yehi hai the twitter nutrichoice baby?evp – marketing, maruti suzuki, tarun garg, says wryly,...
TRANSCRIPT
‘Health is wealth’ has never held true for health food brands in India. Can Nutrichoice buck the trend? By Amit Bapna
Health in snacking has always an anachro-nism; more so in bis-cuits. No elaborate research is needed to
conclude that it’s highly unlikely a consumer hankering for a bis-cuit will insist on a healthy op-tion. The category conversation in India has been glucose biscuits at one end and various forms of chocolate and creams at the other. Which explains why the healthy biscuit has been an area of indif-ferent focus for most big players.
Against this this backdrop, Britannia plans to make the youngest brand in its portfolio, Nutrichoice, healthier, both for consumer and company. Launched 10 years back, it oc-cupies a sizable 70% share of the fast-growing premium health biscuit category pegged at about
`1000 crore. The company has big-ger ambitions. Shares Ali Harris Shere, vice-president - marketing, Britannia, “While NutriChoice is only about 10% of our port-folio currently, its importance in Britannia’s overall portfolio is much more as it provides the thought-leadership in the health space.” The category has been see-ing heightened competition, with major players getting their act together: ITC launched Farmlite, Parle launched Simply Good and UK’s leading brand McVitie’s launched its digestives range.
Nutrichoice is trying to open up the category with new prod-ucts, accessible price points, and easier availability, shares Ali. The current range includes clas-sic Digestive, Digestive Zero, Diabetes Friendly Essentials, 5-Grain and most re-cently Oats Cookies – Orange & Milk etc. The category is challenged on multiple fronts. A not too satisfying expe-rience on taste and the premium price points have resulted in low adoptions rates. As per industry data, house-hold penetration is an abysmal 2% and retention at about 28%. One of the biggest disadvantages for the category is its processed-imagery
which works against the “kitchen-made” imagery that more nutri-tious and holistic choices, offer.
One may well ask, is having a health portfolio all that necessary since it is not the most profitable? Brand consultant Harish Bijoor explains it thus, “In the portfolio of food and beverage, three kinds of products are needed - yesterday’s winners (often not the healthiest options), today’s brand-climbers (also not necessarily the healthiest),
and tomorrow’s possi-bilities which is where health is positioned.” They may be a niche to-day in terms of volumes and constitute a strain on the profits but they are also insular brands of the future, he adds. Nutrichoice was backed by the belief that a spe-
cific consumer segment, although small, was beginning to emerge: that was conscious about healthy living and eating without wanting to give up the good things in life, adds Ali. Now the brand hopes to take it to the next level. The just launched in-tegrated brand-campaign ‘#power of a good choice’ aims to strengthen that belief and also urge consumers, struggling with motivation, to make healthy choices.
>Continued on Page4
INSIDEBE
India has many accomplishments it’s justifiably proud of, and others that, alas, exist only in the fictional uni-verse of WhatsApp forwards, where UNESCO hands out plaudits like ‘best national anthem’. But one dubious dis-tinction that we should all be working at getting rid of is the maximum num-ber of fatalities due to road accidents, anywhere in the world.
The first six months of this year saw
a reduction in road fatalities; down to 75,583 for January to July 2017 from 79,354 for the same period last year. In 2016, we had 150,785 people die in road accidents, which works out to around 413 people every day. Or four people ev-ery minute.
Unlike other statistics, there’s evidence of this everywhere one looks. The sort of driving that Hollywood chase sequences are made of, is pretty much the norm.
Every driver appears to have a death wish and sometimes this is evident in passengers too: note the kids sticking their heads out of sunroofs, in vehicles racing around, upwards of 60 kmph.
Pretty much every auto company worth its salt had road safety cam-paigns out last year. And this year, they’ve returned. Here’s what India’s largest passenger car companies have up their sleeves.
L a s t y e a r , M a r u t i S u z u k i l a u n c h e d #SafeRoadsWithMaruti: films that addressed every-thing from mobile phone use while driving to not wearing seatbelts. They were marked by deadpan humour — the film where drunks in a car, driving on the wrong side of the road, rail about the lack of lane discipline was a great ex-ample. Unlike most videos by Maruti Suzuki, it had
disappointing views. This year, Maruti Suzuki
has zeroed in on a single focus area — poor seat-belt use. It is attacking the problem with a mul-timedia campaign built around #PehniKya? The process started with a survey of 2,500 passenger vehicle users across 17 cit-ies. Discussing the results, EVP – marketing, Maruti Suzuki, Tarun Garg, says wryly, “The top reason for the lack of seatbelts was weak legal enforcement — 32%. 25% believed seat-belts kill their macho im-age. 20% didn’t wear them because their friends and families don’t and 23% be-lieved seatbelts are not a safety device.”
>Continued on Page4
Unlike many other car mak-ers, Hyundai’s road safety campaign began with pro-grams in schools and resi-dent welfare associations. Last year, it launched #BeTheBetterGuy with long serving brand ambas-sador Shah Rukh Khan doubling up as “safety a mbassador”wa r ni ng against speeding etc. This year SRK is back and has an arguably larger role: an omniscient narrator in a film that acknowledges that while being the bet-ter guy may not win you any popularity contests, it is nevertheless the right thing to do.
The new campaign takes on everything from speed-ing to underage driving. Accordi ng to P u ne et
Anand, senior general manager and group head – marketing, HMIL, “The key difference is while last year, the ads focused on people who needed to become ‘the better guy’, this year it is about peo-ple who’ve changed for the better.” Even if those a rou nd t hem a re u n-changed, and sometimes openly mocking.
