DIGITAL MARKETING
PART ONE: Brand analysis
1. Introduction
Brand name: Hero Motocorp
Hero Motocorp Ltd. is an Indian firm which is the largest manufacturer of two wheelers like motorcycles and scooters. It is guided by its mission to fulfil its customers' needs and aspirations for mobility while setting benchmarks in quality and technological innovation. It has launched itself on the various social media platforms to address this mission with efficiency.
Website URL: http://www.heromotocorp.com/en-in/.
Hero Motocorp is has been present on various social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc.
Product & service offering/USP: Hero Motocorp offers products across various categories for two wheelers in the motorcycle and scooters product categories. The major segments are from <110cc, 110-125cc, 125cc-150cc and in the above 150cc segment. The products offer customer value proposition of being value for money, superior product quality and having a high mileage efficiency. During the months of August and September in 2016 it has clocked on an average 6 lakh+ units being sold pan India, one of the highest in the industry. India is a developing economy with the average Indian middle class segment of buyers growing with a growing demand for two wheelers. This sentiment is echoed both in the rural and the urban areas where having a two wheeler is an emotional purchase as well as an aspirational one. Hero Motocorp has been using social media proactively to raise causes of Girl Child Empowerment, Child
Education, Road Safety, etc to focus on the core issues pressing the country. These social issues make the brand appear as authentic as well as socially responsible among its target audience. Its USP is to provide a large product variety as per the customers’ needs, possessing an excellent brand equity as well as in maintaining and acquiring high customer loyalty.
Tone, persona, & communication style:
Brand Persona: Ajay is a 28 year old male from Lucknow, India. He is a Software Developer working for Amazon. He belongs to Gen Y and regularly makes use of social media especially Facebook and Twitter to follow the brands of his choice as well as YouTube for watching videos. He makes use of his motorcycle to travel to and fro from his place to his office location. He also loves to travel across the city with his friends for motorcycle rides on the weekends as well as for his NGO related work assignments. Hero Motocorp’s persona can be summarised as being a confident, passionate, aware and a caring brand which can be highlighted from its social campaigns.
Brand personality traits: Ajay’s persona resonates with that of Hero’s brand personality, which highlights honesty, confidence and awareness. Trust and self-confidence are major aspects of Hero’s brand personality. It is most certainly not an untrustworthy, ambiguous or a timid brand.
Voice of brand persona: Hero’s brand persona is perceived as that of a caring, self-confident one which tries to engage its consumers and comes across as trustworthy. It makes use of SEO and PPC to a large extent. It also makes use of its extensive Twitter and Facebook presence among the other two wheeler brands in India to raise awareness about safe driving, girl child empowerment and education, etc.
Marker’s comments: /8
2. Target market
India is a young country with a median age of mere 27 years. Hero Motocorp has segmented its target audience primarily in terms of their income and age to make better and economical products. All urban & semi-urban as well as rural youth in the age group of 20-40 years of age with a low to middle income group. It provides products in the price range of INR 40,000 up to 1,00,000. Hero’s customers are young, pre-dominantly internet-savvy and seekers of value for money. They are usually working professionals irrespective of marital status. As youth today are more socially aware, most of Hero’s consumers are vocal. They are increasingly sensitive to issues of social importance and of the changing dynamics in the society. They are more value driven and believers in equal opportunity for all. Their attitudes & opinions are instrumental in shaping the upcoming societies and their governance structures.
Marker’s comments: /6
3. SMART objectives SMART
Objective
Tactic(s) KPIs Tracking Tools
To attain a 20% increase in revenue through customer acquisition as well as retention during the FY17.
CRM, Discounts and offers in place, e-mail marketing, SMS marketing. No. of e-mails forwarded to the target segment and their forwarding rates; No. of repurchases done by previous customers; etc.
Use of e-mail marketing analytics tools like SendLoop, Contactually, Intercom, etc.; Sending streamlined offers to select customers; Making use of CRM through data tracking. To attain a 30% increase in Hero Motocorp’s online community especially social media platforms by FY17. Using Digital marketing on Twitter, Facebook; Making use of social theme campaigns. Growth in fan follower base on the social media platforms; No of retweets,
promoted posts, likes and shares; Timeline analysis of new posts being made/interval.
