"This campaign intends to bring credibility to real estate sector once again" Prasun Kumar on new Magicbricks campaign

The campaign, #PropertyKaSuperMarket has been conceptualised by RK Swamy BBDO.

Online real estate site Magicbricks.com, recently launched a new TVC, #PropertyKaSuperMarket. The ad has been conceptualised by RK Swamy BBDO, directed by Ruchi Narayan and produced by RAT Films.

The campaign will run across TV, print, digital, outdoor, and radio platforms. The brand has spent Rs 50 crore to promote its new campaign. The ads which are currently on air would also be seen during the upcoming India versus Australia One Day and T20 International series which would be played between September 17th and October 13th, 2017.

New TVC by Magicbricks - #PropertyKaSuperMarketWe spoke to Prasun Kumar, Marketing Head, Magicbricks.com about the challenges that the brand is facing and the objective of this campaign.

Prasun KumarHe says, "Due to massive regulatory changes in the last one year, right from demonetisation to RERA (Real Estate Regulatory Authority) and then GST (Goods and Service Tax), it led to lot of pressure points building up. We needed a trigger for someone to become an active home buyer. That trigger was missing after all these changes occurred. A lot of the active buyers who were there in the market became passive buyers and that is a problem the industry has been battling with."

He adds, "Consumer sentiments got upset because of industry challenges and real estate was facing a lot of issues; what it resulted in was a lot of queries being raised, but it wasn't heading to the closure stage which is transaction. This campaign intends to infuse a sense of positivity and confidence and bring credibility to the sector once again."

The core TG for the brand is largely male. Online, the brand sees a lot of tech savvy people between 25-50 years old and between SEC A and B. They get online traffic from metros and small towns in India.

Talking about the psychological barrier faced by the consumers in this category, Kumar says, "Psychological barriers would be involvement on high ticket items (homes) and it is a once in a lifetime investment for the consumer, so the barrier in the mind of the consumer could be whether they are making the right decision or not. For them it would be important to do a lot of research so that when they take a decision, they know it is the right one."

When it comes to deciding the marketing and advertising strategy, Magicbricks.com depends completely on data. Kumar says, "Being a portal, data obviously, is our skeleton and we look at consumer points on a daily basis; what is happening on the platform; what the consumer is looking for; what they don't like etc. That wealth of information helps us in developing a proposition which the consumer can resonate with. Most of our campaigns and marketing initiatives arrive out of the things that we spot in the data trend on our site."

Speaking about the platform and geographical areas from where the brand expects its next million users, Kumar says, "Majority of data consumption is on the mobile. Today, from our traffic point of view, we have omni-channel traffic and the data is consumed from the app and other platforms available, but what we are seeing is that the fast interaction with the consumers is happening on their mobiles. That is almost become a set pattern. And given the position of smartphones today, we believe the next million consumers are going to come from emerging towns outside metros - like Coimbatore, Jaipur, Bhopal, Lucknow etc. which are developing real estate markets."

Review:

We asked our reviewers in the real estate segment what the one thing is that brands should focus on when communicating in their TVCs.

Jagdish Acharya

Sagar KapoorJagdish Acharya, Founder and Creative Head, Cut The Crap (an ad agency), says, "Magicbricks is a literal campaign; converting a thought to creative in its literal sense on the tagline - Property Ka Supermarket. Literal campaigns generally depend on the spin at the end to deliver the punch. However, that does not happen in this case. The ad gets pre-empted early on, therefore the rest of it becomes a stretch. One factor that could have made it more watchable is its song and dance narrative, but the execution falls short of the task."

Acharya feels it's a good idea by the brand to focus on choice. He adds, "That's what consumers want most from brands like Magicbricks. But it's also a generic claim without much credibility -hence the need to dramatize, either through a creative leap or a consumer insight. The present campaign does not do enough on that note."

Sagar Kapoor, Executive Director - Creative, Lowe Lintas, says, "The brand could have emphasised on strategy and worked harder on crafting the executional elements in the film. Real estate is a very high involvement category. So, even if Magicbricks is an aggregator website, it is still the only window available to consumers of the category. Hence, the Supermarket idea doesn't quite work. Buying a property is not as simple as picking it up and placing it in the cart."

He adds, "There is a lot of time spent in the decision making process before zeroing in on a property. It would have worked better if the focus was on the real estate category, positioning Magicbricks as the best window for the consumer to make a good choice. I would suggest 'expertise' rather than 'choice' in this case."

Credits:

Creative Agency: RK Swamy BBDO

Creative Director: Ankur Suman

Production House: RAT Films

Director: Ruchi Narayan

Creative Director: Ankur Suman