Cinthol - Analysis

[Warning - A bit heavy on marketing concepts and jargon. Reader discretion is advised :) ]

Ironically, this product has a tagline '24 hour confidence'. When I read this recent article on Cinthol's strategy, it scared me. In a typical MBA marketing course, we were trained to confidently handle such hypothetical scenarios. Say you are the brand manager of a X year old brand. The market share has dipped from 9% to less than 2% over the last few years. You need to define activities to be undertaken to revive market share to X%. Here's what we'll usually come up with:

1. We'll understand a) what are the new/changed/evolved consumer needs b)perception of our brand
2. We'll do repositioning based on existing brand values and on insights from the previous step.
3. We'll use heavy advertising campaign - print, TVC, Outdoor to communicate the change.
And of course we'll throw in some social networking, a bit of online experience and web2.0 jargon to boot.

(And this is a best case scenario. Usually MBA class participation is diminished, the objectives blurred and the output a khichdi of activities)

The brand is doing all of that.
And that's what scares me.

Cinthol Activities

1. Understand changed consumer needs
'Cinthol has always been associated with the alpha male personality. We have revived it, but in a more contemporary manner'
2. Reflect the change in product communication
'The new communication has a masculine tonality, but it is targeted at young adults who aspire to an active lifestyle.'
3. Have a distinctive celebrity endorsement(which according to HarishB was the right thing to do)
4. Reflect the change in packaging (view)
5. Run a planned campaign for 12-18 months bringing together all the above elements
6. Have a website for interacting with customers and creating tribes of like minded users.

One half of me (the MBA part) is acknowledging that Cinthol has been pumped with all the right ingredients. The other half (the consumer part) is indifferent to the efforts being made for the brand. A website for this brand ? So what! ( Objective according to them - 'It will bring together like-minded individuals who keep on moving, irrespective of the hurdles in their life.') Maybe, just maybe some Cinthol loyalists will reach the website.

The Cinthol Website

Interactive ? I don't think so

There are a total of 3 links. One is a link for the TVC, already available on youtube. The other two are static pages - one of which gives banal advice on being physically fresh. The second page has a dumb flash game, I didn't care to play it through.

Loading Screen

Every click is followed by a annoying loading screen, which a visitor with just passing interest (rather than an inquisitive disposition) would have avoided and quit the 'experience'.

According to Sameer Penkar, general manager, marketing, Godrej Consumer Products, “The site will be modified in phases. Currently, what you see on it is part of Phase 1. In the second phase, we will be tying up with portals such as Yahoo!, Rediff, Google and Zapak in order to direct traffic to our site.". Though I don't agree with the phased approach. There won't be a revisit by an online user unless it is enjoyable the first time.

Is there is any piece missing in their campaign ? It would be naive to applaud the strategy and impute execution quality for any poor results. Even if you get all the steps right, follow the tenets of good marketing, how can you hope you've done good work ?

Sources
The Cinthol Ad (indianbrands)
Cinthol on Marketing Practice
Cinthol on agencfaqs (here and here)

Shoppers Stop - Analysis

Delhities were greeted with a fake front page ad last week (the kind of advertisements only the mighty ones can afford) - Shoppers Stop advocating a message of 'Start Something New' in an a classy b-w ad. It drew corollaries from Manmohan Singh's and the Indian Cricket team's success.

I was curious because it looked silly. So I did a bit of research on this to figure it out.

Business Objective

Being in the retailing business, Shoppers Stop has been a pioneer - and that's not just a juicy compliment. They were the the first in India (since 1991), they have a fruitful IT setup, and they have constantly expanded their product line, encouraging even unconventional tie-ups like Om Shanti Om movie clothing line. They have also pioneered in developing their B2B sourcing technique. Some online interviews revealed that they intend to rapidly expand to over 50 stores in 2 years, from the current strength of 22 in eleven cities.

The original logo now functions as the Raheja group's logo for retail stores. I was surprised to know about their diverse investments. Apart from Crosswords, they own other speciality store brands including HomeStop, mothercare, Brio and desicafe'.

Old logo

New logo


The Ad Campaign

The current campaign speaks of a logo change and a untenable 'Start Something New' tagline. Such rebranding campaigns communicate an underlying reason for the change, benefits (if any) to the consumer. This campaign seems to starkly lack that. Here's the comment from Ravi Deshpande, the man who suggested the idea:

"Shopping is a treat. It makes you feel like a new person. I felt that this could be made into an idea like “start something new”, so that life is looked at completely differently, something as different as responding to the environment and its issues, saving trees, recycling, being a child again, or just doing nothing. All of this with a fashionable twist to it."

Here's one of the Print Ads (source Agencyfaq)


In the formal rebranding ceremony held on April 24th, Shahrukh Khan tries to dispel the same cynicism evoked within viewers - "Its not just a logo change. Its much more". They have also plonked a CSR angle - "Think Green - Awareness for the environment". Don't see anything useful happening here (source video)

As a contrast, the AXIS Bank rebranding campaign focussed on a single message - we are still the same, using twins and other analogies. Or my favourite Vodafone campaign, used the pug and colours to simply imply change - Hutch is now Vodafone.

I am sure the management of Shoppers Stop have got strong business acumen. I just feel they have been a little confused about the utility/objective of the ad campaign and hence the poor output. Lets wait for the consumer response now.

Links

Detailed information on the Ad campaign (agencyfaq)
Shoppers Stop business investments in IT (DNA)
Interview with the CEO, Shoppers Stop (pdf)
Shoppers Stop homepage