Twitter Analytics and Facebook Insights for specific media tracking; ORM tools like Radian6, uberVU, Attentio, Brandseye, etc. Content Management tools like Marketing.Al, etc;
Making use of workflow maps and calendar schedules for content updation. To drive an additional increase in revenue of INR 15 mn. from its pan India sales during the next quarter in FY17. SEO, Online and Search Advertising CPCM/CPA, etc of ads; Value conversions from the undertaken tactics as well as the no of conversions. No of referrals from search & display ads; Quality score and CTR.
Campaign tracking through tools like Piwik; AdWords tracking in Google Analytics for PPC; Server tracking for paid media.
Marker’s comments: /9
1. Competitor analysis
The competitor site under consideration is Royal Enfield. It has been chosen as a competitor due to Hero’s growing aspirations and investments of venturing into the 200-250cc motorcycle segment where Eicher Motors owned Royal Enfield clearly scores in the digital strategy domain. It scores notably above Hero Motocorp in the following three areas:
#1 Brand Website Layout: For a motorcycle brand, it is essential that it showcases the product so as to make the value proposition authentic and appealing to the consumer. The website has elements to attract the consumer through a number of factors as follows:
(a) Consumer based content: Imagery have been aesthetically highlighted and showcased as an experiential product;
(b) User convenience to help them locate the nearest dealer, nearest service centre as well as the roadside assistance feature;
(c) Ride Calendar which highlights the different events being scheduled like bike rides;
(d) Highlighting the consumer filmed videos like Himalayan Stories, Rider Mania, etc.;
#2 Social Media consistency: Royal Enfield makes extensive use of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram to drive user engagement. It makes use of its Twitter handle and Instagram to share user
stories and upcoming events. Its YouTube channel
(https://www.youtube.com/user/royalenfieldmedia) posts content with exciting videos. Its brand image consistency can be checked from the following snapshots:
#3 Building an online user community: Royal Enfield unlike Hero Motocorp is trying to incorporate its users into its brand through posting their stories, promoting discussions, retweets, shares, etc. It is also building a cult type image of its brand by bringing out a dedicated range of apparels like jackets, gloves, etc for bike riders as well as accessories like helmets to increase the brand association for its users thus building brand belongingness and identity.
Marker’s comments: /9
2. Role of data
In the given context, in order to execute the digital marketing strategy of Hero Motocorp, there will be an extensive use of data to validate and track the firm’s objectives. The following tracking tools can be implemented to gauge the effectiveness of the firm’s digital campaigns:
#1 Facebook Insights, Twitalayzer #2 SEO: Google Analytics
#3CRM Analytics
#4 ORM and Sentiment Analysis on Social Media platforms
#5Campaign tracking and Google AdWords for PPC advertisements #6 Email Automation & Analytics
Since Hero Motocorp has its dedicated social media channels thus its web analytics will play a critical role in analysing the current consumer behaviour and its favourableness for the firm.
Metrics that uniquely identify and characterise the site visitors, posted content and the conversions taking place can be possibly tracked to optimize results. Some of the following are examples of metrics that can be analysed:
#2 Duration/ visit and the no. of pages navigated and viewed from the home page as well as value conversions
#3 No. of unique visitors visiting at a particular point of time
#4Usage of keywords and referrer’s used to reach the brand website #5 Entry/ exit/ landing pages
It is crucial to analyse the performance of the specific product wise landing pages, etc. to understand the website’s objectives. This could possibly be tracking of the specific reports in Google Analytics. The obtained insights could be used to implement a conversion optimization process by making use of A/B or multi-variate tests to improve performance.
Marker’s comments: /6
PART THREE: Tactical plan
Tactic 1: Social Marketing
Hero Motocorp now is planning to enter the 200-250cc segment which is whole new target market they have to cater. This market is driven not just by value for money, but also by community building, social recognition and shared ownership of brand with its customers.
One very important thing to notice is that, the brand which enters this segment have to constantly put their efforts in coming up with idea till execution of events
where the users can come together a long rides and community building so that they feel attached with the brand. This creates a unique psychological advantage to the products pricing, thus adding premium to this segment. It’s the lifestyle which this segment sells, hence we should focus on our online campaigns also in a way which can consistently deliver this message. Eg. The recent ‘Tour of Rajasthan 2016 – Royal ride through the sands of time’.
