No. 1: Coca-Cola Up 3% to $68.73 billion · A 123 year young brand · No.1 producer of sparkling beverages in volume and dollar terms · More than 700 product launches in 2008 · Truly GLOBAL brand – present in 200 countries · Giving “Open Happiness” in the tough times
No. 2: IBM Up 2% to $60.21 billion · Big Blue – another truly global brand – present in 170 countries · Successfully shifting from hardware provider to a s/w and services brand
No. 3: Microsoft Down 4% to $56.65 billion · First YoY decline in its public history · Maturing market – facing stiff competition · Internet Explorer lost 10% market share to Mozilla Firefox · Biggest launch last year – Bing (Google it if u don’t know!)
No. 4: GE Down 10% to $47.78 billion · Lost leadership position in medical technology last year · Slip in technology leadership and financial services business as well · ‘Ecomagination’ – going green or red?
No. 5: Nokia Down 3% to $34.87 billion · Growing in developing markets · Targeting younger audience with trendier design and low cost · Tie up with AT&T; in US · iPhone and BlackBerry – can N97 combat them?
No. 6: McDonald’s Up 4% to $32.28 billion · “I’m Lovin’ It” = 6 mn more customers · Expansion to new markets with low price strategy · Big Challenge 4 Big Mac – higher food costs (higher beef and cheese costs in US)
No. 7: Google Up 25 percent to $31.98 billion (It’s recession time!) · Continuous innovation – actually! · Google Crome – two times faster than competitors · September 2008 – launch of Android phone software · Allegation – very large, diversified, and very profitable company
No. 8: Toyota Down 8% to $31.33 billion · 2008 – First loss in 70 years · Net revenue down 21%, sales dip 15% · Fuel prices down = Prius (‘Hybrid Synergy Drive’) down · Going RED but by 2011 it expects to have 100 ‘green’ dealerships!
No. 9: Intel Down 2% to $30.64 billion · Trying to capture fast-growing mobile computing market · Atom doing well with Notebooks (issues – cost and power consumption) · World’s No.1 chipmaker ties up with world’s No. 1 handset maker - ‘Intel Inside’ + ‘Connecting People’ =?
No. 10: Disney Down 3% to $28.45 billion · Recession -> Tighter ad budgets -> Disney Dooms · New formats – video games, new resorts, and interactive websites · Is the magic over? Wait 4 Toy Story 3…

Related posts:

1. HUL – Introduction
2. ITC Brands in Hotel and Apparel Category
3. Closeup
4. Brands of India: Introduction and ITC
5. How to do Competitive Advertising?
6. HUL Fact File and Brands

The target segment for the brand is traditional Indian middle class specially women. The brand is positioned as: ‘ayurvedic ki surakhsha sabut ke saath’ i.e. ‘ayurvedic protection with scientific proofs’. A famous Ayush ad shows traditional Indian bahu or daughter-in-law adjusting with everything in her in-laws place but not with beauty cares and asks for Ayush and ultimately succeeds to convince even her mother-in-law to use Ayush – this is perfectly in tune with target segment and positioning of the brand. The tagline of the brand reads: ‘Asar Shuru Adjustment Bandh’ i.e. ‘Adjustment ends when the actions starts’.

Related posts:

1. Lakme – On Top of the World
2. Fair & Lovely – Is marketing meant for exploiting the consumers?
3. Dove is not a soap!
4. Aviance
5. Sunsilk
6. Clinic is Clear

But lately the theme has changed to emotional appeal of self-confidence. One of its most popular tagline has been: ‘Hasso Toh Khulke Hasso’. Few years back Closeup tried to take brushing to a new level by asking the consumers: ‘Kya Aap Closeup Karte Hain?’ which tries to project the image that Closeup is synonymous to brushing and or something even more than that. Close up changed is tagline to “The closer the better” in 2008 as manifested in this popular “Pass aao na” ad.

