Bishop have a lot to worry about. The argument that agencies offer is that this ‘connects which the customers feel’. The intrinsic idea being, ladies from a bourgeois household identify with Genelia and ask the local kirana guy ‘Bhaiya zara who Genelia wala cream dena’.
The madness has spread to the men’s segment as well. All the skeletons are falling out of the closet. Guys are openly buying fairness products and Garnier is laughing all the way to the bank. How can a fairness cream increase the confidence in an individual? How does a fair Shahid Kapoor morph into a ‘fairer’ Shahid Kapoor after using Vaseline? How does a guy get a job after using a fairness product? Aren’t we promoting racism and untouchability? These are the questions, which we need to ask ourselves as future brand managers. ‘Tall dark and handsome’ has turned out to be a ‘cliché’ after all. Someone needs to show the Indians how the world is going bonkers for ‘bronze’ skin. Brown skin in the west is considered exotic. But, nobody’s going to do it and you know why? It’s because all of us are busy milking the category. Next time someone gloats about how fairness creams are the best things to happen to us after the invention of the wheel, show them ‘Eva Mendes’. The author is a PGP1 participant at IIM Indore. You can reach her at p11deepaks@iimidr.ac.in
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In the news Making the Store Walk to You!
I
by Ankita Aggarwal
magine standing in a subway. Amongst the hustle bustle, all you have on your mind is the dinner preparation for your imposing guests. And the thought of your boss’ expression if you ask him for a half-day leave, makes you shudder. The fact that your stock of food has run out makes the situation more exasperating! Now imagine that instead of worrying about how you will sail through the evening, you are busy ordering food items and grocery with a guarantee that by the time you reach home, all you need will be waiting for you! Unimaginable, is it? Well, not anymore. Tesco has employed the same concept in Korea. It has leveraged upon the tech-savvy but extremely busy people of Korea to launch a campaign which caused a furore at the Cannes Lion and won a Grand Prix- the first ever for Korea.
Tesco has made shopping more convenient by creating virtual stores in Korean subways. The virtual stores displays looked exactly the same as actual stores, except that smart phones were used to shop. Users scanned a QR code with their phone and the product automatically landed in their online shopping cart. Once the payment was made online, products were delivered to the customer’s door the same day. The campaign caused a whooping 10,287 consumers to visit the online TESCO mall and a boastful 130% increase in online sales. The question here is, will a similar campaign work in India? Though India is becoming increasingly tech savvy, the market penetration of DECEMBER 2011
smart phones amongst the Indian youth is just 10% as compared to 43% in Italy! The increasingly busy work-schedules make it difficult for people to cater to daily household necessities, and a trip to supermarkets is the last thing they would prefer. So even though there is a latent demand, this strategy may not really work in India currently. 20 Years down the line, maybe. But QR(quick response) code is something that even India is looking at. Many companies in India are trying out this strategy to push sales or increase brand recall. Cottonworld, a leading apparel brand, used QR code to push sales, by asking customers to scan the QR code cards kept in their outlets and avail a discount. They are trying to talk to the ‘young consumers’ in their language. QR codes have reached the skies. Literally. Jet-Airways’ in-flight magazine has QR code printed on it to help the passengers download flight information, sector details and other useful data. While QR codes seem to be a marketers dream, why has it got the public all puzzled up? For one, people are not aware of the fact that a free application has to be downloaded before the phone camera can be used as a QR scanner. Poor availability of internet, very low penetration of Wi-Fi and smart phones are some other reasons. Though technology and QR codes are here to stay, it’s going to take a lot more than a simple code to decode the enigma that is the Indian consumer.
