Asia-Pacific Power List 2022: Ranjani Krishnaswamy, Tanishq

Ranjani Krishnaswamy

General manager, marketing
Tanishq
India
New member  

Marketing jewellery in India is traditionally reliant on formulaic campaigns, sticking to traditional roles and rules of society. Festivals, weddings, and motherhood are celebrated in layers of gold, and jewellery brands aren’t expected to take a contentious stance on matters of importance. Ranjani Krishnamurthy, who helms marketing for Tanishq, the country’s largest organised jewellery brand, has swept many of these stereotypes off the table.

She’s known for pushing the envelope—this campaign in 2020 featuring an interfaith couple had to be pulled due to spiralling protests. She’s also got a bagful of other notable campaigns. These include ‘Ekatvam’ which celebrated the idea of unity; campaigns that have rescripted India’s wedding narrative (‘Marriage Conversations’, ‘When it Rings True’ and ‘A Jewel for Every Tradition’); and Puddumai Penn (new age woman) in Tamil Nadu which focused on the balanced duality of women.

Elsewhere, Krishnaswamy, who has spent a decade at Unilever and was a marketer with Indian company Wipro, supervised a Mother’s Day campaign, ‘The Interview,’ which depicted a more progressive version of motherhood and celebrated inherent leadership traits in every new mother. Similarly, she also sought to recast age-old expectations of a woman’s life with the ‘Every Woman a Diamond’ campaign. Tanishq also executed India’s first immersive 3D anamorphic installation for its ‘Live a Dream’ campaign.

Outside a flurry of campaigns, Krishnaswamy led the growth of Tanishq’s digital capabilities by driving contactless selling and strengthening its omni-channel marketing with virtual try-ons and aisle-to-video calling facilities at a retail level. She also oversaw a metaverse launch under its Rivaah sub-brand. Through continued marketing efforts, Tanishq claims to have seen a 100x jump in ‘digitally-influenced sales’ in the last two years.

Krishnaswamy has also been keen to bolster Tanishq’s brand purpose as the company’s marketing leader. The company made efforts to improve the livelihoods of the Karigar (workers in jewellery factories) community by launching the ‘Blessed Gold’ or ‘Dua Ka Sona 2.0’ campaign aimed to highlight Tanishq’s efforts during the pandemic.