Pragya Bijalwan on how Crompton is fortifying its digital strategy

With a brand legacy of 80+ years, Crompton Greaves Consumer Electricals Ltd. is India’s market leader in the category of fans and residential pumps. Over the years, the organization has continuously strived to produce a range of innovative products that cater to the modern consumer including superior quality and high-performance water heaters, anti-dust fans, antibacterial LED bulbs and a range of other categories like air coolers, food processors like mixer grinders, electric kettles and garment care like irons. The company has further invested in brand and innovation to not only better understand and meet consumer needs, but to also help drive energy efficiency. The consumer business also has a well-established and organized distribution network driven by a strong dealer base across the country offering a wide service network and robust after sales service to its customers.

In conversation with Adgully, Pragya Bijalwan, Chief Marketing Officer, Crompton Greaves Consumer Electricals Ltd, speaks at length about the company’s over 80 years journey, how Crompton Greave is leveraging digital transformation trends, marketing strategies, and much more.

With over 80 years’ legacy of experience, how is Crompton Greaves changing the game of marketing in the durables industry?

As a leading brand in the consumer electrical durables industry, it has been our endeavour to drive brand salience across each category of Crompton. Our marketing communication is based on consumer insights and focuses on key brand propositions in service of meaningful consumer product innovation. Accordingly, Crompton has built unique propositions across categories focussing on silence and energy efficiency in Fans category, fine grinding in the mixers category, faster cooling in air coolers, etc.

Moreover, we follow a strategic approach for media deployment that varies depending on the marketing objective. The focus is to build “awareness” across each of our categories, hence the task is to maximise reach with presence on high impact properties like IPL, etc., being present on both TV and Digital. Moreover, we are now reorienting our media mix by investing in new age ad and media formats and betas within the contemporary platforms like YT, Discovery, Quora, Cricbuzz, etc., to drive consideration and preference.

How is Crompton leveraging digital transformation trends to enhance customer experiences and reach a wider audience?

Precisely targeting the appropriate audience is of paramount importance for effective digital outreach in today’s landscape. Modern digital tools employ advanced algorithms and data analytics to create efficient cohorts – distinct audience segments based on behaviours and preferences. This sharp targeting ensures your message resonates with the right audience, optimising resources and boosting engagement. With the help of these tools, we have been able to specifically pinpoint the behavioural aspects of our end TG and have deployed very sharp targeting for our recent campaigns.

As ~80% of the consumer evaluation happens over the digital realm, often commencing with platforms like Google and Amazon, we have channelled our strategic investments into enhancing our presence and discoverability on these platforms. We have been investing on our discoverability on Amazon through Search and Display Ads and on Google through driving High Share of Voice (SOV%) on generic and branded keywords.

GenZs today spend about ~240 minutes on Social Media daily. Hence, our focus has been on creating engaging content on social media to drive Higher Engagement Rates and Organic Reach.

Further, as more and more millennials look for relatable content created by influencers with a high follower base, we are co-creating content with Mega and Macro influencers on leading digital mediums across our categories.

Bringing purpose to the forefront, what is Crompton Greaves doing to ensure its meaningful campaigns resonate with consumers?

We at Crompton have always aimed to make a positive change in people’s lives through meaningful innovation and offering technologically superior products.

We have been constantly driving “Purpose-led campaigns” across our categories. A prime example is the “Cooling Pod” initiative that we orchestrated at Gurgaon Cyber Hub, where we extended respite to dedicated delivery personnel battling the relentless summer heat. Bringing comfort to our doorsteps, we sought to go beyond mere appreciation and provide support, creating a small difference for these modern-day heroes.

Similarly, for the Lights category, we had tied up with schools and old age homes to provide them the “transformation” through our lighting range of products. We wanted to communicate in a more meaningful way how lighting can lift up anyone’s mood and especially do so for people who are unable to experience it. The campaign, “Lighting up your lives”, was able to strike the right chord with our target audience.

Driving the diversity narrative, how is Crompton Greaves effectively incorporating diversity and inclusivity in its advertising campaigns?

Our campaigns have always been inclusive, with focus on driving the product proposition and brand messaging. For instance, our Mixers campaign talks about the “Secret of Fine Taste” delivered through the Crompton Mixers by showing the comparison of the Crompton versus Non Crompton by using “Male Protagonists”. Notably, our approach across all our advertisements emphasises on the remarkable awareness of our female protagonists, who emerge as significantly more well-informed in navigating our diverse product categories. This narrative symphony exemplifies our commitment to portraying empowered and informed individuals within our brand universe.

How does Crompton Greaves’ marketing strategy contribute to achieving brand excellence in the consumer durable industry?

As a leading brand in the consumer electronics industry, our endeavour has been to provide unique, relevant and meaningful propositions for the end consumer. We strive to drive brand salience around the key brand equity measures for each category of Crompton through our campaigns. Thus, our strategic focus aligns seamlessly with the unique attributes in each category, prioritising silence and energy efficiency in fans, precision and fine grinding in mixers and faster cooling for Air Coolers, etc.