Holistic Marketing.

Business Dictionary defines Holistic or sustainable marketing as the

"A marketing strategy that is developed by thinking about the business as a whole, its place in the broader economy and society, and in the lives of its customers. It attempts to develop and maintain multiple perspectives on the company’s commercial activities"

Its understanding basically revolves around the Internal marketing, Performance marketing, Relationship and Integrated Marketing as shown below:

It thus refers to the adoption of these marketing services that create better businesses, better relations and a better world without causing any harm to environment.

As far as Ambi Pur is concerned its Parent Brand of P&G understakes the follwoing initiatives to ensure a holistic development. 

Moreover, under the CSR plan, companies above a certain threshold have to spend 2% of average profit of the previous three years on CSR activities specified by the government, which does not include political funding. Companies that are unable to do so have to give reasons for falling short. Companies having a net worth of at least Rs 500 crore or a minimum turnover of Rs 1,000 crore or those with a net profit of at least Rs 5 crore are covered by this policy.

Thus P&G has successfully came up with its Shikshka campaign.

It thus donates Rs.1 from every product that the P&G product Buyers to their social enterprise- Shikhsha. Through this initiative, P&G has been doing good by setting up schools across the rural India. It has until now set up 330 functioning schools. Also, for this purpose P&G makes use of maximum celebrities to reach out to the last mile of the fan following.

Analysing Business Markets.

One important aspect of Analyzing the Business Market is the Organisation Buying. It pertains to the Organisation decision making process by which businesses purchase products, services and choose suppliers and alternatives.

Hence the Business market differs from Consumer markets in terms of buying, B2B or B2C relationships, professional purchasing, sales calls, buying decisions, inelastic demand, fluctuating demand, demographics, direct purchasing and so on.

The following are the participants in Business Buying Process of Ambi Pur:

• Initiators: taking lead to bring about a purchase.
• Users: The users of the new product, they help in evaluating the unmet requirement parameters.
• Influencers: People who influence the buyding decision eg: Technical persons.
• Deciders: People deciding on the product suppliers.
• Approvers: People authorising the actions of deciders or buyers.
• Buyers: People at the top level who have the formal authority to approve the buyers and pass the further arrangemnt of buying process.
• Gatekeepers: They keep the salesperson away from the users or deciders. eg Agents, receptionist.

The Analytical Business marketers need to evaluate their B2B2C relationship status.

based on their alternatives, importance of supply, complexity of supply and supply market dynamism, the marketer has 8 category buyer-supplier relationship to the B2B context.

• Basic: this type of buying and selling involves not much effort and cooperation. It is fairly simple.
• Bare Bones: It requires more adaptation by seller and less of cooperation & information exchange.
• Contractual: It is very official and formal Thus contracts involve low level of trust or even cooperation.
• Customer Supply: Competition thrives here more than anything.
• Cooperative System: It has operational  unity on the outer side but hardly any commitment.
• Collaborative: Trust & Commitment leads to the partnership with a collaborative approach.
• Mutual Adaptivity: Relation specific adaptions that Buyers and Suppliers engage in with trust and cooperation.
• Customer being the King: Fulfilling the needs of the customer at no cost of exchange or change in satisfaction.

Analysing Consumer Markets.

In order to understand the Consumer Market it is pretty much essential to analyse the key psychological processes that goes on to a Consumers mind during Buying your Product.

Thus the following gives a diagrammatic representation of the Model of Consumer Behavior:

In case of Ambi Pur the consumer 1st decides the 4Ps. viz. price of the product in comparison to the competitiors. The availability and so on. Other inputs that goes on in the consumers brain are the cultural context, economical point of view, any technical aspect that can govern the functioning of the product.

next the Buyers characteristics actually manifests the buying process. It involves any social context or the personal liking, psychological brand effect that leads to brand loyalty. Thus the market stimuli carries out the following in the consumer minds: The Solution to the problem of need, Alternative considerations and the satisfaction or attrition lining up with the post purchase decision. Thus the Buyers characteristics that governs this vary from individual to individual.

Lastly, the marketing stimuli that helps the buyer make the product choice, select and buy it takes place. It majorly deals with the Purchase amount and the personal satisfaction that are linked invariably with each other.

Further,
Frued's and Herzberg's theories do play an important role too.

According to Freud, largely most consumptions lack the motive, they are done invariably.
Ambi Pur has this advantage as the Car Fresheners are bought for the cars as an accessory even if the car is not in use.

Likewise,
 Herzberg's theory of sellers identifying their customers and avoiding attrition in approaching other areas is linked to the Ambi Pur's TG which is carefully selected and well catered to.

The Maslow's pyramid diagram which is shown below relates to Ambi Pur in the following way:

Ambi Pur Car Perfume satisfies the Car air care hygiene thus fulfilling the basic needs of the car users. The Elimination of Car odor saves the car users from being embarrassed in front of the passengers which is a part of the Social needs. Moreover, using this category product sets a premium standard to the car accessories. It thus caters to the esteem needs too.

