THE PAWSOME PEDIGREE PROGRAMME

Most pet parents (wrongly) assume home food is best for their pets little realizing that dogs have specific nutrient needs - different from humans. The major communication challenge for Pedigree was changing this mind set and educating the consumer on how the right nutrients affects the health of their pet and how Pedigree guarantees the five signs of good health. The core focus of our communication was ‘breaking’ the ‘habit’ of home-cooked pet meals. However that involved individual prompters standing at each of the 3000 outlets across India which was not just a logistic nightmare but also a very expensive proposition.

The Summary Statement

While the challenge was to come up with a cost-effective solution with minimal spill-over that targeted sampling leading to education and eventually conversion through incentivisation, our KPIs were defined.

  • The quantifiable goal was to increase reach 10X by sampling 300k unique pet parents in Year1 [15% of the STP (Specialist Point of Trade) universe]
  • Reduce cost of activation from $6 in 2015 to $2.5 in 2016
  • Boost market penetration via coupon redemption (1st purchase post sample) to 15% (FMCG benchmark being less than 10%)

Strategy

The pet food industry in India is still in a nascent stage. The calorie conversion is 3.4% or in other words 3.4% food served to dogs is pre-packaged pet food with a staggering 96.6% preferring to give their pets home cooked food. (Basis IPSOS research data 2010 and a dipstick of 200 pet parents).

  • The estimated urban pet dog parent population is 6 million. 10% of households have a dog (Agency research) and that demographic is pan-India and spread out so individually targeting such households is a humungous task.
  • However the annual unique walk-ins at retail stores, vets and other associated outlets is 2 million pet parents of which 60% feed their dogs home-cooked food
  • In other words reaching out to pet parents where we are most likely to find them was a huge category opportunity that had to be tapped

No other player in the marketplace was educating the pet parents other than Mars (Pedigree®) or conducting an aggressive sampling-to-purchase programme.

Concept

To get customers to sample as well as avail benefits on the first product purchase (post sampling), with coupons generated being specific to the sale point thus ensuring footfalls and customer gain for the POS. The annual unique walk-ins at retail stores, vets and other associated outlets is 2 million pet parents of which 60% feed their dogs home-cooked food. (Data source: IPSOS research data 2010 and a Dipstick survey conducted by Mars). That is a huge concentration of pet parents across 3000 outlets and therein lay a huge category opportunity. This insight is what led us to consider tapping pet parents were we are most likely to find them and to change their pet food habits by encouraging, educating and incentivizing them to try Pedigree®.

Campaign Execution

With 3000 outlets spread all over India, scaling up the sampling programme would have been an expensive proposition entailing the need to have a prompter and a manager at each outlet. So instead we created an app that also incentivized the retailer and thus got the implicit support of the trade. The programme captured valuable data via the app that in turn led to sampling and building up loyalty. Our programme helped capture leads in a simple format, disseminated free samples and dispensed additional information as well as a discount on product purchase. All of this was done seamlessly through a system wherein-

  • The leads were captured through an app and the customer received a sample basis his or her breed type
  • Data was handled through a Lead Management System
  • The trained call center staff worked to convert the lead into a satisfied customer hence driving sales
  • The app allowed us to ramp up the programme quickly and smoothly – taking it pan India
  • Sampled customers received a feedback call within 24 hours keeping the brand connect alive. They received information on how to use the product, had their queries answered by trained call centre staff and also received an m-coupon that they could use to purchase a pack at the same outlet at a subsidized rate

  • The main media used was tele-calling for the issue of coupons and educating the consumer on the benefits of dog food Vs home-cooked food
  • Other media used was the mobile app which helped in registration and redemption of the coupons issued
  • A redemption module for the POS was created - who gained points based on the samples given and the coupons redeemed



Campaign Results

As against the Rs 20 crore spend on TV media (2015), just 6 crore of the budget was used in the sampling programme and it proved to be very effective reaching out to the relevant audience and in getting the best return on investment since it was completely scalable.

  • The sampling increased from the targeted 2,500-5,000 to 30,000 per month
  • We achieved 33% as the coupon redemption rate which is 3 times more than the average ‘high’ FMCG market standard of 10%
  • The app brought down costs from Rs 900 (2015) to Rs 150 (2016) since not only were additional people not required, the generation of a unique OTP ensured that only unique pet parents were being approached and thus cutting down on spillage
  • Customers were pushed to the same retail store as the sampling to redeem their M-coupon
  • The app also helped retailers to keep tabs on the pet’s nutrition requirements basis the breed and age. Timely calls were made at regular intervals to pet parents reminding them to replenish their Pedigree stock thus ensuring repeat footfalls to the store where the product was first sampled
  • Small pack sales in sampled outlets registered a 2X faster growth vs other outlets



    • A win-win situation for everyone


    * HFC – Home cooked food

    * Add case film video in webpage of the case study