Are Mascots Worth Thousand Words ?

Mascot is ‘a person or animal or thing that is supposed to bring luck to its users.’ Mascot is used by a company as a part of a marketing strategy to interact with the customers or consumers. It is a way to gain more customers by using a mascot as a medium for physical and psychological interaction with them and distinguishes brand by having a marketable character. A mascot helps to brand the company/product and can be used in creating games (flash games, computer games etc.), commercials, advertisements, toys and cartoons. Effective ‘Brand Mascots’ increases awareness, sales and profits whereas ineffective ‘Brand Mascots’ do not amass customers or wealth, yet incur ‘MASS COSTS.’ A strong mascot marketing effort enables to create media exposure and excitement, generate goodwill for the brand, act as an ambassador for the brand by providing a voice for the company's social conscience and provide tie-in identification at point-of-sale (the mascot boldly featured on packaging, in-store merchandising, trucks and T-shirts), and sell products.

For effective development of a character or mascot a company should spend reasonably to develop a professional character that is worthy of the product, contact professional firm to guide through the important development phase. Character development, particularly for mascots, requires a special base of knowledge to make it work successfully as they must have strong identification with the brand and use mascot everywhere from signage to collateral to in-store merchandising to packaging, advertising and events which will enable brand association .Apart from this whenever a company wants to introduce a new mascot they need to identify that whether the present mascot is consistent and helping company to increase sales, the withdrawal of the existing mascot is a good decision and will the new mascot be efficient enough? To answer above questions and decision more accurate one has to fall back model to the model knows as Brand Mascots v/s Brand MASS COST. In this model one needs to compare few things like:

1. Relevance v/s Irrelevance:. If it is a highly industrial category or a highly technical category, it may be prudent to look at other branding means rather than use ‘BRAND MASCOTS.’ This is because the target audience is serious and there is high probability that they may consider mascots frivolous and casual, thereby destroying the rational product story, the technical competence as well as the product efficacy image. While on the other hand in categories like services, FMCG or other consumer products, a ‘Brand Mascot’ may work out to be relevant and effective.

2. Attract versus Distract :If the ‘Brand Mascot’ is able to attract consumers towards the brand, not only in terms of awareness, but also in terms of trials, purchase, consumption and repeat purchases, then the ‘Brand Mascot’ is working. However, if the Brand Mascot distracts from the brand and its products and service usage, then it would just be a Brand Mass Cost. In fact many years ago, 7-up lost its product usage because Fido Dido actually distracted consumers from the product. Consumers bought the concept of Fido-Dido - the ‘Brand Mascot’ and did not buy 7-Up, the brand itself. There is a very thin line between attraction and distraction and must be worked on very carefully.

3. Focus versus Hocus-Pocus :Over a period of time there has been a focus on the Air-India Maharaja. Its consistent usage has definitely helped the Air-India business and created a special identity reflecting the culture and splendor of India and its history. The ‘Brand Mascot’ clearly symbolises that the passenger would be treated like a King. This focus has helped. In some other cases constantly changing brand mascots under the garb of boredom leads to a shallow, inconsistent hocus-pocus thus leading to ineffectiveness.

4. Brand Mainline Versus Brand Sidelined :Everything a ‘Brand Mascot’ stands for should keep the brand in the mainline and mainstream to bring out its core values and benefits. It should not let either the brand or its benefits get sidelined. There was a feeling that Gattu, the ‘Brand Mascot’ of Asian paints had outlived its utility and the brand was brought back in the mainline with Gattu being removed so that the mother brand does not get sidelined. If a choice has to be made between the brand and the brand mascot, it is better that the ‘Brand Mascot’ be sidelined because ultimately the brand is the hero and celebrity, whereas the mascot is only a support.
Thus, as per this model if the four parameters are appropriately evaluated, ‘Brand Mascot’ will work, otherwise it may turn out to be just a ‘Brand Mass Cost.’ After all a mascot is supposed to bring good luck to the user, isn’t it?

Contributed by: Vaibhav Gupta