Auto Expo 2012: Shashank Srivastava on Maruti's transition from 'Count on us' to 'Way of Life'

Maruti Suzuki recently got a revamped corporate tagline as the automobile manufacturer moved away from its 'Count on us' thought to its global tagline, 'Way of life'.  

  

Commenting on the change in the tagline, Shashank Srivastava, chief general manager, marketing, Maruti Suzuki said, "Our new tagline comes from the changing consumer mindset, both demographically and psycho-graphically. We saw people becoming less brand loyal and more brand conscious. Our old tagline gave us the notion of being reliable and trustworthy, which we think has become essential in any case. Now the Indian market has matured, where things like the product being good and reliable is a hygiene factor and not a differentiator. Our new tagline, 'Way of life', is the tagline we use globally through which we look to  become a part of our consumers life. The change in our tagline has been on the cards since 2008 and we've changed it over the past two Expos where we had the themes, 'Colours of life and 'Joys of life'."

"Our new tagline is built on four core values; spirited, value, sportiness and straightforward. These are the pillars and our stall at the Auto Expo is based on these values. We have a colour each to represent these new values. Spirited - Orange, Blue for Value, Red for sports and Green for authentic and straight forward. The logos have an image behind every product which represents the core target audience," added Srivastava.

Maruti Suzuki has also been very active on the digital platform over the past few years, and their stall for the Auto Expo has its fair share of digitisation. Visitors could give their approval of a Maruti product at the venue by placing their thumb over a pillar placed next to the car, which would link to the users Facebook page, and generate a like on their profile for the car.

Commenting on the digital platform in India, Srivastava said, "Digital is catching on in India now as the penetration of the internet is increasing. Out of the 80 million internet users, 12 million users can access the internet through their mobile phone. As technology improves its pretty obvious, that digital is going to be THE medium. In some countries, we are seeing examples of digital spends increasing and even exceeding print and sometimes even matching television. We aren't close to those levels, but the direction is there. At Maruti last year we spent seven percent of our total spends on digital and this time we are looking to spend about 13 percent of our spends on the platform. Social media is growing in the country as earlier we only saw the youth hooked onto social media, but now we are seeing more older people now taking to social media. We have a very strong social media presence with our FB page for Ritz more than 500,000 people."