Brand Growth and Development

Attribution is overrated. Incrementality is what actually matters Every new-age brand wants to know what’s working. Meta ROAS is looking good. CAC is steady. Revenue is growing But here’s the truth: Your Meta ad might get the conversion. But did it cause the conversion? That’s the difference between attribution and incrementality. Most dashboards, attribution tools, and agency reports stop at attribution. But if you’re a brand selling across Amazon, Flipkart, GT, MT, Q-com, and D2C—pure attribution will always lie to you Because the sale might happen on Amazon. But it might have been nudged by a Meta video or a YouTube bumper ad 4 days ago. You don’t need a full-blown Marketing Mix Model to get started. There are simpler, street-smart ways to directionally understand what’s working—and what’s not. Here are 4 that have worked for us at Atomberg: 1. Geo Split Testing Pick two similar markets. Run campaigns in one. Don’t run in the other. Then track: • Branded search volume • Sell-through on marketplaces • Secondary sales from GT counters If the test market moves faster than the control, you’re seeing true lift. That’s incrementality. 2. First-Time Buyer Growth vs Returning Buyer Growth Track whether your growth is coming from first-time buyers or repeats. If your campaigns are just bringing back old customers—you’re not creating net new demand. But if there’s a spike in new buyers across Amazon, Flipkart, D2C—your campaigns are likely working at an incremental level 3. Paid Traffic vs Organic Trend Lines If paid traffic, clicks and spends are going up—but your organic sales or branded search isn’t moving—you’re likely just harvesting demand that already existed. But if organic lifts alongside paid—your ads are creating interest. Not just closing it. Directionally, this is one of the simplest sanity checks most teams ignore. 4. Channel Crossover + Offline Signal Mapping Your Meta ad may not show up in last-click attribution. But it might have nudged the consumer to visit your store or buy on Amazon. You can detect this through: • Post-purchase surveys (Where did you first hear about us?) • Branded search + store footfall spikes in campaign-active cities • And most powerfully—offline signals passed back to Meta At Atomberg, we pass back data from installations and warranty registrations—including pincode and purchase timelines Sometimes, we’re even able to identify this at a unique customer level through their cookies for warranty registration This has helped us understand true incrementality of perf marketing campaigns even for offline sales If you’re only measuring ROAS, you might scale what’s only taking credit for sale about to happen anyway If you chase incrementality, you’ll scale what’s working. For more details, read the full post- link in first comment.

For years, the biggest players in CPG and FMCG—Unilever, Nestlé, Kraft Heinz—built their empires on food. But now? They’re making a massive pivot..if you had told me 5 years ago that these brands would be pulling back from food, I would’ve raised an eyebrow. -Unilever is cutting loose its $8 billion ice cream division, choosing to focus on higher-margin beauty and wellness. -Nestlé is doubling down on health-science-based nutrition as food brands struggle with pricing power. - #CPG giants are seeing stronger growth in self-care, supplements, and skincare than in traditional food categories. The global personal care market is expected to hit $758 billion by 2030, while processed food growth slows. Why This Shift? 1. Margins in food are shrinking. Consumers are trading down, private labels are winning, and inflation-wary shoppers aren’t absorbing cost hikes like they used to. 2. Health & wellness are driving premiumization. Customers will pay more for skincare, supplements, and functional beverages—but not for basic pantry staples. 3. Brand loyalty in food is eroding. Over 50% of consumers are comfortable switching food brands based on price, but loyalty remains strong in beauty, healthcare, and wellness. Winning Brands Are Already Moving: -L'Oréal’s skincare division posted 9.1% revenue growth last year, while traditional CPG food brands saw single-digit declines. -The Coca-Cola Company is investing in functional drinks and non-carbonated wellness categories to stay relevant. -PepsiCo’s biggest success? Gatorade’s expansion into hydration and performance-based drinks, not soda. CPG Leaders: ✅ Stop thinking of food as the core driver of growth. Instead, align with evolving consumer behavior. ✅ Invest in personalization, self-care, and functional health. That’s where demand (and pricing power) is strongest. ✅ Rethink your brand mix. Is your portfolio weighted toward categories that will still be relevant in 5-10 years? So, here’s my question to FMCG execs: Are you future-proofing your brand strategy—or just managing decline? Let’s talk. #FMCG #CPG #ConsumerTrends #GrowthStrategy #Beauty #Wellness #RevenueShift #BrandEvolution "