>Continued on Page4
Everything from celeb firepower to emotional appeals are being deployed to get Indians to drive safely. How well are the auto majors driving home the point?
By Ravi Balakrishnan
TIGER ZINDA HAI
the twitter index
On 3
On 2
Tiger Balm’s revival story
Vistara’s premium economy play
#Throwback
TASTE & PRE-MIUM PRICE POINTS HAVE RESULTED IN LOW ADOP-TION RATE
While NutriChoice is only about 10% of our portfolio currently, its impor-tance in Britannia’s overall portfolio is much more as it provides the thought-leadership in the health space.Ali Harris Shere, VP, Marketing, Britannia
CAN ADVERTISING MAKEINDIAN ROADS SAFE?
#PehniKya by Maruti Suzuki #BeTheBetterGuy from Hyundai
25% OF PEOPLE SURVEYED BY MARUTI SUZUKI FEEL SEATBELTS DENT THEIR MACHO IMAGE
BEING THE BET-TER GUY MAY NOT MAKE YOU POPU-LAR, BUT IT’S STILL THE RIGHT THING TO DO, SAYS HYUNDAI
BY RAJIV SINGH |
DELHI
It was the third quarterof the last year. Samsung, India’s largest handset maker, was sitting pretty with 22.6% of smartphone market share. Xiaomi, at the same time, was lan-guishing at 6.4%. Any talks, even in wildest dreams, of the Chinese phone maker toppling the South Korean giant from the top pedestal would have sounded ridiculous.
Cut to the third quarter of this year. Xiaomi leapfrogged to 22% and Samsung has stagnated at 23% between July and September, according to market research firm Counterpoint Research. If the gap between David and Goliath was a meagre 1%, the lat-est report by IDC has fast-tracked the race to the top. With 23.5% each, Xiaomi has joined Samsung as top smartphone brand.
The remotest, in fact faintest, possibility of an upstart overtaking the leader now looks a distinct reality.
Given Xiaomi’s growth trajectory — its smart-phone share has grown over 300% YoY — it is highly probable that Xiaomi become a market leader, reckons Hanish Bhatia, senior analyst, Devices and Analytics at Counterpoint. Though Samsung still en-joys the widest distribution network in India, entry of new players have lured us-
ers into trying spec-heavy alternative devices with a strong value for money proposition. The major concern for Samsung, lets on Bhatia, is that it is not growing with the same pace as the market. A larg-er chunk of replacement demand in mid-segment is captured by players like Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo and others.
Xiaomi’s online-offline hybrid model, reckon mar-
keting experts, has worked wonders for the brand. While traditional players like Samsung kept guarding their offline turf, Xiaomi fo-cused on online and made it big. “Its big offline push now is ably supported by online reach,” says Ashita Aggarwal, head of mar-keting at SP Jain Institute of Management and Research. “Xiaomi is the new Samsung,” she adds.
Well, the jury is still out. The Q4 numbers will de-cide the winner.
Can Xiaomi Topple Samsung?
Samsung Xiaomi
24.0%
22.6%
Smartphone Market Share
24.1%
23.5%
23.5%
26.0%
6.4%
9.0%
13.0%
15.5%
Q3 2016
Q4 2016
Q1 2017
Q2 2017
Q3 2017
Source: Counterpoint and IDC (*)
*
The Chinese handset player comes menacingly close to dethrone the South Korean giant from
the smartphone ranking
‘ALL I WANT IS A (LEG) ROOM SOMEWHERE’
Nutrichoice Baby?Yehi Hai
TRYST WITH DESTINY
NAMASTE LONDON
THEXFACTOR
How two London-based brands are putting their mark on India
Kopal Naithani takes us through the
struggles of a womandirector
SRK on being the better guy
On 4
Vineet Sodhani
THE ATTACK OF THE CLONES
By Invitation
THE ECONOMIC TIMES NOVEMBER 22-28, 2017
CCI NG 3.7 Product: ETMumbaiBS PubDate: 22-11-2017 Zone: BrandEquity Edition: 1 Page: BEFP User: sandeep.dutta Time: 11-18-2017 00:57 Color: CMYK
Breaking News...
PRESENTING THE BRAND ENGAGEMENT INDEX
AS ON NOVEMBER 15, 2017
The weekly Twitter Advertiser Index lists
the brands which have generated most
engagement with users on the platform
The index looks at the live list of all advertisers on the plat-form and measures the total number of user engagements with all the tweets that they sent out that week - specifi-
cally this is a sum of all the re-plies, retweets and favourites across all tweets that week.
1) @oppomobileindiaOn the First Day Sale Event of the #OPPOF5, @oppomobileindia urged its followers to retweet their tweet from their account to stand a chance to win the new OPPO F5 mobile phone. The brand made use of live broadcast to show fans who joined on Twitter the crowds lining up at stores to purchase or have a feel of the smart-phone that #CaptureTheRealYou. Bollywood actor and the brand ambassador Sidharth Malhotra was also present.
2) @HeroMotoCorp@HeroMotoCorp launched the newest #Hero #XPulse adventure bike at the 2017 EICMA Motorcycle Show in Milan, Italy and also released a video ad on Twitter to showcase the two-wheeled vehicle in an adventure. Showing that the motorcycle can endure different terrains, the handle displayed the #Xpulse to be an ideal vehicle for those who love adven-ture and nature.
