Zen and the art of community marketing

This Eid, as with other festivals, brands laid out a lavish buffet. The Western Union Company, a leader in global payment services, offered an array of prizes to Indian customers receiving international remittances through Western Union-branded money transfer services during the holy month of Ramadan in Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Haryana, Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Maharashtra. Till July 28, more than 14,000 lucky Indian consumers stood a chance to win anything from a mobile recharge coupon to travel backpacks, LED televisions, refrigerators and mobile phones. Three winners had the opportunity of winning a cash prize of ₹1 lakh each and one lucky recipient could take home the grand cash prize of ₹5 lakh.

Companies such asWestern Union are clearly riding on the back of a large population of Muslim expatriates who would be sending money back home, particularly when they could not get leave to visit their near and dear ones during festival time. Western Union is only trying to make that experience better for the ones back home by giving them an additional surprise during Eid. “Indians working and living overseas make an extra effort to send money to their family during Ramadan, to ensure that the religious observations and festivities of Eid-ul-Fitr are not compromised,” says Kiran Shetty, managing director and regional vice-president, Western Union India, in a media statement.

Then there was Go Air. The airline offered discounted air fares up to ₹786 off on select routes.

Others, such as Natural Ice Cream, a major Mumbai-based ice-cream retailer, took the innovative route. For the second year running, the chain introduced a special Malai Korma flavour during the fasting period of Ramadan. Srinivas Kamath, director, Kamaths Ourtimes Ice Creams, which owns the Natural brand, says this year the chain sold nearly 5,000 kg of the new flavour during the one month of fasting leading up to Eid, a huge incremental gain over the previous year. And those who came asking for the limited edition were not just Muslims but a cross-section of consumers who wanted to taste the flavour of the season. Kamath agrees that the innovation gave consumers one good reason to buy ice-cream during the lean season (monsoon).

Earlier too, Natural came up with innovative flavours to coincide with festivals. For instance, during Holi, it introduced Thandai flavoured ice-cream, during Ganesh Chathurthi ‘Prasadam’ or Gajar ka Halwa during Raksha Bandhan and even a Til-Gul offering for Makar Sankranthi. Kamath says these festival introductions help create a strong word-of-mouth and enable the brand to stand out. But he’s reluctant to make these festive treats a part of the mainline offerings as that would take away the novelty factor.

Take the case of retailer Shoppers Stop. Much like other retailers, Shoppers Stop too targets customers in West Bengal during Durga Puja. Vinay Bhatia, customer care associate and executive vice-president - marketing, loyalty and analytics, Shoppers Stop, says the chain decided to go through its database of loyalty card holders to identify pin-code clusters of Bengalis in other states. It soon located clusters such as Chittaranjan Park in New Delhi, and in Mumbai and Bengaluru. It sent its loyalty club members festival wishes through SMS and also used the interaction to publicise its offers. Bhatia says the chain got an incremental sale of ₹1 crore through this exercise. Buoyed by this success, the chain replicated this initiative for others festivals such as Navratri (identifying Gujaratis in its loyalty club outside Gujarat), Onam (identified Malayalees outside Kerala) and so on.

While the communities flock to brands during the festive season, marketers are reluctant to assert that customers who are acquired during good times will have a long-lasting relationship with the brand. “That might be a bit of a stretch. I would not answer that in either way,” says one marketer. But there’s no denying that the real community brands are the ones that go beyond being the flavour of the season — brands that consumers hold close to their hearts, come rain or sunshine. Food brands such as L.G., a brand of asafoetida that is a crucial ingredient in most South Indian kitchens transcending generations, or Idhayam, a brand of gingelly oil that continues to dominate South Indian homes and has even thwarted challenges from bigger names such as Marico and Dabur, are examples that qualify. Talk about a close-knit brand community!