smallcase witnesses 2x surge in users after Shark Tank every episode airs

The fintech brand takes a humorous approach in its new ad campaign. VP, marketing Aniket Thakkar talks about the campaign, Shark Tank association and more.

Fintech has been one of the fastest-growing sectors in India. As per a  Statista report, the digital investment segment is expected to show a revenue growth of 34.3% in 2024.

The high growth has led to several new entrants. As a result, the market has become highly competitive and the companies are in a tussle to acquire the biggest market share. Marketing in this category is also challenging as trust and credibility play a crucial role.

One of the challenges that this sector faces is that people think of investment as a tedious task, which makes it a challenge for marketers to come up with unique and exciting ways to promote the brands of this category.

Started in 2016 by Vasanth Kamath, Anugrah Shrivastava and Rohan Gupta, smallcase is a fintech platform that provides direct indexing and model portfolios of equities and EFTs. The platform aims to transform the investing product space by providing investors with low cost and transparent investment products.

Shark Tank’s ideas partner

smallcase has associated with SharkTank India’s season 2 as its ‘ideas partner’. The first season of the show saw a massive popularity and featured some entrepreneurs who have now become household names in the industry.

The brand has associated with the show as they are looking to reach a large number of investors and contribute to the booming entrepreneurship and equity culture in India.

Talking about this association, Aniket Thakkar, VP, marketing at smallcase states,“For this association, the first part we saw was timing, the second was audience base. It ticked both boxes. People are either sensitive to invest in stocks, or they've dabbled in it by buying one or two stocks. And I thought there was a big overlap between the audience and the audience on Shark Tank.”

The brand checked all demographics, age groups and also there was a lot of buzz for the first season and so the brand decided to back the second season. Since the budget 2023 is coming, the Shark Tank association seems to be timely as it will help the brand guide investment decisions of its users and tap the high demand.

When asked about the brand’s expectations from this association, Thakkar says, “We are relatively a small startup and currently working on brand awareness. Every time, when a Shark Tank episode goes live, we see a 2x jump in the number of users between 10 pm to 12 am. Hence, this association has worked well for us.”

smallcase’s recent ad outing

Recently, the brand launched four ad films. The films are created by Tanmay Bhat, Devaiah Bopanna, Puneet Chadha and Deep Josh. Through these ads the brand attempts to create a niche for itself as compared to other fintech platforms which are focusing on shares/stocks investing. 

Elaborating on the campaign, Thakkar says, “The campaign is running in two phases. The first two creatives are delivered with the intention to hit the point. The message was direct as investment is a complex subject and we need some experts to help us out.”

“The parent and kid reversal role ad films are created with the intent for somebody who doesn’t have the expertise in stock. Such a person might usually go through each and every stock to figure out which is in profit and loss. And, that single stock trading can lead to big losses which is what is highlighted in the ads,” he mentions.

smallcase aims to help its users through experts who will make and handle  their portfolio.

In the last two ad films, the brand shows that the best experts are  present on smallcase’s platform. The ad films highlights the profiles of some of the  marquee investors who are available on its platform. The tagline of the campaign is ‘millennials ke investor experts now available on smallcase.’

“The first two ad-films are made to educate them and the last two to put them in action,” Thakkar adds.

Other than spending on digital mediums, the brand is using cinema screens just for Pathaan for the film’s initial 10 days in theatres. The digital campaign will continue till mid-March.

Branding: how dominant is it?

Branding lies at the heart of fintech marketing. It creates both a first impression for your customers and builds a lasting link with them.

The positioning of the brand plays an important role in the fintech sectors as there is large monetary involvement of the customers.

“We didn’t want to position our platform to guarantee results, as nobody can predict the market. We never positioned ourselves in a way that you will get this much return. However, we are proud of our managers as all of them are registered, and we want to showcase them,” Thakkar mentions.

Talking about the association with Tanmay Bhat and team, Thakkar says, We had a great experience working with them, and we loved the concept as well as the execution. The work they did has done great numbers and that was the reason to test them again.”