With it’s rich cultural heritage and stunning landscape, India is better known for it’s booming tourist industry, than for the manufacture of motor vehicles for export. But CEO of TMI Pacific, Claire Tynan (pictured) would like to change all that. Recently Claire spoke to Australian Women Online about the challenges of launching the new Mahindra Pik-Up from India on the mature Australian car market.
Claire Tynan is the daughter of Michael Tynan of Tynan Motors, one of the largest motoring families in NSW and now nationally. The family was listed 74th on the BRW Rich list, their company has over 300 employees and they reported a $557 million turnover in the 2007 financial year. But whilst growing up amongst car buffs and as a part of one of Australia’s most prominent motoring families hasn’t hurt her career prospects, Claire has spent most of her career working outside the family business, holding marketing and management positions in companies such as, Video Ezy and Esprit.
Claire told Australian Women Online, “I went out and built my own career. I did a commerce degree so I majored in marketing and management and I have held marketing and management positions for most of my career. And then the opportunity came up to have a look at this particular project to see if it was something the [Tynan] motor group would be interested in investing in.”
“Before we signed on the dotted line, we actually imported at our own cost twenty-five Mahindra Pik-Ups and put twenty of them out to different country people and basically said to them, ‘do your worst’ and come back to us. We had focused groups and surveys to get their feedback to try and figure out if we wanted to put our name to it.”
Claire says those who tested the vehicles put the pick-ups through the most vigorous testing imaginable. “They were doing things they wouldn’t do in their own Toyotas, Nissans and Holdens and they lent the vehicles to other people they knew as well.”
Although it is subsidiary of the Tynan Motor Group, TMI Pacific is very much Claire Tynan’s baby. Since 2006, she has spent hundreds of hours on airplanes flying to and from India, a country she now loves, to introduce the Mahindra Pik-Up to the Australian car market.
When speaking to Claire Tynan her passion for the product and the Mahindra brand is obvious.
“Trying to pioneer a new brand into a mature market – if you’re not passionate – forget it,” said Claire. “You can have every qualification and every good intention in the world, but if you really don’t care about what you’re doing, it’s just too hard.”
One of the biggest challenges Claire Tynan and TMI Pacific had to face when introducing the Mahindra Pik-Up to the Australian market was the perception held by many Australians that India is a third world country.
Claire explains, “You could say that India is a sleeping giant. They’ve been a closed economy and it’s interesting from the perspective that a lot of people have in Australia, that they are a third world country. But they’re not, India is a developing country and there is a major difference between the two.”
“What’s also interesting about India is that they are now becoming so highly educated and the fact that they’re a democracy, you can work with them on almost an even keel. They call it the “New India”.
So right from the start, Claire realised that educating the market was going to be crucial in any advertising campaign for the Mahindra Pik-Up.
“The Australian market are so discerning and because the product is from India, a lot of our marketing campaign has been education. So we’ve used a lot more text than a traditional marketing campaign would use and what we’ve tried to do is use customer advocacy. When you’re introducing a new brand into a mature market, you only really attract early adopters and the early adopters that we have are fabulous brand advocates. They are very happy to offer testimonials and realistically, that has to be part of the selling tactic.”
“But we’ve also courted the media and tried to make sure that the media are always aware of what we’re doing. We’ve made the product extremely available for any type of test drive and put it under any extreme conditions they can think of, to the point where some media have submerged the vehicle.”
Claire added, “Our aim has been to be truthful in our advertising, using titles on our print ads such as ‘rugged and reliable’ and ‘strong and tough’, with the by-line “Pik-Up – Built with Purpose” so as to convey the fit-for-purpose workhorse attributes of this vehicle. We have not claimed unrealistic attributes, nor have we claimed any competitor superiorities – we have just been honest, educational and clear in our messages.”
So no big glossy print advertisements or TV advertising. Although when you consider Mahindra’s target audience, ‘rurals’ and ‘tradies’, it is not all that surprising. “They’re a no bullshit type of customer and they will not accept untruths in advertising, they will instantly dismiss it.”
Claire Tynan says other models will follow the launch of the Mahindra Pik-Up on to the Australian market. “Within the Mahindra brand we’ll obviously look to bring out other different models of vehicles and that will be the SUV and the MPV, in the next 12 months.”
For more information on TMI Pacific and the Mahindra Pik-Up visit the website www.mahindrapikup.com.au