SpiceJet has launched its first series of television commercials. The five-film campaign uses reverse testimonials to drive home the airline’s services. Each film describes the travails of a non-SpiceJet traveller. With gentle irony, the voiceover guides the viewer through each character’s situation; the film ends with the message that this person always had the choice of flying SpiceJet, which could have solved his problem.
The genesis for this campaign came in 2009 when the economic downturn hit the aviation industry hard. Full-service carriers like Jet Airways and Kingfisher began to compete with low-cost carriers by offering similar fares. As a result, the market share of low-cost carriers jumped from 35 per cent to 65 per cent. “That’s when we realised that in this new scenario we had to do more than just our regular tactical campaigns that highlighted the price and promotional offers,” says SpiceJet Senior Vice-president Anish Sri Krishna.
Thus, it went to its creative agency, Contract, to highlight a differentiator beyond price. To that end, each of its 25-second campaigns highlights value-added services that no other low-cost carrier offers. A case in point is the complimentary service of supervising a minor on a flight. “With these films, we hope to show that while we may be low-cost, we are certainly not low-service,” says Krishna. The company chose television as a route in an effort to tap its target audience which comprises urban men from socio-economic categories B1 to A1, aged between 25 and 40, who live in the top 22 cities of India.
“While this market size is close to 100 million people, current estimates suggest that only 6 to 8 million people actually took a flight in 2008-09,” adds Krishna. The first four ads that released on January 25 are being aired across Hindi and English news, infotainment and movie channels. The last ad in the series will release shortly. All the ads will run till mid-April.
Low-cost carriers the world over cut costs wherever possible. Will the current campaign not add to SpiceJet’s costs, which is widely recognised as the country’s first profit-making low-cost carrier?