Above & Beyond: Lessons in Marketing leadership underscores how Maruti shifted gears to meet its consumers where they were with Disney+ Hotstar

“Disney+ Hotstar’s unique marketing solutions for us helped us break the clutter and stand out,” says Shashank Srivastava, Executive Director, Marketing and Sales, Maruti Suzuki.

The recently concluded IPL 2020 saw a fruitful association between Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. and Disney+ Hotstar. The partnership tapped into the Maruti consumer’s love for cricket. This fact was brought to light by the brand’s research that showed one in three consumers are passionate cricket fans. Changing consumer behaviour in 2020 – underscored by a massive shift to the digital medium – spurred Maruti to look beyond the traditional ways of reaching their audiences and work within the digital paradigm.

In the second video from the series titled ‘Above & Beyond: Lessons in Marketing Leadership’, Shashank Srivastava, Executive Director – sales and marketing, Maruti Suzuki Ltd., talks about how Disney+ Hotstar became an ideal partner for them to engage with their consumers in the evolved digital construct. IPL overlapping with the festive season combined with the platform’s capability to create industry-first innovative solutions, especially suited for Maruti, enabled them to achieve exponential success in the quarter that was extremely crucial for the brand.  

“Disney+ Hotstar’s unique marketing solutions helped us stand out by engaging with cricket-loving consumers in innovative ways,” said Srivastava.

The partnership led to phenomenal success for Maruti. In addition to an uplift across brand metrics, there was a 1.6X increase in website traffic.  

“Our association with Disney+ Hotstar had many unique marketing innovations – for example, the Maruti Suzuki website incorporated in the live environment of cricket. The brand scores jumped across all participating brands, and there was almost a 15% jump in the brand-message association and 18-23% jump in the purchase intent,” he explained.

Watch this insightful video to know more about Maruti Suzuki’s partnership with Disney+ Hotstar, Shashank Srivastava’s thoughts on the future of OTT and his marketing philosophy: