Karan Kumar, Marketing Manager, Education & Stationery Products Business (ESPB), ITC Limited, talks about establishing the brand as a serious player in the notebook segment, importance of reaching out to consumers in their own space, the brand’s upcoming art stationery and more…
Q] ITC Classmate began its journey with the notebook segment, which was treated more like a commodity. What were the strategic initiatives undertaken by the brand to establish itself in this scenario?
Notebooks were not known as brands, it was more like ‘mujhe ek sau page ki notebook chahiye’. We identified an opportunity in this segment and worked very hard on the brand and product proposition. Today in the operating segments in notebook, we have a more than 50% share. That makes us by far the largest player. We outsell our closest competitor 1:2 and we outsell our second closest competitor 1:5.
Q] The brand has extended into other allied offerings as well, how different is your strategy for these offerings from the notebook segment?
About three years ago, we started getting into categories that complement the notebook category. Our aim was to complete the basket of stationery for a child who uses notebooks. It also gives us more touch points to interact with consumers; so we got into pens, pencils, erasers, sharpeners and geometry boxes. In the last year-and-a-half, we have got into art stationery. Success with notebooks and brand strength empowered us to get into other segments along with our established distribution strength. Geometry boxes are a segment where we have about 20% marketshare of the industry; this has been an extremely successful product for us. At the same time, there are categories like pens and pencils where we are trying to make our mark. These categories have been dominated by extremely strong and now legacy brands that have a great foothold and deep penetration in the market as these players have been around for about 30-40 years. For these offerings, we use the strategy of market share acquisition with a product and brand proposition mix which is superior and resonates better.
Q] What according to you have been the game changers for the brand?
Getting the entire product proposition right in terms of need gap, consumption, usage and behaviour in the category, research on whether the current products in the category are failing consumers. As simple as it sounds, all of these entail a lot of hard work with attention to minute details… for example, paper quality and binding quality; responsible marketing to children – ensuring that the brand proposition resonates with children and is important for their future.
Q] How has the brand’s proposition of celebrating every child’s uniqueness been used to further engage consumers?
What we do as ITC Classmate is to celebrate the uniqueness of every child… we discourage rote academics, we want to encourage children to become successful in line with their own strengths. Their skills could be vocational as well, which could ensure them livelihood in the future. So while a lot of brands in our category focus on passing exams, we are saying that everybody is born unique… maybe a child is not interested in being a class topper but a damn good chef, dancer or musician. We are speaking to children as well as the influencers, that is; parents and teachers, to allow children to explore and follow their heart. We recently completed a series of talk sessions called ‘Follow your heart’. This was an incredible journey for us. It was about establishing what your brand proposition is. If you look at our TVC, it is all about empowering and partnering with every child to be the first in his or her chosen field. We did this at a pan-India level; on ground and we also had the largest webcast. The audiences ranged between 600- 700 students, while the session was on in one school in Mumbai, we simultaneously had the largest webcast session in five schools at 10 centres and questions were being answered via a live blog. We had a panel of four extremely successful women, all representing alternative careers – Mahrukh Inayet, who was an anchor on Times Now and has started her own school for anchors; VJ Juhi Pande of Channel V, Dipika Pallikal who was world Number 10 in women’s squash and Soha Ali Khan, who was in the corporate world before she became an actor. These individuals made choices by following their heart. Not for a moment are we dissuading students from studying hard, but telling them that if your true calling is somewhere else, we are there to help you. There were teachers and principals and parents in the audience and we got fantastic reviews. We reached almost 25,000 kids in 50 schools. Plus 15,000 on our Facebook account. This was a fairly large consumer engagement initiative which did not sell anything, it was a purely proposition based engagement.
Q] What are the significant consumer trends in this segment?
• There is more information available for a child or an adult to process
• Greater platforms for purchase
• People are talking among themselves, sharing experiences on products and services
• Consumers are becoming less defensive on consuming. It is more about desires and wants and then needs, which is great for consumerism
• Kids have strong opinions about what their parents should buy
Q] Will television remain the primary medium for the brand?
Most certainly… it has the largest cut through in terms of numbers. It is the most cost-effective.
Q] What is the brand strategy on the digital front? Is mobile a part of the digital spends?
We take the digital forum extremely seriously. We have an agency for digital marketing and annual plans and dedicated content and budgets and milestones to achieve. Our spends on digital media would have been anywhere between 15- 20% in 2012, and will grow progressively. We wanted to build a strong foundation on social media first; we will move on to the mobile platform progressively with baby steps.
Q] What can we expect from ITC Classmate in ’13?
Exciting new products, for sure. There will be a focus on writing instruments on more premium products in the notebook category and interesting campaigns; a couple of extremely exciting ‘firsts’ in the industry brand marketing initiatives.
Feedback: priyanka.mehra@exchange4media.com
