BULLSHIT CAN ALSO TAKE YOU TO THE TOP BUT CAN’T GUARANTEE YOU THAT SPOT

BULLSHIT CAN ALSO TAKE YOU TO THE TOP BUT CAN’T GUARANTEE YOU THAT SPOT

Motive of writing this article is to derive the activities used by different sales people for their regular business and helps you to understand the best practice for better results.

Observing different sales people from various sectors I found out 2 types of sales people- First one is planned and second one is unplanned. Both having the same number of hours and almost the same urge for business but entirely different mindset in targeting their market.

First I would like to discuss how an unplanned mind set approaches towards the market for business. Sam and Kevin joined the organization together as Sales Executives in a trading company doing B2B sales. Due to target pressure Sam became very desperate for business. Even though Sam was not having  proper knowledge of what he was selling nor proper idea of the product nor had the intent to know about the same.

 Everyday Sam used to go office on time but used to start prospecting and start calling people for business and because of not having the sufficient and complete product knowledge he just used to provide incomplete information about the products and company.

Initially he generated many leads and in the  first few months he got many leads and even some of them got converted into business . For the very first month he was very much recognized by the company. But from the  3^rd month onwards  most of the leads which he was getting didn’t got converted into business during the mid of the sales cycle because the customer found the information provided initially was not the same which he communicated about the product and some of them which got converted in the initial months into business didn’t came back for repeat order even though they had a regular requirement.

So what happened exactly?????

        Below is his daily approach for the business in sequence:

1. SUSPECTING (Poor product & process knowledge, insufficient Segmentation, Targeting, Position)
2. PROSPECTING (Making random unplanned calls)
3. QUALIFYING LEADS (Without proper knowledge whether the leads are really qualified or not, no concept of prioritization)
4. CLOSING BY CHANCE (Dependent upon luck)
5. NO  CONCEPT OF RELATIONSHIP WITH CLIENT OR   DESPERATE  FOR THE NEXT SALES.

On the other hand there was Kevin was also working with him. Initially he started focusing on learning and researching and identifying what is the expected target market and what are the product details, supply chain and which process is suited for the maximum penetration.

                                                                                   

After getting all these information and understanding he started the prospecting process. Even though gathering these information took time and even though he was also having the same target pressure and was also initially criticized by his peers for being slow in starting customer acquisition process. Everyday Kevin used to go office on time like Sam but used to research and read about the product and also about the competition and their offerings.

Above that he also tried to identify target market where his product has the maximum usability. After gathering all these information about the target market which segment the product belongs to and how and where he can position his product in front of his prospects. He provided complete information about the products as well as the company. As a result the conversion ratio was much higher than Sam and on the top of that he was getting repeat orders and enjoyed a better repo and relationship with his clients.

           So what happened exactly?????

          Below is his daily approach for the business in sequence:

1. SUSPECTING (Proper product knowledge, market knowledge, Segmentation, targeting & positioning)
2. PROSPECTING (Tele calling, Cold calling social media tools, email marketing, Identifying needs)
3. QUALIFYING LEADS  (Prioritizing customer into A, B & C categories,  knowledge of delivery terms, payment terms)
4. CLOSING (After sales service, referrals)
5. CUSTOMER DELIGHTS (Customer satisfaction, feedback & most Important repeat orders.) 

     BELIEVE ME IT WORKS

      Written by:

      Anshuman Tewari & Kumar Gaurav

Gillette - Soldier For Women

Summary 

This ad starts with soldier wanted. It features various men and women who belong to different professions. This ad is shot in black and white with message written in bright yellow colors which reads: “Soldiers wanted. Not to guard the borders. Not to go to war. But to support the most important battle of the nation. To stand up for women. Because when you respect women… You respect your nation. Support the movement. Gillette salutes the soldier in you”.  And ad ends with  #SoldierForWomen. At last it shows men standing up with a woman.

Segmentation

Demographic segmentation

·         Age- 15+

·         Gender- Male.

·         Income-  From middle to high income group.

Psychographic segmentation

Market segmentation based on Value, Attitude and Lifestyle.  In this ad Gillette hits psychology of a man who respects and values women as a inevitable part of the society and also ignites a man feelings to be the same.

Targeting

This campaigns overall intention is to get youth attention which is evident by its vast social media presence but this ad specifically focuses on Men of all age group because anybody can be a soldier.

