Are you looking to take your marketing game up a notch? If so, then you need to understand the power of BTL or Below-the-Line advertising.
While ATL(Above-the-Line) advertising may get all the attention, BTL is quietly becoming one of the most effective ways for businesses to reach their target audience.
In this blog post, we will explore BTL advertising, a powerful tool for businesses looking to reach their target audience in unique and effective ways, we’ll break down everything you need to know about BTL advertising and how it can help your brand stand out from the crowd. From guerrilla marketing tactics to experiential marketing, get ready for the exciting journey into the world of BTL advertising!
BTL Advertising: A Comprehensive Guide
In today’s era, using traditional mass communication mediums such as broadcasting on the radio or television proves to be inadequate to establish a connection with consumers. Marketers need to become more adept at understanding consumers changing needs and preferences to accomplish the task of building a successful recall value. Thus, BTL marketing a non-conventional marketing tactic that directly approaches a highly specific niche audience is used to foster meaningful relationships with consumers. It helps to bridge the gap between the two market players-the consumer and the marketer.
In this light, now let’s take a look at how BTL adds to the success formula of a business:
Advantages of BTL:
- Targeted Approach
BTL campaigns enable targeting specific demographics, ensuring advertising efforts reach the most relevant audience. This approach results in higher conversion rates as the ads are more likely to resonate with the intended audience.
- Enhanced Customer Engagement
In today’s competitive business landscape, by focusing on fostering meaningful relationships with potential customers, businesses can improve their brand image and encourage customer loyalty.
- Lower Costs
BTL marketing is often more cost-effective, as it avoids the high costs associated with television and radio ads.
BTL Activities Checklist:
BTL activities often involve extensive market research to identify the ideal target demographic, thus allowing a more personalized and direct form of advertising.
Through the use of various branding methodologies such as Product Sampling, Roadshows, In-store Promotions, Exhibitions, Mall activations, Innovative Product Displays, etc., businesses are able to target a specific niche of buyers who are more likely to be interested in their products or services. So, here is a checklist of BTL activities that serve as a source to register the brand/product in the minds of consumers:
- Experiential Marketing: Creation of memorable experiences that allow consumers to engage with the brand. This includes interactive installations, pop-ups, product demonstrations, or experiential activations that activate multiple senses.
- In-store promotions: Implementation of promotional activities at retail stores to encourage immediate purchases. This includes demonstrations, presentations, discounts, contests, or giveaways.
- Events and trade shows: With industry-specific trade shows, exhibitions, or corporate events to showcase products or services, it provides an opportunity for hands-on participation, presentations and networking.
- Loyalty programs: By implementing program discounts, personalized offers, or special offers repeated purchases can be encouraged.
- Guerrilla Marketing: Advertising through unconventional and creative tactics to surprise and interact with audiences with the ultimate aim of leaving a lasting impact on the minds of consumers.
Examples of BTL Campaigns
Some of the examples highlighting on-ground BTL Campaigns at our agency are as follows:
- “Tata Tea Leaf by Agni: Chhath Activation”
Tata Tea launched their new Chhath pack series called “Tata Tea Chhath Leaf by Agni”. The main aim of this campaign was to engage consumers to boost the sales of the product.
During the campaign’s course, a mix of BTL activities was conducted to engage a good amount of people visiting the ghats for Chhath Puja. Branded Van set up at high congregation points in markets for buzz creation, Free E-rickshaw rides for people visiting ghats, and Installation of Wet Sampling Booths & Free Mehndi Zones were the main attractions of the event. A Photo Booth activity zone to engage consumers was also set up, wherein, the participants were gratified upon uploading their picture with the Chhath Pack.
The campaign proved to be a great success in generating sales and awareness for the product in the focal points, Bihar & Jharkhand.
- “Trinity: The Next Level Campaign in Partnership with Facebook Gaming”
An ACEF (Asian Customer Engagement Forum and Awards) 2023 Entry, this partnership was truly a “Next Level” campaign for our BTL agency. Trinity Gaming India, the country’s leading gaming and marketing platform in collaboration with Facebook Gaming conceptualized a talent hunt and gamer onboarding program at the college level. It was anchored by the ambition to turn budding gamers into pro content creators. The cynosure of this campaign was the Canter, it had a built-in gaming session where the participants could live stream with renowned content creators.
Other attractions of the campaign included awareness sessions on GFX & VFX, talent management, esports tournaments, gaming content creation, etc., a celebrity spot to get photos clicked with their favourite gaming influencers and exciting gratifications in return for the organized challenges.
The campaign was featured in “Navi Duniya Newspaper”, “News Monk E-Newspaper” & “Pumirror E-Newspaper” and became a launchpad for gaming enthusiasts to embark upon their professional journeys in the gaming industry.
- “Tata Tea Premium: Lohri Vaddi Khushiyan de Tappe Mall Activation Campaign”
Another feather in Triveni Media’s hat, an ACEF (Asian Customer Engagement Forum and Awards) Entry, 2023, proved to be a resounding success with its two major activation legs: trade activation at retailers and consumer outreach.
To increase visibility at General Trade and Modern Trade Stores, gate arches & floor standee units were installed. Special Lohri Hampers were distributed to retailers to foster sustainable connections with them.
The consumer-led mall activation campaign included an On-ground AI-Powered Celebrity Engagement Activity with the leading actress Shehnaaz Gill Creating Personalized Tappe (Tappe meaning boliyaan or couplets) via WhatsApp for the live audience. The event was carried out with the scanning of a QR code on TataTeaTappe.com.
The campaign also incorporated many other engagement games like family dance competition, tappe singing competition, mimicry competition, kite-making activity and wet sampling for the product in focus.
The event turned out to be a hit in terms of media coverage & engagement and was an unforgettable experience for all.
- “Godrej Good Knight D2D Yodha Campaign”
A Door-to-Door Campaign implemented for the very first time by our BTL Agency was another milestone in its journey. It started off with promoters visiting and educating consumers about the product and concluded with the distribution of Good Knight mosquito repellent, at a discounted price.
Customer Feedback was collected and the campaign eventually overachieved the set target through its persuasion, community, call-to-action and sales-led approaches.
BTL Marketing, thus, outperforming in all these campaigns can be seen as strongly enhancing the recall value of a product. It builds brand credibility and makes it stand out by enabling the consumers to feel the product through experiential marketing tactics.
To conclude, Below-the-line marketing is an essential tool for businesses looking to target specific consumer groups and build meaningful relationships with potential customers. By employing a variety of BTL marketing tactics, businesses can create cost-effective and engaging advertising campaigns that resonate with their target audience.
