Samsung Marine- The Positioning Problem ?
Few days back Samsung had launched this new cell phone called Samsung Marine.
The TV commercial was great.
The name Marine and the TV commercial sets the positioning straight and positions it as a waterproof phone.Shock Proof and Dust Proof were the additional qualities associated with it.The name Marine seemed apt.The whole ad was shot in rafting boat.In the end of the commercial the phone is shown in water too.
Water Proofing is a major issue with phones.Many of my friends have lost their phones due to this problem.In Mumbai people carry their phones in plastic bags to avoid water seepage in rains.I nearly lost my cell phone to rains but somehow revived it luckily.
Samsung Marine seemed to have the answer to these problems.
Dust and shock(free falling phone not the electrical shock 
) related problems are not that much prominent but water related are.
But Today i saw this new ad.I kept on waiting for the ad to refer to the waterproofing thing but it didn’t.
The main point in this ad was the shock proof attribute.First thing that came to my mind was that the name of the phone is Samsung Marine and there is no sign of water or water proofing in the ad.
The name is the first marketing tool.Many a times the name positions your product.
In Cell Phone industry,the names are not that prominent.More or less cell phones are referred by model numbers.
Nokia 3230,5210,3610 or Sony Erickson p200 etc.So you can chose any positioning as per the features offered in the phone.
Samsung normally keep names for their products and justify them properly.Duo(two sim cards),Omnia(high end) or generic names like Star etc were well kept names and justified by the product well
Even Samsung Marine is a good name with a good tagline,”planet proof”.But the new ad doesn’t go with the name as such.The tagline has also been changed to ‘Girega to bhi chalega(will work even after a fall)’The ad highlights the secondary attributes of the product and no signs of water,waterproofing etc as the name suggests.
The first thing that comes into mind when you hear the word marine is water(or Sea),which is not highlighted in the ad.If it would have been US ,then the word marine could have been used to show any of the three attributes,water,shock,dust equally as Marine is commonly used for a US Navy Soldier.In India the word Marine in that context is not that popular(Indian Navy does have a Marine Commando Force)
In the same ad if instead of dropping the cell on stairs if the model would have dropped it in a pool or something similar then the ad,name and positioning all three would have been in sync.
I saw the product demo video of the product.Even in that the product manager puts the phone in a water glass and proves that it is waterproof and highlights that fact well.
The ad is good if the viewer knows about the product already and has seen the last commercial(of which chances are high) otherwise there is a lot of mismatch between the name and the ad.
I know it will not cause much of a problem to Samsung but its interesting to see the whole campaign as a Marketing or an Advertising Case.
What Say ?
Update 1 : There is a new ad of Samsung Marine which should be on TV soon.It is just perfect.It shows a girl stuck in rain as her Scooty stops but phone doesn’t so she calls her dad and he comes to take her.In whole ad the phone is shown to get wet but doesn’t stop working.
The Video :
I don’t know whether this ad has come on TV or not yet but this ad is perfect.Instead of the ‘Boss’ ad Samsung should have preferred this.
If i would have seen this ad before i would not have written the whole post on the first place
but still i think Samsung could have done away with the Boss Ad or modified it a bit to justify the product well.
What Say?
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Well, you could be correct.
or Samsung Sturdy or simply Strong!!!
But looking at it this way, Samsung has run its ad campaign and named the product on the most important feature i.e water proof. Awareness is over.This new set of ads could be for the still unconvinced customers. Its like presuming that you already know about the product.
But yes, the name distorts the whole positioning. It could have probably gone for something less specific like a Samsung Macho
Nevertheless, I am sure they must have analysed all of this and do have somehting in mind already. I am impressed by the kind of come-back they have done with their mobile phone category (Amir Khan and all…). Personally, last 3 handsets bought in my family have been Samsung and we never went to the shop with the intention of doing so.
Just in case what we are discussing here turns out to be true and Marine manages to fail ( I hope not though) it ll make a good case-study for managers-in-the-making
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Even i agree that this new ad is to reinforce the funda of shockproofing to unconvinced customers.That presumption thing i have mentioned in the post.Your names rock.Macho and Sturdy could have been just perfect !
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Samsung Marine- The Positioning Problem ?…
But Today i saw this new ad.I kept on waiting for the ad to refer to the waterproofing thing but it didn’t.
The main point in this ad was the shock proof attribute.First thing that came to my mind was that the name of the phone is Samsung Marine and t…
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good read
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Thanks! both Poojas of our class commenting on the same post !
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