Mr. Raina then moved on to talk about how they came up with defining XOLO’s vision statement. “When companies were working hard to make the computers reach the last man, the world jumped to smartphones.” He focused on this statement to emphasize upon the imperativeness of the vision statement of any company and the importance of the ability to predict future. Do not define yourself by what you are doing, but focus on how it serves the customer for times immemorial. And with this regard in mind, XOLO demarcated itself a brand as “Made in India can be premium and high technology”.
In 2012, the telecom market was clearly split between two brands namely the Indian and the MNC brands. The Indian brands were all about price (low on cost and low on technology), whereas the MNC brands spoke of pride (high technology and high cost). Mr. Raina elaborated that they leveraged upon this opportunity to hit the sweet spot which was in the mid-space, by coming up with high end technological devices at competitive prices. He went on to add that XOLO targeted itself towards the young urban males within the age group of 18-24, specifically the tech enthusiasts and confident mobile users who would be more appreciative of the technological features that XOLO wanted to introduce.
Mr. Raina talked about the various smartphone launches that XOLO commenced with. In 2012, XOLO X900 was manufactured which was the world’s 1st Intel processor powered Android phone. By collaborating with AMD, the first Windows APU powered tablet was introduced. In 2015, XOLO launched its first dual sim phone in the market called the XOLO Black. He then also presented the customer dispersion statistics which showed that the metro cities along with Ahmedabad accounted for about 49% of the total demand for XOLO phones.
In order to explain their partnership with Liverpool Football Club, Mr.Raina elucidated about how Indian brands usually hired cricketers or Bollywood stars as their brand ambassadors. However, XOLO wanted to beat the obvious and take a different route by partnering with LFC. Mr. Raina justified the alliance by pointing out how football is the next big choice of the new age Indians and the commitment between the two highlights XOLO’s promise of delivering ‘the next level’ even in terms of marketing campaigns.
XOLO announced its three-year association with the English football club, Liverpool, which included launch of Liverpool themed phones and merchandises. Also, in an attempt to build a mass awareness and extend its reach, XOLO was betting on “Mission Million”, a three-month program that promised a Liverpool branded football for free to every XOLO buyer.
Mr. Raina also presented before the audience the launch video of Mission Million which depicted celebrating the spirit of Football in India. In an attempt to bring about a revolution and a change in the mindset of people, the video inspired people to play football. The partnership created a lot of chatter and buzz on media and the twitter engagement trended for quite a long time. Our guest also highlighted on the Google trends which clearly reflected that the dormant growth curve shot up multifold in June 2014. During that quarter, the growth in unit sales and revenue happened by 35% and 30% respectively.
Mr. Raina then concluded the lecture by explaining that when you go about creating a marketing campaign, there are quite a few conventional templates available. However, with the changing world, the marketing campaign has to revolutionize as well. How well you bring about the vision of your company and the innovation in your products is the crux of the matter. The floor was then opened for questions and our guest, with his profound expertise and competence, answered all the queries of the students.
DMS, IIT Delhi expresses its heartfelt gratitude to Mr. Sunil Raina for sparing his valuable time and delivering such an informative lecture to our students. We look forward to having him on campus many more times.
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