When it comes to tyre marketing, what is the next big innovation?

Driving on Indian roads can be a demanding task. Safety is critical, and it is no secret that we deal with poor road or traffic conditions, every single day. This is why CEAT, for decades, has remained committed to providing safe and smart mobility to Indians. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to claim that over the years, CEAT and tyres have become synonymous with each other. Staying ahead of the curve with ground breaking, industry-first products has been at the forefront of the brand’s innovations.

At CEAT too, at different stages of the brand, the endeavour has been to develop strategies that resonate with the consumer. Sure, it’s a low-involvement category and print and television are proven ways of reaching masses. Where, then, will the next innovation come from?

The digital highway

In the current times, the answer to the last question lies, but obviously, in digital! That again is not really a road less travelled. One needs to be innovative for a digital marketing solution to be truly effective. And with CEAT, we realised marrying sports with digital could definitely make the right noise with our audience that is 99% male.
Partnering with leading OTT player Hotstar, CEAT decided to leverage the one sport that unites this country – cricket. And what better occasion than the sporting world’s biggest carnival – the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019?

Getting the right grip

To partner with Hotstar was a no-brainer, given the streaming platform’s reach and wide range of content and, of course, its cricket broadcasting rights. Adding to the list, the Hotstar metrics and very customisable ad formats made the decision even easier.
The industry numbers made sense too. According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report released last year, the OTT video industry in India is set to grow by over 11% to touch INR 4.5 lakh crore in the next four years. These numbers are barely surprising given the content consumption habits of the common Indian, today. Also, the Hotstar numbers revealed that non-metros are way ahead of the metros when it came to video consumption.
CEAT knew where its audience – comprising 99% males – was and what they loved. It was then an obvious choice to join the winning team. It wasn’t the first time the brand tried this route though. We chose to do something similar during the IPL last year as well and the results were more than satisfactory.
This time around, we got on board cricketers Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane. Betting on these dynamic cricketers reaped great dividends. Sharma was crowned the highest run-scorer in the World Cup while Rahane, too, proved to be impressive thereby helping the campaign.

A winning ride to the finish line

Today’s consumers have evolved and are looking to consume snackable, on-the-go content. This is why we exclusively tied up with Hotstar for the ‘Highlights’ and ‘Fall of Wickets’ package. The idea worked wonders. ‘Highlights by CEAT’ had over 300 million views and cut through the ad clutter to reach audiences beyond the live game.

The mid-roll video ads also had a great impact and reached 80 million viewers. The language barrier was overcome by customising six language feeds. These drove consideration, and in the process, recorded a whopping 1 billion plus impressions.
Here’s trivia: Hotstar’s reach during the World Cup was comparable to the entire population of the United States. CEAT received a massive lift in message association – 15% for CEAT Gripp X3 and 18% for CEAT Milaze X3 brands. The brand also witnessed a whopping 3x increase in direct search of the website, a 10% rise in website sessions and 40% increase in website leads.

It cannot be overstated how video as a medium has amplified opportunities for brands in several ways. CEAT experienced this during the World Cup campaign. It (video) did not just help gain the right eyeballs, but also increased traffic to the website and generated leads. The regional marketing strategy tailored for different geographies broke all language barriers, and further cemented the brand equity. Sports and digital marketing, like every time, proved to be a very successful marriage indeed. Here’s to the next big campaign, here’s to innovation.