Neither an IIT nor an IIM degree, still, this guy made Rs 10,000 crores business by selling deo. 👉 Born in Ahmedabad and raised in Sambalpur, Odisha, Darshan's story is a testament to hard work, resilience, and an unshakeable entrepreneurial spirit. 👉 With no formal business education, Darshan, alongside his brothers, co-founded Paras Group, which eventually led to the success of Paras Pharmaceuticals—one of India’s leading pharmaceutical companies. They introduced iconic products like Moov, Krack, and Dermi Cool. 👉 In 2010, Darshan made headlines by selling Paras Pharmaceuticals for an incredible ₹3,260 crore. But rather than resting on his laurels, his entrepreneurial hunger only grew stronger. 👉 Darshan took a bold step into the fragrance industry with the launch of the 18 Plus perfume brand. Although it failed due to fierce competition, Darshan didn’t give up. He identified an opportunity to innovate the deodorant market. 👉 He realized that while the market had plenty of deodorants, none combined affordability and long-lasting quality. And so, Fogg was born—"No Gas, Only Spray". 👉 Fogg’s success story began in December 2011 when Vini Cosmetics was founded. Positioned as a revolutionary product with 800 sprays per 100g bottle, Fogg became an instant hit. It not only broke free from traditional gas-based deodorants but quickly became a household name. Marketing Innovation: Fogg’s success wasn’t just about the product. It was about strategy. By identifying a niche in gas-free sprays, Fogg stood out in a crowded market. Word-of-mouth marketing played a crucial role, with satisfied customers becoming the brand’s strongest promoters. The iconic “Kya Chal Raha Hai” campaign resonated with middle-class consumers, reinforcing Fogg’s message of long-lasting quality at an affordable price. 👉Strategic distribution made Fogg available everywhere—from retail stores to online platforms. 👉 Fogg’s affordable pricing (₹160-₹300) helped it dominate the market, competing with premium brands like Axe and Nivea that were priced much higher. 👉 In 2021, KKR, a global private equity firm, acquired a 55% controlling stake in Vini Cosmetics for $750 million and total valuation Rs 10,000 crore  Despite the acquisition, Darshan remains involved as the Chairman, ensuring the company's growth and expansion into global markets. Today, Vini Cosmetics is present in 50 countries, and with KKR’s backing, it’s poised for even bigger global success. 👉 Darshan Patel’s journey proves that success doesn’t come from degrees or privilege. It comes from identifying opportunities, taking risks, and staying determined. His legacy lives on not just in the brands he’s built, but in his commitment to empowering others and giving back to society.

The shift from seats to agents pressures SaaS margins. At the same time, the longstanding practice of getting enterprise customers to pre-commit and also prepay for functionality they may never deploy will get harder as CIOs look to free budget for their own LLM costs. To weather the storm, some SaaS companies have increased prices. This boosts revenue and margins in the short-term but can't be done repeatedly and creates even greater scrutiny over shelfware as procurement teams right-size and shift contracts to "pay as you go." To achieve sustainable growth, SaaS companies need to become hyperefficient at sales and marketing. Here are common ways to do so and who's doing it well: 1. PLG. Shopify and Atlassian exemplify efficient go-to-market based on product-led growth with free trials, low-friction upgrades and upsells. Their sales teams only need to get involved in the biggest opportunities at the largest accounts; every other step in acquisition, commercial transaction, activation, onboarding, and growth is self-service and automated. 2. Vertical SaaS. Guidewire Software and Veeva Systems are laser-focused on insurance and life sciences, respectively. Rather than casting a wide net, they spear-fish with deep domain knowledge and purpose-built solutions for that industry's specific workflows and regulatory requirements. Guidewire doesn't need to buy Super Bowl ads– their annual customer conference is the Super Bowl for property & casualty insurance executives. Nearly zero GTM effort is wasted– unsurprisingly they're the two most efficient on the list. We modeled Hearsay Systems after both these companies, and this focus allowed us to win incredible market share among Fortune 500 banks & insurers despite only raising $60M in totality. 3. Relocate operations to lower-cost regions and AI. This is private equity's favorite playbook to take costs out of companies they buy. Field sales continues to shift more to Zoom, which means you can hire AEs anywhere. Inside sales contributes a greater % of revenue as PLG motions are established. AI handles top-of-funnel leads qualification and generating marketing content and campaigns. 4. Focus on gross revenue retention. Because of high customer acquisition costs in #SaaS, leaky buckets are margin killers. Use LLMs to help customer success teams analyze product usage, segment cohorts, and identify opportunities to increase value realization. Put in guardrails to prevent sales reps from overselling an account, as doing so only creates churn in the next renewal cycle. 5. Introduce another product line. This only works if your new product has the same buyer as your existing products. Many SaaS acquisition pro formas fail to actualize for this reason, as it's not actually feasible to have the same AE sell both old and new products. Every SaaS company right now needs to double down on one or more of these levers in the AI era.

