Mak: Mission impossible... possible

Like in any low-involvement category, in lubes and engine oils, getting consumer attention isn't easy. Naturally, lube marketers have been trying various things - from computer-aided wizardry to slightly right-of-centre creativity - to communicate how the right lubricant can boost drive quality and performance, and give the automobile a new lease of life. It just so happens that much of this advertising simply has shots of car, open road (burning rubber optional) and viscous lube being poured out of the can. Little of this advertising has really helped disturb consumer ennui.

Which is why Mak's use of a funny little donkey in its ad to make a point about improved performance appears a little odd… but certainly refreshing. The ad, created by Saatchi & Saatchi, Delhi, opens on a nondescript villager crouching at the edge of a lake, drinking water. His donkey grazes in the vicinity. The man's gaze falls on a discarded yellow plastic can lying by the water's edge. Eureka! He fills the can with water and returns to donkey. However, the moment he saddles the can to the beast of burden, it lets a loud bray and bolts, leaving the man baffled and stranded.

Cut to a racecourse where an excited crowd is egging on the racing horses. Suddenly, the race commentator announces the arrival of another contender in the race. The new contestant turns out to be the little donkey, sandwiched between the powerful horses, yet running at an incredible speed. It doesn't take long for the donkey to leave the horses behind and make it to the post. The camera zooms in on the saddle on the donkey's back. The yellow can, as it turns out, is a can of Mak engine oil. The voiceover concludes by saying, ‘Mak makes it possible. Mak Lubricants from Bharat Petroleum.'

While ‘performance par excellence' is something that quite a few lube brands have talked about in their advertising, Mak has clearly taken a more lateral approach. And it's not just with this ad. During this year's cricket World Cup, Mak ran a cricket-centric campaign that also had the making-the-impossible-possible idea at its heart. So fielders took ‘impossible catches' by virtue of being near Mak hoardings, timid batsmen hit ‘impossible sixes' with Mak bats and lousy bowlers bowled laws-of-physics-defying googlies on account of having wiped their fingers on Mak headbands. The point being made in all ads is that any association with Mak (Mak bats, Mak hoardings or, in this case, a Mak can) increases performance in a way never thought possible.

This genesis of this positioning was a consumer survey. "When we did a consumer group survey we came across two interesting insights," explains Anand Narasimha, executive vice-president, Saatchi & Saatchi India. "First, people are already aware of the benefits of a lubricant. They know that it makes the car run smoother, that it improves the mileage and all that. The second thing is that the user believes that if a brand of lubricant is from a reputed company, it will automatically deliver the promised benefits. So, in terms of product differentiation, talking about these hygiene factors was redundant."

While the survey gave a certain direction to the brand strategy, the category itself played an important role in adopting a non-linear approach. "Lubricant is not something that people wake up in the morning thinking about," Narasimha says. "The level of interest is low, by default, and it is a very dull category. With this as a background, we knew two things for sure - steer clear of strutting product benefits, and put the brand in a context that ensured top-of-mind recall."

Top-of-mind is imperative for Mak as it has a lot of catching up to do in an overcrowded category. There are some 32 players in the estimated Rs 6,000-crore lubricants market (1,200 TMT, in volume terms). Servo (from Indian Oil) is the market leader with 35 per cent share, followed by HP and Castrol, both of which have an 18-per cent share of the market. Mak lays claim to a 10-per cent share, while the remaining 19 per cent is distributed among other players, many from the unorganised sector.

The agency believes that nothing would serve the end of top-of-mind recall better than a category-busting idea. "We had to position Mak in the most unexpected manner. Mak making impossible things possible gave an edge to the brand positioning. Mak delivering an unexpected performance is like the Fevicol theme - centred at an exaggerated idea," states Narasimha. He adds that it was important to convey exaggeration in an "endearing way", so that the advertising had the desired impact. Which is why the ad chooses to show the rub-off-effect Mak has on people and animals… leaving the possible effect Mak would have on the automobiles to the viewer's imagination. © 2003 agencyfaqs!