Close up is an international brand and present in many other countries other than India. The targeting and positioning of the brand is very similar across countries. The following popular Close up ad from Philippines proves the point. The ad is embedded in a nice music video created by Lowe, Manila. This is a unique to way market a old brand in a new exciting way. Hope you will enjoy the song and the story behind.

Similar to Pepsodent, to gain consumer confidence Closeup offered ‘Shade Card’ so that consumers can check the level of whiteness of their teeth. In 200 Official website of this brand is: www.closeupuniverse.com.

Related posts:

1. Sunsilk
2. Aviance
3. Clinic is Clear
4. Pepsodent
5. Truth of Ayurveda, Proof of Science
6. Lakme – On Top of the World

Do you use Google search? Of course, you do! Ok, so how much do you pay for it? Zilch, you say? I agree. Did you ever notice how many products and services you are using in your daily life which come at no or almost no cost? Did you ever wonder how this is possible? Of course, the concept of cross-subsidy and bundling free products with other items has been there for a long time. But they all have some hidden costs associated with them. Contrary to that in this new economy there are so many products and services that actually come for free at least so for the consumers – no strings attached. In this article we are going to explore this economy of ‘free’ or ‘Freeconomics’ if we can call it so.

Moving Beyond Economics:

Traditional economics considers only buyers and sellers interacting in an exchange relationship in the marketplace and hence ‘free’ seems to be an unviable concept. But in real markets more than two parties interact while only some of them exchange cash. The most common example of this is media business – where publishers provide the products for free (or almost free!) to the consumers and advertisers pay to ride along. For example – your newspaper company is not charging you for the creation of all those useful and useless content, printing and distribution of newspapers; in fact they are not in the business of selling newspapers – they are selling readers to advertisers. Web is helping industries of all sorts to adopt a similar business model. And advertising is not the only source of income – there are other methods like ‘value-added’ subscription, upgrade to premium version, direct e-commerce, selling information and many more.

How does it make sense?

Google which has converted free search into billion dollar business can be considered as a big success of marketing ‘free’. Recently, this concept of ‘free’ has been popularized by two of the most popular Marketing Gurus of the world – Chris Anderson and Seth Godin. Now, let’s see why marketers do this? Future business is one of key reasons why marketers give away things for free. Consumer psychology theory says: consumers feel guilty when they get something for free. They try to reciprocate or buy the guilt by purchasing something or spreading good word-of-mouth. Sometimes consumers help the companies even without being fully aware. The loyalty cards being used by consumers are meant for capturing consumer data to better target marketing offering and thus making more profit. In the online world the huge customer data obtained through Orkut or Facebook is worth the investment. Recent research shows that a zero priced item are over-valued compared to its dirt-cheap counterpart. Open source developers usually learn this the hard way: distribution plummets as soon as they start charging even a penny for their software. Simply put given the choice between a free, low-end product and a dirt cheap, similar one, we’ll pick the free one. But that does not help marketers. Here comes the concept of Freemium. The key of Freemium is to have the consumer rationalize that the free version won’t satisfy his needs completely; and then proceed with the sale of the premium version. A typical online site follows the 1 percent rule – where 1 percent of the users pay for the premium products or services and support all the rest.

Taxonomy of ‘Freeconomics’:

The Road Ahead:

