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Social Media Project
Students wil create social media communications plansfor their chosen company or
nonprofit. Each student will outline the specific audiences addressed by the social
media plan, the social media outlets they plan to use, key messages and a tactical plan
to get out those messages using a social media platform.
- Outline:the specific audiencesaddressed by the social media plan, thesocial
media outlets they plan to use, keymessages and a tactical plan to get outthose
messages using a social mediaplatform
- Presentation: PPT- Time limit: 4 minutes
Company
The company we are going to analyze here is Nestle which was originated from
Switzerland at 1947 and the product for discussing is Maggi. It provides soupy
noodles with seasonings. This product is extremely popular across the nation and it
makes people’s lives much easier as it immediately became famous in India and
Malaysia. It is interesting to see that “Maggie” even becomes a substitution for
“instant noodle” when people are referring to it. Maggi noodles had 90% of its
shares in India and about 39% of its share in Malaysia when FFSAI banned these
noodles and which ended up a fall to 53% of the market's noodles supplies.
Currently, the company is facing the impact of the regulation and the negative
influence of the previous food ingredients investigation, and they are going to fix the
branding problem through brand marketing to gain more market share in India.
Communication Crisis Description & Impact
At May 15th, 2015, the popular instant noodle Nestle Maggi had been reported that
its products contained an extremely high amount of monosodium glutamate, which
far exceeded what was allowed by the local government. Right after that, instant
noodle Maggi had been banned from selling in the local store immediately, which
undermine the brand name of Maggie in the local market as the sale of the month
almost shrink 37%, according to the data collected by Sakunial. Even though only
part of Maggie’s product had been banned, it was still allowed to export the instant
noodles. Maggie was not allowed to sell on the market until the standard test held by
FSSAI was cleared. This ban caused a serious toll on brand's name in India. The
company faced drastic financial loss as 320 billions of Maggi was recalled from
store shelves, and an additional amount of 20 billion were spent to burn the said
stock in a cement factory. Moreover, MCA also imposed a ban of 640 billion on the
parent company because of their negligence (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016). The
organization has taken a toll since then, and its credibility has drastically affected
because of this crisis.
Additionally, the company responded to public media 16 days later than the test
result coming out, and they did little to calm the public outcry. Accompanied with
some other previous side effect problem reported by the customer, this crisis almost
crushed the company.
Competitor
There several competitors, like ITC and Patanjali Ayurved, in the market were
waiting for the opportunity to gain more market share from Maggie and the FSSAI’s
testing result provided a great chance for them to occupy the market with advertising
how safe their instant noodles are. For instance, Patanjali Ayurved Limited (PAL)
launched an instant atta noodles with a tagline of 'jhatpatbanao, befikarkhao' which
means 'make instantly, eat safely.' Competitors quickly responded to Maggie’s crisis
and adjusted their strategic plan to this event. They mainly focus on advertising on
highlight the food safety and promising that they don’t have such problem in their
product for convincing customers. The purpose was to undermine Maggie’s brand
name for making it look like a poisonous food to be consumed by keeping customers
in mind about its previous health hazards. (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016).
Audience
As mentioned in the previous competitor part, competitors were trying to gain more
market shares through highlighting the food safety of the instant noodles. This
indicated that the customers these companies and Maggie targeted are who care
about public food health.
Then who is the one who cares about the public food health most and would be
affected by Maggie’s crisis? The answer is parents who need to care about their
children’s health, people who keep a healthy diet in their daily life and the
supermarket cooperating with Maggie. We could summarize it as customers and
Maggie’s partners in the market. As Maggie’s products were required to recall from
the stores and another sale channel, this action largely undermined Maggie’s
partners’ daily operation and their local brand reputation such that no further store or
supermarket would like to put Maggie’s product on their rack.
Furthermore, more than 1500 workers were directly affected because of this crisis,
as the production stopped for this instant noodles brand and they had to find work
somewhere else.
Climate
According to the Indian Express, for responding the Maggi Crisis and its negative
influence on the society, FSSAI proposed that they are planning a more specific
regulation for noodles to prevent the similar case from happening.
Communication Challenge and Future
Maggi was confronting the difficulties of gaining back its market share and their
brand loyalty as customers were still suspecting the food quality. Maggi is supposed
to respond to the media to comfort the customers that had been deeply affected by
this event. As Maggi has the strength on the public influence as it had already gained
large population before the scandal, they used the emotional and nostalgic memories
to remind customers how their products help them make their lives easier. Tagging
notes like “Nothing like Maggi” and “MaggiMother” was used to created an
emotional attachment with its consumers and it did affect lots of consumers’ choice.
Introduction
Nestle started Maggi in 1947 and was originated from Switzerland. It is an international
brand which consists of soupy noodles with seasonings. Maggi instant noodles had made
life so easy that it instantly hit fame in India and Malaysia. It has become so famous that
the word instant noodles have been replaced with Maggi. Maggi noodles had 90% of its
shares in India and about 39% of its share in Malaysia when FFSAI banned these noodles
and which ended up a fall to 53% of the market's noodles supplies (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016).
