Currently, P&G’s India media planning is split between Starcom and MediaCom, while buying is managed by Madison.
It is believed that the review was the result of lobbying from agencies competing to offer attractive rates. It could also be the result of its considerably weakened planning capabilities: after assuming the role of regional CEO in January 2007, Starcom’s star planner Ravi Kiran no longer handles P&G’s planning and at MediaCom, president Jasmin Sohrabji left for Omnicom’s OMD last year.
It is believed that the review was the result of lobbying from agencies competing to offer attractive rates. It could also be the result of its considerably weakened planning capabilities: after assuming the role of regional CEO in January 2007, Starcom’s star planner Ravi Kiran no longer handles P&G’s planning and at MediaCom, president Jasmin Sohrabji left for Omnicom’s OMD last year.
P&G India, however, maintains that the current review is “a matter of standard corporate requirement to ensure that the best agency resources are working on P&G brands” and a “periodic review of external capabilities”.
After coming to India about four decades ago, P&G still lags FMCG leader Hindustan Unilever (HUL) by a long way. As a matter of fact, its Chinese operations, started 19 years ago, are more than three times the size of those in India.
The general feeling is that P&G could have been more competitive. For example, throughout the ’90s, P&G India launched just one large brand - wash care product Ariel.
The company has still to come to grips with the fast-evolving Indian consumer and is trying to figure out the best way to straddle the mass-premium and urban-rural opportunities. For instance, P&G hasn’t built breadth and depth into rural areas. “P&G is mostly concentrating on premium products and there is little demand for these products in rural areas. If there’s no demand there’s no point in going there (rural areas),” says an analyst from a leading broking firm in India.
In categories like personal care, size does matter, and here’s where its competitors like HUL have an upper hand, claims a source from a rival FMCG company. He says P&G is operating in many categories that are under-penetrated - for instance, premium shampoos; but the entry of new FMCG entrants like ITC is forcing P&G to hold the price line.
Like Unilever, P&G needs to play the visibility game through events, engagements with consumers, branded content and product placements, says the CEO of a media agency. HUL’s digital initiatives, like sunsilkgangofgirls.com, were done to create visibility, he says. But P&G is finally learning its lessons. A source from a rival FMCG company admits that P&G did a good job with its Olay launch earlier this year, creating a half-hour programme on Sony’s SET for its launch, among other things.
It also explored cross-brand collaborations for a reality TV show with Whisper-Pantene Khud par-karo yakeen, India’s hunt for a female TV news anchor. Recently, it appointed Arc Worldwide, the marketing services arm of Leo Burnett, to ‘Indianise’ its site beinggirl.com, the website for teenage girls created by P&G’s female care brand Whisper, and to promote it using new media.