Keeping the evergreen topic of gender equality in mind, Bharat Matrimony is now looking to attract women towards the platform through its #FindYourEqual campaign featuring, ironically, a male celebrity — MS Dhoni — as its brand ambassador. As of now, about 70% of users on the platform are men. Murugavel Janakiraman, founder and CEO, Bharat Matrimony, says, “We want to start a social change with this campaign so that, over a period of time, people understand the importance of equality in relationships.”
Equality rules
Backing words with action, a permanent product change has also been brought in. In their profiles, men will be asked to share their views on equality in marriage as answers to a questionnaire. These answers will then be shared with interested members along with the rest of their profile information. Since the campaign launch (beginning this month), there has been a more than 10% increase in sign-ups by women. Naresh Gupta, managing partner and CSO, Bang in the Middle, points out, “Bharat Matrimony has given the ability to women to choose their partner. The film doesn’t feature parents at all. It has done this very sensibly by being conversational and non preachy.”
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The agenda is to make equality a continuous conversation and not a ‘flash in the pan’ campaign. While a majority of the marketing spends will be allocated to TV advertising, next year’s focus may also be on taking the conversation on ground and online. Janakiraman informs, “We are also looking at holding on-ground events and sessions that encourage discussions on topics such as equality. We may also look at creating some online forums.” Where FY19 is seeing marketing and advertising spends of over `70 crore, this will go up to around `100 crore in FY20.
Differentiation is key
Incidentally, another player in the matchmaking space is speaking about equality. Location-based dating site Bumble marked the launch of its portfolio in India last week with its #EqualNotLoose campaign featuring investor-cum-brand ambassador Priyanka Chopra. Gupta believes that for Bumble this is a missed opportunity and in this case, Bharat Matrimony is far ahead in its strategy. “ The film talks about ‘not (being) loose’ a little too much. The days of saying that being on a dating app means you’re a morally loose woman, are long gone,” he says.
The promise of having control over your choice of partner instead of it being regulated by family is an argument that dating sites ride on. However, Janakiraman states that times are changing and even in the online matrimonial environment, more individuals are taking the initiative. In the recent quarters, more than 60% of the new profiles were created by individuals themselves, 80% of which were men.
These communication efforts are also meant to open up the northern market for the brand and provide some much-needed differentiation. Janakiraman elaborates, “While we have an almost 90% market share in the South and other regions, that is not the case in the North.”
Online matrimonial players thus far have struggled to maintain differentiated positioning. Arch rivals for Bharat Matrimony include Jeevansathi and Shaadi; communication for the latter last month was a call-to-action campaign that invited registrations with the promise of appealing profiles on the platform. Jeevansathi’s last big campaign (although aimed at women), called Be Found, was unleashed in 2016, also to coax registrations in addition to addressing inactivity in existing profiles.
KPMG’s Digital Classifieds in India 2020 report finds that matrimony (as a segment of the overall digital classifieds market) is expected to grow at a CAGR of 19% till FY2020.