In our previous article, we learned in detail about the marketing strategy of a financial company, Incred. This article speaks about the elaborate marketing strategy of Greaves Cotton which is a diversified engineering company and leading manufacturer of diesel, petrol, kerosene, gasoline engines, diesel pump sets, gensets and farm equipment.
The idea behind is to help you gain insight on Greaves Cotton’s transition from producing ceiling fans and a range of other electric vehicles to become an entrusted engineering brand with 500+ retail centres and 6300+ small spare part retail outlets across India and also wide global footprints expanding globally.
‘Marketing aims to make selling superfluous’- Peter Drucker, resulting in the make or break of a company. As now companies were forced to take to the digital world of marketing due to the pandemic; it is great to be on the top of such a happening area and stay at the top of it.
If you are interested in new-age digital marketing, then you should check out IIDE’s Free MasterClass on digital marketing and if you are looking to master a particular skill relevant to you, look out for the short term certifications in Digital Marketing; the short courses are not only elaborate but very time efficient and guidance from the industry leads with meaningful insights is as sweet as a brownie.
We will learn the entire marketing strategy of Greaves Cotton by the end of this blog. Before talking about the marketing strategy of Greaves Cotton, let’s begin with the company’s story, target audience and digital presence.
About Greaves Cotton Limited
Greaves Cotton Limited was founded in 1859 by James Greaven and George Cotton. It was incorporated in 1922 as a private limited company. Then in 1947 the owner of Thapar group Lala Karam Chand Thapar purchased and converted it into a public limited company. The company’s headquarter is situated in Mumbai.
The chairperson Mr Karan Thapar and Greaves Cotton believe that Technovation is at the core of what they do. They are a multi-product and multi-location company with a rich legacy of 162 years.
It stands as a diversified engineering company and a leading manufacturer CleanTeach Powertrain solutions (CNG, petrol and diesel engine), Generator sets, Farm equipment, E- Mobility, Aftermarket spares, and services.
Greaves Cotton has a fairly large share in the BSE and NSE along with other competitors like Cummins India Ltd, and Kirloskar industries ltd. The company has a market capitalization of 4,438Cr but has taken a huge hit as its profit after tax (PAT) takes a dip of 92.28% ie from Rs 147.51 Cr in 2022 to Rs 10.36Cr with a tremendous amount of profit cut done to expenses with non-recurring items (33.49Cr).
The company strongly believes in its CSR activities, they have conducted 8 such activities which include Reskilling, Supporting coworkers, Student Scholarship Programme, and many more.
| CEO | Nagesh Basavanhalli |
|---|---|
| CMO | – |
| Area Served | Worldwide |
| Industry | Engineering |
| Market Share/ Revenue | Rs 13391 Million |
| Vision | Building productivity solutions for a cleaner planet, responsibility |
| Tagline | Driven By Passion Guided By Technovation |
Marketing Strategy Of Greaves Cotton
They don’t have an elaborate marketing strategy, though they seem to be coming up with campaigns and making an effort to increase their digital presence across various social media platforms.
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Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning
Segmentation
Over the years the company has tapped into various segments such as Engine, Retails E-Mobility, Finance, and Tech Services. Despite all the sectors seeming to be very different, they complement each other to the core.
The engine sector caters to auto applications and non-auto applications. They have their own retail market along with Auto EV MART and AfterMarket. The finance segment formally known as E-motion helps the end-user to transfer its use to E-Mobility containing 2,3 and 4 wheelers. Hence they have created a very clean knit company that is pretty much self-sustainable.
Targeting
They have a target market of OEM (original equipment manufacturer) customers such as
And also enable financial service through E-Motion to enable the end customer to buy their 2-wheeler EV range.
Positioning
Greaves Cotton LTD is said to be a good quality company based on 10 years of previous financial records. Compared to its past it said that the company now stands in the overvalued zone and according to various price trend analyses it is a strong buy as the prices may increase in the future.
