From Quora answers to offline drives in the Hindi heartland, Pee Safe marketing strategy has conversations at its core. Founder & CEO, Vikas Bagaria tells us more.
In the business of selling hygiene products to menstruators in a country where conversations about it are hush-hush and accessibility a major concern, Pee Safe is making some pretty big swipes with their marketing strategy. They are creating as much how-to content as they can to increase awareness about the importance of menstrual hygiene products. By increasing the number of products and sub-brands under their portfolio, they are also trying to expand the scope of accessibility of not just hygiene but also pleasure.
In the last few months, they have launched a Vaginal Infection pH Screening Kit, a female condom - Domina, and a full-body massager. Products under Pollution Safe, Raho Safe, and Palm Safe have also increased in sync with the needs of the pandemic. Domina is perhaps the rising star in the mix.
What began in 2013 as a means for women to avoid contracting UTI has now evolved into a company that sells a wide range of products. Talking about this evolution, Pee Safe Founder & CEO Vikas Bagaria says, "By 2017, we were selling menstrual products. In 2019, we had launched Raho Safe to expand our range of intimate and hygiene products," adding that Raho Safe was created because Pee Safe wasn't an appropriate term for the category they were trying to build and the demographics they were trying to reach.
Offline Communication
Raho Safe includes affordable hygiene products such as sanitary pads, floor cleaners, handwashes, and surface disinfectants. Pandemic played a key role in the range's expansion as it also includes face masks and fruits & vegetable washes. Most of the communication around this brand is targeted towards non-metro cities, particularly tier-3 and tier-4 cities.
Pee Safe has been working towards communicating with menstruators in the Hindi heartland to spread awareness about menstrual hygiene products. They also regularly partner with NGOs and sex workers to reach out to women in Tier II and Tier III cities with the intention to empower them with a range of choices.
Most of the Pee Safe products have over time become available in Tier I and Tier II cities, especially at modern trade outlets. They have also tied up with lingerie stores, metro stations, multiplexes, and university (in-campus) shops. Now they are also opening up their exclusive stores. The target group for the brand includes 16 to 45 year-olds. Most of them are menstruators and/or persons who identify as female. Though they do sell some products for males as well.
"About 85 to 90% of our consumers are women and 10-15% are men," Vikas tells us. He further explains that a lot of males tend to buy these products for their significant others or female family members. This is something that can be seen from the kind of hampers they are selling this Rakshabandhan and the marketing communication around them.
In terms of geographies, the kind of business they get from Mumbai is pretty much similar to what comes in from cities like Bhubaneshwar, Puri, and Cuttak combined.
Pee Safe's marketing mix, as explained by Vikas, includes Instagram as a key tool to interact with GenZ persons. On Facebook, their communication is tailored to reach Generation X and Millennials. So, while they would push products like menstrual cups and female condoms on Instagram, their adult diapers are being promoted more on Facebook. YouTube is used by the brand to push informative content, including how-to videos.
Earlier on Instagram, they had only one page for Pee Safe products. Now they have individual pages for sub-brands Domina, Furr, and Raho Safe.
Quora is a key tool for Pee Safe to communicate on as it helps them reach audiences that have questions related to intimate hygiene. If one were to look at the Quora conversations around the brand or the categories they cater to, answers by Kritika Verma, a content specialist at Pee Safe are easy to spot. The content thus created on Quora helps answer queries as well as add a personal touch to the communication.
With these avenues, Pee Safe strives to create a marketing mix that facilitates conversations, not just about the brand but also the categories they function in — primarily female hygiene. It helps them build trust in the brand as well as lead conversions. A huge part of their communication revolves around facilitating sex-positive sentiments.
Reviews, Infuencers & Discounts
Something that worked in the favour of Pee Safe pretty early on is organic reviews. This was especially true when they were only concentrating on selling toilet seat sanitiser sprays. The product had the power to spark off conversations without a lot of paid push — at least to a certain extent. Regular users/individuals became their influencers by default. These are/were people with 500 to 3000 followers. Back in 2017, the brand did send out PR kits as well.
In 2018, they started working with celebrities and influencers who could work as their spokespersons. Jacqueline Fernandez, Tandin Bidha, and Nusrat Jahan are some of the recent ambassadors that the brand has tied up with.
One of the most long-standing marketing strategies at Pee Safe has been to offer discounts in exchange for product reviews. "Even if they were putting up a negative review, they would still get the discount code. This made them happy on some level because most of the complaints we were getting were about a delay in delivery or damage during transport," Vikas tells us.
Domina & More
Since Pee Safe has added Domina to their portfolio, a whole new territory has opened up for the brand. A huge part of their communication revolves around pleasure.
"There is a thin line between erotic and sensual and we want to remain in the latter space. We depict the importance of pleasure. There is strictly no nudity in the communication. While we may reach audiences below 18 organically but from a performance marketing perspective, we ensure that the content is projected to only 18+ persons," Vikas tells us about their strategy for Domina.
An interesting aspect about the internal team that works on Domina is that it includes 8 persons, 6 of whom are women between the age group of 21 to 23. They are involved in R&D and marketing.
Vikas proudly tells us about his team and how so many of the product ideas come from them and their lived experiences — enriching the team's capability to come up with products that have a 'need' among people, especially women.
When asked about inclusivity in their brand communication, Vikas explains that they do try to use terms such as vulva-owners instead of women because they intend to cater to audiences that way. However, it is a work in progress and could be expected to be more visible over time.
The brand is also trying to have an element of empowerment in their communication — their hair removal products offer a choice and solution to women without emphasizing the idea that women should shave their body hair. They offer it as a solution to those who wish to.
Pee Safe has launched a plethora of products and sub-brands in the last year or so — in some cases despite the pandemic, in some propelled by the pandemic. In either scenario, they have been able to keep conversations at the core of all their marketing communication.
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