Exclusive | BB shall celebrate loyalty: Blackberry India's Thomas

As the smart phone market begin to clutter, old hands of the game have begun to brush up their product enhancement, marketing and promotional moves to keep in pace with the business. Blackberry being one of them celebrates a decade of its presence in the country this year and promises to bring in a lot of rewards and gains to its users.

Adgully caught up with Amar Thomas, Country Marketing Manager, BlackBerry India to know the about the growing smart-phone market, the marketing plans at Blackberry India and more.

While Blackberry was always perceived to be a business phone, about 3 – 4 years back, this changed and BB became a youth symbol in India with affordable handsets available. Sharing his thoughts on why and how this would have happened, Thomas said, “The emergence of blackberry as a ‘youth’ symbol comes from the fact that their parents have been avid BB users. Young children mostly aspire to be what their parents are, they wish to do what their folks do and in the same manner and understandably, their parents become great influencers on the choices these children make. Thus, the young population of India gradually took to the BB fever! Our associations and activities with telecom players like Vodafone reinforced the fact the BB is the place to be in!

He said that the current TG that they are catering is the on-the-go generation. “Though it may sound clichéd, but they wish to do a lot more in less time. And that is exactly the psychographic segment we at Blackberry cater to”, he added.

A couple of years of years back, the birth of Android saw Blackberry take slight beating with drop in popularity and thus drop in sales. Responding to how did the company deal with this, both in India and globally and shedding some light on product enhancement activities done at Blackberry India, Thomas said, “We are the pioneers in the smart-phone business, and like every business, with the entry of new players comes new strategies and plans. Every OS launched in the mobile space, has its own time-band to get the required market share and the same has happened with Android as well. However, we welcome and thank competition to enter the market and help us grow as well”.   

With a youth icon like Ranbir Kapoor on board for Indian consumers, a renewed approach was devised to bring back the lost BB lover. Also, amidst the surge of multiple Instant Messaging services, Ranbir’s entry in team Blackberry which was highly focused on the revival of BBM was seen as a strategy to renew the love for BBM. Sharing the strategy and rationale for this move, Thomas said, “Ranbir Kapoor is a youth icon and bringing him aboard was with the thought of a fresh approach to present to product along with the instant messaging service – BBM. The idea was to bring together a stellar actor / celebrity alongside a stellar product which would instantly shoot up the recall value for Blackberry. The current ‘Be on Blackberry’ was devised as an extension to the idea of the pleasure of being in the BB world!”

Elaborating on the rationale and insight that went in for the Be on Blackberry campaign, he said, “BlackBerry has continued to innovate and concentrate on offering its users an un-parallel experience as they continue to improve the BlackBerry 10 platform with constant periodic updates that bolsters a platform that’s only over a year old in the changing and dynamic smart-phone industry. Be On BlackBerry recognizes this power user who is an industry leader, pioneer in his field and a small credit of his success is catalyzed by BlackBerry. BlackBerry reaches out to this user who is a diehard BlackBerry Fan and will advocate that BlackBerry is the right choice of the user who sets the tone rather than sheepishly follows a flock. These individuals are role models to many a common man and have built their reputation on the sheer achievements. Be on BlackBerry relies on this advocacy rather than paid celebrity associations that often lacks a ‎personal relationship with the brand s/he is endorsing. The iconic stature of these individuals mixed with the iconic Brand of BlackBerry calls for a potent confluence that builds for the resurgence of BlackBerry in India”.

He goes on to mention that the ‘in store’ customer moments will be a blend of the customers interface with some of their top retailers who have participated in the resurgence of BlackBerry. And stand by their advocacy of their brand and product promise to the customers and prospective buyers. “350 of our top retailers will meet you in person at these stores to share their moments with Blackberry or you are likely to also see in store branding in prominent space within the store with the retailer advising you " Be on BlackBerry because I am…The moment you see this you are likely to then ask our trained and courteous in store experts to demonstrate the improved BlackBerry 10 experience after the 10.2.1 OS update, considering this is coming from retailers who also sell other brands for reasons that are truly business but are personally BlackBerry people. And if the demo prompts you to join the growing number of Blackberry people you would have made a choice that the world most responsible leaders, journalists, influencers and regular common man have made.‎ Not to mention that select devices also win you accessories and merchandise that can't be ignored.

With other cell phone manufacturers providing pocket-friendly Android phones, speaking about how the company manages to make way to tier II and tier III geographies in India and smart phone market trends in tier 2 and 3 cities and towns in India, Thomas strongly stated, “We don’t really break down our mechanism as tier II and III cities and the others. But having said that we surely see a quantifiable percentage of sales coming from the non-metros by virtue of selling outlets like large format retail stores like Croma, The Mobile Store etc and the strong distribution network we hold. Though the adoption of Blackberry is from the top 8 – 10 cities, but there is an inherent demand in these geographies. The growing e-commerce culture plays a vital supportive role in reaching out to these unconventional markets.

As Blackberry celebrated a decade in the country, sharing the marketing plans in place to up the game in the Indian market and the innovative strategies adopted to celebrate this moment for Blackberry India, Thomas said, “While our 10th year in the country is a milestone in itself, we believe there are more to achieve. Along with other announcements this year, we have also launched the BB Loyalty programme that is intended to reward old and loyal BB customers and bring in newer customers with newer products. This would be by way of special pricing, buy-back offers etc. The BBLoyalty program targets the consumer segment on BlackBerry OS 7 and below roughly about 400K customers. Customers within this base get upto 10% discount on operating prices. ‎This is an extension of Be on BlackBerry.

In the last year itself, Blackberry has upped the ante with regards to its marketing activities by associating with events like CEO’s Got Talent, Ad:tech 2014 etc. Speaking about more of such associations, Thomas said, “Blackberry India essentially focuses on four verticals / pillars - Enterprise, Devices, Messaging, QNX. Our associations with the said events have been moves to strengthen the ‘enterprise’ pillar at the company and we look forward to joining hands with activities we believe will to fruitful to both the parties involved”.

Concluding the conversation, Thomas said, “As far as my journey is concerned, it has been fantastic up till now. A proud user of Blackberry, I hold a lot of pride in being associated with the brand. There are some great people to work with and I come out alive everyday! I have enjoyed every moment trough this rollercoaster ride and look forward to a long, fruitful relationship”.