‘Look Inside’: A platform to tell stories

Campaign India caught up with Anuj Dua, director - marketing and consumer sales, Intel Asia Pacific, and Sandeep Aurora, director - marketing and market development, Intel South Asia, to talk about the brand’s ‘Look Inside’ campaign.

Tell us about ‘Look Inside’ campaign.

Anuj Dua (AD): It is two simple words that tells the Intel story. It is rooted in our heritage and rich legacy where people understand that the best computing machines have Intel inside. It is in a sense call to action for our end-users. Beyond this, it gives us a platform to tell stories because at the end of the day, people buy computing devices for what it does for them. Look Inside becomes an aspirational call to what you can achieve with the power of technology that you have in your hands. It also allows us to talk about the company. We have many inventions that push the technology forward.

We are excited about the campaign. We think it gives us a wonderful communication platform for the next few years to tell the Intel story.

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The campaign was launched in June in many countries, and is being introduced in India now…

AD: It is a phased introduction, and we haven’t rolled it out in all the markets. You will see it move forward as we enter 2014, across print media, points of sale. The Look Inside message will be prevalent and used across mediums.

Sandeep Aurora (SA): It has been a phased launch depending what is getting introduced in which market.

Coming to ‘Look Inside’, how are you planning to roll it out in India?

SA: You will start seeing everything getting integrated around that platform. For instance, our activation in villages - the platform has the potential to tell the villagers to look inside themselves. In mall activation, it tells the consumer to look inside the product.

From 'Sponsors of tomorrow' to 'Go do something wonderful’ to 'Look Inside' now. Are the rapidly rolled out campaigns reflective of frequently shifting focus for Intel in India?

SA: The campaign has to look at the reality of the market to draw on what we are trying to communicate to our consumers. 'Go do something wonderful’ was something specific that we did for India. ‘Look Inside’ is a platform that we are looking at worldwide. The beauty of this campaign is that it can adapt itself to different countries. It can adapt to social upliftment story in India and it can adapt to a new technology being employed inside a space-age device in California or smart city system in Singapore. It is a call to action to consumers to look inside, in each way – to look inside within themselves and inside devices. The repositioning has not been sudden at all.

AD: ‘Sponsors of tomorrow’ talks about the investments and innovations you made to make the lives better. ‘Go do something wonderful’ asks people what they can do with technology. ‘Look Inside’ ultimately brings it all together under the one communication platform. There is a similarity and a thread. It is an opportunity for us to build through the themes with three pillars: look inside yourself, look inside the company that does great things for the world, and look inside the devices.

From product-centric to people-centric focus in your campaigns...

SA: The product and the consumer is the hero of our campaign. In the evolution of our brand and messaging, we were initially focussed on telling people what products we make and what the products do. Slowly, as computing became more prevalent, it is about what you can do with the device. And that is where the consumer becomes the centre. We will continue to talk about what we make possible and what the product makes possible, versus what we make. That thinking is here to stay.

How has the ‘Look Inside’ campaign been received?

AD: In the limited rollout that we have done, it has been very well-received.

People know that best PCs have Intel inside but may not know that we exist inside tablets. We are getting into that category now. We want to urge people to look inside the other computing devices. They need to understand about the performance, quality and the experience that they have come to expect. That is what we are hoping to accomplish with this campaign.

Is marketing strategy for Intel different in India than in Apac markets?

SA: Yes, it will be a little bit different in some other markets, where you will talk to consumers who know a little more about technology. In some markets, you talk to consumers who are a little less aware of the technology. For instance, communication in Australia is about more form factors. In India, the messaging is around what you can do with technology or device. Those nuances will be different in each market. The platform to ‘Look Inside’ is to do that seamlessly in each market.

What is the growth strategy for Intel in India?

SA: First is about how we communicate to consumers the power of technology. That obviously helps grow the business. And this is not just advertising and communication work, there are programmes like National Literacy Mission. The sense of empowerment that technology brings is what we do fundamentally, and we will communicate that.

Have the marketing spends increased for India over the years?

SA: It reflects the market. The Indian market has been growing steadily for the past many years, and so have been our overall investments in the market.

How big is digital in your marketing mix?

SA: Digital, globally and in India, is growing rapidly. We think we can do more there and we are slightly behind where we should be. There is so much you can do in the digital and social space. We have a strong team focussed on that. We use our assets in social and digital very well. We have a 2.8 million strong fanbase in India on Facebook. We have a strong Twitter presence. We are very closely engaged with the community. The beauty of social is when you make the communication two-way. We get a lot of feedback from our fans, and it feels great to incorporate that – in our positioning and products.

How is Intel viewing the growth of computing in tier 2 and 3 towns?

SA: We are excited about it. We are driving it, on one side, and it is a huge opportunity for India as a country because the youth’s association with computing is very essential for India to remain competitive. We love the fact that they are adopting technology much faster and at a much younger age.

We are doing bunch of initiatives to train people, consumers on what all you can do with technology. A tier 1 (town) person might be more aware, but there are people who do not know how technology gets used. It is more about covering all the tiers because consumers are everywhere.

AD: The transformative power of technology is untapped potential. There is a long way to go because PC penetration is less than 10 per cent.

How is India’s contribution to Intel’s revenue growing?

SA: It is growing. The penetration in India is still low. India was a market that was growing when other markets were seeing the slowdown. From the focus standpoint, India has been on the radar and it is one of the fastest growing markets in the world right now.