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Business News/ Companies / News/  ‘Our digi spends rose four to five times in last two years’
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‘Our digi spends rose four to five times in last two years’

In India, we are large consumers of content over multiple media. So any brand seen advertising here has a typical kind of trust

Sunil Narula, senior vice-president of marketing and sales at Panasonic Life SolutionsPremium
Sunil Narula, senior vice-president of marketing and sales at Panasonic Life Solutions

NEW DELHI : Japanese giant Panasonic Corp. will merge its local consumer durables business, Panasonic India, with its electrical construction materials (ECM), lighting, and fans business, Panasonic Life Solutions India, to create a single entity in the next couple of months. In an interview, Sunil Narula, senior vice-president of marketing and sales at Panasonic Life Solutions, talks about the role of electricians as influencers and the company’s advertising strategies. Edited excerpts:

What is the size of the electrical market in India?

It’s called the electrical construction materials or ECM category. It’s pretty large with several verticals. Wiring devices, comprising switches, extension cords and flexi cords, is approximately 5,500 crore in size. The wires and cables business—for industries and domestic use—is massive at around 1.5 trillion. We participate in the domestic cables market, which would be approximately 15,000 crore to 20,000 crore. The third category is switchgear—a 15,000 crore to 17,000 crore category. The power business also has a cable management system, which is another 1,000 crore category where we participate.

Do you operate under Panasonic or Anchor brand?

Anchor was established by the Shah group in 1963 as a manufacturer of switches. In 2007, Panasonic saw Anchor as the right fit for acquisition for entry in the Indian market in the ECM space. For all categories, we have both the brands Anchor and Panasonic. In the power category, brand Anchor is dominant. Lighting and fans are dominated by brand Panasonic.

Why did you retain the Anchor brand?

It’s a value for money brand and a household name. While Panasonic is known in the metros, tier-I markets and among evolved consumers, in smaller markets and rural India, Anchor is much more entrenched. So there was very strong merit in retaining and growing Anchor and getting in Panasonic products in the premium space. That strategy will continue.

How difficult is it to market the ECM category?

The kind of engagement that all of us have with the switch is unimaginable. But it’s so mechanical, as in, you don’t realize when you’re switching on or switching off a fan or a light. The marketing is interesting as there are different stakeholders. On one side, you have an electrician who’s completely entrenched in this category. On the other side, consumer involvement is pretty high when it comes to constructing a new house or renovating to ensure that the switch matches the colour of the wall, or while doing the false ceiling, to ensure that the wire is the best in terms of safety.

So, what kind of communication do you use?

As I said, the electrician is a very important stakeholder. There is constant engagement with the electricians through our sales teams. We have also evolved an Anchor certified electrician programme where we pick up some of them for formal one-day training and certify them.

We also incentivize them. So in certain product categories, we have special QR codes on the boxes, which they can scan and make some money by promoting these products to consumers. We have almost 90,000 such electricians on our Smart Saver app, and almost 25,000 electricians regularly engage with us every month when they scan these QR codes.

But you can’t neglect the consumer. In India, we are large consumers of content over multiple media, whether TV or digital or print. So any brand seen advertising here has a typical kind of trust, which comes in.

So, where do you advertise?

We were doing TV on a regular basis before covid. But we have kind of slightly moved away from it. And next year, again, we are coming back with a large amount of money being spent on television advertising.

We have probably gone up by almost four to five times in our digital spends over the last two years. More than the spend, the amount of focus we have brought in, in terms of social media, is strengthening our internal teams.

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Published: 26 Dec 2021, 11:53 PM IST
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