'Brand'aholic!

The term Brand and branding per say is defined by AMA as:

"A brand is a customer experience represented by a collection of images and ideas; often, it refers to a symbol such as a name, logo, slogan, and design scheme. Brand recognition and other reactions are created by the accumulation of experiences with the specific product or service, both directly relating to its use, and through the influence of advertising, design, and media commentary."

Thus the best possible diagrammatic representation that follows the above is:

Apart, there are many a things that go in a Branding activity. The basic ones are the driveforce to create a brand image bu the ones that bring about the Brand Equity are the offereings that your brand makes.
It has to be distinct from the competitor's offerings i.e. Point-Of-Difference (POD), else it will result into a Point-Of-Parity (POP).

AMA defines Brand Equity as:

"Brand equity is a phrase used in the marketing industry to try to describe the value of having a well-known brand name, based on the idea that the owner of a well-known brand name can generate more money from products with that brand name than from products with a less well known name, as consumers believe that a product with a well-known name is better than products with less well known names. "

Ambi Pur as a brand under the parent brand P&G has always strived to maintain a High Brand Equity.

This being a category creator, has brought about the generation of demands on a large scale. It has made the car users realize the importance of Ambi Pur Car Freshener to their car as a mandate. The innovation in its diffuser system technology act as  the vital POD. The variety of fragrance range to suit your mood has been its USP. The idea however has been today used by other competitors like Godrej Aer. To some extent acts as the POP. 

The brand has also adopted Line extension in which is evident from the new fragrant variants that promises to eliminate the car odor while giving u a pleasant smell of your choice. Further it has taken measures to extend the to the New Brands in which it has introduced the Electronic Dispenser used indoors.

Also, the variety of products like indoor electronic dispensers, aerosols, Car perfume etc show Ambi Pur's Multi-Branding.

Nevertheless, Ambi Pur undertakes mass campaigns of advertising and promotion to remain the Top brand in this car air care category. For this, now since its decade long operation, it has undergone necessary modifications and brought in new innovations in terms of design and packaging that is essential as we move ahead with the time and technology.

Thus, the Brand logo of CAR featuring its car air care products has underwent strong transformation. It designs the 3 letter word in the front and rare of a sedan car. This mighty bold logo design under Ambi Pur imbibes strongly the product's bold looks, perfect functioning and quality assurance in to the consumers mind.

This adds on to the strong Brand Recall in the BRS and thus helps Ambi Pur as a brand do away with the market competition by staying as the leader.

Sale! Sale!! Sale!!!

Sales- The primary 'funda' of marketing revolves around creating a demand. However, practical marketing is much more 'Sale' oriented. It encompasses all those which contribute to the selling of your product. There exists a sales funnel which arrives at the Sales in the end through the awareness, leads and prospects.

Technically speaking AMA refers to sales as:

"Any of a number of activities designed to promote customer purchase of a product or service. Sales can be done in person or over the phone, through e-mail or other communication media. The process generally includes stages such as assessing customer needs, presenting product features and benefits to address those needs and negotiation on price, delivery and other elements."

The process of Sales is an amalgamation of the following set of activities that are carried out to bring about a desired sale.:

The Preparation for Ambi Pur Car Freshener involved involved an extensive research. It studied the Indian consumer needs for such a category product. Moreover, the research shows that the consumer behavior played an important role in realizing the attitude about this product.

Introduction phase of this car perfume shows their addressing to the right TG promised the cause of creating demand. 

This new to the category diffuser system product was highly questioned on its functionality, price, use and so on. However, the strong research and market studies made them do away with the Questioning phase. This shows that obtaining an early mover advantage is not that simple for any nascent product.

Presentation of Ambi Pur has been up to the mark. It has been successful in pitching to the consumers about its new diffusers, fragrances and kits. Involvement of PR strategies, events, publicizing the Key Differentiator and story telling to build curiosity and awareness plays a vital role in the presentation of a product.

The reason all this Sales process is undertaken is to have a good Object Handling. The Objective of satisfying the consumer needs and generating further demand while maintaining a profit is the main purpose of the sales. Ambi Pur does this efficiently so that the sales team could capitalize on the brand image.

The conversion of the much created interest into the sales deals with the Closing. This category creator offered its diffuser kit at a premium of price and quality which compelled the consumer to buy it.

The Follow Up is a mechanism to build a long lasting consumer relationship. This can be achieved in many ways like the feedback mechanism. It gives an idea of the consumers' brand loyalty towards your product. Ambi Pur has been doing it often by conducting drills at service stations, in feedback forms at showrooms or by promoting their product TVCs in which they interview the consumers. Thus Follow Up provided by the mentioning the customer care number or by providing an email address to enable the consumer to get back to you are ways Ambi Pur has undertaken religiously. It is important to note that the Follow Up and Relationship Marketing are closely associated aimed at delivering customer satisfaction and resolving attrition issues if any.

