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Airtel- The Story to Tell Through a Tale

The unprecedented growth in the mobile market is, perhaps, the most
vivid facet of India's economic transformation since the mid 1990s. Mobile
technology and services came to India just about a decade ago. In the early
days, a mobile was seen to be a fashion statement for the rich. Today, it is
accepted as a basic communication medium for all socio-economic segments.
The Indian mobile market is, today, amongst the fastest growing and the most
competitive in the world. Today India has approximately 100 million phone
connections as on July 2005 (Source: Cellular Operators' Association of India
and Association of Basic Telecom Operators). Out of which a little over half
comprise of mobile subscribers.

Airtel is one brand which has been instrumental in building up a vast


subscriber base for itself. Airtel's journey to leadership began in Delhi in 1995.
Since then, Airtel has established itself pan-India targeting the entire population if
India. In the last ten years Airtel has achieved many firsts and unique records: it
was the first to launch nationwide roaming operations, it was the first to cross the
one million and the five million customer marks. It was also the first to launch
services overseas.

Today, Airtel innovates in almost everything that it presents to the market.


An excellent example is Easy Charge - India's first paperless electronic
recharging facility for prepaid customers. For theses endeavours, Airtel has also
been conferred with numerous awards. It won the prestigious Techies Award for
'being the best cellular services provider' for four consecutive years between
1997 and 2000 - a record that is still unmatched. And in 2003, it received the
Voice & Data Award for being 'India's largest cellular service provider', amongst
others.

Bharti’s true calling came in the mid 1990s when the government opened
up the sector and allowed private players to provide telecom services. Bharti
Enterprises accepted every opportunity provided by this new policy to evolve into
India's largest telecommunications company and one of India's most respected
brands. Airtel was launched in 1995 in Delhi. In the ensuing years, as the Airtel
network expanded to several parts of India, the brand came to symbolise the
very essence of mobile services.

Airtel provides a host of voice and data products and services, including
high-speed GPRS services. Airtel also offers a wide array of 'postpaid' and
'prepaid' mobile offers, with a range of tariff plans that target different segments.
A comprehensive range of value-added, customised services are part of the
unique package from Airtel. The company's products reflect a desire to
constantly innovate. Some of these are reflected in the fact that Airtel was the
first to develop a 'single integrated billing system'

Evolution of Airtel as a Brand


Bharti Enterprises wished to transform itself from a Delhi cvlluar operator to a
pan Indian telecom operator. The company worked on a three-layered branding
architecture:
• To create specific brands for each of its services
• Build sub-brands within each of these services
• Use Bharti as the umbrella brand

The brands identified to be retained for theses services were – Airtel for its
mobile operations, Touchtel – for its fixed line phones, IndiaOne for its NLD
operations. In early 2001, The Bharti Mobile promoted AirTel cellular service
went in for repositioning of its brand image. The new brand ethos it portrayed
was in two distinct fashions - the tag line "Touch Tomorrow", which underscored
the leading theme for the new brand vision, followed by "The Good Life", which
underscored a more caring, more customer centric organization. This was aimed
at re-engineering its image as just simply a cellular service provider to an all out
information communications services provider, Touch Tomorrow meant to
embrace the new generation of mobile communication services and the changing
scope of customer needs and aspirations that come along with it.

The new communication was to potray new dimension in the cellular category. It
went to symbolize something beyond the Internet, SMS, roaming, IVRS, etc. It
symbolized the whole gamut of wireless digital broadband services that
constitutes tomorrow’s cellular services.
This branding came up with Touch Tomorrow

From 'TOUCH TOMORROW' To 'LIVE EVERY MOMENT’

In late-2002, Bharti Cellular Ltd. released a television commercial (TVC),


which despite using the 'oft-repeated' celebrity endorsement route was unusual
in terms of its celebrity selection. Instead of using the usual movie stars/sports
celebrities, it chose one of the country's most successful music composers, A.R
Rahman (Rahman) to promote its brand. The campaign attracted considerable
media attention because this was the first time Rahman had agreed to do a
television commercial and also because, Rahman had been paid Rs 10 million
for the campaign, a sum usually unheard of, for celebrity endorsers in India. The
campaign received brickbats as well as bouquets in the media, both for the
selection of Rahman and the TVC's execution. However, Bharti claimed to have
scored an ace in terms of getting Rahman to compose five exclusive symphonies
downloadable as ring tones for Airtel users. The TVC was a part of the brand
repositioning and restructuring efforts for Airtel, as part of which, Bharti changed
the brand's tagline in early-2002 from 'Touch Tomorrow' to 'Live Every Moment.'
The company also decided to undertake a comprehensive brand building
program for the company and chose the slogan 'Unlimited Freedom' for the
same. Commenting on these changes, company sources said, "Airtel's brand
identity and campaign will now have a new younger and international look and
feel that builds on the earlier positioning."
Bharti's massive media expenditure plans were no surprise, considering
the fact that it was the largest cellular telecom company in the country - reaching
over 600 million people in 16 (out of 29) states of India.. The Airtel brand (and the
pre-paid card service brand, Magic) had top-of-the-mind recall amongst cellular
phone users and enjoyed a leadership position in most markets. Industry
observers primarily attributed it to Bharti's strong brand building and positioning
strategies.

Amalgamation of the Brands


It was September 2004, when BHarti undertook yet another repositioning
exercise. BTVL decided to unify its entire gamut of telecom services under the
Airtel Brand. This was done with an intention to be seen as an integrated telecom
services player rather than just operating in the mobile space. It was an attempt
to change the perception from "Airtel equals mobile" to "Airtel equals telecom",
and position Airtel as a complete telecom services brand.
The company’s telecom were clubbed under four heads -- Airtel mobile services,
Airtel telephone & broadband services, Airtel long distance services and Airtel
enterprise services.
With Airtel’s launch of Rs 200 denomination cards in early 2005, Airtel has
targeted the low usage segment, thereby offering services to cater to all
segments. The strategy of Airtel is gradually shifting to the mass market. By
targeting the segment of lower income group the brand is also changing its
communication strategy from the premium brand or the brand for high class
society to the brand for all segments.
Airtel as a brand seems busy in building a mass franchisee for its target
market. But Mr Sunil Mittal wants this brand to grow as the ‘Most Preferred and
Respected Brand of India’. The sales driven communication has a limited ability
to promote the brand as the ‘Most Preferred and Respected Brand of India’. One
needs to use neutral methods of communication and public relation tools for
building this level of brand recognition.
Question
Analyze the brand image of Airtel and suggest suitable public relation and
publicity strategy for making Airtel brand as the ‘Most Preferred and Respected
Brand of India’.

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