Revolutionizing Sustainability: DMAasia & WION's Brandmaster Trailblazer Series | S1 E2

Music Welcome to Trailblazers. In this episode we tackle two of the biggest ticket marketing items in the 21st century canon. Sustainability and the experience economy. And we're joined by an incredible panel of guests to share their experience and wisdom. Shashank from Maruti Suzuki. Mona from Z Media. Radha from Tata Starquake. Shubran Shoo from Tata Motors. Vineet from Aviva. And Raul from SAP. We welcome all our guests and let me start by inviting Shashank to the stage. Welcome to Trailblazers Shashank. We're delighted to have you here. You're at the helm of India's largest automotive business. One in four vehicles. Now here, for a business and a brand Shashank that was not always associated with sustainability.

Tell us what's working for you guys and how you think about the topic. Yeah, so first of all let me begin by saying that we are actually one in two vehicles, not one in four vehicles. We have a very large market share and therefore we believe we have a larger responsibility towards sustainability as well. You know when we talk about vehicles, generally people and sustainability, people think it's about vehicular emissions alone. But it goes beyond that. Vehicular emissions is obviously very important part of sustainability. It's also about manufacturing process. It's also about logistics. It's also about energy conserving of energy. It's about conserving of water.

So it's a mix of all these things, including by the way, the choice of media that you make while you are doing advertising. So it's a mix of many things that we do in order to have sustainability as one of the pillars of our approach to business. And Shashank, you're a 15 year veteran of Maruti Suzuki. Was this a hard cultural shift to make? Absolutely. I think first of all we had to burst this myth, which is not only amongst employees and general business community. The first myth is that sustainability is not what consumers want. Like they are looking for products, they are looking for price, they are looking for performance, but not sustainability. That's no longer true. It's changing. It's changed completely. You can sell it now.

Actually, you can sell better with sustainability. Second, people feel that for companies, sustainability would, if you take measures for sustainability, it will be more pricier. It's not. Actually, in the long term, it is cheaper to take the route of sustainability. But Shashank, you mentioned media. What's working for you guys in terms of media channels? You'd be surprised that if I were to say that if in a digital campaign, you want to have one million impressions. The one million impression is actually equal to charging 120,000 smartphones, which is resulting in a huge amount of COTR mission. So actually, here what we are doing at Maruti Suzuki for this aspect is to track the parameter of impressions versus the bids made.

That ratio defines how efficient you are and therefore how much you are adding to the sustainability element of media. And it's not just that. For vehicles, which is our primary business, we have power trades like the CNG, for example. We have sold 1.4 million CNG vehicles so far. That's equal to saving 1.4 million tons of COTR emissions. If you line up 10 different automotive firms, what is it about your brand management that makes you more convincing in sustainability? We have the largest fleet of vehicles in the country, as you just mentioned. But we are also the lowest in terms of emission. That's the number one fact which comes across as a very hard-hitting fact to consumers.

That despite having the largest fleet on the road, we have the smallest emission. Okay, it's a new marketing topic but actually as ever with Maruti Suzuki, one in two, not one in four. The message is still simple. Biggest, best. That's consistent. That's right. Done. Shashank, thank you so much. Thank you very much. Now next up in our Trailblazer batting line-up, Radha from Tata Starquick. Radha, welcome to Trailblazers. Let's get the ball rolling Radha. Experience economy, is that a contradiction in terms between customised experience and the collective economy? It's been intriguing to me as to where the trigger point for change really is. Is the consumer evolution the trigger point for the economy to change?

Or is it the things in the economy that changes which actually changes the individual? And I believe there is a certain interaction between the two. But clearly for me, and being in grocery for the last so many decades, I have seen that the consumer has got to be ready for something. And that is a change that comes with, sorry for using a cliche, whether where on the Maslow's hierarchy the population is. And I think India has really shifted up from the bottom of the pyramid. And there has to be a lot of change that's happened to the Indian as an individual. But are we getting there? Because you raise an interesting point Radha, which is in something like grocery, so very price driven, so very functional.

