Media Coverage: Freecharge Blog
Bangalore, India: Markelytics Solutions, a global research conglomerate, shared the results of consumer research done for e-wallets in India in April- June 2016. Cut-throat competition in the e-wallet segment has grown manifold with every brand looking for the top of mind recall among users.
There have been continuous ad wars to topple each other from the top of the pedestal, but the effectiveness of these campaigns has often been questioned. Freecharge, India’s leading digital payments platform, unveiled its latest brand campaign through a series of TV commercials rolled out to edify users of its latest attributes viz. Request Money, Send Money, Split Money, Data Lifeline & Speed Pay.
This coincided with Freecharge’s association with IPL as on-ground partners for two years. This association scripts resemblance as both Freecharge & IPL resonates with the youth brigade of the country. The company’s branding was extensively covered on all the major indoor & outdoor platforms of IPL 2016. Further, in its quest to study the effectiveness of its marketing campaign and IPL association, Freecharge partnered with Markelytics Solutions.
The study found that Top of Mind (TOM) recall for Freecharge significantly increased from 15% in the pre-phase to 28% in the post-launch phase. At the same time, there was a significant dip of 11% points in TOM for its closest competitor. Further, future consideration for Freecharge also increased from 51% in the pre-phase to 65% in the post-launch phase.
The study to understand brand recall & usage before & after this campaign was launched pan-India among the age group of 18-30 covering both males & females of SEC A & B. With a base of 5,847 respondents, the study represented the voice of the nation and was covered across the major cities of all the regions.
The ad campaign has been a definite success for Freecharge with a clear increase in performance across all the key metrics including awareness & recall. In addition to this, consumers in this information-centric world, where time is a premium, are keen to find a fast & easy to use method to manage bill payments. The Freecharge campaign was a good example of how the simplicity of ‘Lo Do Khatam Karo’ appealed to consumers because it promised simplicity.
“For an ad to be considered successful it needs to have a tangible impact, either on awareness or on actual sales. This campaign has done both and more importantly, the gains in market and mind share are entirely from competitor brands”, said Rohan Monteiro, Research Director at Markelytics. “Freecharge still needs to be watchful in a few regions but overall, this was a successful ad campaign by Freecharge”, he asserted.