Fevicol is the ultimate sticky brand. And building this brand took more than just vanilla advertising and there is much to learn from the Fevicol brand story. Vivek Sharma, ?Chief Marketing Officer - ?Pidilite Industries Limited, decoded the #StuckByFevicol strategy at the 10th edition of the Pitch CMO summit held in Mumbai on Friday. The holy grail for all marketers is “creating brands that don’t need to be sold,” said Sharma in his opening remarks about creating sticky brands. Brand Fevicol is one of those brands that doesn’t need to be sold and has high brand loyalty and brand love, that too for a product that historically has very low involvement. “We first need to transform the brand from an adhesive brand to something that is even stickier, through sharp insights and understanding the need gaps,” said Sharma. Fevicol anticipated the needs of its consumers by continuously innovating and creating multiple variants such as water resistant, fast settling, heat resistant and a high-performing adhesive. “The fundamental key to creating a sticky brand is to fulfil a need; it’s all about product innovation,” he said. The second pillar of creating a strong brand is to “always remain focused on your core proposition and build an emotional connection beyond the function of the product,” Sharma noted. Fevicol moved from its core functional promise to an emotional promise through what we love most about the brand: advertising. “Fevicol has built itself by being culturally relevant to the consumer. The core proposition of Fevicol is that it creates unbreakable bonds. Whether it is the physical aspect of this or the emotional, we have never veered away from it,” he said. Pidilite began its advertising journey by first demonstrating the physical strength of glue through the early phase of its communication. This communication then evolved into the metaphor that we today know as ‘Fevicol ka Jod.’ “If a brand has to connect deeply with consumers, it has to take its proposition beyond the physical aspect of what role it plays in the life of a consumer,” Sharma observed. Sharma further added that a brand cannot always live in the metaphorical world of what the product means, but also keep reiterating what it offers. In the most recent ad for Fevicol Marine, the brand brings back the physical aspect of the product after a long gap. And in the ad prior to Fevicol Marine ad, the brand created an emotional connect with the Govinda ad in 2016. All of this has to be “combined with product innovation” and Fevicol demonstrated once again that it can anticipate the needs of its consumers with the latest Fevicol Ezeespray product. He then cautioned that advertising alone does not make a brand. The brand has to continuously engage with its consumers to maintain the strong emotional bond. That’s how Fevicol collaborated with Bollywood to give us the item song “Fevicol Se” from Dabangg 2. Fevicol took its brand positioning further with an on-ground activation where people could truly experience Fevicol ka Jod. Sharma also spoke about the need to have a digital presence to connect with the young consumer of this day and age. He added that the digital presence is lapped up by users and Pidilite hardly spends anything on these digital campaigns. Lastly, Sharma answered the question: Are advertising and product innovation enough to create a sticky brand? “The third pillar of building a brand that is very sticky is to cover the entire value chain. Do not leave anyone, who influences the brand choice, out,” said Sharma speaking about engaging contractors who are a crucial part of the value chain. The Fevicol Champions Club is a loyalty programme that lets contractors connect, receive training, offer the stakeholder reward points and a whole support system for the contractor and their family. And that’s how you build a sticky brand, folks! Watch the session here