Advertising & Sales Promotion Management

Submitted to:

Dr. Jyotsna Mukherjee Submitted by:

Mohd Tahir

Poonam Kumari

IILM Institute for Higher Education

Executive summary1

Advertisement and sales promotion are the part and parcel of the marketing strategies of every company. They play an important role in growth of any organization.

In this project we study the advertisement and sales promotion strategies of Micromax mobile.

Through the very clever strategies of micromax enable it to achieve 10% market share and 3 rd

position in the mobile handset manufacturing industry in India in just a time period of less than 3 years.

It is utilizing the integrated market communication tools like sponsoring events (cricket match and film awards), advertising through hoardings, TV, radio etc very effectively.

They have become more appealing to their target customers i.e. youth by having akshay kumar as their brand ambassador.

Micromax is very different from other players as everyone initial target the urban market than tap the rural market but micromax initially it target the rural market than move to urban market and it is very successful in implementing this.

The three advertising objectives of micromax mobile are

To create awareness To increase recall of their brand To create brand equity.

Table of content

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Serial No

Particulars Page No

1 Executive summary 2

2 Introduction-Micromax 4

3 IMC Tools 5

4 Advertising Agency 7

5 Consumers 8

6 Source, Massage & Channel factor 9

7 Advertising objectives & budget 11

8 Creative aspect 12

9 Conclusion & findings 14

10 Recommendation 15

11 References 16

Introduction3

The mobile phone market in India is worth 130 million handsets annually. While the big players

like Nokia, Samsung, LG, Motorola and Sony Ericsson make up for 70% share, the market has

of late seena slew of domestic firms such as Micromax, Karbonn and Entex making large inroads

and new established brands like Videocon and Onida entering the field.

Micromax, started operations in 1991 as an embedded software design firm, but was

incorporated as accompany in 1998, when it branched out as a distributor of computer

peripherals such as printers, monitors, scanners from manufacturers such as LG, Sony Inc., Dell

Corp.

To day, Micromaxi s one of the leading Indian Telecom Companies with 23 domestic offices

across the country and international offices in Hong Kong, USA, Dubai and now in Nepal. With

a futuristic vision and an exhaustive R&D at its helm, Micromax has successfully generated

innovative technologies that have revolutionized the telecom consumer space.

Micromax is on a mission to successfully overcome the technological barriers and constantly

engender “life enhancing solutions”.

The company’s vision is to develop path-breaking technologies and efficient processes that

incubate newer markets, enliven customer aspirations and continue to make Micromax a trusted

market leader amongst people. The Micromax ideology stems from its rooted belief in

‘Innovation’ and delivering “nothing short of the best”

Micromax has a lot of interesting and thoughtful products to its credit on their versatile product

portfolio. It was the first to introduce in the market,

Handsets with 30 days battery backup

Handsets with Dual SIM / Dual Standby

Handsets Switching Networks (GSM - CDMA) using gravity sensors

Aspirational Qwerty Keypad Handsets

Operator Branded 3G Handsets

OMH CDMA Handsets, etc. .

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One of the major aspects that contribute towards the substantial monthly growth of Micromax is

its 80% sales in the rural areas. After building a strong presence in the rural market, where the

prominence of both subscribers and operators is rapidly increasing, Micromax’ is now

progressively moving towards establishing its foothold in the competitive urban towns as well.

The news further elaborates that Citigroup Global Markets Inc. has confirmed Jain’s assertion in

a 3February.2010 report, which said Micromax had a 10% market share, putting it at No. 3

behind Nokia and Samsung, which had 12-13%.

IMC tools used by MICROMAX

Advertising is the one of the biggest tool to development of integrated marketing

communication. So the Micromax uses IMC tools to promote the product and build the strong

image of the brand in the consumers mind. Integrated Marketing Communication ( IMC) is the

practice of unifying all marketing communication tools so the send a consist, persuasive massage

promoting company goals.

With a 360 degree advertising and marketing strategy sketched out, the company has an

optimistic outlook for the telecom consumer space. Currently present in more than 40,000 stores

across the country, the company plans to have an aggressive market incursion to reach out to its

customers through 70,000 operational stores in the coming year

The following tools of IMC are being used by Micromax:

Events and experiences

For marketing of its products the company is riding on two enduring Indian obsessions--sports

and films--to build its brand.

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Following up on its association with the popular Twenty20 cricket Indian Premier League (IPL),

Micromax, a brand that is less than three years old, has become the title sponsor of almost all

tournaments and series of which India is a part, including the recently concluded Asia Cup, the

forthcoming India-Sri Lanka Test series and the India-New Zealand-Sri Lanka tri-series in

August.

The objective behind the cricket "roadblock", as such behavior is termed in advertising, is to

drive brand awareness and recall. The company believes that while cricket may boost a brand

instantly, viewers may still not remember the brand after the match or the tournament. Even if

consumers remember a series, they may not remember the advertisers. That's when they thought

of a roadblock and decided to sponsor all cricketing properties post IPL.