The author is a PGP1 participant at IIM Indore. You can reach her at p11aggarwala@iimidr.ac.in
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Perspective Soap or Shampoo? by Buchallli Varun
B
athing has morphed from being a sanitary need to an experience. Just counting the number of categories fighting for space on your bathroom counter is mind-boggling. Body wash, soaps, shampoos, conditioners, shampoos with oil and shampoos which have conditioning properties. There’s always a new category round the corner fighting for ‘shelf space’. Just imagine a guy walking towards the common hostel-bathroom early in the morning with his soap, shampoo and conditioner and dropping them because of the cold. Life would be so much simpler if there was a product, which could do all the three ‘clean and deodorize’ your body, shampoo and condition your hair. But, would this product work? Would it spawn a new category? The concept has been tested before. Just ask your dad if he remembers the Godrej Crowning soap advertisement featuring Dimple Kapadia. It had a saucy Dimple asking consumers to use the soap for their body as well as hair. Based on the advertisement the product seemed to be targeted at men. The product did well initially but later faded out. What comes to mind when one thinks of soap? It is essentially a product used to clean one’s body. The consumer’s perception about it has been ingrained in him/her right from childhood. When Godrej tried to unsegment the product it created a lot of confusion in the minds of the consumers. Was the product a shampoo or soap? This initial buzz resulted in a spurt in sales. Consumers just wanted to try out the product. There was another question in the minds of the consumer. How can soap be used to shampoo and condition hair? This was the only product in the market, which had this unique value offering. They might have doubted DECEMBER 2011
the authenticity of the product’s ability to act a substitute for shampoo. Another aspect, which could have hindered sales, would be a perception that a standalone shampoo would do a better job at protecting hair as it was designed for that particular purpose. All these could have contributed to the fall in sales. Godrej also launched an ayurvedic version of this concept, Shikakai. As far as the Indian market is concerned both the products have been discontinued.
The concept has also been tested in foreign markets. Dial For Men is a product with the following positioning statement- Here’s a shortcut any guy will appreciate – a liquid soap that gets your hair and body clean, without extra bottles or steps. Get clean, conditioned hair and skin in a single step. To give you more time for more manly stuff. The product has been accepted by the consumer and has carved out a niche for itself.
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Winners Mass Customization
Is this the new communication strategy by Vidhi Jain
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ith so much of variety available these days, customers choice for a product or a service changes with the location, time and conditions. In order to stand apart, “customize” is the best strategy that can be adopted by the businesses. So, nowadays various products are sold to the customers on the basis of taste, size, color or other criterion. Be it chocolates, clothes, sandwiches or ice-creams, everything can be customized today at a reasonable price. Let us understand it this way, you go to a restaurant and get seated, the waiter serves you water. It is summer and the waiter serves you cold water, which is the way it should be. But you have a bad throat and request for normal water. Few months later you walk into some other restaurant of the same company and the waiter before serving the water asks you would you like to have cold water or normal water. This gesture of his will delight you and win your heart for the lifetime. Thus this ability of the company to adapt more upstream processes as per the requirement of individual customers gives it greater customization ability and greater customer loyalty. And the mass customization is the strategy to satisfy heterogeneous tastes of consumers at a minimum possible cost.
It has been proven time and again that choice improves the satisfaction of consumer and makes him happier. And as we all know that for a company, “Customer is God”. And in order to please their God managers are struggling with mass-customization which is considered to be the new communication strategy. Several companies in various industries have adopted masscustomization.
In Hotel industry, Subway is the best example of mass customization. One can choose his or her favorite combination of ingredients for the submarine sandwich. Dell in the Information Technology industry is the other example of customization having famous “build-to-order” model. Kwality Wall's has brought customized ice-creams to match their consumer’s taste and preferences with their product “Swirls”.
Railways provide customized services to the Aclass customers. Apparel industry has been successfully providing high quality customized products at lower prices with faster delivery.
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Levi Strauss in Unites States and Canada is using mass customization with its custom fitted jeans program. At Levi’s stores customer’s measurements are taken with the help of trained salesperson and after selection of style and fabric by them the data is forwarded to production by the internet. The store delivers the customized jeans in minimum time.
Think what next you wish to customize. How about the idea of personalized newspaper? You may be amazed to know that a German researcher and entrepreneur publishes Improo, a mass customized newspaper – a newspaper that is daily personalized according to each individual reader's personal taste and preferences. An individual can choose areas of interest and the articles are chosen from different sources as per the reader’s demand, this helps in saving their valuable time.
