CASE STUDY
Ambuja Cement: Wall-to-wall Advertising
Ambuja Cements formerly Gujarat Ambuja is one of India's largest cement brands. The company came into existence in 1984. Ambuja Cements is a classic example of a successful commodity branding. In the last decade the company has grown tenfold. Indian cement market is different from the rest of the world because the largest segment of buyers of cement in India is the individual home owners rather than the institutions. Although this scenario is witnessing a change due to the boom in the organized realty sector, individual home owners form a significant segment that no cement marketers can ignore. Although these individuals shell out the money to purchase cement, they are not the decision makers in the buying process. The demographic profile includes 25- 45 yrs young males the intermediaries like the contractors, masons etc take up the role of the influencer/decision makers in the purchase of this product. Since the consumers view this product as a commodity, the involvement of ordinary home owners in the purchase is low.
Ambuja Cements also focused on influencing the other players in the business like the contractors/masons and engineers through camps and meets.
Ambuja Cements is one of the companies that realized the potential of brand as a differentiator. Even in the eighties, Ambuja cement started its activities for building the brand. It adopted various other strategies depending on the trend. Emphasis was on Quality. High Advertisement for branding at least 3 times more than the competitor ACC at one time. Improvement in Packaging by information provided by suppliers acted in favour of the company. Extensive & primarily exclusive distribution network-Over 6,000 dealers and 20,000 retailers helped them to reach remote areas also. Promotional activities like seminars, workshops for masons, architects, contractors etc by providing information on use of Ambuja Cement. Advertising and Publicity campaign. In fact according to Super brands report, Ambuja cements is the first cement brand to start advertising in television. The Selection of Agency by the Ambuja Cement was well researched and fulfilled their expectation.
Grey Worldwide ranks amongst the largest global advertising companies. They have long standing reputation for launching and building many of the company’s leading brands like P&G, Gsk, Bharti Axa, Kinderjoy, Fortis etc. Ambuja Cement’s association with the Grey Agency helped them to capture the market share and build Brand Image. For Ambuja Cement’s Ad, Grey has ensured that the strength of the cement rides on the strength of emotion.
While branding the cement commodity, the agency concentrated on its core brand promise of “Strength". Strength is a very highly relevant attribute as far as customer is concerned. Commodities are boring products, but for smart marketers, this was an opportunity to make difference.
Television Commercial (TVC) for Ambuja Cement, revolves around the story of two estranged brothers (Bhai Bhai, featuring Boman Irani, which was released six years ago) trying to break down the wall that runs between their houses, the wall which they put up to separate their houses when they were fighting with each other seasoned with an emotional (almost humanitarian) twist. Priti Nair, national creative director, Grey Worldwide, says that the strength of the wall was juxtaposed with the strength of character of the two brothers. “Cement is a low involving category,” says Nair. So, the brotherly love element and the often used Bollywood type plot were added to make the ad more entertaining.
Nair and her team wanted to stay away from the stereotypical ‘milavat (adulteration)’ type ads for cement, or even those involving big buildings and pride of ownership. “We wanted to show the victory of the underdogs,” she explains.
After that humorous attempt, came some ads which presented the brand in a sentimental vein (the Dadi ad), a move that Vivek Deshpande, Ambuja Cement’s vice-president for brand and promotions, agrees was rather disastrous, so much so that the Bhai Bhai ad was recalled. Perhaps it was the most memorable ad .The campaign is still successfully running. The ad still ables to generate freshness with the humor and the script. The Advertisers bought in lot of humor to this (otherwise) boring product. Most of its campaigns are humorous which makes the consumers stick to the advertisements.
'Ambuja Cement Yeh
Deewaar nahin tootegi nahi’
For the longest time ever, Ambuja has been harping on its ‘giant compressive strength’ proposition; the brand even created the visual of a ‘giant’ and then a broken hammer adding that the brand will now strike a balance between emotion and humor.
The primary objectives of the advertisement were Creating awareness, Build Saliency, Have a top of mind recall which is very well achieved with the campaign. This advertisement reinforces the core positioning of Ambuja as strong cement. Ambuja Cements also used the outdoors extensively to reinforce the brand image and enhance brand recall. All through its campaigns, the brand was very consistent on reinforcing its positioning as the “Strongest cement” or symbol of compressive strength. The brand was also very clever in selecting a unique logo.
These initiatives helped Ambuja to charge a premium over other brands. With the competition hotting up from Grasim, Ultratech, Ambuja Cements could hold on to its share because of the brand equity it had created over these years.
While branding a commodity, the critical question is whether these ads can influence the consumers to change their commodity mindset towards this category. The answer is definitely affirmative. We have noticed many home owners directly procuring these products for their home construction because they don't trust the contractors. In these scenarios, high brand recall will give the edge for the brands like Ambuja Cement and exploring a market of new customers and thus making the home owners decision makers.