Are we yet at the stage where we can have a consumer experience? I think we are doing a disservice to the category of grocery by actually making the price the biggest selling point. Because grocery involves several categories which require nurturing. And therefore there has to be a theater around some of those categories, which is getting completely missed if you actually go down the price route. However, saving money has never been more important than it is today. Because you are spending money today on several other interests or aspirations that you have. And therefore I think grocery becomes the fall guy from where you've got to actually save money. And personally I feel that there must be a limit to which you actually chase price.

Because if you don't do that, the category is not going to go well. But Radha, where do you place the reason or the blame for this? Is it consumers unwillingness or is there an element here in the Indian marketing community that we are not putting enough marketing effort into explaining the experience? 100%. I think that's a great question. I think the problem is that the retailers maybe are not doing enough theater in the stores. If you go to the West, you go to the US or to Europe, some of the supermarkets are really worth visiting even for the visual appeal. The problem in India is are we differentiating grocery enough? Are there enough differentiated products where you move the consumer from the price? I don't think it's a consumer problem.

The problem with price is that if everything is the same, then what I want to buy is at the lowest common denominator. Well, maybe this is a challenge. You're across multiple product lines, multiple SKUs, thousands of them. But most importantly, you're transnational. When you think about consumer experiences, and maybe this is looking back into your career, Future Group, Retail, Spencers. How do you make the consumer experience relevant to the micro markets? I think modern retail, organized retail, hasn't moved away from the top 20 cities yet. So imagine the headroom. This is a $400 billion category. And most of that growth is coming from the top 20 cities. I think we are yet to start. I don't think we've even started to some of the micro markets.

Some of the products that the big brands have haven't gone across the cities yet. It's not available in some of the micro markets. And therefore, that's really the opportunity. I don't think it's a point for discussion. It has to grow. There is headroom and there is enough geography to actually get to. Take FMCG as a category, right? Are we getting enough exciting brands in that category or is it rather vanilla? The answer is no. I can't remember in the last 20 years any FMCG category which has actually made a paradigm shift in the way a consumer uses the category. What's missing in the narrative is the word category management is out. And they are really chasing the price. And you know, you need to quote from HG Wells' War of the Worlds.

War is the victory of the dying over the dead. And there's the right context to say it. That pricing will be the victory of the dying over the dead. And if you say it in Hindi, First you die, then you die. Then you die. That's absolutely fascinating. Roada, that's a fantastic place to end. And I think that's a brilliant rallying call for young marketers. So we want to hear from you young marketers on Trailblazers. Come up here and tell us how you do it. Thank you, Roada. Fantastic. Thank you very much for having me, Jimmy. Now can I call Shubranchu from Tata Motors, another veteran of the marketing trade to the Trailblazers stage. We're going to talk about the experience economy again, right?

But as a starting point, when I think about your vast commercial vehicles division, all product, all engineering, all spec, it's hard to make the leap into the experience economy. Help us make that leap. So I think it's a misconception that commercial vehicles owners are not interested in experience or that their due diligence is somehow not tuned to the experiential aspects. Because every commercial vehicles buyer is actually running a business on wheels, their need to be convinced to compare is far higher than many of the individual purchaser type roles or categories. And so I think they want to be sure that they're making the right decision. And digital access gives us the opportunity to get them onto our web assets.

We have commissioned a very large program of content creators and influencers. In the present year, we've got nearly 15 crore views on a variety of content, largely advocacy programs about how we design better, how we make better, inviting these content creators into our plants, our service centers, our retail establishments, so as to be able to give them the intenders vicarious experience. They're able to experience what it is even before they get into the physical journey or brick and mortar journey for purchasing, which also happens. This is very interesting. So when you choose these influencers, who are they? Where are you choosing them from? So we've created a cadre of about 300 at various tiers. There are a few national influencers.

