Kotak Life’s new campaign seeks a fresh outlook on term insurance

Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance Company (Kotak Life) has launched a new campaign titled 'Viraasat Ban Ke Hi Rahegi' featuring Bollywood celebrity Rajkumar Rao. The campaign aims to revitalise the discourse on term insurance, redefining it as a tool for wealth accumulation. 

In the ad, conceptualised and created by independent ad agency The Womb, Rajkumar Rao is seen convincing a man who is already working hard to accumulate wealth for his family to also take out term insurance as a security to protect his family in case something unforeseen happens before he dies.

The ad positions term insurance as a complimentary safety net to these goals. 

The ad doesn’t offer protection plans as the be-all and end-all of financial stability, but rather acknowledges and validates other financial plans, with term insurance serving as an additional layer of security for these legacy-building plans. 

This, as per Ashish Nair, who is the CMO and head of customer value management and health tech at Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance, is a new way of looking at term insurance. 

He says, “Insurance has always been positioned as a safety tool for your family. But today, Indians are emboldened in their financial pursuits. They are building homes, accumulating gold, investing in other instruments, saving money, etc. So, for them, term insurance is not the security net neccessarily. So, the aim is to position term insurance in a new light, where it complements this thinking.”

Kotak Life onboarded Rajkumar Rao as the brand ambassador in December 2023, and the partnership has continued through 2024 and into 2025.

Speaking about the insight behind taking Rao as the face of the brand, Nair says, “Kotak Life appeals to the mass affluent individuals largely. And Rajkumar Rao compliments that image, with his humble background and high aspirations like most Indians. Besides being a trustable celebrity, he’s also doing well at the box office which adds to his appeal as an endorser.”

According to Nair, the company will continue to partner with Rao for the next couple of years.

Target audience and media strategy

“Insurance as a category is relevant to all sorts of people—newly married, those with kids, those with elder kids, people nearing retirement, and those in retirement." Nair identifies Kotak Life's key target audience as the mass affluent generation aged 30 to 45. 

However, for this campaign the brand has crafted content for each of the cohorts to be as refined in its communication as possible. 

“With the help of digital and its ability to reach out to all sorts of target groups, our cohort is the young jobber, the single woman, the working lady, the family man, the businessman, among others. We’ve identified these cohorts and we are going to disseminate this campaign among them through digital and our advisor partners.”

The ad film serves as the anchor asset of the campaign, while the brand has created additional content pieces for each of the TGs, which are also being deployed on the landing page of this campaign.

“We have an internal martech tool which our advisors use which helps us showcase this content to the consumers.”

"We’re continuing our association with Royal Challengers Bangalore. We inked our partnership with them last year. We’ve also associated with Indian Idol on Sony Liv."

Ashish Nair, Kotak Life

Kotak Life's overall communication strategy, including this ad, is digital first. “The biggest chunk of our spends are on digital. In addition to that, we keep a certain kitty with us, to assess impact properties in sports and entertainment that enable storytelling.”

Speaking of impact properties, with the Champions Trophy coming up, followed by the IPL, we asked Nair if the brand plans to use any of these events for advertising.

He responds, “From the IPL point of view, we’re continuing our association with Royal Challengers Bangalore. We inked our partnership with them last year. We’ve also associated with Indian Idol on Sony Liv. For the Champions Trophy, we are still evaluating our options. As long as we get the right value that are seeking, we’ll see how we can expand our collaborations.”

Influencer marketing

"We have also taken a lot of regional influencers to talk about the campaign and help it reach larger set of audiences"

Ashish Nair, Kotak Life

The brand has also callaborated with influencers to amplify the campaign. “We’ve previously created content with influencers, all of which is getting packaged with this new narrative."

The brand has also partnered with more influencers and will be present on all major digital channels. In addition, it will use influencer material, which will be broadcast directly to customers and through its advisers.

Some of the influencers that the brand is partnering with include finance educator Rachana Ranade, and real estate influencer Ravi Kewalramani, among others.

“We have also taken a lot of regional influencers to talk about the campaign and help it reach larger set of audiences.”