Bollywood is also a major platform for the brand, which is targeting consumers between 18 and

27 years. Bollywood's most bankable star Akshay Kumar was signed on as the brand ambassador

six months ago. More recently, his wife Twinkle Khanna was engaged to promote Micromax's

bling phone that comes with Swarovski crystals and a vanity mirror. To push its association with

films, the firm also sponsored the IIFA (International Indian Film Academy) Awards held in Sri

Lanka, where Micromax recently launched its phones. The brand is now ready to enter

Bangladesh and West Asia.

Advertising

Broadcast media micromax use television to broadcast their advertisements.

Apart from using cricket, films, celebrity micromax also advertise through news papers.

They also utilize hoarding and bill boards to advertise their products.

Prime site recently kicked off a month-long campaign for Micromax mobile phones in Delhi,

executed mostly through hoardings. Going further, this promotion will be extended to the other

regions of northern India as well.

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On the brief and objective of the campaign. The city of launch was Delhi to start with, and post

which we did the launch in Patna and Jaipur. Indore is next in line. There are more cities where

the campaign will be launched in the near future for which we would be briefed accordingly.”

All the Medias used by micromax are very carefully selected as to reach its target audience and

through each medium the innovative aspect of the product is portrayed.

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Advertising Agency

Agency: - Lowe Lintas

Lowe Lintas is one of the India’s largest and most storied communication groups. Its founded in 1939 as a

part of Hindustan Lever. Headed by Chairman and Chief Creative Officer R. Balakrishnan (Balki) and

CEO Charles Cadell, Lowe Lintas employs over 650 people across eight divisions and nine cities all over

India.

Lowe Lintas is a full service agency, it provides all the service to its clients like market research,

production, designing, selecting and purchasing media.

Today, Lowe Lintas India is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Interpublic Group, and one of the star

offices in the Lowe Worldwide network. Headquartered out of London, Lowe Worldwide has over 80

offices in 73 countries and a client roster that includes Unilever, Johnson & Johnson, Nestle, Ericsson,

Sharp, TATA, Saab and many more.

Lowe Lintas India leads global and regional communication for several Unilever and Johnson’s Baby

brands.

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ConsumersMicromax has divided its target audience into three categories - the rural sector, the urban youth

(18 to 27 years) and the high profile users. Micromax is solely targeting the rural segment right

now - and why not? After all, it promises the maximum number of consumers and all they

demand from a handset is regular features at an affordable price. The youth segment is the

second most important segment, whom the brand will appease with innovative features such as a

memory card with more capacity, better music and camera quality and a trendy face value. For

the third segment or the premium class 'technological innovation' will be the catchword.

One of the major aspects that contribute towards the substantial monthly growth of Micromax is

its 80% sales in the rural areas. 

 After building a strong presence in the rural market, where the prominence of both subscribers

and operators is rapidly increasing, Micromax’ is now progressively moving towards

establishing its foothold in the competitive urban towns as well.

It was in 2008 that Micromax ventured into the mobile handset market. The brand wanted to

create a base before taking on the large players. Hence as a go-to- market strategy, Micromax

concentrated on the rural market first. It was a different move altogether since most of the

marketers tend to concentrate on the urban markets then move to the rural markets.

Micromax launched its first phone in the rural market with a very unique USP- 30 days battery

standby time. The brand was launched from a consumer insight that most of the rural households

do not get enough electricity to recharge phones on a daily basis . Hence a phone with a 30 day

battery standby would be a worthwhile differentiation. The first product was a big success. The

first product Micromax X1i priced at Rs 2150 was lapped up by rural market.

The success of X1i enthused the company to go aggressively into the market. But tapping the

rural market is not an easy task. There is severe logistics pressure in servicing these markets. One

of the first things that Micromax did was to establish the distribution network. According to a

report in Forbes India (March 5, 2010), Micromax created a distribution network comprising of

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34 super distributors, 450 distributors and around 55,000 retailers. The brand could also take

advantage of the inroads made by other brands into advantage

Source, Message and Channel Factors

Source:

Celebrity: micromax has used Akshay kumar and very recently his wife twinkle khanna to

endorse their brand. these celebrities are used as brand ambassador because of the following

reasons

Familiarility: akshay kumar is a very famous celebrity in Indian villages as well as urban

areas.so he is very familiar to the target audience i.e. the youth. So it was a good decision to get

him to endorse this brand.

Likeability: many of the youth in India resemble themselves with akshay; hence there are great

chances that if he endorses this brand, it will become more popular among youth

Message

Through all the medias microamax is conveying a very clear message that we are best in

manufacturing phones which have innovative features which makes yours life simpler and at a

very affordable price.

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Channel factors

The different channels that micromax is using for advertisement are :

Broadcast: It is using television as well as radio to reach the target audience. it use personal channel as all of its advertisement is focused to the youth .

Print media: it is creating a lot of noise by using news papers, in these advertisements it also focuses on innovation of their product.

Support Media: Micromax uses also support media to reach their target customers.

Clutter: since it a industry where a lot of competition exists .every company is using all these

medias too, hence a lot of advertisements are aired by different companies, which creates a lot of disturbance.