How modern brands grow Lessons from marketing science I just had the pleasure of watching Magda Nenycz-Thiel from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute present to a room full of marketers. Magda shared some of the key principles of marketing science and how to apply them practically. I was scribbling down notes. Here's the takeaways: 1. Marketing science is about increasing the likelihood of success; it's not about guaranteed outcomes. This was the biggest lesson for me. Knowing the "laws" and principles, this frees up your team from arguing about that logo change, or whether you now need to target a new segment, to getting on with the work that matters. 2. Penetration. It wouldn't be an EBI presentation without the Double Jeopardy law. The fact that most things are actually an outcome of your market share (inc. loyalty) and the key driver of market share is new light buyers as most customers for all brands only purchase once or twice. If penetration is the metric, reach is the strategy. 3. Value creation. A great reminder, and you can spot senior marketers at FMCGs who focus on this. 3 ways to increase the value of your business. Share gains, category expansion, or acquisition. The bigger your brand gets, the more growth must come from growing the category, not stealing share. Good strategy needs to be about expanding occasions and growing the pie, not just fighting for a larger piece. 4. Earn growth, don't just snack on market share. Earning long-term market share (not just discounting to steal share) is far more valuable. Improved advertising to increase mental availability, route to market innovation, innovate to create true customer value, and expand the quality or quantity of distribution. This is the hard stuff we must focus on. 5. Creativity. I was rather surprised at the focus on creativity. How consistency, emotion, and distinctive brand assets use are key drivers of proper long-term growth and often the fastest and easiest way to earn share. Also, EBI research showing that getting enough attention is also important. There was then a bit of a debate about challenger brands, and how to apply these principles to small brands when budgets are limited and "reach reach reach" simply can't happen. There's still more to learn in this area, and perceived difference must play a role. However, I accept that most brands asking "are we different" is a daft way of measuring that. Magda Nenycz-Thiel, a real pleasure meeting you. Loved hearing your stories from two decades of marketing science. If anyone's new to marketing science, recommend reading "How Brands Grow" as a good place to start! I share #advertising and #marketing insights daily, follow for more.

Contrarian view: India is not a 1.4B population market. The real TAM for D2C brands is only 130M – <10%. This is the India with actual consuming power – roughly the size of Mexico. The remaining billion are focused on necessities, with almost nothing left to spare. Beyond being a socioeconomic observation, it's a blind spot. When we estimate scale possibility and real market size for our brands – these are the real numbers. Why do brands get stuck at 50–70 Cr scale in a country of 1.4B+? I guess this is the answer. Look at how middle-class India is actually living today: → The middle 50% of taxpayers have seen their real income halve over the past decade when adjusted for inflation → Household financial savings are at a 50-year low according to RBI → The wealth gap is widening dramatically — the top 10% now control 57.7% of national income (up from 34% in 1990) It's a tale of two Indias: one buying Coldplay tickets and iPhone 15 Pros, the other counting every rupee at a kirana store. So yes, the biggest opportunities are in mass-scale products. Think Amul (₹55,000 Cr), Parle G (the world’s largest-selling biscuit), and Jio. So, is there no opportunity in premium India? 130M Indians or 30M households is also large. But one needs to be fully aware that this is the size of this segment when building. Will a premium women’s handbag do ₹2000 Cr in sales? My view: No. It won’t have 1000s of crores in sales or unicorn valuations. But they will build value and profit. So, the typical tech investing lens may not be the right way to invest in these businesses. Enter early, look for a higher rate of success, and underwrite realistic outcomes (USD 100M or below). What do you think of the premium consumer opportunity in India? #India #Consumption #Entrepreneurship