We have about 100 odd who are regional or statewide influencers, and another about 150 to 200 who are actually micro-influencers at a district level. And I find uniformly that the micro-influencers are able to give us the highest levels of engagement, because people context is king in marketing. They're able to relate better. So if I'm selling a pickup to a shrimp farmer in coastal Andhra Pradesh, he wants to hear from somebody who is a shrimp farmer in coastal Andhra Pradesh. And you remain as excited as you've ever been as a veteran marketeer? Yes, I am. In fact, it's been two years and a couple of months, and it's vast, the category. It's complex, but not complicated. The number of types of applications, the number of types of variants,

the end uses are just spectacular in terms of its diversity. And every bit of India's economy is touched by commercial vehicles. We're sitting here, I can bet you the sofa, the breakfast we just ate, much of the electrical equipment, even the material with which the studio was built, everything would have come on commercial wheels. So we find ourselves directly contributing to the national growth and agenda. Shribanchi, thank you so much for coming on the show. We're delighted to have you. Lovely to be here. And now we're joined by the brand leader of Aviva, Vineet. What does sustainability mean for Aviva, Vineet? The basic problem with a category which is insurance is awareness. Now, do consumers really understand what insurance is?

Do they really understand what the products are? I mean, we have two veterans from the auto industry here. A consumer will never miss getting his car insured. Is the value of the car more than the value of his life? I mean, we really need to start looking at those things. Or are consumers really buying something which they understand? The problem starts with the awareness part of it, where people really need to start understanding what the product is all about. And in the Indian context, more so because they said the penetration is a low single legit. If you want to look at insurance, life insurance, it is sold as an investment category. It is not an investment category.

It is purely a cover on my life where I feel my life is more valuable than any of the sets that I have sort of, you know, in life. I'll also get you a context. If I'm insured for supports of 100,000 or a crore rupees today, my value of life continues to go up, whereas the insurance that I have continues to go down. People need to first start understanding what the category means to them. Once the category understanding comes to them, then they need to start looking at what is it that they need to sort of look at when it comes to the right fit product. Going back into sustainability, Vinit, what's working for you from a marketing perspective?

How are you getting consumers to choose Aviva versus another insurance provider because you're more sustainable? When do people actually use a life cover? When something wrong goes in their lives? Can we do something beyond where basically say, can we start having people live healthy habits? Can we get them to do a little sort of mental where all the stress goes away? Can we sort of go back and tell them that, you know, mental health, physical health and financial well-being are all part and parcel of one package? So I see. So in a way you're saying that by living a more sustainable life, you're more insurable. That's the link. Well, the idea is that, like I said, people don't really know the value of human life.

And the human life first starts with the fact that you need to first have a healthy lifestyle, which means physical health, mental health and also financial health. The financial health part of it can come in from what as products we offer. But let me add, we're going a lot more in terms of building physical and mental health also. Today was a day in the morning, six o'clock, we run live yoga classes for all and everybody. Anybody can join, it's not only consumers. On Thursdays we run a mental wellness 30-minute session where we want people to meditate. How on earth can insurance be part of an experience economy? What we look at doing is that simplifying a purchase. It's a very complex category.

Can we ask a consumer a very select few questions and give him the right offer? Rather than actually giving him a 20-pager to look at and read which are terms and conditions and standard terms, you know, which people don't understand. Even people on the other side don't understand. When you think about experience, it sounds like more, but actually in the case of insurance, it's less. Right, that's the better experience. Thank you so much for being on the show. You've been a wonderful guest. Thank you Jasper. Thank you so much. Now joining me on the stage is Mona from Z Media. Mona, we're delighted to have you on Trailblazers. We're sitting in the middle of an experience, right? So this feels innately like we're part of the experience economy.

