Mohit Ganju, Head, Marketing & Communication, IndusInd Bank talks about building on the proposition of responsive innovation through marketing activities like roping in Farhan Akhtar, launch of Video Branch and branding a metro station amongst others
By SALONI DUTTA
Q] How does Farhan Akhtar add to IndusInd Bank’s new brand identity?
IndusInd Bank aspires to be a high street brand and Farhan Akhtar fit our objective perfectly. He personifies sincerity, new-age thinking and dynamism. Our association with Farhan Akhtar as a brand ambassador is set to strengthen the bank’s communication towards its core philosophy of responsive innovation, reinforcing the bank’s brand statement ‘You Desire, We Deliver’. In the recent past, IndusInd Bank has featured Bollywood actors such as Sharman Joshi, Jimmy Shergill, Neetu Kapoor and Ranvir Shorey to promote campaigns around services such as Choice Money ATMs, Check-on-Cheque, Cash-on-Mobile, Direct Connect, Quick Redeem Service and My Account My Number. Through several brand studies and consumer research, we found that the campaigns reached our target audience and were received well.
Q] Tell us about the Video Branch and the marketing efforts around it.
Our brand studies indicated that IndusInd Bank is recalled as an innovator. Video Branch is yet another innovation to our kitty; it is a perfect blend of technology with human touch. To promote this service, we launched a 360-degree integrated marketing campaign with a mix of TV, Digital, OOH, Radio, Cinema and tactical Print.
Q] How do you keep up with the ever-evolving consumer?
In an endeavour to emerge as the best-in-class brand, IndusInd Bank has made responsive innovation a central theme of its brand-building programme. We have been continuously investing in various advertising and marketing programmes to enhance the brand’s image and recall. To propagate our innovative products and services, we have used campaigns that have been developed using strong consumer insights and executed in lively, humorous and relatable situations with the objective of breaking clutter and creating impactful communication.
Q] Give us an estimate of your marketing spends.
IndusInd Bank has invested over Rs 15 crore on this ad campaign and TV is its lifeline. It comprises two TVCs with the singular objective of propagating the Video Branch service. The films communicate the benefits of this newly launched service and the fact that customers can connect with the bank anytime. We have explored certain media innovations on TV to create contextual messaging. Face-to-face banking being the main theme, we have embedded the same in few media channels such as Star Gold, Aaj Tak, Set Max. Tata Sky DTH has been explored as well to create branding during channel switch over weekends.
Q] How has IndusInd Bank adopted Digital as a medium?
Being a Digital innovation, we have worked out a comprehensive digital marketing strategy for this campaign. While key media properties have been leveraged to publicize the Video Branch service, significant efforts have been made to reach our existing clients. One-on-one communication, eDMs targeted app download tactics, etc., have helped our customers. The digital campaign started with teasers showing Farhan Akhtar talking about somebody special in his life which was later revealed as his BM or RM at IndusInd Bank who makes the actor’s life easier with the help of Video Branch. This content went viral, creating a surprise element in social media circles. Certain roadblocks were created on news genre sites which helped us reach more than 80% of our TG in Digital.
Q] IndusInd Bank recently inaugurated its first Digital Branch at IndusInd Cybercity Rapid Metro station in Gurgaon. How has it worked for the brand?
The association with Rapid Metro is an excellent example of transit mode of advertising in India. The station is strategically located in the heart of Cybercity which houses Cyberhub and many other key commercial establishments of Gurgaon. It’s a fully digital branch which aims to deliver the best-in-class service to its growing tech savvy customer base. Digitization of businesses has become the central theme of the bank and we believe within a span of a few years, digitization will become an inherent part of banking. The Digital Branch lobby also has a smart table with iPads on which customers can perform a host of banking and non-banking transactions. Further, the branch is aesthetically designed with stylish and modern interiors to provide customers a rich and delightful experiential banking experience.
Q] What are some of the BTL activities, sales promotions and innovations that you have engineered to increase consumer engagement in the banking sector?
We believe BTL activities play an important role in reinforcing our innovative service and product propositions. They also aid in getting us instant feedback from our customers as there is a direct connect with the end users. These activities are tailor-made keeping the service propositions in mind. For the recently launched My Account My Number proposition, at most of the branches, we arranged for numerologists who helped customers with their lucky numbers. This was an instant hit and we received positive feedback from our customers. We inaugurated the IndusInd Bank Cybercity Rapid Metro Station in Gurgaon, the first metro station in the country named and branded by a bank. The station has a rich aesthetic and artistic feel to it as the interiors and exteriors don the brand’s colours, conveying the inherent brand values. The smart messaging across the station can be related to the new age banking requirements of the millennium city. At the station, again for the first time in India, the bank has opened its first digital branch. This branch aims to deliver best-in-class services to its growing tech-savvy customer base. One of the USPs of the Digital Branch is the Interactive Video Branch machine, another first in India. Our objective is to provide our customers not only with innovative services but couple it with experiential banking. To propagate the Video Branch concept, we have installed a Video Branch demo at select malls and corporate hubs which helps the audience understand the concept. In the online space, we have created a user-friendly video which not only explains how one can open a bank account online, but also helps customers in choosing their own account numbers.
Q] What’s the USP of the brand?
Responsive innovation.
Q] What opportunities do you see in the banking sector going forward?
The market is vast and there are manifold opportunities, but to break the clutter, innovation is the way to survive and be noticed.
About the Brand
IndusInd Bank, which commenced operations in 1994, caters to the needs of both consumer and corporate customers. Its technology platform supports multi-channel delivery capabilities. As of September 30, 2014, IndusInd Bank had 685 branches and 1277 ATMs spread across 464 locations in the country. The bank also has representative offices in London, Dubai and Abu Dhabi. It enjoys clearing bank status for both major stock exchanges - BSE and NSE - and major commodity exchanges in the country, including MCX, NCDEX and NMCE. On April 1, 2013 IndusInd Bank was included in the NIFTY 50 benchmark index. The bank is ranked 19th amongst the Top 50 Most Valuable Indian Brands 2014 as per the BrandZ Top 50 rankings brought out by WPP and Millward Brown.
Facts
• Creative agency – RK Swamy BBDO
• Media agency- Lodestar UM/ McKinsey
• Social and digital media marketing agency – Ignitee Digital
• PR agency – Adfactors PR
Marketing Tip
Simple communication is the most effective communication. Let’s make it simple and crisp!
CMO File
Mohit Ganju is responsible for branding and marketing initiatives of IndusInd Bank. He has more than 12 years of experience, and in his last assignment, was part of the global leadership programme ECLP at GE. Prior to GE, he worked in the marketing team at ABN Amro. He was instrumental in creating marketing communication campaigns and programmes for Personal Banking, Credit Cards and Van Gogh Preferred Banking. Before that, Ganju worked with Ogilvy & Mather and Rediff.com. At both these organizations, he was part of the client servicing and business development teams and gained experience in running both offline and online branding and advertising campaigns. Ganju is a marketing specialist and brings with him expertise in diverse skillsets. He believes being simple, interesting and relatable is key to any good marketing or advertising campaign. Ganju is an engineer (BE) and has an MBA in Marketing.