The financial case for brand strategy: Why CFOs should care. Branding isn’t just about looking good.* It drives real financial impact (* if done strategically) Yet, many companies still see it as a cost rather than an asset that increases enterprise value, reduces waste, and boosts profitability. Here’s what most businesses get wrong: - They see branding as expense, not an investment. - They focus on short-term lead generation over long-term equity. - They underestimate how much a strong brand lowers acquisition costs, improves pricing, reduces churn and attracts talent. Here’s how: 01 - Brand Strategy Increases Market Value: Brands are intangible, but they drive real financial value. Today, 80–85% of the S&P 500’s market value comes from intangibles like brand equity. Corporate reputation alone is worth $16 trillion globally. Companies with strong brands deliver 2× higher shareholder returns over 20 years than the MSCI World Index. Why? A strong brand builds trust, reduces risk, and increases pricing, partnerships, and M&A leverage. 02 - A Strong Brand Lowers Marketing Costs: Weak brands must pay to be noticed, they have to keep buying attention…spending millions on ads and lead gen. Strong brands generate attention. Tesla, for example, spends $0 on traditional ads, while competitors spend $495 per vehicle sold. Tesla’s brand, combined with a touch of Elon, drives WOM, earned media, and loyalty...saving hundreds of millions in marketing costs. (And yes, I know it works both ways, for better or worse) 03 - Branding Improves Profit Margins & Pricing Power: A strong brand lets you charge premium prices and avoid price wars. Apple sells iPhones at 40%+ gross margins, while competitors struggle, even with similar hardware. Why? Customers aren’t just buying a product, they’re buying into a brand. Data shows: - Consumers pay 11% more for trusted brands. - Brand-loyal customers pay 38% more, even price-sensitive ones pay 14% more. - Without strong branding, companies must compete on price alone. 04 - Strong Brands Retain Customers Longer: Retention is one of the biggest profitability drivers. It costs 5× more to acquire a new customer than to retain one. A 5% increase in retention boosts profits by 25–95%. Brand loyalty reduces churn, increases lifetime value, and creates repeat buyers without ads spend. 05 - Resilient Brands Outperform in Crises: In downturns, weak brands suffer revenue losses and resort to discounting. Strong brands hold their value & recover faster. During 2020, while most businesses struggled, the top 100 most valuable brands grew by +5.9%. A well-built brand acts as financial insulation, stabilising revenue. The Hard Truth: A strong brand isn’t a luxury, it’s a financial strategy. If your CFO still sees branding as a cost center, send them this. Sources: McKinsey, Interbrand, BrandZ, Bain & Company, Nielsen, Kantar, Invesp, Unilever, Tesla, industry reports on brand valuation, CAC, and shareholder returns.

If you ever visit Bali, you'll notice a flood of Polo Ralph Lauren stores... All selling Polo apparel at almost 60% off the retail price... And despite the on point branding of the stores, they're all fake - not the original Polo Ralph Lauren... And this is because in the late 1970s, an Indonesian man trademarked the brand name, colours and logo in Indonesia, much before the American company decided to enter into that market. So all the stores can legally operate under the Ralph Lauren name and with the logo, but are not owned by the original American company we know of. Plus, the original brand cannot sell its products in Indonesia. And so that the same thing doesn't happen with your brand anywhere around the world... you must take these steps while registering your trademark... 1/ After registration of your trademark at the Indian Trademark Office (ITO), within six months file for a global trademark that is valid in 130 countries through a WIPO application which happens from the ITO itself In certain countries like China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Japan - also make a separate filing independent of the WIPO application - as these countries have a first-to-file method, which means if someone else files before you, they get the right even if you have been using the brand for longer 2/ To increase defensibility, also register variations of your trademark in other languages such as Chinese, Arabic - as well as trademark common misspellings of your name 3/ Consider getting a trademark not just in the same category in which you currently operate, but allied categories where you may operate in the future as well - for example, an apparel brand may want to enter bags, shoes, or even cosmetics, watches and sunglasses later. These days, even as small D2C brands begin to sell online and start getting orders from NRIs outside of India - it becomes important to protect your brand not just in your country of origin, but even elsewhere. #casarthakahuja

