“Motorola has always believed in pursuing a sustainable strategy of profitable growth”

With customer centricity and innovation at its heart, Motorola is now changing the way they discover, share, and connect with the world around them through their marketing spree. Marking them as the 3rd most preferred brand in the FY 2021-22, with brand preference doubling year-on-year, Motorola has positioned itself as one of the leading brands with their revolutionary technology world and through their successive device launches.

Motorola has always believed in pursuing a sustainable strategy of ‘profitable growth’. For the past few years, the company has been profitable and is growing rapidly both in terms of value as well as volume, with a double-digit premium to market growth every year. With the changing dynamics of how brands endeavoured to capture the hold of the markets, Motorola takes pride in moving with the astute pace of their consumers, for their consumers.

Speaking to Adgully for their column Marketing Minds, Shivam Ranjan, Head of Marketing, Motorola India, speaks about Motorola’s strategy of ‘profitable growth’, adopting relatable contextual communication to gain traction for their innovations, pushing ahead with their 5G strategy, and much more.

Motorola smartphone was a frontline brand few years back. With the entry of Chinese brands, the market became very competitive. What’s going to be the bounce back strategy for the brand to garner a larger share of the market?

Motorola has always believed in pursuing a sustainable strategy of ‘profitable growth’. For the past few years, we have not only been profitable, but are growing rapidly both in terms of value as well as volume, with a double-digit premium to market growth every year.

With all our brand parameters at a 5-year high, we have doubled our brand preference YoY; now the No. 3 brand in India for aided awareness, consideration, and preference.

The key aspects of our strategy fueling this rapid growth include:

• Driving aspiration for the brand through consistent product innovation. (For example, Motorola edge 30 – the world’s thinnest 5G phone)
• Establishing use-cases through software and services. (For example, ThinkShield for mobile, ReadyFor)
• Growing presence both in online and retail channels. (For example, Flipkart, Reliance Digital retail, Motorola.in, etc.)
• Localised, youth centric communication to build stronger connect with India’s Gen Z.
• Media innovations for driving disproportionate increase in our category SOV without proportional increase in SOE.

How do you plan to woo the GENX audience who have strong preference for brands like iPhone and Samsung? How do you plan to differentiate your offerings to get them into the consideration set?

We have been consistently growing our brand preference over the past five years; have doubled our brand preference YoY in CY 2021 and are now India’s 3^rd brand in terms of brand preference as per our annual Brand Track study. We have also been recognised as India’s best brand (by ET Edge) and India’s most preferred brand (Marksmen Daily) in 2021.

This consistent growth in preference is driven by combination of factors, including:

Product Portfolio Enhancement – Last year we were successfully able to establish ourselves in the premium market segment with the expansion of our Motorola edge franchise, garnering an incredible response from Indian consumer. We are now present across all smartphone segments in India, including mass (E series), mid (G series), premium (Edge) and super premium (Razr).

Hardware Innovation – We have been consistently delivering industry-first innovations across our Moto G and Motorola Edge franchises. Some of the recent examples include Motorola Edge 30 Pro, world’s first smartphone with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 and Motorola Edge 30, which is world’s thinnest 5G phone.

Software & Services Innovation – Differentiating from the competition not just based on hardware, but also in software and services with unique propositions that include a clean Android experience, ThinkShield for mobile and ReadyFor solution for leveraging consumer use-cases with interconnected devices.

Relatable Contextual Communication – In a highly competitive market, it’s important for us to also differentiate our communication, by customising it for the Indian audience. We’ve been doing this consistently and effectively to gain traction for our innovations, some examples of which are:

G52 digital film:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2_Pj6SABh8

Edge 30 digital films:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aj7_YmBWWrY , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL22E1iqG-E

Lot of growth is expected from the Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets. How are you planning to tap these markets and what’s going to be your strategic approach to reach markets?

Growth from Tier 2 and 3 markets is a reality, considering the rapid growth of middle class in India and our strategy to address this demand is as below:

1. Product Placement and Availability – By partnering with the largest eCommerce player in the country. We are already catering to a large set of digital savvy audience through Flipkart and are now, also expanding our retail distribution footprint rapidly, with an aim to cross 50,000 touchpoints by year-end.
2. Product customization – The needs of Tier 2 and 3 audiences are different from a standard metro audience. Thus, we are specifically developing smartphones and feature phones catering to the needs of these audiences.
3. Enhanced use of Regional Language in communication by translating and serving to audiences in 8-10 regional languages for stronger connect.

