Case Study: How realme saw 302% increase in sell-out of Narzo 50 post campaign launch

The case study decodes how realme connected with the youth to create awareness and consideration for the launch of the Narzo 50 smartphone.

In this case study, we take a look at the #BeatThatChallenge campaign by realme in collaboration with Amazon for their Narzo 50 smartphone launch. The campaign focused on the objective to create a community of young customers and gain popularity among its core youth audience.

Category Introduction

India’s smartphone market saw 12 per cent growth in 2021, reaching record 162 million shipments. The market size was valued at US$ 139 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow with a CAGR of 10.5% and reach US$ 281 billion by 2028. Some of the major factors contributing to the growth of the market are growing disposable income, development of telecom infrastructure, the emergence of budget-centric smartphones and an increasing number of product launches.

In 2022, the smartphone market is expected to continue growing in India, with demand being driven by replacement needs as well as new customers migrating to smartphones. 5G, which is the next generation of mobile telecom networks, is also expected to play a more important role this year and is expected to drive growth in the smartphone market as well.

Brand Introduction

realme is a technology brand that specializes in providing technology products with a comprehensive superior experience for the youth. The brand was officially established on May 4th, 2018, by its founder Sky Li and Madhav Sheth in India, together with a young and strong team that has rich experience in the smartphone industry. Committed to creating a smart, connected and trendy lifestyle for the youth, realme democratizes cutting-edge technology to provide the best technology products in each price segment under 1+5+T strategy.

In the fourth quarter of 2021, realme was number three on the list being the only player which saw positive annual growth in the top five list with 7.6 million shipments and 49 per cent year-on-year growth.

The brand’s focused marketing efforts in the form of social media campaigns, and creating communities to connect with young consumers have helped the brand understand consumers’ needs as well as gain popularity, especially among its core youth audience. This is complemented by its online channel strategy, which has helped realme respond quickly to consumer demands by bringing its products faster into the market and to scale.

realme Narzo 50 launch case study - Summary

realme partnered with Amazon for their Narzo 50 smartphone launch. The brand's TG is GenZ, and with their limited attention span, the brand had to make sure that this phone gets noticed and gets added to their consideration set. The idea consisted of a Rap Music Video featuring trending rap stars - Arivu and Raga to leverage sub-cultural behaviours prevailing amongst GenZ, break vernacular boundaries for wider reach, and to create intrigue about the product.

To amplify the reach and impact of the music video, the team launched the #BeatThatChallenge social campaign and invited influencers and content creators to participate. With this campaign, the brand wanted to encourage the youth to express their true individual self as the “Real Me”, which is also reflected in the uplifting lyrics of the music.

The campaign was conceptualized and executed by Amazon’s GTM agency for Smartphones and TVs- magnon eg+ (part of Fortune 200 Omnicom Group).

Problem Statement/Objective

The objective of this campaign was to create awareness and consideration for the launch.

The brand wanted to position the product as the preferred smartphone under the 15k price category by creating buzz and chatter around the product that finally translates into sales. To address this objective, realme wanted to create a community of young customers and gain popularity among its core youth audience.

Brief

The brief was to create an insight-driven campaign that the youth of India can relate to. The agency was to invent a perfect marketing vehicle to add Narzo 50 to the consideration set of their core audience, while also announcing its partnership with Amazon.

Creative Idea

GenZ relates to brands that custom connects with their tastes and preferences. They love subcultures that stand in opposition to the norms of culture set by Millennials. Rap emerged as a growing subculture prevalent across India. It is stylised rhythmic music that commonly accompanies a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted and was developed as part of the hip-hop culture. As a musical lingo, rap had the potential of connecting with the core realme target audience and would enable them to express the “Real Me” within them.

The idea was to unite the reigning rap winds from north and south with artists Arivu & Raga who are known for their upbeat music and attempt to voice the sentiments of India’s GenZ. Further, a perfect mix of collaboration was to be created by getting best-in-business artists and agencies on board such as Nisrin Aziz for Direction, Deval Samanta for Cinematography, the electronic music sensation Kalmi for music, Talentrack for talent collaboration and Amazon’s GTM agency for Smartphones and TVs- magnon eg+ for conceptualization and execution. The video was to be set in a backdrop of a starry night in urban, futuristic India, and was to be released in different vernacular languages to mirror the brand’s audience base.

