The Hindu Business Line : Front to the wall ad strategy

POSITIONED smack in the middle and dominating the showroom foyer, the over-sized poster of the near-bare back of a woman was attracting more than hesitant stares. Customers walking back after the trial were sheepishly trying to stick `Post-Its' on to the crowded poster.

This wasn't a shampoo sample survey or a French perfume company's sniff test. So, just what was going on?

The venue was the neighbourhood Maruti showroom and customers were trooping in to post their feedback after test-driving the new Suzuki Swift. By any yardstick this is a marketing promo that is a far cry from any that Maruti has ever conjured up in the past.

During the past two decades and more of its existence, Maruti Udyog (MUL) was considered a stodgy, public sector undertaking incapable of aggressive marketing strategies. Even after competition came in, it was always accused of being slow to react and incapable of coming up with a hard-hitting campaign.

But the launch of the Suzuki Swift has changed all that. From advertising that previously focussed on the family and tried to appeal to the thrifty side of the homemaker, the high decibel advertising for the Swift has been a paradigm shift for MUL. Promos and one-liners for the Swift are youthful, catchy and intelligently steer away from being titillating, even as they are attention grabbing.

Here is a sample of some of the taglines that the Swift's ads come with: `Play, Boy'; `More OOMPH per MPH'; `You just blew your chances of an arranged marriage'; and `Get younger every kilometre'.

In several ways the advertising style for the Swift is a reflection of the car's inherent personality, one that is aggressive, unique and clearly young at heart. Naturally, Maruti has marketed the car like never before.

Almost all of the promos only feature the car. Maruti feels that the car can sell `itself' and did not see the need for a brand ambassador. The company even went to great lengths to separate the Swift from the rest in the Maruti stable by appointing an exclusive 1,000 member sales team to conduct dealer-level customer interactions.

The Swift is the first `all new' small car from the Maruti stable in a long while. Maruti has changed immensely after the Government sold a portion of its equity and the subsequent change in ownership at the company. What the Swift and its marketing strategy reiterate is that Suzuki is now firmly in the driver's seat in the erstwhile joint sector company.

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