Kings of Marketing
India’s marketing environment has through the years experienced some form of radical transformation as a result of advanced technology, shifting consumer behaviour, and an upsurge in competition for the market. Given these shifts, marketing leaders in India have had to blaze the way, create innovative and creative solutions and dictate how brands and their audiences interface.
- Unilever India (HUL)
Innovative Approach:
Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) spearheaded Unilever’s digital agenda in India. The brand hosted a spectacular integration of e-commerce, data analytics and digital marketing that threw enormous growth to these brands including Dove, Lipton and Surf Excel.
What It is Doing Differently:
The team at HUL invested efforts in thinking creatively and purposefully, leveraging the power of sustainability and social issues through brand campaigns. For instance, the ‘Dove Self-Esteem Project’ and ‘Surf Excel Daag Achhe Hain’ campaigns have just begun to tread new grounds focusing on body confidence and child welfare respectively while being crafted around the core values that resonate with consumers. This approach combines digital tools with authentic storytelling, setting a new precedent for how multinational brands can engage with Indian consumers.
- Coca-Cola India
Innovation is a synonym for Coca Cola- the company who redefined the entire marketing strategy of Coca-Cola for India through an extremely merged blend of global strategies and hyper-localized campaigns. It has used India’s evolving digital ecosystem to make the brand’s campaigns relevant to the Indian consumer.
Why It is Breaking the Mould: Coca-cola has executed marvellous campaigns such as “Thanda Matlab Coca-Cola” and “Open Happiness” that have found a deep cultural and social appeal in India.
Coca-Cola has embarked on some serious efforts towards leveraging this digital storytelling with social media and influencer marketing in order to remain relevant to youthful consumers. It further emphasized youth engagement through music-driven campaigns and tie-ups with Bollywood celebrities and regional celebrities.
- Mastercard India
Differentiated Approach: Mastercard helped bring about a revolution in India’s marketing approach, which involved developing emotional connections with consumers through powerful storytelling. As a result, the company managed to position itself as a brand that enriches lives and experiences, not just as a payment company.
Why It is A Changemaker: Its ‘Priceless’ campaign, celebrating the diverse experiences offered by India, has been a huge success. India’s rich culture, from the festivals to street food, was cultivated in the campaign, creating a more emotional bond with audiences.
It aims at transforming the experiential travel market in India, offering customised cultural, culinary and wellness experiences in a range of cities including Delhi, Agra, Jodhpur, Dehradun and Pune.
Through this programme, Mastercard, with the support of the Ministry of Tourism, will give a boost not only to India’s ‘Dekho Apna Desh’ initiative but also to offer the opportunity to travel enthusiasts within and outside India to discover the country’s rich heritage.
- Aditya Birla Group
In terms of a focus on customer-centricity, Aditya Birla Group introduced data-driven, personalized marketing campaigns wherein it catered to India’s vast and varied consumer base.
How It is Innovating: Aditya Birla Group focuses on a particular advantage of digital media and consumer insight, namely the ability to create highly personalized, hyper-targeted campaigns.
The Group has focused on crafting a consistent brand story across the group’s subsidiaries, developing a single marketing story that resonates with customers on both an emotional and functional level. Its approach merges traditional marketing with the essential component of digital transformation so that brands of the Group stay ahead of this curve in India’s fast-evolving market.
- Dentsu India
The change agent with creativity and innovativeness Dentsu India has strategized the innovative disruptive moves of Dentsu India. It encouraged brands to evolve past the regular commercial ad and embrace opportunities for customers to engage them in new, engaging ways using the tech available to them.
How It is Pushing Boundaries: Dentsu has helped brands to work through influencer marketing, experiential events, and augmented reality, areas of marketing that require audiences to interact, and not simply watch. In its campaigns, it has applied data analysis and consumer insights when crafting its campaigns to offer consumers marketing that is not only relevant but also memorable. As a result, Dentsu remains a new-age agency in the country, which uses creativity to embrace technological advancement.
Conclusion:
The creative and innovative marketing leaders are on the redefinition of how brands connect with
audiences in India. They embrace new technologies, leverage data, and resonate with all that is changing about the Indian consumer to create a highly engaging campaign that is culturally relevant and socially impactful. These leaders are establishing a new yardstick for creativity and proving that, in today’s high-speed marketing landscape, innovation is the only way to succeed.
