28th December 2009, New Delhi…“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half” said John Wanamaker, and he must have known, since he was a visionary businessman of America who gave his employees free medical care, education, recreational facilities, pensions and profit-sharing plans in the second decade of 20th century, much before such benefits became standard.
“Today, almost a hundred years later, his statement still sounds refreshingly true” says Pradeep Saxena, Senior Vice President, TNS Automotive. According to him, all brands build relationships with their stakeholders by creating a Brand Experience. If this Brand Experience can be quantified, then John Wanamaker could possibly get his answer.
The key challenge in measuring the Brand Experience is identifying a common unit to measure the effect of different media. As per Pradeep Saxena, Integration - a company owned by ex-media and advertising professionals, has developed just such a unit. It is a measure called ‘Brand Experience Point’ or BEP. It measures the quantity of Brand Experience created by a brand through individual contacts (media) used by it. This is a common unit, which can be used across all contacts and is amenable to all arithmetic operations.
The Contact Point Optimization (CPO for short) study of TNS uses this concept to compare the Brand Experience generated by various car brands. It is a study conducted across ten media markets amongst recent buyers and current owners of cars in addition to the intending car buyers.
As per the study, in 2009, ‘Maruti Wagon R’ has been able to create the highest Brand Experience followed by ‘Maruti Alto’. At the same time, Tata Nano’s brand experience is the lowest among the 18 brands. The success of Wagon R is evident from the fact that it has been able to displace ‘Hyundai Santro’ from the top position and is able to garner a higher Brand Experience than the larger selling Maruti Alto.
The study findings also show that `Word of Mouth’, `Test drive’ and `Cars on the road’ are among the five most influential contacts apart from TV and Newspaper ads. The influence of the word of mouth has grown over last three years and that of newspaper ads has actually come down. Still the car marketers spend a huge amount of money on full page ads in newspapers and very little is spent on buzz marketing. Predictably, the influence of manufacturer websites has grown over the years. The younger age group notices the websites more than the older age group. The influence of Test Drives has also shown a consistent rise. Once again the younger people seem to experience the test drives more than the older buyers. Majority of car companies use celebrities in their advertisements. Overall influence of celebrities is low in the category but has been increasing. The older age groups notice celebrities less than the younger age groups. The influence of car test reviews on TV has been going up and they are viewed more by the younger buyers. It is understandable because a moving car shown on TV with accompanying expert comments is more interesting and informative than a press article. However the advantage of a press article is its easy retrievability when required. But the younger generation constantly up on the learning curve can probably do the same on the Youtube and such other internet portals.
*Data Source: CPO Study, Jul-Sept 2009 ** Gives the total brand experience created by all contact points for the brand, in %.
According to the study, the influence of newspaper ads and car test reviews in newspapers and magazines has been steadily falling. However newspapers ads still remain the fourth most influencing contact. The influence of Direct Sales Agents and road shows is also on the decline.
Upper Premium Compact segment has witnessed a lot of activity in the recent past with the launch of cars such as Maruti Ritz, Hyundai i20 etc. Buyers of this segment notice the websites more than the others. The buyers of expensive cars also pay more attention to the internet forums and blogs. Test drives are experienced more by the buyers of midsize cars.
Another key learning is that even when industry’s thrust is on mass media, in reality, the ranking of five out of the eleven mass media contacts in terms of influence is rather low. This essentially means that the spend on these contacts is likely to give low returns.
All brands treat `Market’ Share as a measure of success in the market. It is also possible to calculate the `Brand Experience’ Share (BES) in the market. In the study, the correlation between Brand Experience Share and Market Share is close to 80%.
Could John Wanamaker ask for more?
- Ends -
About the study: The TNS 2009 Contact Point Optimization study covered Economy and Premium Segments of passenger cars covering large number of models. Face-to-Face interviews were done every month during July - Sept 2009. Total sample size was 1798. The target group included intending buyers (Intending to buy a car among the given models, in the next 6 months), Recent Buyers (Bought a car, among the given models, in the past 12 months) and Current Owners (Currently owning a car, among the given models for 1-4 years.)
The geographic coverage of the study included ten large automotive and media markets viz. Delhi, Lucknow, Ludhiana, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Cochin and Kolkata.
About TNS
TNS, who recently merged with Research International, is the world’s largest custom research agency delivering actionable insights and research-based business advice to its clients so they can make more effective business decisions. TNS offers comprehensive industry knowledge within the Consumer, Technology, Finance, Automotive and Political & Social sectors, supported by a unique product offering that stretches across the entire range of marketing and business issues, specialising in product development & innovation, brand & communication, stakeholder management, retail & shopper, and qualitative research. Delivering best-in-class service across more than 75 countries, TNS is part of Kantar, the world’s largest research, insight and consultancy network. Please visit www.tnsglobal.com for more information.
