(consumption )^2

Come to think most brand marketers work on demand generation and that typically consumes 80 % of their time , this post makes an attempt to rethink this age old principle /ways , in the sense from a pure demand generation play marketers need to work at driving consumption ,which according to this blog is the key for -if no consumption then the demand itself would not there in the first place !

(consumption )^2 , is a term that we are using to denote the process of driving consumption to newer level and how the rules need to change from pure demand generation to consumption drive by marketers ,lets look at some known consumption driving measures

induce trial - the small sachets phenomenon which was a shampoo domain,has seen categories like pickles,hair oil , biscuits ,jams , on this bandwagon , the method is self explained

change the product - guess you must have heard about toothpaste brands had increased consumption by changing the dia of the orifice ! smart move -- add diet coke or pepsi to your range !

Combo deals - the one that in which a weak brand piggy backs on a strong brand , to induce trial and again then increase consumption !

consume more of the same - well used by telecom marketers in driving their minutes of usage

There are a host of consumption moves but to elaborate all would mean that this post would never end , switching on to the ones that might be unknown , here are some interesting ones that the blog has noticed -

addict then fail- this happens when you are hooked on to a product and its designed to fail after a short span , so you end up buying its latest version again , classic example is Blackberry ,which makes you a "crackberry "then runs into trouble by the time you would want nothing but a blackberry as a replacement!

consumption drives loyalty - this is a difficult thing to do to get consumers hooked on to your brand , but its best exemplified by telecom marketers who by driving consumption of their services ensure that consumer is engaged with the product plus also suddenly is bound to his/her number , thus consumption can drive loyalty

Fmcg durables- gone are the days when durables like TV and fridge were bought once in 10 years , marketers have wonderfully bought down cycle time , thus you end up changing your TV at a great offer on LCD TV or good exchange offer ! surely the word "durable " would be redundant it would be FMCG durables ,maybe its already that currently !

Consume with validity _ best elaborated with the prepaid platform ,in telecom wherein on the prepaid platform your talktime works on a validity , say you have talktime of 200 rs validity of that would be 30 days ,so the time factor drives consumption otherwise you would forfeit the same !

Work on raising new consumers :: If your brand is a leader in a category and ur confident of new consumers coming to you , it might be useful spending time and money on developing new consumers for the category !

Hope the above observations are useful , the objective of this post is to reinforce that consumption drive is important , once that is done let the other parameters of brand equity , brand recall , service ,distribution etc take over and let the best brand win in the market place! Come to think of it ,during the current tough times ,its going to be consumption , that would take us out of the woods!