The gift-economy is actually replacing the monetary-economy in many spheres. The huge amount of user generated contents on web, TV and radio shows that money is not the only motivator. Sometimes self-expression can be a bigger motivation. And who else can be a better example of this than the Wikipedia team! With improvements in technology the marginal costs of manufacturing and distribution is going down rapidly and more so in case of digital economy powered by ever deflating costs of storage, processing power, and bandwidth. So, giving products or services for free (or almost free!) is not as stupid as traditional wisdom suggests. In fact, it will increasingly become a profitable idea in the new economy if the strategy and implementation is executed rightly. So, in this increasingly ‘free’ market – what is there for you? For the generation-X marketers – buyers are no longer your only source of revenue – think beyond the box and the broader you can think the better. More importantly bid adieu to cost-based-pricing and welcome value-based-pricing and while doing that keep consumer psychology as a key determinant. And here consumers are the not necessarily the traditional end consumers using your product but can very well be the advertisers who pays you for putting their ads on site. Pricing should depend on what consumers ‘think’ as the value of the product and not how much you have spent to produce and market the product. Provide value and reap rich returns. Don’t overcharge but at the same time never keep money on the table. For the consumers – ‘free’ is not that bad or irrational at all. So, enjoy the ‘free lunch’!

References:

Marketing Science, The Wall Street Journal, Knowledge@Wharton

Related posts:

1. ITC Brands in Food Category (Part-1)
2. Freedom equal to no free lunch, water and air?
3. ITC Brands in Paper and Other Category
4. Brands of India: Introduction and ITC
5. HUL – Introduction
6. Lakme – On Top of the World

This is a serious duplicitous behavior from world’s leading personal care company where one of their brands is promoting artificial beauty by talking about fairness whereas the other talks about ‘real beauty’. Though from STP point of view that makes sense as Dove and Fair & Lovely are catering to two different segments and hence rightly have different targeting and positioning to suit the brands’ marketing objectives. But doesn’t the company have responsibility towards the consumers as well? All the tall talk about serving people, helping to make life better – are those just for fooling consumers? And ultimately does marketing mean hoodwinking consumers to achieve only narrow financial objectives? Though businesses talk about creating value for all the stakeholders – when it comes to practical life does stakeholders mean only shareholders? That brings us to even serious questions about management as a practice. Is money and profit the only and ultimate goals in business? How many more recessions, Enrons and Satyams will it take for us to understand that it is time to walk the talk!!

Related posts:

1. Pond’s – the new Fair & Lovely?
2. Truth of Ayurveda, Proof of Science
3. Dove is not a soap!
4. Aviance
5. Lakme – On Top of the World
6. Sunsilk

After HLL adopted the “power brand strategy” they planned to phase out this century old brand. But then, they relaunched Sunlight in 2004 as a powder detergent. Currently this range is sold in only two Indian states: West Bengal and Kerala. In the price-quality spectrum Sunlight is placed above Wheel and below Rin. The twin benefits that the detergent brand in India promises are: brightness and color protection. This message is conveyed in Sunlight advertisements showing people wearing bright clothes and spreading cheer and brightness around them. Consequently the tagline of the brand is “Spread the Brightness”.

Worldwide Sunlight is present in different forms in different countries – like a bath soap in Australia and a dish cleaning liquid in Latin America etc.

Below ad is one of the oldest ads of Unilever from 1898 (yes! before the TV days) featuring Sunlight.

Related posts:

1. Wheel – freedom from hard work
2. Surf Excel – Dirt is Good
3. RIN – Bijli giri!
4. Rexona – flawless skin or 24 hours protection?
5. Dove is not a soap!
6. Pears: Aysi Pears Twacha, Aur Kahan

Internationally the most talked about but controversial ad campaign by Dove talked about ‘real beauty’. I personally find a dichotomous behavior from the owner company Unilever who also promotes Fair & Lovely. To know more about my opinion and the controversy please refer to this article: Fair & Lovely – Is marketing meant for exploiting the consumers?

Related posts:

1. Rexona – flawless skin or 24 hours protection?
2. Pears: Aysi Pears Twacha, Aur Kahan
3. Truth of Ayurveda, Proof of Science
4. Hamam – Tejaswi Roop
5. La lara la la…Liril
6. Sunlight – Spread the Brightness

This brand caters to stationery products, an industry that ITC entered in the year 2002. It offers products like notebooks, long books, drawing books etc. The target segment for ‘Classmate’ is the ‘school goers’. Recently the brand extended to launch a new range ‘Classmate Fun N Learn’ which targets the children segment. Recently under the classmate brand ITC has launched branded pens in selected markets. One of the tools to promote the brand is ‘Classmate Young Author & Artist Contest’ which is successfully running for last five years. The tagline for the brand is: ‘Inspiring Young Minds’ aptly pointing out the target segment for the brand.

