In a country of over billion people and millions of brands, each brand has the potential to tap into the vast sea of consumers and sail its ship. Each needs to mount a strategy essential in successfully harnessing this potential and determining whether the vessel propels with force or stay afloat directionless. In today’s dynamic environment, which keeps evolving due to shifts in consumer and content patterns, brands look to go beyond cookie-cutter solutions and are scouting for ideas that can create buzz and garner a higher share of voice. Today, clients seek services and solutions that will make their experience more pleasurable and their lives easier. Simon Sinek, a British-American author and speaker, states that “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. And what you do simply proves what you believe.”

Brands today are repositioning themselves by being a purpose-led brand that connects with customers who share their fundamental beliefs. At Sony Pictures Networks (SPN) India, it is in our DNA to put ourselves in the client’s shoes and understand their perspective and core business. To be able to serve and engage with clients better, it is imperative to recognise what forces are they driven by. One such example at hand is the ad sales solutions provided to Tata Motors for its Commercial Vehicle Business Unit (CVBU). We like to call this “thinking like a brand manager” approach, where we innovated by catalysing the brand’s sales objective and creating a seamless and impactful solution.

Being in the commercial segment, Tata Motors operates in a very challenging category. Thus, it was critical for us to understand the brand and their potential customers to come up with a solution that was beyond the conventional viewpoint. Tata Motors highlighted the unique challenge they were facing, where the two key products in their portfolio were being misunderstood by their consumers – Tata Ace and Tata Intra. While Ace is a regular pick-up vehicle, Intra, a premium design vehicle that falls in the mini-truck category, has a car like appeal and delivers reliability with a compact, robust, and attractive design language.

Assigned to create a visible difference between the two, we tried to understand the consumers of Tata Intra and their thought processes. After much reckoning and research, the team at SPN came up with a fitting consumer profile, which was as an aspirational and ambitious small business owner and a white-collar professional in a blue collared job. A hard worker but at the same time desires comfort. As soon as we deciphered the profile, we aimed for Intra to become synonymous with the realisation of a small business owner’s dream. We focused on the word Intra and successfully built the campaign “Interview to iNTRAview” with the intent of inspiring the audience to attain freedom from a monotonous life of giving interviews and starting a business of their own. They become their own boss through the catchphrase “Badle Soch, Badle Zindagi”, further promoting the feeling of accomplishment associated with their own successes. The message was linked to the pleasure of driving and comfort, thus creating a strong brand connect with the audience.

The campaign designed in four phases was aired extensively for two days across Sony’s network channels, establishing build-up by roping in notable lyricist Manoj Muntashir, appealing to the audience to tune into the Indian Idol finale. Further, we revealed the end phase of this integration by leveraging the most anticipated finale of Indian Idol. The three campaign stories were strategically placed on marquee shows such as The Kapil Sharma Show, Indian Idol and the rest of the channels to create the desired impact and achieve a higher share of voice.

The brand solutions team at SPN went beyond by marrying the brand objective by creating synergies across networks and bringing the idea to life by creating immense value for the brand – Tata Intra. The featured innovation is an isolated example of the creative and problem-solving capabilities within SPN’s brand solutions, a team that constantly strives to tell stories beyond the ordinary.

Disclaimer: Views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the blog are solely that of the author, and not necessarily of Sony Pictures Networks India and/or its subsidiaries and affiliates.