People are tired of stereotypical products, gone are those days when we used to say yellow soaps for clothes and orange for body. Customization is the new mantra today. Look around and you will find this is the world of difference, be it customizing greeting cards, mugs and gifts for your loved ones by Archies or customizing travel books for its readers by company MissInformation. Some industries significantly known for mass customization are check printing (Deluxe), package delivery (FedEx), internet search (Google), and digital music delivery (Apple iPod/iTunes). Product is designed for the customer, and customization gives him the very right to spend his money the way he likes. He can design the product as he wishes to and then pay for it. The customized product is bound to have more satisfaction than the stereotypical product, because each product will have something that the customer has himself put into it as per his liking. It also gives rise to choice benders, these are people who get influenced by other’s choices and customize their products accordingly. Quite often you must have heard in a restaurant, “I will have what that lady in blue is having.” That happens with customization as well, people get influenced by others as well. Some may get influenced and some may influence others, either way the company is benefitted by it. So what are you waiting for just grab a pen and paper, and start drawing what your product should look like, be it jewelry, be it clothes, be it car, be it food, or be it your computer. Today everything can be customized to have it look, like the way you want it to be. So take your pick and the products are before you, who says only genie can give you what you wish for.
You can reach the author at
vidhi.13@tapmi.edu.in DECEMBER 2011
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Winners Tourism Marketing
With emphasis on North India
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by Himangshu Das
he recent economic sinusoidal swings notwithstanding, globally, Tourism has been a sector that has seen a substantial growth in the recent years. The zeal to capture this booming market has even lead to the segmentation of the industry with some countries specializing in health tourism like India, some in Eco tourism like Costa Rica and Nepal and still others in rural tourism. India, regarded as the Diversity capital, with its millennial old history and cultural richness is actually at the pedestal to harness this tourism growth. Slowly but finally the government seems to have realized this and has made concrete efforts to seal the loopholes plaguing the industry. The “Incredible India” campaign; The National Tourism Policy of 2002; Mega Tourism Projects involving both the central and state government with the Ministry of Railways, Civil Aviation, Road and Transport and Urban Development and the Tourism Department to bring about convergence and synergy in solving the issues; the Visa on Arrival policy are some of the few steps that have been taken in this regard.
various segments of the tourist populace. 1) The Thrill of the unexplored: For the adventurist Tough the tourism industry is based on “There is a lot more to see”, thanks to record tourism and the severe exploration done by the television channels, most have explored or know about the famous places be it the Swiss Alps, the Pyramids or the Taj Mahal. The thrill of exploring something unknown is not there always. The scenario is not the same in case of North East. An Advertisement like “The last unexplored territory on Earth” would be perfect for attracting tourist. Be it the mountain range of Tawang or the seven falls in Cherrapunjee or the largest river island in the world, Majuli; there is hardly any documentary or exploration of these places. Such a region is paradise for the adventurist venturing into the unknown and efforts needs to be made to market the same.
So where does North East India fit in all these ? Located in the lap of the easternmost Himalayan range, the pristine beauty of North East India has remained unexplored for a long time. Be it for the decades of Militancy, the lack of Infrastructure development, the limited connectivity with the rest of the country or a culture and tradition that is distinct from the rest of India. However recent truce between the government and various militant groups and the “Look East” policy of the government has made the scenario a lot more optimistic now. And it is this opportunity that the North East should capitalize on. Below are some of the strategies that can be positioned amongst DECEMBER 2011
2) Richness of flora and fauna: For the eco tourist Rapid industrialization and deforestation has taken out the green shine from most part of our congested country. Arunachal Pradesh (state with lowest population density in the country) and states like Meghalaya and Manipur abound with a very rich variety of unexplored plants and trees engulfing ranges of hills and mountains. Arunachal Pradesh alone has as many as 500 species of medicinal plants. MARK AVENUE
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Apart from this there are certain birds and animals that are found only in NE India like the one horned rhinoceros, Assamese Macaque, the Himalayan black deer, the red panda, the white winged duck . A break from the mundane city life and journey into the pristine jungles of North East is what most would aspire for.