What’s your view on the 5G entry? How are you gearing yourself to this and offering phones which are 5G compatible at affordable pricing?

Motorola has been pioneer in the 5G devices ecosystem, along with being the first to launch a 5G enabled device in April 2019 and the first smartphone brand to launch India’s most affordable 5G smartphone – Moto G 5G in 2020.

It is important for smartphone brands to ensure that they do not compromise on the features, including the 5G support itself, while trying to hit affordable price points. We are the pioneers of ‘True 5G’ in India, which implies support for the maximum global 5G bands with our smartphones to give consumers truly 5G ready smartphones across price points. Our most affordable 5G smartphone Moto G 51 provides the most well-rounded feature set in the affordable segment and is currently available at an effective price of just Rs 11,999, including offers.

We are committed to providing consumers with the best 5G smartphones across price points as the 5G ecosystem continues to mature in India.

How’s online shopping working for Motorola? What steps have you taken to beef up distribution channels for easy availability of all your models?

Flipkart is the largest e-commerce marketplace in India, with reach across metros, Tier 1, 2 and 3 cities alike. Our strategic partnership with Flipkart has allowed us to offer our wide bouquet of product across the country in a seamless manner. This strategy has helped us grow our volume and value share consistently over the last two years.

Further, we have been investing in the retail channel and are constantly looking to expand our retail footprint through partnerships across GT, Modern Trade as well as the O2O. Through strong partnerships with national LFR chains such as Reliance Digital as well as regional chains, O2O and general trade, we are aiming to be present in approximately 50,000 stores in India by the end of FY22-23.

In the electronics business customer centricity is the backbone to retain customers. What has been your strategy to delight your customer with flawless service?

Consumers are at the center of all we do – from designing products and services that cater to their needs to giving them the best after sales experience.

With our extensive consumer survey programs across products and categories, we keep gathering insights on the needs of consumers and changes in their consumption patterns, which help us customise our products as per their requirements.

With the increase in multimedia consumption, we observed a strong need for stereo speakers even at affordable price points from Indian consumers. Our latest range of smartphones, including the affordable Moto G 42, pack a dual-speaker set-up. Similarly, the consumers’ need for lighter, thinner designs has also been addressed through introduction of premium looking and elegant designs across our product range, along with a commitment of up to a 3-year upgrade policy for security updates, ensuring the after-sale consumer experience remains perfect. Plus, our services such as ThinkShield for mobile provide business grade security to consumers.

Finally, with almost 400 service touchpoints across India, dedicated call center, WhatsApp, and chatbot support, and premium services such as home pick-up and drop and priority queues for Razr and Edge series owners, we offer some of the most advanced ways and accessibility for consumers. We consistently monitor our customer NPS and have been seeing strong growth in every parameter YoY.

What’s going to be your communication and engagement strategy with your audience to heighten the awareness levels and get the brand top of mind in a crowded market?

There are 5 key pillars in our strategy to drive awareness and engagement with our target consumers:

Drive curiosity, buzz and conversation through industry-first product innovations – Examples include the world’s first 5G device, world’s first flippable smartphone (Motorola Razr), world’s thinnest 5G smartphone (Motorola Edge 30), and more.

Localised, contextual and engaging storytelling – At the heart of communication is good storytelling and with our strategy to create localised videos, we deliver cut through communication that is relevant and relatable to the target audience.

Maximising reach with relevant audience – A large smartphone market also implies a very large ‘in-market’ audience base. Thus, it is important for the brand to reach the consumer set actively looking for a smartphone with top funnel media investments. While performance marketing continues to be important to drive sell-outs, top funnel investments are critical for us to be visible enough to create an uplift in TOMA with the relevant audience set.

Staying fresh & relevant – In this fast-paced category, recency is critical factor in driving SPONT and TOMA. We are ensuring that we stay visible and fresh in minds of Indian consumers through our new product launches and campaigns.

Driving consideration and engagement through influencers – This is specifically important in a cluttered category, where consumers have too many options to choose from at any price point. Consumers look for guidance or views from experts, where our review programs with technology-led influencers play a big role in assisting the consumer decision making.