For The Connected Consumer

The 2020 reality, regard- less of personal or professional, compelled people to conduct themselves differently. Working from home without engaging additional help at the time had added to the pressures of all at home. For Havells, this provided an opportunity to be the home helper. With #FilmFromHome, conceptualised by Mullen Lintas Gurgaon, Havells and its range of appliances dove in to ‘help save the day’.

Havells home appliances category has over the years spoken about equality and sharing responsibilities among family members’ at various times. Starting with the ‘Respect for women’ campaign to the latest ‘Saath Ki Life. Sukhoon Ki Life.’ as well. #FilmFromHome was the company’s endeavour for family members to step up to help their loved ones and to encourage more people to do the same.

Kicking In Demand

While the campaign featured Havells’ appliances as the additional help to shoulder home responsibilities, it also was a pointer towards the changing consumer preferences in the sector. Amit Tiwari, the vice president of marketing at Havells, explains that consumers have become much smarter, and have adapted themselves to every situation.

He says, “Every home is moving towards a smarter home and every consumer is becoming a connected consumer in the true sense. In line with this, our products are connected, whether it is the electrical appliances range or the consumers durables.”

Havells had begun registering numbers in the year to reflect this. Tiwari attributes the growth in demand that it was seeing to two factors. He explains, “Due to the constrain for about five to six months since the lockdown had begun, there was immense pent-up demand. This moved to a different spectrum subsequently. Also, unlike the urban and metro markets that were gravely hit by the pandemic, the semi-rural areas bounced back much faster, markets opening quicker there. That further led to increase in demand.”

Tiwari points out that going forward, the world is moving towards connected homes and that is shift in consumer preference that Havells too us expecting in its sector.

The Savvy Spender

Tiwari’s 2020 marketing game plan was not about increasing spends but optimising them. “We could not be sure what we would be hitting, so taking spends up would not be prudent. Instead, we optimised what we were spending by going to places, where our audiences were. This gave us a much higher return due to meaningfully reaching out to people, rather than investing for impact, which would in fact be burning monies.”

On being named among BW India’s Top 50 Marketers 2021, the veteran marketer notes, “This is a cumulative result of what the team has done in the last year. It was a tough year not only on the business front but also from a personal health standpoint. Irrespective of everything though, each of our colleagues brought in the discipline of delivering on the company’ requirements. I am only a recipient of the hard work that all the 140 people who work with me, across India, have done in the last year.”