3) A different India: For the explorer From the land of the Ahoms to the land of the Rising Sun, the region encompasses 7 states and comprise of a multitude of languages and dialects across different cultures and customs. Away from the hinterland India the cultures and traditions are unique to this region itself, a fact also evident in the ways and life of the local inhabitants. 4) Value for money: For the economic traveler North east as a whole has not seen much of Industrial development. The lifestyle is majorly rural in most regions and the per capita income is also low. This being the fact the cost of living is low in most places. The economic traveler can enjoy North East to a much greater extent than any other region without having to search deep inside the pocket. For an economic package of around Rs 5000, a person can enjoy a 4N/5D travel and stay across the major tourist places (as per a travel portal). Compare this with an average of around Rs 800 per day in average hotels across rest of India. DECEMBER 2011
5) Gateway to the Eastern India: For the Business Traveler Globalization as an era has forced people to seek out for business opportunities across countries to be in competition. The North East India surrounded by Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal, China and Bhutan can act as the nerve centre for trade and commerce with these countries. The credence for this has been lately recognized by the Government of India and a huge thrust has been given for Infrastructure development in the region. Also a proposal has been considered amongst these nations for road and railway connections to create more trade opportunities. For a trader looking for long term trade growth and benefits the North East India is the next big place. In any business Advertising and Marketing strategies hold good as long as the product is able to hold good on the promises. There is no doubt on the tourism potential of North East India but to tap that potential a huge amount of back ground work needs to be done. Some of the points are outlined below. 1) Awareness about respect for the foreigners
2) Proper verification and recognition of the tour operators 3) Incentives and reduction in tariffs for hotels situated in remote locations 4) Churning out more professional courses on tourism 5) Public-Private-Partnership in regions where Government Investment is not enough
6) Awards and accolades for the best service
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You can reach the author at
manbirtandon@gmail.com MARK AVENUE
Winners Pricing Strategy for Game Stalls in a Mela by Pradeep V., Deepak Ranjan
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e keep hearing about a lot of pricing strategies: competition-based pricing, cost-plus pricing, value-in-use pricing and so on. But consider this scenario: In a diwali mela, there is a game stall having a few games. For example, 10 glasses are arranged in a pyramid shape and visitors are asked to play a game wherein they would get twice their money if they bring down all the glasses in just 3 throws of a ball. Another example – a lot of items of varying value like soaps, shampoos etc. are arranged in a table and visitors are asked to throw hoops on any of the items to win them. What kind of pricing strategy should be followed for such games? India is a land of festivals and melas. In fact, these melas are an integral part of the Indian culture, lifestyle and constitute a recurring source of entertainment. Diwali mela, Navratri mela, annual melas according to the specific customs, trade fairs are few such melas. All of these have numerous stalls for food, ornaments, garments etc. where visitors can shop for local flavour as well as attractions like giant wheels. Another typical stall we find in such melas are game stalls. Typically these stalls have three or four attractions – hoopla, hit the glasses, burst the balloons and many more local innovations. The generic way of pricing for these games is that you pay a certain amount to play something and there is a tempting possibility to earn more by winning the game. But what kind of pricing should be followed by the owners of these stalls? Do these stall owners even follow any method of pricing? The answer is no. The games are priced by intuition and usual practice. Not much thought goes behind it. But is that the only way to go
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about it? Just because it is a local mela dependent on a lot of contingent factors, does it mean the pricing has to be instinctive? Can the pricing be methodical yet simple even for a semi-literate stall owner to comprehend and execute?
The first step is to determine the cost to set up a stall. This would include the rent for the stall, materials and setup costs, labour costs and contingency costs. Next step is to set the profit margin. The pricing has to be such that the stall is able to attract visitors, involve and indulge them in the games, such that some of them must win to build expectations whereas most should not, in order to earn profit. For that, the most important information needed is the estimate of expected footfall in the mela. The organisers of such melas usually have estimates of the footfalls based on historical data, which might sometimes be exaggerated in order to attract stalls. It is a known fact that people come in families to these melas and hence ideally a stall must have sets of games that would attract the entire family – a ball throw game for kids, a hoopla for women and a dart board or something more challenging for the family head. The next important estimate is about the number of people actually expected to visit the stall. This would depend on the location of the stall in the mela, the number of similar stalls and also the size and attractiveness of the stall.
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Another very important step is to test these games well, because the pricing is very much dependent on the design of the game. While a little crowd or a small waiting line would help it is essential that a few people don’t lock the stall by winning continuously. For that it needs to be ensured that the largest return is not only the most difficult but also the riskiest. Also the game should not become too difficult so that no one is able to win. There should be a balance between the two. The pricing should cater to both the conservatives who would play safe and get very little returns and those willing to take risks.
Finally the success of the stall would depend on the flexibility inherent in the design of the games. The stalls usually last half a day, sometimes over a few days. Sometimes it also happens that a few games could be disastrous failures or some may attract too large a crowd to manage. The trick is to be aware of the current situation and have the possibility of changing the pricing making the games a bit riskier or easier depending on the circumstances. In some cases, it is necessary to stop a game or start another counter for a successful game.
