Micromax takes the humour route to accelerate smartphone adoption

Conceptualised by Lowe Lintas, the series of three films featuring Kapil Sharma and Rana Daggubati is aimed at encouraging the 70 million new age consumers using feature phones to switch to smartphones

BestMediaInfo Bureau | Mumbai | October 16, 2015

Click on the image to watch the TVC.

To accelerate the smartphone adoption in the country, Micromax Informatics recently launched a 360-degree marketing campaign to encourage the 70 million new age consumers using feature phones to switch to smartphones.

To reach out to first time smartphone users in the true Micromax way, the company roped in popular stand-up comedian Kapil Sharma for the North and 'Bahubali' actor Rana Daggubati for the South. The two stars will be seen in a series of films that give very tangible, easy to comprehend benefits of switching to a Micromax smartphone.

The campaign, conceptualised by Lowe Lintas Delhi, includes a series of three films, each shot with Kapil Sharma and Rana Daggubati. The campaigns featuring the two stars explain the benefits of making the switch to smartphones with the Micromax Bolt range.

Micromax has developed a full business initiative comprising key components such as affordable devices with big screen size, regional language support, customized data package and a fully developed customer education programme – including printed material, digital content available over phone in local languages to empower first time users of smartphone to set up and use basic functions like email, social networking and other basic utilities.

In line with this, Micromax's new Bolt series phones offer big screen experience and cut across various price points to suit the pockets of diverse consumer sets.

Micromax has also initiated a tech buddy programme, which includes trained retail representatives and customer care executives across 850 Micromax service centres to help consumers in seamless transition.

Shubhajit Sen

Commenting on the launch of the new campaign, Shubhajit Sen, CMO, Micromax Informatics, said, “Around 70-80 million Indians convert from their feature phones to smartphones every year and more and more consumers will use a smartphone for their initial computing and Internet needs leapfrogging the PC and laptop generation. We believe that smartphones will play a significant role in meeting PM's 'Digital India' vision to connect the next billion. Micromax, being a front runner in the sub 7.5k mass segment handsets, has taken a step ahead in its philosophy of democratising technology to the masses and has come up with a special program to enable the consumers to take the next technological leap towards the smartphones from feature phones.”

“To make smartphone adoption a mass phenomenon, we are bringing together an ecosystem of device, services, local language and Internet as well as roped in two celebrities with 'nothing like anything' attitude and mass appeal – Kapil Sharma and Rana Daggubati – to take our message ahead,” he added.

Micromax's 360 degree marketing campaign comprises TVC, print, broadcast, digital, outdoors, and POS. The entire campaign is designed to make the consumers more comfortable to approach Micromax to hand-hold them through all the apprehensions and inhibitions of using a smartphone for the first time. The campaign will act as a trigger for the consumers to be connected to their friends and family in a better way.

The communication, in a very tongue-in-cheek manner, talks about Micromax differentiators that come with switching to the Micromax Bolt Smartphone range, which are – free data for use on WhatsApp, regional languages, affordability and big screen. The TVCs will showcase both the brand ambassadors in a double role, which is a first for both of them.

Shayondeep Pal

Commenting on the campaign, Shayondeep Pal, ECD, Lowe Lintas, said, “India has a huge population of consumers who are still using a basic feature phone. At Micromax, we decided to talk to this massive consumer base and urge them to upgrade to smartphones. After incentivising them at a product level, it was our turn to take the message to them. To take this message to all corners of the country and reach our TG in the true Micromax way, we teamed up with Kapil Sharma for North and 'Bahubali' actor Rana Daggubati for South – who are seen in a series of films that give very tangible, easy to comprehend benefits of switching to a Micromax smartphone. The creative rests on the device of a double role played by the stars. One is the cooler, already arrived smartphone user. The other is the reluctant one, who is yet to see the magical world of the smartphone.”

“WhatsApp is excited to partner with Micromax as it continues to offer affordable innovations that enable connectivity. With over 900 million active users around the world and India being an important part of that, we remain focused on helping people communicate in a way that has become a part of everyday life. We are pleased to be working together with Micromax in this unique offering so that people in India can stay connected with their friends and family both in India and abroad,” said Brian Acton, Co-Founder of WhatsApp.

Rakesh Deshmukh, Co-founder and CEO, Firstouch, added here, “We believe that India with its diversity of languages is not well served by English centric smartphones, in fact, it proves to be a barrier and creates a digital divide. We intend to bridge this divide by offering Firstouch Regional Operating System to Micromax Bolt series smartphones and empower consumers to confidently transition from feature phone to smartphones for all their work and entertainment needs in the language of their choice.”

The TVC:

https://img-cdn.thepublive.com/filters:format(webp)/

Credits:

Client: Micromax

Creative agency: Lowe Lintas

Servicing team: Rajiv Chatterjee, Sonia Upadhaya, Kshitij Kapoor

Creative team: Mohit Arora, Abhishek Deshwal, Saarthak Dutt

Info@bestmediainfo.com

Info@BestMediaInfo.com