Unique Case Study on Ola’s Digital Marketing Strategy and UI/UX (free PPT included)

The world we live in is very dynamic, and the desires of the customers keep on changing. One such major shift in customer desires is making environmentally safe business models. The rising awareness about global warming and environmental degradation across the world has put pressure on companies to act on saving the planet. In this presentation case study, our students at IIDE will take a deep dive into problems faced by Ola Cabs and propose a solution that meets the new demands of the customers to be eco-friendly.

As a part of their course, IIDE students get a chance to work on assignments related to some of the top brands across the globe. We train them to create innovative, tech-centred solutions that are customer-focused as well as viable and profitable for the brands.

Four of our students, Aastha Vyas, Umair, Sheena, and Riya chose to work on Ola. They researched the problems that users faced and tried to come up with a unique solution that was practical and scalable. Read on to find out more about it.

Let us begin the case study by learning more about Ola’s Business Model

 

About Ola and its Business Model

 

 

Ola is India’s biggest mobility platform with a gig-economy business model. It provides on-demand taxi services in 250+ cities across the country. It was launched on 3rd December 2010, by Bhavish Aggarwal.

Ola first targeted the Indian Metropolitan cities and then increased its reach into tier 2 and tier 3 cities. The company leverages the power of the internet and widespread connectivity to facilitate one of the largest gig economies in the country and operates a fleet of more than 15 lakh cars and drivers. By providing ease of usage to customers, it has become one of the most successful startups in India.

The philosophy that Ola follows is simple- they wish to make travel more accessible, safer, and comfortable for all their customers. It has become one of the most recognizable brands and is a testament to the Indian entrepreneurial spirit.

Before we discuss the solution, let us first understand the Target Audience for whom the solution will be made.

 

Ola’s Target Audience

To better understand who the actual users of the Ola Platform are and how they use it, our students conducted interviews. They understood that a lot of people used the carpool feature while booking cabs. However, using this had its own set of problems.

 

 

They also found out that:

• 60% of the people have used a carpool
• 40% of the people surveyed said ‘Yes’ to share a ride with their neighbour; 30% of the people answered ‘Maybe’; and 30% of people responded ‘No’.

40% of the people said ‘yes’ to “Will carpooling make your commute easier”; 20% responded ‘Maybe’ and 40% responded ‘No’.

 

 

To summarise the findings of the survey, the student team found that a decent majority of people are warm to the idea of carpooling and sharing their rides with people. Now that we understand the Ola Cabs audience, let us now turn our attention to the process of identifying the problems faced.

 

Ola’s Problem Identification & Analysis

Our students took multiple interviews to improve their insights and understand the pain points of the users. The users wanted:

• Cheaper Ride
• Less Crowd
• Less Detour
• More Reliability
• Lesser Cancellations
• Safety

After stating the pain points of the customer, the student team has used multiple management techniques for problem identification. They are as follows:

1. User Persona Analysis

To create a better solution for the users, our students created a User Persona and defined their attitude, goals, aspirations, and frustrations.

 

 

2. HMW Statement

After identifying pain points, our students created an HMW or ‘How Might We’ statement to narrow down the issues they want to tackle. Here’s their HMW statement:

How might we

Provide more economical rides

For

Our users

So that

they can commute easily, cheaply, and safely

3. Empathy Mapping

This technique is a great way to visually arrange all the insights we have about the consumer and aids in the decision-making process. Our students have created the following Empathy map to aid their problem identification process:

 

After identifying the problems faced, let us now look at the proposed solution created by our students.

Solution: Ola Swift – A Digital Marketing Plan

After a lot of brainstorming, our students built a feature named “OLA SWIFT” that is solving users’ problems as well as helping Ola earn more profits. If you wish to download and see the presentation on Ola made by our students, click on the link below.

Ola Swift is a real-time ride-sharing feature that allows users to travel by car owners within the city. Although it is essentially a carpool, the main differentiating factor is that the car will not stop at multiple stops to pick up other people. The car owner will pick you up and directly drop you at your destination that is on the way to wherever he/she is travelling to.

This will help the users to share a ride, reduce their travelling cost, and still reach their destination without being delayed while being environmentally friendly!

After defining and creating the solution’s business model, let us now look at the process of creating the aesthetic and user experience part of the solution. 

Mood Board

To design this solution, our students built a mood board. A mood board is a visual tool that helps in bringing together different design elements in one place to showcase the general theme to be followed.

 

 

Solution Prototype

After defining the elements of design, now let us start with designing the user experience. Ola Swift needed to be integrated well within the existing Ola app to ensure that users could use it seamlessly. To ensure that this happened, our students designed a wonderful prototype of the User Interface (UI). 

 Now that the user experience is defined, let us look at the marketing strategies our students created to promote Ola Swift.

Ola Social Media Marketing Plan

Any business cannot do without a proper marketing strategy. A new feature is not going to be used by people if they are not aware of it. The following are the mediums that the student team proposes to use.

 

1. Push Notifications

One of the ways how people could be made aware is through sending push notifications to people who used the app. Push notifications are an effective medium to grab the attention of already existing ola cab users. It is essential to ensure that users are aware of Ola swift and that they do not mix it with Ola Share.

 

 

 

2. Ola Marketing Campaigns

To market to customers who do not use the Ola App currently, social media marketing, as well as youtube video campaigns, could be used. Social media helps in reaching unprecedented numbers of people in a very short amount of time and at very low costs, especially with creative campaigns like these!

 

 

 

Conclusion

Ola is India’s most popular platform for on-demand rides. However, it is closely followed in market share by Uber and other small startups.

To ensure that it stays ahead of the competition, Ola needs to keep coming up with new, practical solutions to improve the ease of mobility for its customers.

Our student identified different pain points for Ola and its customers and proposed the solution, Ola Swift. This business model benefits riders, car owners, and the environment. By crowdsourcing travelling services, Ola Swift combines the people’s need for saving money with a low-cost high-efficiency business model. This will enable the company to give better services to more people without any explicit expenditure.

In the last few years, the emphasis on making environmentally friendly business plans has increased manifolds. Ola Swift is a brilliant example of a socially valuable and profitable business solution.

If you too want to create such great solutions for brands across the world, be a part of IIDE.

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