The social media presence of Hero can be seen from the image above. To increase their presence further, we would like to suggest a campaign similar to that of ‘MTV Roadies’. Instead of having it collaborated with MTV, we would like it to be a Hotstar Original Show. Further, various customer engagement methods such as elimination through votes can be done on various social media networks. We would continuously post live feeds from events like Auto Expo, etc on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and Snapchat. Reviews from various websites such as Cardekho, xbhp, Overdrive, Autocar, Bike etc would be posted keeping the page active. User reviews and promotions in form of wordcloud will be posted based on twitter feeds using sentiment analysis.
Marker’s comments: /8
Tactic 2: Video Marketing
Apart from the normal campaign advertisements, we would promote the user videos like Royal Enfield’s. We will be conducting small time surveys from Hero users regarding their trips, how they feel about their bike, what all they look forward etc. A potential customer always looks ahead for such reviews which helps them with their purchase.
Hero can have an official YouTube channel for the same like Arsenal TV for fan interviews. Also, an unofficial hero biking community can be formed like Bajaj’s NS Wolves. Such a conglomerate video which contains the edits of various videos appeals to the youth providing them a sense of community. A community, today, is one of the most essential components of marketing a bike and Hero even having a good online presence lacks in such a community.
Hero can have an association with a review providing channel. Potential customers usually seek out for such information before making a purchase.
But with all the above attracts negative publicity. These videos not only damage the brand but also feed a negative perception which is hard to change. The online team has to take care of such videos based on their marketing strategy.
Marker’s comments: /8
Tactic 3: CRM
In this competitive environment in the auto mobile market where post purchase service is considered to be at par with purchase of the vehicle, CRM is one must-need tools for Hero Motocorp Ltd. The servicing of the vehicles is another source of revenue. An unsatisfied customer due to post purchase servicing would have very low switching cost and would easily switch among bike maintenance centres. CRM is a tool which would enhance the customer loyalty and customer engagement. Apart from CRM, we also have Database marketing which would help the same cause.
We would use CRM to improve the quality of Hero's service centre. Increasing the satisfaction level of the customer induces him to repurchase thus building loyalty. CRM along with mobile marketing would lead to better customer engagement.
Using analytics and database marketing, we would be able to analyse and identify the causes of dissatisfaction in our services. These causes can be lack of spare parts, inappropriate behaviour of maintenance staff etc. It would help in analysing the distribution channel and identify the bottlenecks to be rectified. Bottom line, through this we are trying to improve the customer experience post purchase and provide a positive WOM which would help in building the brand. Marker’s comments:
Tactic 4: Online Advertising
Hero is seeing a shift from its <150 cc segment to >150cc segment. The shift in the segment also signifies a shift in the target audience. While bikes below 150cc were targeted for customers who seek value for money, are more mileage oriented, more utility oriented and have low disposable income, bikes above 150cc cater to different needs altogether. Its potential customer would have a high disposable income, more power and speed oriented; mileage comes second but high on aspirational values. When segmented demographically, this segment is tech savvy and their online presence is in the form of YouTube, review websites, etc.
Above 150cc, Hero has already launched the CBZ and Karizma with upcoming models like HX-250 and Hastur 620 in the pipeline. Hero’s credibility has already lied in the segment below 150cc and has to fight with the likes Yamaha, Honda, Kawasaki, Bajaj, Royal Enfield and now TVS. These companies have been producing above 150cc vehicles in the past decade and have huge market share as compared to Hero. So for Hero to enter this rat race, it has to spend heavily on its branding. From the display of the bike in an Auto Expo, we would start building up the brand through chain of articles and YouTube videos. Content Marketing and Review articles by credible sources like xbhp.com are most important. We would get the bikes tested by them and promote their reviews thus helping to establish the brand in the segment above 150cc. Also, we would launch a series of promotional video or a promotional campaign like “Vroom vroom” campaign. The campaign would in alignment to the brand persona which the company wants to promote. Any misalignment with the persona could send a very different image, thus hurting the establishing brand.
Positive blogging will be promoted and we would selectively add excerpts in the website which would be adding to the credibility of the brand.
Marker’s comments: /8