But when you think about Z and all your brands and products, Mona, how do you think about the experience economy? You know, we are a business where we have news, you know, which reaches out to varied kind of consumers. Our viewers are very differentiated. We talk to many geographies in the country. In fact, absolutely all geographies that you can really think about. You know, we have brands reaching out to the mass audiences, right to the social strata. We have brands talking to trade through our business proposition, which is e-business. And we have Vyond. So Vyond is one of our jewel in the crown, if I may say so. You know, it is a brand which is very distinctive, you know, very exclusive.

Talks to a very, you know, an audience which is difficult to get otherwise, you know, very influential audiences, not only in India, but globally, you know. And I love to say that whenever I'm making a pitch to my advertisers, that Vyond is one platform that reaches to the world. It reaches to the influential audiences in India, to the Asians across the world, and also the non-Asians across the world. Because they're interested to know what we're really saying from a global perspective. So that's really, you know, yeah. So you're initiating conversations, you're having conversations, and you're spawning conversations. All of which were innate to it. Mona, that is a fantastic way to complete our panel discussion.

Thank you for joining us on Trailblazers. Thank you very much, Jasper. That's really good. And now our final guest and a great friend of Trailblazers, Raul from SEP. You're a very interesting marketeer. And Raul, I know before we get into the topic, I know you have a very particular perspective on how brands tell stories. Start us off there, please. Well, storytelling, at least this is my definition in the context of business, is really about, you know, wrapping up or packaging your value proposition in a, you know, in a humanized narrative, right?

And for some reason, it is assumed that, you know, in the world of B2B, where I come from, there is very little space to do that, to be able to create a narrative which talks not just to the brains of your customers, but to their hearts. But nothing can be far from the truth. In fact, I am, I'm personally a huge fan of a storytelling format, which I call B2B, B2B2C, right? Which is, which is really about telling your story from the perspective of your customer's customer, right? So the story is not about what we sold and what they bought. It is about the impact that they created in the lives of their customers and their employees.

And really proud of a piece of work that our team created about two years back when SAP was completing 25 years of its inception in India. We have used this B2B2C format and we looked at, you know, the changes that have happened in India in the previous 25 years. And it was just incredible to see the transformational change that had happened in sector after sector, right? So we decided to tell the story. Let's say if you pick up automotive, right? In 1996, there were probably two car brands in India and now the whole world is here. Eight out of 10 cars that, that run on Indian roads are manufactured by our customers. So that's the way, that's the hard data point.

But the story that we told was from the perspective of the first car buyer, Rajesh, who moved from his scooter to, to a car for the first time. We were there, right? So that's, that's storytelling from the point of view of your customers. Big tech businesses that have been around a long time. The, the, the skepticism lies in these fellows are now all talking a sustainability game, but they weren't like that 50 years ago. How do you tell authentic stories, Raoul? Well, sustainability to start with for us, um, is, is not a brand narrative. It is actually embedded in everything that we do. It's not a story. But I think from a, from a brand perspective, um, I think a more important approach is, uh, is something that we call leading by example,

uh, where SAP tells the story of how, um, a large multinational operating out of 160 companies, 100,000 employees, how we have managed to reduce our own carbon footprint over, over the last, uh, in fact, we started our sustainability journey in 2009. So it's been 15 years. And for each of those 15 years, we have topped, uh, the Dow Jones sustainability index, uh, in, in our business category. And also, um, we are going to become carbon neutral in 2023, two years ahead of time. And by 2020, 2030, uh, we intend to be net zero. Well, that, that's awesome. And, and listening to you, it's really interesting because as an enabling brand,

these sustainability stories not only inspire your downstream clients, but they also, of course, inspire other big businesses who may or may not be your clients. Raul, you've been a fantastic guest on this show. Thank you, Jesper. My pleasure. Brands are everywhere. I arrived in a Maruti today at the studio. The breakfast was probably procured from Tata Starkwick. Shubranchi told us about how everything arrives on commercial vehicles and all of those organizations might well be powered by SAP. And I'm reminded to renew my car insurance tonight.