Kingfisher Airlines is already grounded and Air India is in paralytic mode since ages. There are precious few aircraft that can carry elite ‘business flyers’ in India. Almost every airline in the country is posting huge losses, and flyers to both domestic and international destinations are facing the heat of the slowdown badly. Ironically, at this juncture, air fares continue to head northwards at a brisk pace.
Online travel portals, on the other hand, are most comprehensively in growth & discounting mode, and are vying for every inch of space to retain a favourable brand recall in the minds of customers who seek economical, enjoyable and safe travel. According to a research by IAMAI (October 2012), online travel booking has become the fastest growing e-commerce business with a whopping 31% rise yoy in online flight bookings, which reached 1.58 million in October 2012.
Post its collective venture capital funding of Rs.2 billion from Intel Capital, Norwest Venture Partners and Valiant Capital Management, Yatra.com, in particular, has been on a major acquisition spree for the last 15 months. To expand its customer base, the company now controls entertainment portal Buzztown (with nearly 3 million registered customers), ticketing firm Travel Services International and MagicRooms (which offers live information of 3,000 hotels across India).
As a brand, Yatra.com has been successfully able to evolve in order to become a one stop shop for diverse travel needs. Lately, the company has been focussing on maximizing its visibility in the app world and launched an exclusive app for Windows 8 in early December. Pratik Mazumder, Head of Marketing & Strategic Alliance, Yatra.com, elucidates the portal’s value proposition in an exclusive conversation with 4Ps B&M, “Abiding by the promise of creating happy travelers, customer satisfaction is our utmost priority. Our sole motivation has been to not only give them what they are looking for but to also surpass their expectations.”
When McCann Erickson walked away with the creative duties of the travel portal after a multi-agency pitch earlier this year in January, the idea was to retain the humour in its campaigns. Post the success of the previous campaign focusing on discounted tickets for tours, the company wanted to feature tour packages and highlight the brand promise of leaving no stone unturned towards getting their customers the best this time. Synonymous with their trademark humourous style of showcasing hassle free bookings and best in class deals, the latest advertising campaign from Yatra.com marks the comeback of Bollywood actor Salman Khan as a negotiator (the Yatra Man) who ensures that customers bag great deals at the online portal.
The TVC opens with Salman Khan picking up a ringing phone and apparently promising a 40% discount for a trip. In a few seconds, we see a man visibly getting cosy with a lady, who gets shocked as the door bell rings. Fearing that it’s her husband at the door, the lady asks the man to go and hide himself somewhere in the room. Eventually, the man seems to have concluded that hanging from the window is the best option. Salman is then shown sliding from a swing and asking the hanging guy to fulfil his (Salman’s) promise of a 40% discount or else he will reveal the guy’s secret to the lady’s husband. The man apprehensively agrees, only to discover later, to his chagrin, that Salman was the man who had rung the doorbell in the first place! And it ends with a voice over by Salman Khan committing to get the job done. Understanding the aura that the actor carries in Bollywood, McCann realised that it had to maintain a delicate balance. “The idea behind the campaign was to marry the brand persona along with Salman’s larger-than-life personality. But there was a concern that we should not overplay Salman’s persona so much that it takes over the brand. We had the characters in mind and we tried to keep a balance between the characters,” confirms Ranjeev Vij, General Manager, McCann.
The company has allocated nearly 80% of its marketing budget to its TVC with the remaining set aside for online promotions to showcase latest updates in Yatra.com’s portfolio. Though the key focus of the TVC revolves around building the company’s holidays and hotels business and getting the brand to be seen as ‘the most preferred travel brand’, the TVC retains the flavour of the previous campaign. Sharing a light moment with 4Ps B&M, Mazumder reveals, “We had asked Salman Khan to imitate an action done by our previous ambassador Boman. He looked at me and said “Star aur Superstar mein koi farq hota hai!” (there is a difference between a ‘Star’ & a ‘Superstar’).” But can Yatra break the growing clutter with this superstar endorsement? That will depend on how attractive their discount deals (with the fine print included) turn out to be.