Challenges

The smartphone market, especially under the 20K price category is generally cluttered with new launches across e-commerce and traditional marketplaces. The challenge was to get the attention of the people who are looking to buy a smartphone within that price segment. With GenZ’s limited attention span and numerous options available in the market, we were to create a campaign that connects with the TG and gets the product added to their consideration set.

The launch was done on Amazon; therefore, another challenge was to reach out to a larger base of the TG and drive relevant traffic to the Amazon landing page.

Also read: The marketing approach centered on redirecting leads from digital to official website: Francis Wong, realme

realme Narzo 50 launch case study - Execution

The execution was divided in three parts.

• Awareness: The Hero Idea- Rap Music Video by trending rap stars - Arivu and Raga to leverage Sub-cultural behaviours prevailing amongst GenZ, break vernacular boundaries for wider reach, create intrigue about the product and enhance brand acceptance. The video was released on the brand’s social media handles and was strategically promoted to relevant audiences.

• Engagement: #BeatThatChallenge was initiated by Arivu & Raga to express people’s love for the Music Video. A contest-led activity which invited the community to participate and beat their peers, through fun rap challenges & dance moves. The contest was promoted on Facebook and Instagram using paid media real estate and influencer interventions for wider reach and engagement.

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• Consideration & Conversion: Retargeting engaged audiences from the awareness and engagement phases. Using Sharp Targeted Ads highlighting product features and offers across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Google Ad Networks to drive traffic to a campaign landing page on Amazon.

All of the above was conceptualized and executed within 20 days.

Results

• Quantitative - The campaign overall garnered more than 53M impressions, 26.5M reach and 16K mentions. The cumulative views for the video crossed 4M within a span of 2 weeks, which was 11x higher than the views on the previous launch. Furthermore, there was a 302% increase in sell-out on realme Narzo 50 variants post music video launch in the campaign timeline, with 881K+ clicks leading to the Amazon page.

• Qualitative - The campaign received positive and reassuring comments across the social handles of realme. The UGC entries received for the #BeatThatChallenge were diverse and remarkable. Most of all, Narzo 50 products hit the No. 1 Amazon Bestseller mark in the electronic category during the campaign period.

CMO Quotes

“Committed to provide leap-forward performance and trend-setting design at reasonable prices for young people around the world, we democratize cutting-edge technology to provide the best technology products in each price segment. We chose Amazon as our e-commerce partner for the narzo 50 launch because of their global reach, experience, and insight in the category. With this launch, we created a unique futuristic themed video featuring Gen-Z artists (Arivu & Raga) with product performance credentials integrated throughout. Lyrics were also custom made keeping in mind the youthful TG & personality. An integrated influencer campaign to generate buzz and excitement about the upcoming launch was also deployed. With this we have witnessed never-seen-before numbers in terms of views and sales and are pleasant with the success of the launch. We look forward to more exciting cooperation in the near future,” said Madhav Sheth, CEO, realme India, VP, realme and President, realme International Business Group.

“We have seen many brands and launches in the smartphone category in recent times, and it’s critical for brands to stand out. We are happy to have partnered closely with realme marketing team for the recent launch of Narzo 50, where the rap video has appealed well to the youthful customers leading to very strong performance across metrics. We will continue with similar partnerships and innovate across all content formats needed to engage and excite our customers,” said Nishant Sardana, Category Director (Mobiles, Accessories and Television), Amazon India.

“Magnon is currently the frontrunner in conceptualizing and executing influencer-led, creator-generated-content marketing campaigns in India. We enjoyed working with the teams of Amazon, realme and Talentrack to produce the music video and deliver a high-impact campaign to generate unprecedented social buzz for Narzo 50. Also, it’s encouraging to see how global brands are using localization to tap regional markets,” said Vineet Bajpai, Founder & CEO, Magnon Group.