Advertising Objectives and Advertising Budget

When micromax was launched in 2008 the main objective of the advertisements was to create

awareness about the brand as it was a new entrant in the market and very established brands like

Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericson were present. So, the initial objective of the advertisement

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campaign was to catch the attention of the customers and to create awareness about the brand.

This phase of creating brand awareness was carried out for 12 – 18 months from the launch of

the phone.

After that the company realized that awareness was created among the customers but they were

not able to recall their brand, hence they shift their focus to brand recall. For this they have

sponsored a lot of cricket events and film events.

Now since they have attained 10% market share and reach at the 3 rd place in mobile handset

manufacturers they must focus on creating brand value. For this they have sign up with Akshay

kumar as their brand ambassador.

In short the advertisement objectives of micromax are

To create awareness To increase recall of their brand To create brand equity.

Advertisement budget

Micromax, is all set to shell out a whopping Rs 100 crore for its brand building initiative. It is

targeting a wide base of new and existing subscribers, using a 360 degree media approach via

multiple platforms. It has allotted Rs 60 crore for ATL (above the line) advertising, of which

print will take the maximum share, followed by TV and radio. Another Rs 40 crore will go into

the BTL (below-the-line) initiatives.

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Creative aspects

The company is very innovative and creative as it develop new products with innovative

features.

Most of the brand promotion for Macromax is centered around products. We havn't seen a

corporate brand building campaign from Micromax. The ads are for individual products

highlighting the product feature.

Micromax has the tagline “Nothing Like anything " which initially appeared confusing. Perhaps

the brand wants to convey that every product from Micromax has something unique. It is not just

like any other product.

The brand's promotions, although heavy, is a big let down. Some of the campaigns are good but

most are below par. For example, the Micromax Face book ad was outright disgusting. Most of

the campaigns like Gravity, MTV , and EEZPad were very ordinary basic ads. There was no

brand building theme behind those ads. They talked about the product and that is it. I feel a

visible lack of creativity behind those ads.

In a big marketing move, Micromax roped in the Bollywood Action hero Akshay Kumar as the

brand ambassador. This move is going to boost the brand recall of Micromax to new heights.

Akshay Kumar has strong equity both in urban and rural markets. The association with such a

big star will also have a positive impact on the image of Micromax. The brand can now

overcome the perception of a low price product.

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But the first campaign featuring Akshay Kumar was nothing but pure noise. The new

Gamolution handset was supposed to be a game changer for Micromax. But the campaign was a

big let down. With a star like Akshay, the brand could have done much more rather than some

funny noises and acrobatics. I think the agency was stuck in a stereotype as to how to use

Akshay Kumar

The new game handset uses the motion- sensor technology with Bluetooth ( as I understand). So

one can play games using the computer and handset. I don't think that the ads were in anyway

doing justice to the brand's intention. Motion Sensor games are not new to the Indian markets but

playing games on a PC using mobile is something new. I am not sure whether the ad essentially

communicated the innovation.

A very poorly made ad like this will do more harm to the image of Micromax. The brand may

get lot of eyeballs due to the ' noise ' and celebrity power, but a low quality ad will reflect in the

image perception of Micromax.

There is a risk of the brand perceived not as an aspiration brand but a ordinary price warrior if it

does not focus on the quality of the communication.

Micromax now has a wonderful chance of moving up the ladder. With a good product range, reasonable

pricing base and a high profile celebrity, the brand could have positioned itself as an aspiration brand.

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Conclusion and finding

Micromax is a very innovative company as it launches mobile phones with very unique

and innovative features.

It has utilized events and experience as part of their communication strategy to enhance

the recall rate and awareness level.

Its advertisement campaign was oriented to the rural market than the urban.

It take a right decision to sign Akshay kumar to endorse their brand as this will help them

to create brand equity.

It does not make very creative advertisements; they simply narrate the features of the

phone.

They have planed to spent a huge amount of Rs. 100 crore on advertisement and

promotions.

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Recommendations

Now they have achieved a good market share, so now their advertisement should

focus on brand building.

They don`t develop very creative advertisements, sometimes their advertisements

are mere noises like the advertisement featuring Akshay kumar. They must add

creativity to their advertisements.

The tag line is very confusing; a new tag line which can be understood easily

must be incorporated.

The brand's promotions, although heavy, is a big let down. Some of the

campaigns are good but most are below par. For example, the Micromax Face

book ad .hence quality of the advertisement must be improved.

There is a risk of the brand perceived not as an aspirational brand but a ordinary

price warrior if it does not focus on the quality of the communication.

Micromax would do well if it could bring in some class in their campaigns.

Micromax as a brand should be developed focusing on the core brand values like

innovation and value orientation.

When the product range widens, it may not be practical to sustain individual

campaigns. So it is time for Micromax to position the Family Brand and develop a

brand identity

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References

o http://www.micromaxinfo.com/

o www.southasiablog.com/2010/.../micromax-q7-in-india- price-and.html

o http://epaper.livemint.com/

o http://www.afaqs.com/perl/news/story.html?sid=25698

o http://marketingpractice.blogspot.com/2010/03/micromax- nothing-like-anything_16.html

Book:-

o Advertising Principles and practice (John Burnet)

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