You are a corporate high-flier who jets around the globe. Making and breaking deals is a game that you love to indulge in. Your favourite pastime is playing chess. Nat-urally there’s an aura of exclusivity about you. You would want a product that makes you feel special. It has to be a brand that is as special,
creative, and as exclusive as you are.
And that is perhaps the biggest challenge of luxury marketing. You cannot just market it to anyone. You have to make the person feel very special. Believe me or not, marketeers have gone to great lengths to make the target consumer feel that he is different; he is exclusive. One such marketeer even came up with a black card for the elite Hollywood audience that would grant them admission to secret clubs. With the black card the owner could even buy a jet. The fact that the card did not even exist is quite another story. But the marketeer got what he wanted — the eyeballs of his audience.
The luxury segment markets its products to the upper crust of the wealth spectrum — who are not really price sensitive. In fact, the ultra-rich would not mind spending their wealth on something that is considered op-ulent to most of us. So, what would these luxury brands be? These prestige brands could be Hermes, Rolex, Cartier or Louis Vuitton — categories that represent very high aesthetics. There is an aura of mystery around these brands that hook consumers.
Hence, marketeers need to cash in on this fact. They must realise that consumer purchase decisions depend on three factors.
First is the product itself; second is the store’s brand value and third is the price-value relationship. “It is also important to remember that the brand must be expansive. In other words, the brand must be prepared to evolve. It must innovate,” says Saumya Chattopadhyay, director, St-rategic Planning, Ogilvy Africa.
The brand must also tell a story. “This story could be either of great brand performance or heritage that goes into making the brand that it is today,” says Prof. Atul Agnihotri, IIM-Calcutta.
The story must emphasise how it has evolved to be what it is today. and last but not least the brand must be relevant to the consumer’s needs. Now marketeers must realise that the recognition value of the brand must be so high that it should give the consumer a sense of being rich.
As S. Chatterjee, an advertising professional said, “A marketeer can always increase brand value by aligning itself with successful celebrities or be part of elite promotional events.” Also the brand must be relevant to a consumer’s needs and yes, a brand must always perform.
Over the years, there has been a subtle change in the mentality of consumers. They are willing to empty their pockets on products that show them off in a good light. “The product should give them a top of the world feeling. It should make them feel that they are the best in their field,” says Saumya Chatto-padhyay. The marketeer can always earn extra points by adding customised value to his product line.
“Well there is something else too. A consumer must get the feeling that he has bought the product first. That alone can accentuate his achievement otherwise for him it becomes valueless,” says M. Deb, an advertising professional. So marketeers have to be fast and access their customer before anyone else does.
The luxury market behaves in a different manner — there is no standardisation of products as the market size incr-eases substantially.
But a word of caution: the luxury consumer is ever shifting his allegiance. He is always looking for newer ways to satisfy his needs. So it’s best to keep close tabs on such consumers through in-sightful research. Provide newer products that are in sync with his needs.
And as the market booms, it is those marketeers who have been in touch with ground reality that will be the ones to win!

The writer is a well-known industry watcher