3) @motorolaindiaAs a run-up to launch its latest smartphone #MotoX4, @motorolaindia posted multiple tweets to promote the phone including vid-eos featuring popular figures giving a review about the phone’s special functions etc. As fans got excited and started anticipating the launch, the brand also posted a tweet that encouraged followers to retweet or like the tweet in order to receive updates about the phone and its launch.
4) @HiHonorIndiaPrior to launching its newest smart-phone, @HiHonorIndia teased its fans with some tweet-hints to make them think and guess what the #NewHonorPhone would look like. The hints included a gif that showed the change in displays of Honor phones over the past two decades.
5) @TataSkyIt was Indian national cricket captain Virat Kohli’s birthday and @TataSky celebrated it by posting a tweet dedicated to him with the hashtag #HappyBirthdayVirat. The tweet asked the followers to share their favorite moments of the cricketer and add their wishes by leaving a comment that would make its way to the #wishbox.
BY RAJIV SINGH | DELHI
For any fledgling airline, especially a full-service one, there are two ways to f ly into the minds of the consum-ers. First is to take the easiest route: go ‘cheap’ or ‘cheapest’ by positioning oneself as a price warrior. Second is to shun the herd and focus on premium-ness. Vistara wanted the best of both and came up with a hybrid, ‘premium economy,’ to stand out in a cluttered market.
“It is a myth that people go only for the lowest fares,” avers Sanjiv Kapoor, chief strategy and commercial officer of Vistara, a joint venture between the Tata group and Singapore Airlines that made its debut in January 2015. Flyers, lets on Kapoor, see value for money and appre-ciate innovation. In spite of the fact that the fares of premium economy class is `1,000-`3,000 more than economy fares, Kapoor claims f lyers have been floored by the experiment: 20% extra leg room, prior-ity check-in and boarding, more meal choices and 20kg check-in baggage al-lowance.
“Some call it our best-kept secret,” grins Kapoor, adding that the load in this class has been steadily increasing. “It is hitting a sweet spot for a segment of customers,” he says, explaining the trigger for creating such a hybrid seg-ment. There was a need to seg-ment the customer base and offer them more tailored choices.
The gap between econ-omy and business class, Kapoor reckons, is quite wide, and premium econo-my bridges that gap. An en-dorsement of its growing appeal is the fact that many companies have amended their travel policies only to add Vistara’s Premium Economy as a new class of travel. Sectors which have tradition-ally been hubs for major commercial and tour-ism activities such as Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Pune and Goa have seen an up-surge in the demand for premium econo-my, he adds.
Vistara’s pre -mium economy
move, reckon marketing experts, is a smart play that tries to make most of the rising aspirations of consum-ers. “Indian consumers are one of the most aspirational in the world,” says Ashita Aggarwal, head of marketing at SP Jain Institute of Management and Research. There are millions of flyers who wish to travel business class but have a ‘value for money’ mindset or are not able to afford this premium seg-ment. Vistara, she avers, has spread wide its catchment area by appealing to this segment of the population which has an increasing disposable income. “Premium economy could well turn out to be the game changer for Vistara which is trying to get a firm foothold in the aviation market,” she adds.
What premium economy also does is to encash on the eq-uity built by low-cost airlines such as Indigo and GoAir. Flyers, points out Aggarwal, who have used these budget airlines are easy target for an up-grade. “Having Deepika Padukone as brand am-bassador adds to its as-pirational quotient,” she adds. Aggarwal, however, quickly points out the flip side of Vistara’s strat-egy: lack of awareness and communicating clear val-ue proposition. “Will it be ‘more’ in terms of service or comfort,” she asks. To a large segment of flyers, who are not so well versed with the premium econo-my concept, this may be
the only challenge. Kapoor, for his part, con-cedes a lot needs to be done to push the demand. The challenge, he believes, lies in the uniqueness of the product. “It’s new for India, and several agents and online trav-el aggregators (OTAs) were not configured to sell this class,” he says. However, word of mouth has been a big factor in mak-
ing the segment popular and the new campaign is likely to get more eyeballs and foot-
falls.Padukone definitely en-
sures more eyeballs. But will that translate into more fly-
ers picking Vistara for extra leg-room and other frills
like a half decent, hot meal at 15,000 ft?
‘All I want is a (leg) room somewhere’
BY RAVI BALAKRISHNAN MUMBAI
Probably one of Singapore’s most unique tourist attractions is one that’s relatively seldom visited, losing out to its more contem-porary draws like shopping, the zoo, the aquarium and Universal Studios. But for Indian visitors in the 70s and 80s, no trip to the island city was complete without a visit to Haw Par Villa.
The highlight is sculptures that depict scenes from the Chinese epic saga Journey To The West and the tableaux from The Ten Courts of Hell: a nightmarish depic-tion of the after-life horrors that await thieves, liars and those who disrespect their elders, among others. These days, the displays are considered not for the faint of
heart and several reviewers in Trip Advisor whine about it being “un-suitable for children.”
Which would, no doubt, shock Aw Boon Haw and Aw Boon Par, the Burmese brothers who founded
Tiger Balm and who created Haw Par Villa aka Tiger Balm gardens, as a site for moral instruction. You could, if you are so minded, view this as proto-branded content.
While a lot is made of how clean
and anti-septic Singapore is, Haw Par Villa is quite possibly, the city at its most bizarre, a glimpse into the dodgy, outré aspects of its not-so-distant past.
THIN
KST
OCK
the twitterindex
In a first for any full-service carrier, Vistara is set to launch a campaign for premium economy class. Will the gambit pay off?
