Maruti Suzuki-5years of Redefining Customer Experience

Every second car on the Indian road is a Maruti Suzuki car. Seems fascinating, but it is the truth. Starting from FY 18, Maruti Suzuki has continued to enjoy a 50% market share in the passenger vehicle segment, closing FY 20 with 51% to be precise. The nearest competitor Hyundai Motors has a 17.48% market share. It also has leading dealership chains in the form of Maruti Suzuki Arena and Maruti Suzuki Nexa.

The Automobile giant, which was started in 1981 as a joint venture between the Government of India and Suzuki Motor Corporation (SMC), Japan has achieved new heights year after year. Well known for providing affordable cars, Maruti Suzuki is now a public limited company in which SMC holds 56.28% of its equity stake. Shares of Maruti Suzuki are traded at National Stock Exchange (NSE) & Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE).

Product Portfolio

Maruti Suzuki sold 1,563,297 vehicles in 2019-20 which was 16.06% less than what it sold in 2018-19. Major reasons contributing to declining in sales are due to COVID-induced lockdown, reluctance from customer end over the introduction of new BSVI vehicles, etc. Maruti Suzuki added 2 new vehicles to its portfolio during this year: MPV XL6 and Hatchback S-Presso. With these new launches the product portfolio is as follows:

NEXA: Premium Retail Chain of Maruti Suzuki India Limited

The retail chain has been one of the strong fortes for Maruti Suzuki when it comes to connecting with leads and converting them to the final customers. In 2017, Maruti Suzuki rebranded its regular retail chain as Maruti Suzuki Arena and the main purpose of this was to use digital technology to provide customers of its regular retail chain a more pleasant experience.

In addition to that, they set up a new website that acts as a platform where potential customers can check out their cars, customize it, and book it from the website itself. Currently, Maruti Suzuki has 2,390 Arena showrooms in the country spread across 1,964 locations.

Affordability and simple economy vehicles were the keys to success in Indian Market for Maruti Suzuki but with time Maruti did realize that they need to jump into the premium segment as well.

Along with its widespread regular retail channel, Maruti Suzuki wanted to provide a premium feel to its customers who visit their retail chain mainly for the top-notch models. It was a plan to add value to customer feeling whenever they visited the showrooms.

Keeping this in mind, Maruti launched its premium retail chain named ‘NEXA’ on July 23, 2015, in the Dwarka region of New Delhi. Maruti partnered with the Hakuhodo India team for creating NEXA. The vision of creating NEXA was to attract customers who are digitally savvy, who seeks a world-class experience while buying a car. The first car launched in NEXA was S-Cross followed by Ciaz Hybrid and Baleno Hatchback.

One of the major questions that loomed around with the launch of NEXA was whether it is going to cannibalize Maruti’s existing small car market and how it should affect the dealer-brand relationship?

In order to solve this issue, it was decided that Models that would be launched under the NEXA brand won’t be available in the regular retail channel ‘ARENA’. Currently, NEXA has 375 outlets in 219 locations pan India which is offering customers a global buying experience, innovative technology, and enhanced hospitality.

Maruti Suzuki’s NEXA platform has sold nearly 1.1 Million cars since its inception 5 years ago. NEXA is now claimed to be the third-largest automotive channel and holds models like Ignis, Baleno, Ciaz, S-Cross, and XL6.

Adding value to consumers through NEXA

Augmented Reality: According to Maruti Suzuki, nearly half of NEXA customers are under 35 years of age and are technologically savvy. In order to attract these segments, Maruti has introduced an Augmented Reality (AR) based car buying experience. With this, they are able to attract modern urban Indian consumers to the Maruti Suzuki portfolio. In addition to that, NEXA has diversified Maruti Suzuki’s image of an affordable car manufacturer who targeted low to medium-end customers to a versatile brand that has different products and experiences as per the customer need.

Buyer Guide: It is an extensive platform integrated with the NEXA website in which customers can check what all finance and insurance options consumers have when they want to buy a car. This makes life easier when you don’t have to search everywhere looking for options to finance your dream of buying a car. In addition to that, all service bookings that are needed for us can be done through this platform.

Complete Information at one destination: Especially in unprecedented times like COVID, as a consumer if you are looking to buy a car the foremost thing you look for is how to gather more information about the model you like without having to visit the showroom. To solve this dilemma, the NEXA web platform provides the NEXA cars tab in which you can obtain each and every information you need beginning from the features, variants, additional parts, and accessories information. At the tip of your finger, you can gather all the information and place a test drive to check whether the model suits your need or not.

Hospitality: NEXA provides its consumers with a unique buying experience which is not so achievable in a regular retail channel. Target consumers are not mostly first-time buyers and the desire to have something extra in order to retain Maruti Suzuki as their choice. To tap those consumers, NEXA aims at providing a unique hospitality experience that is clear from their tagline: At NEXA, hospitality means listening to you, understanding, and respecting your needs.

How NEXA achieved Brand Success

Maruti Suzuki was spot on in identifying the evolving market in which consumers were looking for customer-centric and personalized experience driven by rising income levels. When they understood the potential, they efficiently set up a content management system which helped them personalize communication to each customer depending on digital signals in the purchase journey.

According to Marketing and Sales Director, Shashank Srivastava, the trick of this success was to ensure the experience of buying is continued with after-sales service and other post-sales connect. In addition to that, Maruti has extensively branded NEXA through initiatives like tie up with Lakme Fashion Week in 2016 and launching NEXA Music in January 2019. NEXA Music, inspired by AR Rahman and other renowned artists, has so far released 29 original English Songs and music videos which garnered over 50 million views on YouTube.

Conclusion

NEXA, which is the third-largest automobile brand in just 5 years is a classic example of how a customer-centric approach can effectively create a premium brand. A platform that started in 2015 now holds 11% of the car market volume and contributes a hefty 20% to Maruti’s Annual volumes, selling over 30,000 units per month even when the automobile sector was going through a downturn lately.

NEXA is the first initiative by a car manufacturer in India in which they tried to sell cars through a new format of retail experience. In these five years NEXA, through its brand associations and unique customer experience has satisfied over 1.1 million customers. The success story of NEXA is a burning example of effective brand creation.