Vritti Delivers a Successful Brand Campaign for lodex at the 2015 Pandharpur Vatra
Summary of the Campaign
GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare, world leaders in healthcare products have time and again adopted innovative marketing initiatives to reach out to their consumers. They recently undertook one such initiative for their iconic Ayurvedic balm- lodex. GSK through Vritti I Media (rural marketing specialists) associated with one of the largest Indian pilgrimages, The Pandharpur Yatra to create contextual consumer activation at the Right Moments of Truth.
Pandharpur Wari is an annual pilgrimage (yatra) to Pandharpur – the seat of the Lord Vithoba in the Indian state of Maharashtra, in honour of the deity. This is the world’s largest & oldest people movement where over 2 million devotees travel for 21 days to cover a mammoth 250 kms distance by foot to reach Pandharpur. The devotees throng in from different parts of Maharashtra & nearby state for this pilgrimage.
While every year Lord Vithoba’s devotion makes the pilgrims forget all pain & travel hundreds of kilometres either through a back-wrenching bus journey for over 8 hrs or by a 21 day long knee rattling walk to the pilgrimage but this year was different as lodex took an oath to ensure that while Lord Vithoba will take care of all emotional pain of the devotees but lodex will take care of all their Body Pains during the pilgrimage. The activation was in sync with the newly launched campaign for lodex Balm – “Badan ke har dard ke liye, sirf lodex” (For Every Pain in the Body, Only lodex) that was launched in July 2015 across India by GSK.
Objective of the Activation
lodex, a 95 year old brand in India, is a strong challenger brand in Maharashtra, which happens to be the biggest state in India for the pain relief category. lodex was launching a new campaign with the singular positioning on being the balm for all types of body pain (neck/shoulder, back, joint, etc) & the key message of the campaign was “Badan ke har dard ke liye, sirf lodex” (For Every Pain in the Body, Only lodex). The Pandharpur Yatra was a perfect synergistic opportunity to activate Brand lodex with the new campaign thought to create strong preference in Maharashtra market.
The Activation
While setting up a massage services or doing sampling during such pilgrimages is a commonly explored idea in the past by many pain relief brands but to make this activation innovative & more effective & truly engulf the consumers with the brand message, it was decided to plan this activation in 3 stages wherein through different touch points & different media vehicles, the brand reached out to the consumers at different moments of truth in their pain journey.
A. Activating the First Moment of Truth – Pre Pain
State transport buses were one of the most popular modes of transport for most of the pilgrims to reach Pandharpur from different parts of Maharashtra. The very thought of an 8 hr plus journey in a state transport bus would give shivers down the spine for many who have back pain but the devotion for Lord Vithoba would make them ignore this & continue with their journey. This was the First Moment of Truth that we activated for lodex using an innovative medium called the