Rohan Builders sells vegetables in a funny new campaign

In the current Indian scenario, the combined effect of demonetisation, crackdown on un-taxed incomes, and a series of Bills passed by the government to make real estate more regulated, the consumer is anxiously holding their breath for real estate prices to fall in urban India. It's made the real estate market sluggish with people delaying buying decisions to avoid the risk of losing money, in case prices fell.

Rohan Builders of Pune, were among the first real estate companies in India to introduce a 'Price Protection Policy' back in 2008. The policy ensures that if the market price of the property bought falls, the company refunds the difference to consumers. The policy has been reintroduced in the wake of current market conditions.

While this policy is immensely relevant in the current market, it normally gets buried in the fine print of the legal documents and is left to the sales personnel to explain (or ignore).

To put spotlight on Price-Protection, LinTeractive recently unveiled a digitally-led initiative, Price-Protected Sabziwala (vegetable vendor). At this shop, you get price-protection on vegetables, even on small fluctuations in the market.

The campaign, set in Pune, kicked-off with a series of prank videos called 'Aaj Ka Bhav' (the rates today) by the popular comedy group STFU18. In the series, vegetable vendors in and around Pune were asked if they would return money to consumers if vegetable prices fell. OOH and social media are being deployed to communicate Rohan Builder's price protection policy.

To push the idea further, an online vegetable store, #PriceProtectedSabziwala has been launched, where people can buy vegetables with a price protection guarantee. Physical vegetable stores on the same lines have been setup in retail malls of Pune. The buyers of veggies from these stores are notified via SMS, every time prices fall and they can claim a refund of the difference online. The website goes on to introduce Rohan Builder's Price Protection Policy to invite buyer interest.

A stock exchange-like price ticker for the vegetable market has been created as a mobile utility.

Abhishek Bhatewara, director sales, Rohan Builders says, "In the current state of the real estate market in India, the home buyer is anxious that house prices may fall, delaying their buying for a later date. We understand the buyers' hesitation in committing their hard-earned savings to buy a house right now. LinTeractive has come up with a very simple and effective way to make people relate to this policy with an everyday fluctuation we all live - the prices of sabzi. We're trying to trigger in the minds of the consumer that buying a home with Rohan is something they should consider without fear as their investment is protected from any downturn in the market."

Within three days of going live the campaign claims to have got a reach of over 3.5 million. Over a hundred potential customers have already come forward with interest in buying properties from Rohan Developers. More leads continue to pour-in as the campaign progresses.

Vikas Mehta, Group CMO and president - marketing services, MullenLowe Lintas Group adds, "To put spotlight in a blind spot (price protection by a real estate company in this case) is always an interesting marketing challenge. These are hard times for the real estate business and I commend Rohan for thinking digital-first."

Sumanta Ganguly, executive vice president, LinTeractive comments, "Inherent to our approach has always been the effective understanding of consumer journeys to use the effective touchpoints to enable specific action. The omni-channel campaign has been created using touch-points including physical and digital experiences (on ground, web and mobile), conversations on social media, video content and OOH. In #PriceProtectedSabziwala while awareness was driven through outdoor and radio, use of videos to bring to life the fluctuating prices in vegetable markets helped the idea gain traction and 'SMS with money back' demonstrated Rohan's brand promise."