                    

Positioning

Gillette’s tagline is “The best a man can get”. Whenever we hear of the word soldier the first few words that pop up into our mind are- protection, strength, confidence and a well groomed man. Gillette has positioned itself as a brand that provides safe, flexible & close shaving experience. Through this campaign Gillette is conveying the message “The best a man can be” seeing the present situation of the society in which women are unsafe and need to be safeguarded.

Consumer behavior

Attitude

·         The ad reflects explicit attitude as Soldier are considered real men whose duty is to protect nation similarly every man has a duty towards women to protect them and respect them.

·         According to Daniel Katz classification of attitudes this ad shows knowledge & value expressive element of attitude as defending and respecting women is embedded into our culture and we believe that a civilization can’t prosper if they don’t respect women.

     Attitude Change:   

           

·         Target Characteristics: This message is directed towards all men independent of their age who respect women and stand up for them.

·         Source characteristics: The major source characteristics of this advertisement are Interpersonal attraction. The credibility of a perceived message has been found to be a key variable here; when one imagines soldier, few things which comes to his mind is protecting nation, well groomed, strength. Similarly this message inspires men to be a soldier for the nation by standing up for women.

Message Characteristics: This ad has a very persuasive message that is safe guarding females. As in the present scenario women safety has become a issue as frequency of rape in India has drastically increased. Every now and then we hear news about rapes happening in India with females irrespective of their age. The message conveyed by this ad to its audiences is that being a man one has responsibility towards women to protect them and women are not an object of carnal pleasure but they are indispensable part of the society. 

       In comparison to most of the ads this ad has black and white background and background music with increasing tempo. The music playing in the background heightens emotions. When we see the ad the texts appears in bright yellow colors against the black and white background which helps us focus on the message which this ad wants to convey.

Emotions

Whenever we see such crime happening in society we feel bad, this emotion lasts for a short period of time, a few days, few weeks or may be a few months than we resume our normal lives and we forget everything. This ad ignites people anger and makes us realize that we are the people who represent our society and are responsible for the same. So we are the one who should be standing up as soldiers, we are the one who should be cleaning the mess. This ad basically wants to leave a permanent impression on people.  With this message the brand is trying to emotionally connect with its audience.

Perception

This ad is trying to create a perception of men as soldiers. Irrespective of what we are, from whatever background we are or of whatever age we are we have a social and moral responsibility towards women. People perceive Gillette as the best men’s grooming brand.   

Social media connect:

Gillette promoted this campaign through Social media portals like Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, etc.

Twitter- According to a source , Within approx. a month the hash tag had reached to 12,837 twitter accounts 13,340 impressions. . And analysis of this tweets show that people are really appreciating Gillette’s step of bringing attention to women’s issues in India.

Youtube- On youtube this ad campaign has more than 30,00,000 views.

Facebook-  With more than 20,00,000 members, facebook provides a great opportunity for brands for marketing activities. Gillette introduced My soldier parade.com which people could login through facebook or twitter and can add their friends images as soldier. It was kind of game platform.  More than 400,000 people participated in 3 weeks.

Viral marketing

Gillette intended to spread this “soldier for women” campaign virally. For this Gillette tied up with NGO’s and promoted its campaign through social media marketing. According to a source, urging others to imbibe and exhibit the qualities of soldier, Gillette tied up with NGOs – Plan India and Akshara, to conduct workshops at grass root levels and spread awareness about the campaign. 

Causal marketing vs. CSR

Business dictionary defines CSR as "A company’s sense of responsibility towards the community and environment (both ecological and social) in which it operates.  Cause-related marketing goes beyond simply donating a percentage of a company's profit to a charity. It positions a social agenda as a platform for a marketing campaign, which has a positive domino effect.

Corporate social responsibility, which is based on the belief that a company should give selflessly without financial benefit to itself, differs vastly from cause marketing.

This Gillette campaign is an example of Cause related marketing as although Gillette had nearly doubled its market share over the past three years, the brand had mostly appealed to a younger, more urbane, image-driven male but, had failed to engage with a larger group of men, to whom stubble was an expression of their manliness. As a result, they were beginning to see Gillette as superficial & shallow. This campaign is an attempt to gain attention of larger group of men to make them buy their product using emotional connect.

Credits.