PREMIUM ECONOMY NOT ONLY PLUGS THE HUGE GAP BETWEEN ECONOMY AND BUSI-NESS CLASS, IT ALSO TARGETS VALUE-FOR-MONEY FLYERS LOOKING FOR AN UPGRADE
Tiger Zinda HaiLost in the wilderness for decades, Tiger Balm is trying to stage a comeback. By Rajiv Singh
In 2010, when Munni made Zandu balm a household name, Tiger was some-where lurking in the dark-ness. The pain-relieving balm from Singapore, which entered India in
1993 via a partnership with Elder Pharma, was, like its namesake, something of an endangered species.
Fast forward to 2017. Tiger, 24 now, is still lost in the wild, is yet to roar and the game almost looks over for a global brand that could have eas-ily preyed on Munni and her ilk had it been allowed to retain its animal instinct. Enter Alkem, the fifth-largest pharma company in India by sales, with its new mission: Save the Tiger.
“ T i g e r z i n d a h a i ,” grins Mukesh Tiwary, senior vice-president of Alkem that tied up with Singapore-based Haw Par early this year to exclusively market, sell and distribute the balm in India. “Tiger will get back its loud roar as we plan to make it `200-crore brand by 2020,” thun-ders Tiwary. The balm, he lets on, has a huge latent brand equity. “One just needs to mar-ket it aggressively,” he adds.
After spending over two decade of low-profile exis-tence, which al-
most pushed the brand off the radar of consumer choice, Alkem is try-ing to give a new lease of life to Tiger which failed to make it big even with its second partner CavinKare. It has rolled out a new television cam-
paign for the balm and lined up ag-gressive below-the-line (BTL) and above-the-line (ATL) activities to push the brand, which was, by and large, confined to a few thousand stores in urban India.
“We will grab the eyeballs and market share as well,” asserts Tiwary, adding that the brand has a presence in over 100 countries.
Can Tiger Balm be third-time lucky? Can it take on the might of Z a ndu a nd A m r ut a nja n? Marketing experts reckon so.
Tiger Balm, contends brand strategist Harish Bijoor, is a global brand in the balm space. Its rise to fame is regional and its till on the the shopping list of any traveller to Malaysia, Singapore and all of South East Asia. “Anyone who has tried Tiger Balm swears by its ef-ficacy,” he says. While conceding that Tiger’s foray in India was ten-
tative and not firm footed, Bijoor maintains that mastering the dis-tribution game can put the brand back on track.
Advertising, reckons Bijoor, will help in recreating the image of Tiger Balm and revive its latest brand recall. “But that’s just a part of the game,” he says. Completing the dis-tribution loop will decide its success in a country where Amrutanjan, Zandu, and possibly fifty others have ruled the local roost. If you are a South Indian, Bijoor reckons, you trust Amrutanjan, and if you come from the north, you swear by Zandu. “This north of the Vindhyas and south of the Vindhyas divide has ruled the balm market,” he says. Tiger has the potential to lord over both regions. “Tiger needs to be the ubiquitous rat in every store and ev-ery home,” he says.
Tejprakash Mishra, general manager - marketing and sales, at Alkem avers that the company has been trying to crack the distribu-tion puzzle. With an extensive sales, marketing and distribution com-prising over 6,500 medical represen-tatives, 7,000 stockists and 40 sales depots and warehouses, Alkem will leave no stone unturned to expand the reach of two variants of the balm: red for body ache and white for headache. “Absence at chemist stores was its biggest weakness. We will plug it,” says Mishra. Tiger, he lets on, doesn’t need a brand ambas-sador or Munni. “Tiger knows to survive,” he says.
But what the doctor has ordered for Tiger is not just survival but also expanding its pugmark. Alkem, for now, seems to be on the mark.
CAN TIGER BALM BE THIRD-TIME LUCKY?
CAN IT TAKE ON THE MIGHT OF ZANDU AND
AMRUTANJAN?
IT JUST MIGHT HAVE A CHANCE IF IT CRACKS THE
DISTRIBUTION PUZZLE
“I don’t want India to be an economic superpower. I want India to be a happy country.” - JRD Tata
Tiger now needs to be the
ubiquitous rat in every store and every home
Harish Bijoor, Brand Strategist
Tiger zinda hai…
it will get back its loud roar as we plan
to make it ̀ 200-crore brand by 2020
Mukesh Tiwary, Sr VP, Alkem
Say ‘Hell’-O to Tiger Balm Gardens
PH
OTO
S: R
AV
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ALA
KR
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MADE FOR INDIA 22THE ECONOMIC TIMES NOVEMBER 22-28, 2017
CCI NG 3.7 Product: ETMumbaiBS PubDate: 22-11-2017 Zone: BrandEquity Edition: 1 Page: BEPER1 User: sandeep.dutta Time: 11-18-2017 00:57 Color: CMYK
BY SHEPHALI BHATT | MUMBAI
During a short break in our conversation with Kopal Naithani, director and founder of Superfly Films, we look around her cabin and find seven books neatly stacked against the wall. Six of those are on feminism. She is planning to start reading classes for the team. “We realised that if we’re go-ing to talk about having a society free of gender discrimination, we need to educate ourselves too,” she tells us.
