Razor Sharp

The brief: The aim was to increase trials of Gillette Mach3 razors. The target audience was men in the age group of 18 to 45 years in SEC A,B,C categories. This was triggered by The Nielsen Study conducted in late 2008 that revealed that 77% of Indian women preferred the clean shaven look.

The insight: The situation was that Indian men were shaving just once a week. The perception was that the stubble looks cool and desirable to women! Just doing an ad was not the solution. The brand needed to ensure a nationwide public sentiment and response to change this situation.

The strategy: Being a low involvement category,Gillette Mach3 had to connect with the target audience by creating excitement about the category and product. The idea of creating W.A.L.S.—a movement against the lazy stubble touched a chord in the mind of the consumer,influencer and the media. This was further fueled by the mall activation and the ‘Shaveathon’ (where 2000 men shaved).

The execution: The agency created a woman’s movement called W.A.L.S. It started on social media website Facebook and resulted in a movement which was also supported by three Bollywood actors. Gillette stepped in and supported the movement by dropping the price of its Mach3 razor. This created huge excitement across all media. It became a national conversation. Women began to shave men in a unique mall activation! The final multiplier happened when about 2000 men came together and shaved their stubble in public!

The result: The campaign got over $2.5 million worth of free media coverage,which is the highest for Proctor & Gamble (P&G) India across all categories. According to Nielsen Track,sales grew by 500% and market share went up by 400% and 763,000 hits were recorded on Google. Purchase intent of the consumers in the activity was over 60%. Overall awareness of the movement was at 160 index,which is the highest awareness level for any activation without television commercials across categories for P&G India.

Client’s take: Sumeet Vohra,marketing director,P&G India,said,“We are extremely pleased to know that our initiative has reached such epic proportions with an overwhelming number of men and women showcasing their support,enabling us to create such a successful movement for the second year in a row.”