Client: Gillette India
Country marketing manager: Sharat Verma
Assistant brand manager: Karthik Srivatsan, Pratik Mukherjee
Agency: BBDO India
Creative: Josy Paul, Rajdeepak Das, Sandeep Sawant
Account management: Keegan D'Mello, Sidheshwar Sharma
In-house agency editor : Rajeev Mohite
Production house: Old School Films
Director: Piyush Raghani
Producers: Surashmi Basu, Annie Sukheswala
Director of photography: Deepti Gupta
Editor: Sancharii Das Mollick
Music: Amartya Rahut
Sound design: Darshan Nair
Media agency: Mediacom

                                                                                                                                     Reviewed By-

                                                                                                       Anshuman Tewari & Kumar Gaurav 

AMUL MOOCH-   “Pride or nothing”

Summary

This ad features variety of people sitting in barber shop getting mustaches trimmed and shaped in different styles. Suddenly a person walks in with his kid. After getting his mustache trimmed he feels very confident. In simple words it showcases the confidence and an attitude a person gets in having a mustache. Now, that little girl drinks from the Amul milk bottle and gets milk mustache and suddenly the girl’s milk mustache becomes synonymous to the manly mustache’s attitude and confidence.

Purpose of this Ad

This ad is trying to connect with the youth with health first proposition.

Ad analysis

Ø  STP-

1.       “Why it’s different from other milk ads ?”

This advertisement is unique in its approach and makes it stand out from other mik ads clutter as it touches the human quotient of youth of feeling like an adult.

2.       Segmentation-

This ad focuses on the youth segment girl and boy child.

3.       Targeting-

Even though milk is a generic product meant for all age groups independent of their age, gender, socioeconomic status, etc but this ad especially targets the youth b/w the age group of 5-15 years.

4.       Positioning-

Through this ad Amul positions milk as a product that ads to your strength and confidence. It touches the pride that is associated with the mustache.

Ø  CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR-

1.       Attitude-

There are various classifications of attitude as given by different researchers.

ü  Attitude as an explicit component-

This ad supports this explicit component of attitude as milk being good for health.

ü  According to Daniel Kartz classification this advertisement also supports Knowledge & Value expressive component as milk is believed to be good for health especially for the growing kids.

Attitude change:

·         Target Characteristics- This ad tries to alter the attitude of those who doesn't prefer milk because of its bad taste or bad odour and some people who think that milk fat is bad for health.

·         Source Characteristics- In India there is a general belief which is associated with a person mustache. Mustache is synonymous to pride.

·         Message Characteristics- The use of milk mustache is nothing new. This has been used by various companies to boost milk consumption earlier. What’s new in this particular campaign is that they have not used any celebrity, model, actors, etc they have conveyed the message using kids as a model. As we know kids our future and if kids are healthy and strong then an entire country will be healthier and stronger.

2.       Emotion:

                      

Emotion is basically a positive or negative experience that is associated with a particular pattern of psychological activity. This particular ad has struck the awe component of the emotional cycle as mentioned in the above diagram. All people in the barber shop in one of the Amul mooch ad look amazed by the milk mooch.

3.       Motivation:

There are lots of theories about motivation and its type but in order to make things simple let us classify motivation as Extrinsic and Intrinsic types. Extrinsic motivation refers to the performance of the activity in order to attain certain outcome. Intrinsic motivation is driven by an interest or enjoyment and exists within the individual.

After carefully observing this ad we realize that people keep mustaches as they want to portray a bold image of themselves as mustaches plays a sense of pride. Similarly milk mustache so represents a sense of pride. The fact that milk mustaches even better than superficial mustaches is because milk consumption makes you stronger from inside which is a source of intrinsic motivation.

Overall this ad is a good example of social influence on consumer behavior.

4.       Perception:

Milk is perceived by some as having bad taste and by others believe that milk fat is not healthy. This ad makes people aware that milk makes you and your child stronger and milk can be consumed as lassi or any other product which helps in altering consumer perception

CREDIT

Client: Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (Amul)

Creative agency: Da Cunha Communications

Concept: Rahul Da Cunha, Preetika Chawla, Patrick Graham 

Production house: Final Call Productions

Producers: Parthiva Nag, Preetika Chawla, Dhruv Chawla

Writer and director (film): Patrick Graham

                                                                                                Reviewed by-
                                                                          Anshuman Tewari & Kumar Gaurav