S-Group Insights: Rubs & balms have highest ad volume contribution on TV, OTC products range dominates radio & print

exchange4media.com and Strategy Group, the Analytical Arm of TAM Media Research, jointly bring  you a weekly column 'S-Group Insights' on Advertising Trends of different Product Categories. This column will be published every Tuesday and aims to aid advertisers, and media agencies understand changes in Media Consumption patterns leading to Scientific Advertising Investments. In the current column, we take a look at Personal Healthcare as a category which is a part of Healthcare Sector.

Healthcare industry is growing at a tremendous pace owing to its strengthening coverage, services and increasing expenditure by public as well private players. The total industry size is expected to touch $160 billion by 2017 and $280 billion by 2020.

Personal Healthcare as a category contributes 1.85% on TV, 4.27% on Print & 0.74% on Radio in terms of its ad volumes. It has the highest contribution on Print (compared to TV & Radio) due to the fact that 70% of the advertisers rely exclusively on the same.

The ad volume for all the three mediums-TV, Print & Radio is on a growing trend across years expanding the scope with an increase in number of channels, stations & publications(Newspapers & Magazines) used. However, the number of brands advertised has seen a drop on TV & Print across years.

For TV, the category is growing at an average annual growth rate of 13.8%. But being driven by seasonal products, it witnesses a drop in ad volumes during March-May every year.

Top 5 product groups out of 25 (with respect to the average monthly duration) namely Rubs & Balms, Vitamins/tonics/health supplements, OTC Products Range, Cough Lozenges & Digestives contribute to more than 55 % of the total ad duration on TV.

Most of the advertisers use umbrella branding in this category and Proctor & Gamble, with its 5 active Vicks Brands, is the top advertiser with 7.6% contribution to the total ad duration on TV.

It is a very competitive industry in terms of promotions. For example, When P&G introduced Vicks Multi Pain Relief Gel in the market in August’14, other players also started advertising actively in the same period especially Moov Pain Balm, which increased its promotions exponentially to outshout the launch of Vicks Multi Pain Relief Gel.

Heinz, Wipro & Glenmark Phamaceuticals are among the advertisers who have started picking up in the recent years.

The category has been promoted the most on Hindi News, Hindi GEC & Hindi Movies across years. However, the contribution from these genres, which used to be 30% in 2011, has come down to 24% in 2015.

 One major change that requires the attention is that the contribution from south based channels is increasing rapidly and currently stands at 44% of the total duration.

Ayurwin Pharma Pvt. Ltd., which is among the top advertisers on TV is a Karnataka based company and is very much focused on Southern channels where as other non-south based players like Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd have also witnessed an increase on the same over the years.

Moving to the Print medium, Health Stimulants/Ginseng which contributes 3.2 % on TV is heavily promoted on print with 17.4 % share. The top three product groups, namely OTC Products Range, Health Stimulant/ginseng & Vitamins/tonics/health supplements, collectively form around 78% of the total advertisements printed with 42% contribution coming exclusively from OTC Products Range.

SBS Biotech contributes the maximum in ad volumes on Print Medium since 2013 and has further increased the promotions with the introduction of Dr Ortho Range of  Products in 2014. Along with the general promotions, it adopted the co-branding strategy and associated its products with the movies like Action Jackson, Gabbar is Back, Baby, Mr. X & Roy in order to attain more readership for the advertisements.

Dainik Bhaskar has always been on the top of the list across years contributing 12-13% when considered for Personal Healthcare print advertisements. However the contribution for Amar Ujala has increased, making it the top publication used in 2015.

UP & Maharashtra are the most targeted markets for advertisements on Print with 34% contribution in 2015. At one place, where contribution from UP in ad volumes is increasing year on year, it has dropped for Maharashtra. The increase in contribution from UP market is majorly due to an increase in the number of advertisers & brands.

For Radio, OTC Products Range & Vitamins are the top product groups contributing approx. 40% to the total Ad Volumes on Radio. Unlike TV & Print, where contribution from Analgesics is very low, Radio gets a contribution of approx. 16% from the same. However, the ad volumes for analgesics have witnessed a downward trend and is at minimal level in Q3’15.

Jagdale Industries (Analgesics), which was a heavy advertiser, has put a stop post June’15 and hence the category has witnessed a huge dip. Under Rubs & Balms, Voltaren Emulgel from Novartis India Ltd is the only brand being advertised heavily throughout in 2015 where as Volini Gel which was using Radio as its primary medium for promotions in 2014, has reduced the ad duration in the recent phase.

 Radio Mirchi & Red FM are the top contributing stations with more than 50% share in 2015 among all the players. Approx. 62% of ad duration is given to stations based in metros and among the states Maharashtra, UP & West Bengal hold 43.7% share of the total Personal Healthcare advertisement duration on Radio.

With the changes happening across mediums, it would be interesting to see what happens next. Is it the south market that will soon be taking over HSM markets or we would get to see more changes happening in the recent times.      

Data Sources: TAM AdEx ,IBEF Report(Aug’15)

Period: Jan’11 to Jun’15(TV & Print) & Jan’14 to Sep’15(Radio)

Source: TAM Media Research, analysis conducted by S group, an analytical arm of TAM Media Research

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