Communication Campaign/Crisis
It was on May 15th, 2015, when food inspectors from Barabanki district in India reported
the presence of an extremely high amount of monosodium glutamate and 17 times more
of what is permissible of lead in Maggi instant noodles (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016). Following
this, Maggi was instantly banned on a domestic scale in India. Although, Maggi was still
allowed to export the instant noodles. The sales on domestic level drastically dropped until
a standard test by FSSAI was cleared by Maggi. After the clearance, it could come back to
the domestic market by November 2015. This ban caused a serious toll on brand's name in
India. The company faced drastic financial loss as Rs. 320 billion of Maggi was recalled from
store shelves and an additional amount of Rs. 20 billionwere spent to burn the said stock in
a cement factory. Moreover, MCA also imposed a ban of Rs. 640 billion on the parent
company because of their negligence (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016). The organization has taken a
toll since then and its credibility has drastically affected because of this crisis.
Competitors
This downfall gave their competitors an advantage and company like Patanjali Ayurved
Limited (PAL) launched an instant atta noodles with a tagline of 'jhatpatbanao, befikarkhao'
which means to 'make instantly, eat safely.' This targeted Maggi to make it look like a
negative brand and unsafe to be consumed by keeping in mind about its previous health
hazards (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016).
Negative Marketing
Board of Directors of PAL Baba Ramdev, grabbed the opportunity and make the most of it
when Maggi freshly returned from its turmoil. Additionally, "desi vs. videshi" tactic was
used to defame the international Nestle Maggi brand by depicting that domestic
production is better for the national economic. It was a hard time for Maggi as it had to
fight on two fronts: first, to clear up its negative brand perception which was created and
second the negative marketing efforts to disgrace Maggi put by PAL (Sakunial & Jha2,
2016).
Audiences Affected
There werethree types of audiences that were affected in this overall process.
•
Customers
Customers lost their trust on one of the most prominent conglomerate of the
region, and Nestle will have to make significant investments in the domains of marketing
and PR to regain their lost trust. They may focus on nostalgic and emotional memories in
their marketing campaigns with this product, as a vast majority of the customers are using
their instant noodles since their childhood and they will be able to easily overcome their
hesitation to consume this product.
•
Food authorities
Nestle also lost its credibility in the eyes of food authority regulators and they
increased the suspiciousness while evaluating samples from them. Nestle will have to
regain its prominent position as a reliable food brand in market by going through multiple
quality assurance tests, in order to regain the trust of food authorities and get licenses for
all of its products.
•
Employees
More than 1500 workers were directly affected because of this crisis, as the production
stopped for this instant noodles brand and they had to find work somewhere else. Nestle
will have to regain their trust and confidence, in order to ensure their positive feelings
toward their organization (Bhattacharyya, 2016).
Emotional and Nostalgic memories.
Taglines like #WeMissYouToo, #MaggiMother, and #WelcomeBackMaggi were used to
create an emotional attachment with its consumersby hashtagging #NothingLikeMaggi.
Founder Director of Scarecrow Communications Manish Bhatt, really liked the new idea as
it was clear how the brand is gaining back its space making it home to people's lives again
through touching the emotional side of the masses. Maggi is irreplaceable because
emotions can't be replaced and may such emotional lines were used to gain power
(Sakunial & Jha2, 2016).
Branding through Storytelling.
The main target through advertisements were young boys and girls living in hostels, and
bachelor pads to the Indian moms who find it very easy to instantly make Maggi for their
kids are really good ways of branding through storytelling (Kapooria, 2015).
Mothers as Brand Advocates
Touching the emotional side of masses was easy so mothers was the best option to stamp
their seal of approval, and perhaps the only easy and possible route to take, as taking
celebrity endorser in the current state was out of because none of them would risk their
name with the controversial brand and endorsers (Sakunial & Jha2, 2016). Hence, the
strategy will be somewhat helpful in clearing up the doubts about the safety of the product
and that the product will cause no potential harm to the health of the consumers.Still, I
think it will take some time to be clearly escape suspicions attached with its brand name.
Conclusion
Following many strategies over the years, Maggi somehow has nurtured the emotional
bond with the Indian masses. It is all thanks to these emotions that Maggi was able to
regain its once lost brand equity by emotionally connecting the minds of the consumers. All
the scandal and controversy also proved to be in favor of Maggi as this way it attracted a lot
of attention and the product that was once losing its importance was once again stable and
thriving through heaps and heaps of attention by its consumers. The feedback and
coverage about people's emotions, concerns and a sudden craving for Maggi instant
noodles also played a very important role in gaining confidence again. It’s high time that
the company comes up with new and innovative advertising strategy and builds on these
past incidents. It is true that Maggi plummeted in terms of market share and brand image,
but it still can make a confident and powerful comeback with a creative marketing plan.