Naithani comes from a family with no artistic inclination. She, however, always had a knack for Performing Arts. “In college, everyone want-ed to do an MBA. I thought it was a good way to travel abroad until my parents said they’re not funding this plan. As an afterthought, I also fig-ured it didn’t make sense since I was graduat-ing in English literature,” she recalls. A film appreciation course post-college brought her closer to her actual ambition: becoming a di-rector. Shortly after, she reached out to Nagesh Kukunoor and landed a job as a costume AD (as-sistant director) on Bollywood Calling (released in 2001). After that assignment, she found that Red Ice (a Delhi-based production house) was looking for a costume AD. While Naithani was not keen on the job, Red Ice was among the three major production houses in Delhi. When Red Ice’s Shoojit Sircar moved to Mumbai to start Rising Sun Films (2007), Naithani (and many others from the team) tagged along. It was here that she started her journey as a director. Last year, she setup her own production house in Mumbai’s suburban area.
While now a known face, Naithani recalls mo-ments of naivety from the time she just started off: “On one of my first ads, I was told we need a product shot. I assumed we will now use the product to show the results. Everyone stared at me. I plainly asked, “Aren’t we claiming this is what the product does?” They started laughing while I kept wondering what was so funny.” Now she knows better.
Naithani has also learned a few things along the way. She says, “As a girl in this industry, you have to toughen up. You have to be on par with men, physically and mentally, to the best of your abilities.” That said, she admits she was a soft girl to start with. “When I was an AD, the crew wouldn’t take me seriously.” There was a shoot where the director left in a huff since the man in charge of creating artificial rain goofed up, leav-ing puddles on the floor before the shoot began. Naithani took charge, wiping the floor, while ev-eryone else stood around watching. Finally, an embarrassed spot boy offered to help. The episode
taught her being nice doesn’t cut it. “When you’re a first AD or a director, you have to command a set,” she says. And everyone judges you on that. Come across as too nice and you could be deemed a pushover. Too aggressive and they brand you a ‘diva’. “It’s tough to keep a balance,” she adds.
Naithani feels a director in this industry strug-gles irrespective of gender. But the fact is that it is tougher for women. And it’s not down to lack of talent. It is the tendency to keep them a rung from the top because of the perception that they are bet-ter multi-taskers. “Women are considered good ADs, good producers, great marketers as well.
But a woman director? That’s more of a position in command. Women running their own production houses, even rarer.” It’s the transition from an AD to a full-fledged director that is tougher, she feels.
As she grows into the role of producer, she plans to give more women directors a chance. She recently shot with an all-women team (art, AD, agency folk) and claims she had a blast. “We put out a good film and had a fabulous time - put-ting all the notions about ‘women not being able to work with each other’ to rest.”
That doesn’t mean she is gender-biased, she clarifies. “I take people who can complement my
work. If you start looking at them as their gen-der, you’re no different from what you’re trying to change. I have been on shoots where majority crew members were men, and had an equally good working experience.” Naithani is certain the change will come not by talking about it but by doing great work. “You have to make your work so good that they have to notice you. That’s what I believe in. I’m not a person who’ll make an angry agenda out of anything,” she concludes.
What pestered Aashish Poojari till early this year was a simple ques-tion: when would India
come out of the Stone Age? What the gritty first-generation entrepreneur in Mumbai alluded to was not stone-faced politicians or incessant call drops in the age of 4G but use of stone for interior designing and flooring.
Furniture, paints, fabrics, artefacts, re ckon s Pooja r i , somehow managed to enter into the homes of discerning Indian consumers a long time back. Marble, ceramic tiles and mo-saic have ruled the roost for decades. But what was conspicu-ously missing was wood. Things, how-ever, have been changing over the last few years. “India is now ready to say RIP to stone,” says Poojari, who brought London-based wooden floor-ing brand Havwoods in India a few months back.
What has brought about a change in the mindset of Indian consumers, Poojari reckons, is global exposure.
As Indians increasingly travel abroad, especially Europe, they get
enchanted with exquisite wooden interiors and floorings. What also helped in seeding a taste for wood is a gradual realisation that what was peddled to Indians over the last few years in the name of ‘wood’ was noth-ing but ‘laminate.’ With consumer tastes evolving and a steep rise in disposable income, India might well be at an inflexion point in terms of
adoption of wooden floor-ing. “Urban India is ready to be floored with wooden flooring,” says the director of Havwoods India.
But can the reach of wood-en flooring be expanded in a country where the market is largely unorganised and the nuances of spotting a difference between various kinds of real and artificial wood is still at an elementa-ry stage? Poojari dismisses
all such apprehensions. What gives him confidence is a renewed inter-est in wood by Indian designers. Inferior quality wood, wrongly sourced and inefficiently installed, proved to be the bane of the industry. “It weaned away designers and con-sumers from wooden flooring,” he confesses. Poojari, however, is quick to add that wood is back in reckon-ing. The wooden flooring indus-try, he lets on, would explode like the smartphone boom in India.
Will Poojari succeed? Well, he’s certainly leaving no stone unturned.
For a foreign fast-fashion womens-wear brand, five years seems to be a decent time to get a firm foot-ing. But Malini Singhal, direc-
tor of London-based brand Zink London that made its India debut in 2012 with two stores, was not happy with the scale of growth: present across 75 cities and 300 shop-in-shops. Singhal knew something was not in sync with the brand that had so far bet big on an omni-channel approach. The answer, she discovered, was exclusive brand outlets (EBOs).
“Zink is set to open EBOs in an aggressive way in India,” she says, adding that by 2020
the brand plans to open 50 EBOs and 500 point of sale across multi-brand outlets in the country. “Exclusive stuff from an as-pirational brand needs an exclusive mode of showcasing,” she says, explaining her
move to step up Zink’s presence in India. With over 50% of India’s population under 35, Singhal reckons the timing to scale up presence in India is perfect. “The brand must now realise its potential,” she adds.