Paperkraft

This ITC brand also caters to stationery products. But while ‘Classmate’ caters to the target segment of ‘school goers’, ‘Paperkraft’ targets ‘college students and executives’. Consistent with the target segment above ad depicts a college-goer using ‘Paperkraft’ product. The tagline of the brand is: ‘The Power of You’.

Expressions

This is another ITC brand in the stationery segment but this caters to the greetings card category. The tagline for the brand is ‘If it’s in your heart, it’s on the cards.’ The website of this brand www.itcexpressions.in seems to have rather less content and not as good as other ITC sites mentioned earlier and seems not being updated with latest content. ITC also has a range of aromatic candles under ‘Expressions’ brand name.

AIM

It’s the ITC safety matches brand. The tagline for the brand is: ‘Ultra Slim Matchbox’ – so the focus is on the functional attributes of the product only. ITC sources the product from small-scale sector and uses its marketing and distribution strength to bring the product to the consumers. ITC has many other brands in the segment like: ‘i Kno’, ‘Aim Mega’ and ‘Aim Metro’. But still the product is quite undifferentiated and till date being considered as a commodity.

Mangaldeep

It is the agarbattis (incense sticks) brand from ITC stable. The business model for this is quite similar to AIM in the sense that these are also sourced from small scale sector and ITC markets and distributes the product. The tagline for the brand is: ‘Poori ho nirmal prarthna’ or ‘Ensuring Purity in Prayer’.

Cigarettes

ITC is the market leader in this segment with many top brands like: Insignia, India Kings, Classic, Gold Flake, Silk Cut, Navy Cut, Scissors, Capstan, Berkeley, Bristol and Flake. Advertising for cigarettes is prohibited in India as per the legal rules.

Related posts:

1. ITC Brands in Food Category (Part-1)
2. ITC Brands in Food Category (Part-2)
3. ITC Brands in Hotel and Apparel Category
4. ITC Brands in Personal Care Category
5. Brands of India: Introduction and ITC
6. HUL Fact File and Brands

In this ad – notice the focus on functional attributes like stronger liquor and superb taste. Later in late 1980s when tabla maestro Zakeer Hussain was employed as the face of the brand its slogan changed to: ‘Wah! Ustaad Wah! Arre huzoor, wah Taj boliye’.

Of late the focus of Brooke Bond ads has changed to emotional appeal of ‘Raas Pyar Ka’ or the ‘Liquor of Love’. The current tagline of Brooke Bond brand is: ‘Cheers Your Senses’.

Related posts:

1. Happiness Begins with it!
2. HUL Segmentation and Lux
3. Sunsilk
4. Lakme – On Top of the World
5. Surf Excel – Dirt is Good
6. Closeup

A very popular and effective series of Pepsodent ads show a child eating out without fear of being scolded by mother as he brushes regularly with Pepsodent where as there is the other child who does not use Pepsodent and hence is afraid of being scolded by his mother for eating out.

Pepsodent has also promoted awareness about dental health by promoting brushing regularly and then with ‘Pepsodent 2 in 1’ ads promoting brushing twice daily: these are win-win solution in the sense that on one hand it promotes dental health and on the other hand more brushing with Pepsodent means more sales for the brand. Pepsodent also offers a range of tooth brushes. Official website for the brand is: www.pepsodentindia.com.

Related posts:

1. Closeup
2. Hamam – Tejaswi Roop
3. Truth of Ayurveda, Proof of Science
4. Clinic is Clear
5. Aviance
6. Pears: Aysi Pears Twacha, Aur Kahan