CFO: What’s a good ROAS target for 2025? CMO: The lower, the better. CFO: That doesn’t make sense. Why would we aim for lower ROAS? Isn’t that the opposite of what we’re trying to do? CMO: Not at all. ROAS obsession is where so many brands get it wrong. By focusing on short-term returns, they build a growth model that depends entirely on spending money to acquire customers. And that’s not sustainable. CFO: But don’t we need to acquire customers? Isn’t that the goal? CMO: Yes, but the goal shouldn’t be to constantly buy customers through paid ads. The real objective is to build a brand so powerful and resonant that people come directly to us when they’re ready to buy. No ads, no promotions—just a deep emotional connection to our brand that puts us top of mind. CFO: That sounds great in theory, but doesn’t building that connection mean spending more with lower returns? CMO: It does in the short term. Here’s the deal: at any given time, only about 5% of your audience is actively shopping for what we sell. For that 5%, ads focused on product, price, and promotion perform well. But for the other 95%? Those ads don’t resonate because they’re not in-market. That’s where branding comes in. CFO: And branding means advertising to the 95% who aren’t ready to buy? CMO: Exactly. The downside is that this effort will show lower ROAS because it’s not driving immediate conversions. But here’s the fantastic news—reaching that 95% is astronomically cheaper because they aren’t being bid on by every competitor in the category. CFO: So what’s the benefit of reaching them when they’re not shopping? CMO: When they’re not in-market, they’re less focused on rational factors like price and features. That’s the perfect time to build an emotional connection. If you connect with them then, by the time they’re in the 5%, they already know, trust, and want your brand. They don’t even shop around. CFO: You’re saying this makes us harder to compete with? CMO: Exactly. Competitors can match our price, promotions, and even features. But they can’t replicate our brand. A strong brand creates a value proposition that draws customers directly to us, bypassing the whole ad ecosystem entirely. CFO: So what’s the long-term play here? CMO: By focusing on branding and building this connection with the 95%, we’re creating future-proof growth. It’s not about immediate ROAS—it’s about turning our audience into loyal customers who seek us out on their own. That’s how we reduce dependency on paid acquisition and build a scalable, profitable business. CFO: Alright, I’m starting to see the bigger picture. Let’s talk about how we balance the short and long term in the budget. And next time, lead with this when you say “lower ROAS.” CMO: I like to get you all worked up sometimes. Lets me know I’m truly alive.

Deepika has 80 million followers, but her brand lost ₹25 crores. Kriti has only 58 million followers, yet built ₹100 crore in 12 months. Let's decode what separated them. Working in retail for two decades, I've seen countless celebrity ventures launch with fanfare and fail silently. After analyzing brands by Deepika, Virat, Hrithik, Katrina, Kriti, Ranveer, Kusha, and Vimarsh Razdan, I found that celebrity power alone doesn't guarantee success. The brands that failed made these 3 critical mistakes: 📍 No authentic backstory: WROGN positioned itself as "buy Virat's style" without any transformation story. Just a cricket star's name on expensive clothes, hoping fans would pay a premium. 📍 Wrong pricing for wrong audience: 82°E priced serums at ₹2,700-3,900 - too expensive for everyday buyers, yet lacking prestige to justify premium pricing. 📍 Treated it as endorsement, not business: Brands like 82°E treated ventures as extended endorsement deals. Just name licensing, hoping celebrity power would drive sales. Now, why some celebrity brands are thriving: ✅ Solved real problems: underneat.in hit ₹4.5 crore in just 100 days after interviewing 12,000 women about their shapewear needs. They created products for Indian bodies and climate, not Western ideals. ✅ Addressed genuine gaps: SuperYou sold 1.6 million protein bars in 90 days by addressing real nutritional gaps, not just adding celebrity faces. ✅ Founder involvement matters: Kriti became HYPHEN's first tester with midnight feedback sessions and personal ingredient research. Result? ₹100 crore in year one. ✅ Built authentic movements: HRX by Hrithik Roshan crossed ₹1000 crore because Hrithik's fitness transformation was genuine. The #KeepGoing campaign turned customers into a community. The lesson? Celebrity status opens doors but doesn't guarantee success. Authenticity, right pricing, and genuine involvement separate successful brands from failures. Which celebrity brand surprised you the most?