About Cuponation
CupoNation is India’s largest coupon portal specially designed to meet the needs of all the online shoppers in India. As we all know India is a price sensitive market and words like “discount” and “sale” have a special impact on Indian buyers online or offline. It is with keeping this fact in mind that CupoNation was incorporated. It offer up to 60% discounts for a vast selection of categories ranging from items like electronics, books, apparels and gifts to services like insurance, restaurants, movies and many more. It allows users to grab their favorite products at the cheapest price available online! In its newsletters it even mails the best promotions and hot deals of the week, along with the most appropriate discount coupon for next purchases. It even has special deals and promotions for Holi, Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, Diwali, Christmas, New Year and many more. Besides offering the best discount coupons available in the market, it also provides for safe and secure online experience. It partners with only the best online shopping sites that offer security certificates. Accordingly you can pay with your debit/credit card without the fear of being cheated.
India has seen a host of coupon websites coming up in the marketplace because Indians are discount hunting buyers. Indians never buy a product/service without bargain. Websites like CupoNation relies on this very premise.
Objectives of CupoNation
- CupoNation wanted Indian online shopping experience to be cheap, fun and secure.
- CupoNation wanted to promote coupons for sports category so they did the Fit India Movement campaign called get high on sports, not on drugs specifically targeting the youth who because of hectic urban lifestyles are driven to drugs and alcohol.
Strategy/Approach Adopted By CupoNation
Following were the strategies adopted by CupoNation to achieve its objective of maximizing youth engagement via social media:
- Campaign especially initiated during the IPL season when sports enthusiasm among the youth is at its peak.
- Prominent sports personalities like Sushil Kumar (Olympic double medallist), Gagan Narang (Olympic medallist), Atul Wasan (Former India Cricketer) & Shiba Maggon (National Women’s Basketball Team Coach) were invited and talked about the importance of sports in our daily lives. They shared their own life-changing incidents which enabled these sports stars to have faith in sports. The 2 minute video hugely motivated stressed Indian youth and invited tremendous response from them.
- The video was even promoted on Facebook page.
- The company also ran contests on Facebook inviting entries on most inventive idea to remain fit, which was interactive and encouraged participation rather than one side doing all the talking, and the winner was awarded a sports bike.
Key Results
- The video went viral and saw huge engagement from fans and followers.
- The number of fans and followers increased from 25%.
- Traffic from the social media channels increased by 40% resulting in increase in sales of various healthcare retailers like Healthkart, Goodlife, Healthadda.com and consequently building brand awareness.
Key Learnings
- Design a campaign which appeals and attracts your target audience. Here the timing of the campaign played an important role. Youth is highly sports spirited during IPL season. The campaign thus was planned in a such a manner that it immediately gathered attention of the youth. Thus, we realize the importance of timing in social media space. Everything in social media boils down to apt timing. Had the campaign been introduced at any other time except the IPL season, its impact would have been affected. By this, it is not meant that it would be completely useless, but that the campaign would have taken a little more time to get audience into sports spirit. Another aspect of the campaign was the abuse of drugs and its impact on the youth. It is no secret that drugs have only ruined lives, but the campaign deliberately included the statement “not on drugs” because sports is an excellent remedy against stress, the primary reason why youth claims to be indulging in drugs. By including motivational videos from acclaimed sports persons, the marketers tried to implicitly send the message across the youth that though the journey of life difficult but not terrible so as to get into drugs and ruin it forever. Everybody faces challenges but those challenges have to be taken head on and this entire process can be made a little simpler by including sports in everyday life. When a nation’s youth is energized, the entire nation is energized. Things can change for the better when the youth of the nation decides to move away from drugs. Implicit in the whole process was the fact that Indians are price sensitive consumers and that is the sole reason why a company like CupoNation exists.
- The contest on the Facebook was drafted in a manner that is was a two-way communication and elicited many responses from enthused youth. Social media exists for a very basic reason, its a platform that gives voice to people’s opinion. People come on social media networks to interact, to converse and build relationships. Any social media contest that does not give an opportunity to people to speak up, that is just like any other lecture simply would not work. The essence of social media is to engage people with the brand’s products/services and this can be achieved only through conversations. Hence lies the importance of building two-way communications. Another psychological reason behind building two-way communications is that we humans are not designed to pay undivided attention to things which are one-sided. We humans, need interactions to arouse interest among listeners and social media networks are apt examples where this truth applies more than any where else.