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Marketing Campaigns
- # NEW GREAVES 2020
This campaign was the launch of the improved and refreshed Greaves Cotton 2022 having a new vision, new energy, new ambition, and new aspiration. They aim to be agile, transformative, and future-ready to cater to the evolving needs of their value-conscious customers.
2. #GROW WITH GREAVES Q3 FY’22
This campaign focuses on the analysis of their financial performance and growth as against Q2 FY’22. This is an informative campaign that helps the end-user understand where the company stands financially and helps them gain confidence in the same.
3. #WOMEN DRIVING CHANGE
This campaign focuses on how women from different fields are here as the driving change. The campaign hasn’t been particularly successful or a failure. As the company at present hasn’t made a real effort to market itself and is working towards increasing the same, they seem to need to put in a lot more effort.
Social Media Marketing
Where can they be found?
Facebook:10,895
Instagram: 2181
LinkedIn: 41,204
Twitter: 2207
They have maximum followers on their LinkedIn profile, along with regular posting regarding their activities and celebrating various festivals, they are also active in terms of hiring for various designations from this platform. Most of their content leans upon their product launches, and festivities and has a pinch of informational content keeping users up to date with their financial progress.
SEO Strategies
The SEO strategy is very poor and has a huge scope for improvement, their organic keyword is as low as 64, which makes sense with their major target customers being OEM but as they are also now selling their 2-wheeler EV directly to their customer; they should take in the necessary action to ensure high and constant sale.
The monthly traffic on the website is also very low and sees a shoot in Oct 2021 and slowly coming back to its original state. During OCT 2021 they managed to sell 7500 EVs. Greaves Cotton stands a long way to reach its true potential in the digital era and improve its SEO strategies.
Influencer Marketing
The company made its first influencer collaboration on 17th March 2022. It collaborated with the influencer Priyanka Kocchar who is more popularly known as ‘BIKE WITH GIRL’. She is a digital creator who is on a new motorcycle every day! with 970K followers and with 1542 posts. Her post on Greaves Cotton 2-wheeler EV has garnered 87,331 views which have gained huge exposure and it was a very good decision made by the company.
E-Commerce Strategies
Greaves Cotton only sells its 2-wheeler EV directly to its customers through their subsidiary AMPERE by Greaves. This section can be easily accessible through their homepage as well as customers ready to know the company can directly go to the homepage of AMPERE by Greaves.
Content Marketing Strategies
They put social media posts on nearly every occasion and keep users updated with their product launches.
They have a blog section on their website which seems to be fairly active than their social media accounts; there are two sections in their blogs, one focusing on the Brand and the other on Humans of Greaves.
The company has a great amount of focus on its CSR activities with the Greaves PRIME Programme and the Greaves scholarship program being their latest.
This ends our elaborative marketing strategy of Greaves Cotton. Let us conclude our learning below.
Conclusion – What’s Unique in Greaves Cotton’s Marketing?
As Greaves Cotton is one of the largest manufacturers in the CleanTeach Powertrain solutions (CNG, petrol, and diesel engine), Generator set, Farm equipment, E- Mobility, Aftermarket spares, and services; the biggest issues plaguing them is their effort in marketing. Marketing is an important function in the company’s existence and in the current scenario, there is a rapid increase in digitalization.
Though the company seems to be taking baby steps towards the same and has started with influencer marketing, they need to have a very strong SEO base to improve its monthly traffic and increase its presence as well as sales; nevertheless, they have a long way to go. The company has turned its head toward hiring digital marketing as well as marketing professionals; hoping this step would yield the much-required results.
The importance of digital marketing has been booming ever since the pandemic and it is here to stay, it is shifting from ‘it’s nice to have digital marketing skills to a must-have skill’.
Just like Greaves Cotton almost every other company is looking to improve their digital presence and hence looking for digital marketers. If you would like to learn more and develop skills, check out Online Digital Marketing Course to learn more. Or else you can attend one of our free online masterclasses held by IIDE’s CEO, Karan Shah which will give you a glimpse into the world of digital marketing.
We hope this blog on the marketing strategy of Greaves Cotton has given you a good insight into the company’s marketing strategies.
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