Singhal is confident Zink can take on the likes Myntra and Jabong. A combination of unique designs, colours, sourcing and competent logistics are some of the ways in which the brand has an edge over rivals, she claims. Dependence on a well-oiled sourcing team that gets regular stock from suppliers in Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Bangladesh and China takes care of the concern to match the quality of
product with global standards.The biggest challenge for the brand, reck-
ons Ashita Aggarwal, head of marketing at SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, is not expanding at a brisk pace but getting top of the mind brand recall. In a country, she adds, where every brand tries to ape global counterparts, Zink has a tough task to capture mindshare. “A for-eign tag is no longer a guarantee of success in India. Zink badly needs a differentia-tor,” she adds.
Singhal, for her part, believes that the brand’s moment of reckoning has come. “Our uniqueness and freshness makes us stand out in this cluttered market,” adds Singhal, as she gets on with the task of find-
ing mojo for Zink in India. [email protected]
HAVWOODS HOPES TO WEAN INDI-ANS AWAY FROM STONE FLOORING TO WOOD
“I’m not a person who’ll make an angry agenda out of anything”
THEXFACTORKopal Naithani takes us through the struggles of a woman transitioning from AD to a full-time director in our series on women directors in the Indian ad biz
Campaign shot of Nicotex’s ad for Nicotine gum (2016). Agency: Soho Square
KOPAL NAITHANI PICKS HER TOP THREE FROM SUPERFLY’S ONE-YEAR-YOUNG PORTFOLIO
Kopal Naithani on the set of Boroplus Perfect Touch ad’s shoot (the one featuring Kangana Ranaut), standing behind Ranaut’s double in this frame. Agency: Rediffusion Y&R
Campaign shot of Carat Lane’s Diwali TVC (2017). Agency: Lowe Lintas
Campaign shot of Combiflam’s latest ad. Agency: Publicis India
Please read the full story online at etbrandequity.com
GLOCAL BUZZ 3
Namaste LondonTryst with Destiny
The only time we’ve seen liv-ing global
leaders in ad-vertisements is when Benetton photoshopped them mid-smooch or in their pre-White House days, selling Trump steaks. Naturally, United Colours of Benetton trig-gered a Category 5 storm when it released ‘Unhate’ featuring demo-crats and dicta-tors, Presidents and Popes, kissing. One would think deceased world leaders have it better, considering they are unlikely to get shamed for kissing or being kissed. But that’s what happened last week, when a photo collage of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru with various women, including his sister, the diplo-mat Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit and Lady Edwina Mountbatten, did the rounds on social media, evoking strong reactions. Some chose to use the pic-tures as a reflection of the former PM’s morals, and called for Children’s Day to be moved from Nehru’s birth day. Back in the day, though, the only posters he appeared were of the political kind and, occasion-ally, in ads for Chicago Telephone & Radio, like this one from The Times of
India, January, 1950. The chief supplier of microphones to leaders of India’s freedom move-ment. We wonder
if they had to publish retractions for “unau-
thorised use of the PM’s image” like so many brands have to do nowadays.
THROWBACK
Zink London Trying to be in sync
IN ANOTHER WORLD THE CAP-TION FOR THIS PICTURE COULD HAVE JUST AS EASILY BEEN ‘NEH-RU SERENADING A MICROPHONE’. GLAD WE DON’T LIVE THERE
HavwoodsLovely, dark and
deep…
Benetton’s Unhate
campaign Malini Singhal
Aashish Poojari
How two London-based brands are trying to perfect their India game plan. By Rajiv Singh
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“Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.” - Charlie Chapli
3THE ECONOMIC TIMES NOVEMBER 22-28, 2017
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Pushing health is also a good choice for Britannia. Companies and brands have to constantly make them-selves future-ready or risk obsolescence. The aerated beverage category is still reeling under the sudden advent of health and anti-sugar consumer sentiment. Nokia discovered this when it found it was a single SIM phone in a dual SIM market, and Colgate and many other legacy toothpaste players have suddenly discovered Ayurveda only after Dant Kanti created a dent. As per Ajay Kelkar, co-founder, Hansa Cequity (ex-Britan-nia) “Most new product sto-ries in health and wellness come from smaller, more entrepreneurial companies looking at where food cul-ture is headed, not where it is right now.” Time then, for companies to not be myopic.
Health may be a badge val-ue category today but it is a must-have in every portfolio argues Mithun Appaiah, CEO of Bengaluru head-
quartered Innovative Foods. The ex-Britannia marketer believes Britannia needs to be the thought-leader to drive stronger associations with health which are more disruptive in nature.
But are brands trying hard enough? According to Sudarshan Gangrade, co-founder of fitness start-up LeanScience and ex-CMO, Ola, often brands ride on ex-isting product or diet-trends that have been proven to be
unhealthy; but repackage them in a seemingly health-ier avatar. He argues, “Most products contain processed sugar, processed wheat flour, artificial sweeteners and more! You may add some oats/ragi to it, but that doesn’t take away the fact that 50% of the product is harmful or most available fruit juices have insane amounts of sugar.” A true test of a hardworking brand is one that leverages R&D strength, to fund and further research and build products that are genuinely healthy, while being tasty and yet appealing to masses. This would help bridge the divide between the healthy Threptin and the sinful taste of Pure Magic. Can Nutrichoice build the biscuit that will make this mid-way path?