Thus it is possible to follow a method to price these games in stalls and not depend on randomness and wait for things to happen. And this can be extrapolated to casinos and similar games in malls.
You can reach the author at pg10deepak_r@mandevian.com
Continued from Page 16 With close to a hundred soaps flooding the Indian market could the FMCG companies revisit the concept again? With their technical expertise HUL or P&G could come up with a product that would offer them a million dollar point of disparity in an already cluttered market. As men are more inclined to multitasking it would be a good idea to target them. They could position it similar to ‘Dial For Men’ and launch a campaign clearing all the doubts in the minds of the consumer about the product concept. They could drop the word soap from the advertisements so that the consumers don’t associate the product category with soap. It could also feature scientific jargon as to why this product would be an ideal fit for a consumer’s body and hair. At the retailer level they can arrange separate displays for this category, which would help them, attract eyeballs and differentiate the product. As it would be something new they could also charge a premium, as it would function as soap and a shampoo. Is there any company out there willing to take the jump?
The author is a PGP1 participant at IIM Indore. You can reach her at p11bvarum@iimidr.ac.in DECEMBER 2011
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Fresh on TV I am Mumbai Story Line: A new TVC for Mumbai Mirror portrays how the city newspaper has become the voice of the average Mumbai citizen (Mumbaikar). Based on four real stories broken by the newspaper in the recent past - the destruction of an author's works, the adulteration of milk, the abysmal conditions of an orphanage, and the "uglyfication" of the city by banners - the fictionalised depictions show the affected citizens taking to a loudspeaker (symbolically representing the Mumbai Mirror) to make their grievances heard.
Title Agency Date Duration
: VW Jetta 'Flyboy‘ : DDB India / Mudra Group : August 30, 2011 : 45 Seconds
Talking and Walking Fingers!
Title Agency Date Duration
Story Line: HTC Explorer, as the name suggests, is aimed at people who want to explore the world of smart phones for the first time. A smart phone is a step up from a handset that just does boring things like making calls and sending texts. The ad portrays a daily mundane activity of ‘texting’ in a very innovative manner. Who knew that just fingers could be so expressive! It is an exemplary way of showing the effectiveness of the touch screen and the ease of use for a newbie. The ‘Hinglish’ background score complements the concept perfectly. HTC, ‘Tere phone ko main waiting waiting, sweetypie’.
: The Best Ghana Cocoa : Ogilvy & Mather India : August 30, 2011 : 45 Seconds
War Controversy Story Line: StopNot Golz is the latest product form Perfetti’s stable. This advertisement talks about the consumer’s never ending love for the product. The ad shows a bullet passing through StopNot ‘killing it’. The consumer’s (soldier) fondness for the product is so high that he’s willing to sacrifice his life to have the product. The background score reinforces the belief that the consumer and StopNot Golz are inseparable. The advertisement ends with a catch tone, which showcases the four variants of the product. A good way to catch consumer eyeballs in an already cluttered product category. DECEMBER 2011
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Title Agency Date Duration MARK AVENUE
: Pizzas and much more : JWT, Delhi : August 06, 2011 : 30 Seconds
Mar‘Quiz’/Trivia 1) In which year was canned beer introduced?
Watch out what you put in Advertising: An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I saw the potato" (la papa). Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave," in Chinese.
2) Who was Little Oscar and what did he drive?
Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea.“ When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the U.S., with the beautiful baby on the label. Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the label of what's inside, since most people can't read English. 3) Who was Nike?
4) Where did the word "money" come from?
Marketing moral: If you are planning to market your products in another country or language, make sure you understand the cultural system and the language. DECEMBER 2011
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Mar ‘Quiz’ Answers 1. 2. 3. 4.
1933, in New Jersey. Little Oscar was a midget who was the spokesman for Oscar Mayer wieners. The Ronald McDonald of his day drove around in a wiener mobile and gave away wiener whistles. Nike was the ancient Greek goddess of victory. The Romans had a goddess, Juno Moneta, who was the goddess of warning. She warned the Romans of dangers. The Romans were so appreciative that they set up a mint in her temple. The name Moneta in the old French language was "moneie" which eventually became our word for money.
500
each
The best two articles will win a cash prize of
competition
Indian Institute of Management Indore