Thus the sales management involves the above process being carried out with an innovation in order to succeed in this world of fierce competition.

S.T.P.

AMA version for market segmentation is:

"The process of subdividing a market into distinct subsets of customers that behave in the same way or have similar needs. Each subset may conceivably be chosen as a market target to be reached with a distinct marketing strategy."

The following is anyway a crisp practical understanding of what STP is all about!

Segmentation: It deals with identifying bases for segmenting the market. It is essential in order to develop Segment profiles.

Segmentation is basically done on the following considerations:

• Demographic  (Age, income, family size, gender, literacy etc)
• Geographic (state, city, district, taluka, gram etc)
• Psychographic (Persona, lifestyle, appearance, aesthetics etc)
• Behavioral (Usage, dependency, attitude, seasonal, occasion, etc)

Ambi Pur Car freshener's segment include the urban, semi urban and seni rural areas, people with middle class + purchasing power and the ones with a basic requisite of a car!

Target Marketing: it involves developing a measure of segment attractiveness and selecting the target segments.

Out of the segmented sample, specializing them and catering to their needs is Targeting that Ambi Pur undertakes. Thus, youth, working men and women who use cars daily are their TG.


Market Positioning: This consists of developing the positioning for the targeted segments and to come up with a marketing mix for each segment.

Ambi pur positions its Car Freshener competitively along with other competitors like Godrej Aer and Renuzit diffusers.
It is priced at Rs. 250
Initially as it entered the market it started from Rs. 180 until a few years ago.

It is also noteworthy that Ambi Pur has been trying to remain the market leader in this segment by positioning itself at a strategic price such that it provides the benefits by catering to the needs and lifestyle of the consumers.

The above gives a diagrammatic representation of how STP the Differentiaion block adds on to the value and acts as a key differentiator to the product. Thus the Positioning somewhere not just deal with the pricing but also with the Distribution and Promotion from the other Ps.

IMC ATL BTL Promotion et al.

Integrated Marketing Communication deals with the approach adopted by the brand to project its products such that they appeal the most to the consumers. The various modes are put together to achieve this. Hence a combination of strategies from above and below the line play an important role in this.

They are bifurcated into 2 categories viz. ATL and BTL. The following is a diagrammatic representation of the same.

P.S.: Here, it is important to note that the reach due to the two ATL and BTL types is measured by the rating points, frequencies, measurement datas of TAM, RAM, metrices etc.

ATL:

The Above The Line marketing focuses on reaching a wider audience. Especially to enhance the brand image.

This is largely carried out by the mass media.

Ambi Pur extensively used this ATL media like TVCs to penetrate into the market and make its presence felt. Even today various innovative commercials come up through the ATLs.

BTL:

Below The Line on the other hand focuses on more targeted audience. It lays a direct emphasis on making sales. This is carried out cause through specific events or even merchandising. 

BTL approach by Ambi Pur is undertaken to reach the last mile of its consumers. Thus, hosting car show events, sponsoring various promotional events are the efforts of Ambi Pur in India.

Promotional Campaigns:

This post in viewed as an extension of IMC. It is in pure relation to the ATL and BTL media types.
Promotional campaigning is today has become an utmost essential part. It is required to promote the product to a next level with all the innovative ways possible. This enables the brand to appeal more to the consumers.

Ambi Pur is know for promoting its air care products by adopting various strategies. The promotional strategies that form a part of this campaign are largely the outdoor events that form a part of the OOH types.

The images below show Ambi Pur promotions at the malls and multiplexes in Delhi, Banglore and Mumbai.

 

The interactive mascot of the Ambi Pur Car diffuser and the walk in kiosks attracted large consumers thus creating a demand.

                                       

Likewise, Ambi Pur also makes use of celebrities to endorse their products. This adds a fan following to the brand and promotes it exceptionally well.

One of the many large campaigns of Ambi Pur include the breathe "Fresh Like New" campaign covered by the Madison World's unit- Platinum Outdoor. This was headed by Sam Balsara in the beginning of 2007. This independent OOH campaign was aimed at educating the people about the diffusers that come along with the Start Kit of the car freshener. 

Also, the launch of various fragrances sees this kind of promos apart from TVCs and Print ads. Quite often it is backed up with a campaign like the "Breathe Happy" one. 

Interestingly, Ambi Pur adopts the creative and innovative approaches. For instance the distribution of free starter kits as an effort to create demand and penetrate in the market. This has been carried out at the local fuel stations and car showrooms. Realizing the fact that Ambi Pur car freshener is closely associated as the car essentials, they have been succeeded in placing their product at the Car Accessory shops. This has been working well with the brand sales as the product is placed at a place where it is aligned with the right category use.