Spatial Access Vineet Sodhani on why you should be even more worried than you are about bots in the digital ad ecosystem
The digital ecosystem is plagued with ad fraud and it is not slowing down. The two major types of fraud are domain spoofing and
bot traffic. Within these two alone, there are up to 60 different known implementations. Domain spoofing is unauthorised use of a third-party domain name in an e-mail message in order to pretend to be someone else. And bots, in this context, re-fer to software applications run by malicious organisations, designed to increase the page views/engage-ment of an advertising campaign. Why malicious? Because while the client assumes he is paying for hu-man prospects, in reality these are machine led applications behaving like humans.
Mu lt iple s t ud ie s f r om I A S (Integral Ad Science), Tune Mobile, DoubleVerify and the like, indicate that the extent of wastage from bots can be as high as 30%. Some of the readers may know that this invest-ment has a zero ROI but did you know it can even lead to the ROI being negative? The implication of driving a bot initiated click does not end with just media cost but it distorts website analytics data. That’s right. Your interpretation of audience insights such as their ge-
ography, age and interests are now all skewed. A wrong interpretation from site analytics leads to wrong audience identification which fur-ther leads advertisers to target the wrong audience.
We observed this in a recent proj-ect, where we realised the client was targeting the wrong audience as there was a drastic change in the demographic breakup after we blocked bot traffic. The revised plan not only improved the planning ef-ficiency by 15% as a result of lower eCPC (effective Cost per Click) but also demonstrated a 14% lower bounce rate. And this does not even account for direct savings of 18% due to reduced bandwidth and serv-er load. The bot analyser, powered by artificial intelligence, is now a resident tool on the client’s website which continuously updates itself with globally discovered bots on a real-time self-learning mode.
However, as the tracking mechanisms begin to get smarter, so do the bots. More sophisti-cated bots can imitate humans to scroll on the website or even do a spam form fill. At first, it might sound intimidating to
tackle such a huge technological problem, but with efficient tracking mechanisms, it can be mitigated.
The following tips can help counter bot traffic: Accredited tools can be employed to ensure media is bought only on transparent platforms with pre-set KPIs and appropriate clauses for payment. Direct bot traffic can be controlled by deploying effective bot detection and protection techniques which provide for cleaner analytics data for more effective insights. You are better off being overly cautious while investing in programmatic platforms which have comparatively higher instance of ad frauds than di-rect buys across advertising formats. Implement transparent program-matic planning and buying where all details are available for inspec-tion. (Often agencies and DSPs/SSPs (Demand/Supply Side Platforms) will make clients believe it’s a black box, but it isn’t). Build and manage a whitelist (trusted sites) - Since most humans sleep during the night, bot percentages are high between 11PM-5AM; avoid these hours.
While one can’t completely get away from bots, existing solutions can re-duce wastage by up to 85%, as per a recent IAS study. That is encourag-ing enough to start, I would reckon.
The author is CEO of Spatial Access and has previously co-au-thored Guide to Indian Markets.
Views expressed are personal.
Continued from Page 1 >>
Yehi Hai Nutrichoice Baby?
COMPANIES & BRANDS HAVE TO MAKE THEM-SELVES FUTURE-READY OR RISK OBSOLESCENCE
BAWDY COPYBrand Equity takes a look at all the who’s who and what’s what of all that is Bawdy in the industry
This FMCG company is going through a major consolidation of its digital and media mandate and the buzz in Gurugram circles is whether the incumbent agency would be able to retain the multi-crore account, also its biggest chunk of business. Our moles tell us that the final race is between three agencies. Of course, the incumbent is doing whatever it needs to save the account from going out of the kitty since the loss of this plum business could cost the agency and some of its senior management dear. Of the other two, while one is an obvious choice - the behemoth of the industry and a pro at fielding such mega pitches and win-ning quite a few, it is the third agency which may emerge as the dark horse in the race to the finish. The latter with an extremely hard-working head honcho has retained and won some plum accounts in the past. May the best man or woman win.
BY INVITATION
The Attack of The Clones
BOTS CAN LEAD TO NOT JUST ZERO ROI BUT NEGATIVE ROI, GIVEN THAT THEY DISTORT WEBSITE ANALYTICS DATA, AN IMPORTANT BUILDING BLOCK FOR MARKETING
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Over the past year, you may have noticed more and more smartphones sporting one increasingly ubiquitous acces-sory: a colorful, rubbery knob attached smack dab in the center of their backs.Turns out, the knob has a name. It’s called a PopSocket,
and for the past year, it’s been taking the smartphone ac-cessory market by storm, with the trend even catching on with celebrities.The craze has spread, it seems, because of the gadget’s infinite usefulness: its collapsible, accordion-style stem serves as one-part grip, one-part phone stand, and one-part headphone wrap. This allows users to easily shoot off one-handed texts, while also ensuring that you’ll never accidentally drop your phone mid-call ever again. Check out Amazon’s list of best-selling smartphone ac-
cessories, and you’ll find PopSockets listed as their fourth most popular item. This year alone, the company has sold 25 million gadgets and they plan on selling an additional 5 million more before Christmas.In 2014, PopSockets were sold exclusively online out of
the garage of their inventor, David Barnett, who first cre-ated the accessory as a way to keep his headphones from tangling. Now,the gadget is sold in over 40 countries and the company has plans for further expansion.
Source: Business Insider
Maruti Suzuki’s Tarun Garg says, “Some people even said, “I don’t use seatbelts because my clothes will get wrinkled!””
Maruti Suzuki believes that in lockstep with government ini-tiatives and modifying its cars to meet safety standards, there’s also a need to educate the masses. Especially in a country where seatbelt use is as low as 25%. Says Garg, “Seatbelts are a primary restraint system. Wearing them reduces fatalities by 45% to 50% and minor injuries up to 75%.”
