What makes Santoor's 30 year old "mummy!" formula work?

Wipro's soap brand Santoor has been marketing itself on the back of the same promise and advertising tack for three decades. It seems to work - Santoor recently dethroned Lux as the No.2 soap brand.

It's a narrative we're all familiar with - a youthful looking woman with glowing skin is being admired by the men and women around her when suddenly, they're taken aback as a child addresses her as "mummy." Santoor has been using the same strategy for almost 30 years and it has worked well for them.

We spoke to S Prasanna Rai, vice president, marketing, Wipro Consumer Care & Lighting, about Santoor's strategy over the years.

This 2016 ad put a digital spin on the 'mummy' narrative

Saif starred in a 2014 ad for Santoor

Mahesh Babu starred in a different version of the ad targetted at audiences down South

S Prasanna Rai

"For over 30 years, Santoor has delivered on the promise of 'younger looking skin' through its natural ingredients - sandal and turmeric. Over the years, the Santoor 'mistaken identity' and 'younger looking skin' campaigns and innovative marketing strategies have helped Santoor gain market share. The key insight behind Santoor's marketing is that women want to look younger, irrespective of their age. While this positioning has remained consistent, we have regularly modernised our campaign to appeal to our target segment. The creative idea of a mother being mistaken for someone younger has remained consistent for more than three decades. The creative execution reflects the changing times and the portrayal of the Santoor protagonist is in line with modern times," he tells us.

Santoor as a brand is not very keen on signing on a celebrity to endorse their product. "Over the years Santoor has carefully chosen celebrities and it has worked well. We were probably the first brand in the personal care space not to use a celebrity in a supporting role in our commercials. Currently, we have no plans to sign anyone on," says Rai. In Santoor ads, it's always the actor who admires the Santoor woman, the protagonist, only to realise later that she's a mother.

Prabhakar Mundkur

We asked Prabhakar Mundkur, a brand strategy adviser, what has worked for Santoor. "I think it is a difficult one to figure; which is no. 1 and no.2 . Some companies focus on value; others focus on volume. Santoor's volume share was 14.9 per cent in June 2018, ahead of Lux's 13.9 per cent. But Kantar, which tracked that volume, does not track value. So it's quite possible that Lux is a value leader and HUL is happy with it being so," he explains, referring to the Kantar Worldpanel data that has placed Santoor at #2 in terms of sales.

"I don't think the current situation is only about what Santoor is doing right. It could be about what Lux is doing wrong. Ever since its inception 22 years ago, Lux was the soap of the stars. When I handled Lux in the 90s, we had about a 100 stars on the roster. But that is not true anymore. Today you see just a handful of stars recommending Lux which is just a celebrity endorsement that does no justice to the positioning of 'soap of the stars'. Also, traditionally, Unilever overseas and HUL in India has milked the brand and not given it all the attention it deserves either in terms of advertising or advertising spends. Having said that, Santoor has been very steady in its positioning of being a natural product beauty soap. Being consistent, although no longer fashionable in the digital age, certainly helps in building the long-term brand value," Mundkur points out.

In Ambi Parameswaran's book, titled 'Nawabs, Nudes, Noodles: India through 50 Years of Advertising,' he quotes the late AG Krishnamurthy, founder of Mudra: "When I do come across advertising like the Santoor campaign, I think it deserves a round of applause. It is a very simple thought. It appeals to every human's desire to keep looking young... it is special because, with every new release, they manage to add freshness and newness to the same old thought. I am sure that this courage to stay on the same course must be a collaborative effort of both client and agency."

FCB Ulka had won the account in 1988-89 and in 2017, ADK Fortune took over. We spoke to Sonia Bhatnagar, senior vice president and executive creative head at ADK Fortune.

Sonia Bhatnagar

"Santoor is an iconic brand and the insight has served them for decades. The idea was not to deviate from what already works for them. We were more concerned with how we can make the communication more powerful. She's always been a woman with a career, now we're scaling up in terms of her achievements and the kind of career she has to make it more contemporary and new age," says Bhatnagar.

Surely enough, one of Santoor's newer ads sees a tour guide who is unafraid of facing dust or the sun. The premise is that her skin is unaffected because she uses Santoor Gold soap. Interestingly, the mummy narrative does not make it to this ad.

"It was important to give a fresh take to the Santoor 'mummy'. We're constantly looking for new ways to tell our story. The audience on digital is different, so there are fresh opportunities to tell fresh new stories," she explains.

ALSO READ: Wipro Consumer Care re-launches Santoor soap

With ADK Fortune, Santoor has also been exploring digital campaigns. "On digital, we are taking a more empowered stance. With our most recent campaign, last Mother's Day, we asked our audience, 'What do you think a mother looks like?' and we provided an answer as well, saying 'Take a look at some of the careers that young mothers have today.'"