And so #PehniKya? a multime-dia campaign. Radio, the most rel-evant medium to reach people on the road, is being extensively de-
ployed. However, Maruti Suzuki’s first salvo is a rather strange film where a young lad named Bunty keeps sabotaging his father’s ride every morning, cramming a ball into the exhaust, punctur-ing tyres etc. On being questioned by his irate parent, Bunty claims he’s acting out because he’s wor-ried since pa refuses to wear a seatbelt. In a less enlightened era, Bunty’s seat would have been in-troduced to a belt of an entirely different variety.
But if enough people resonate with his antics to ask PehniKya? every time they get in a car, mis-sion accomplished.
Maruti Suzuki acknowledges this is an issue that’s not going to be resolved with one campaign, and intends various phases the first of which will go on for three months from now.
However, also deserving of acknowledgment is the prime reason of accidents. Garg says, “Accidents happen for a number of reasons. But the root cause is lack of proper driving training.” Something that no campaign, however clever, or well-meaning can fix.
Hyundai’s campaign will play out on a larger canvas this year — the films are moving to cinema and screens from being purely digital. Hyundai also plans mall activa-tions across five metros with in-novative games driving home the road safety message.
According to Anand, more car manufacturers coming on board with such messages is only a good thing: “No one can boast saying ‘this is my platform to take’. Life is affected not by one corporate film but by many different companies coming forward.”
Analysing the ef-forts by both Maruti a n d H y u n d a i , Karthik Srinivasan, c o u n t r y h e a d , Social@Ogilvy, who makes frequent updates about traffic related travails on social me-dia believes advertising in the category has a long way to go. He cites the example of Speed Camera Lottery, an initiative in Sweden where drivers who were under or at the speed limit were eligible to win a lottery, the mon-
ey for which came from drivers who’d been fined for speeding. He says, “Speeding and not wearing seatbelts are socially acceptable in India. Maybe a more focused approach will work better than emotion: for instance, statis-tics on what could happen if you don’t wear a seatbelt. We are also ripe for the gamification of road safety.” Another suggestion he
has is that the onus shift from car man-ufacturers to insur-ance companies: with those given to speeding or other ir-responsible behav-iour being charged higher premiums.
While advertising is frequently accused of getting people to buy things they don’t
need, the harder task for it will be to get them to shift from behav-iours they don’t want to change. What’s clear is that whatever ap-proach the auto makers choose - be it more advertising, or an ac-tivation driven route - auto safety campaigns have a long, hard road ahead of them.
Did you hear anything after the first edition of Be The Better Guy? On how people’s behaviour had changed?I believe you cannot change behaviour with just one drive. I think the drive is marvellous and the new one carries it a step fur-ther. This is one of the reactions we did get: ‘What the hell? Why be the better guy when everyone else is like this?’ Which is why
the campaign has been turned around to say ‘Maybe nobody appreciates it and you don’t get the results that you want, but it’s still alright to be the better guy.’ A message like this will never change people, but even if it occurs to you, I think we’ve made a dif-ference. People including myself realise, ‘It’s just a belt; why not put it on?’
The last time we spoke, you said you are going to start to belt up. Does that continue in the front and the backseat?In the backseat, not yet. (Laughs) But in the front seat, sure. Whether I’m driving or not. I also don’t speak on the phone when I drive: that’s a rule in my house. No one is to speak on the phone while driving or send an SMS, however urgent.
It can’t be more urgent than your life. I’m sure the cam-
paign has made small differences (like this) but that’s a big thing.
For the complete inter-view, please visit etbrand-
equity.com
#PehniKya by Maruti Suzuki
On the sidelines of his shoot for Be The Better Guy (the sequel) we caught Shah Rukh Khan in a candid mood
‘Why Be The Better Guy’is a reaction we got
#BeTheBetterGuy from Hyundai
CAN ROAD SAFETY MES-SAGES SUCCEED IF DRIVERS ARE RELUCTANT TO CHANGE THEIR BEHAVIOUR?
A Healthy Pitch?
Spacing it out or spaced out?
Cannes Innovation Roadshow
This one is as bizarre as it gets, and our moles tell us it is all true. This network group has been going through its upheaval for a while now, partially as an outcome of a major global structural realignment and rest of it owing to the local leadership change and its ripple ef-fects. Here is one of the ripples brought to our notice. We hear that a really senior gent at the group who had been anyways been accorded a statesman status in the new structure over the past few months, has now been asked to vacate his office and stay home. This frees up some expensive office space which is to be put to some other use, as per plan. Of course, he’ll be paid a salary for some time at least. That is not all. In the same network, another very senior creative resource has been moved to a much smaller cabin - al-most half his previous cabin size, our moles tell us - for reasons unknown. Cutting the office space to size? Or cutting the office bearers to size? Take your pick.
A first-ever initia-tive “Learnings from Cannes 2017” launched by The Times Groupto share the best of Cannes Lions 2017. This includes some of the standout creative work done and the learn-ings from them for the marketers at some of India’s largest market-ing companies across 3 cities (Mumbai, Delhi-NCR & Bengaluru).
What’s Your Problem’s Amit Akali (a Cannes Lions winner and juror) sharing his key insights with the marketers at Asian Paints.
A giant knob for phones that’s on track to sell 30 million this year
BE CLASSIC 3“Thank you for asking, but I don’t
really date. Humans.” - Siri
‘Power of a good choice’ Campaign shots
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