Startup PR case study : Voylla makes PR a partner to build its online jewellery brand

 2nd August 2016    Startup PR 

The PR case study of the month, features Voylla and its brand journey using PR 

Campaign Name: Media Mantra assisting Voylla to emerge as one of the most prominent brands in E-commerce and the fashion industry

Client Name: Voylla, India’s first omni-channel platform which deals in exclusive jewellery and accessories for men, women and kids designed by young and dynamic designers of India.

PR Team: Kanupriya Jain, account manager and Megha Bisht, senior account executive.

When did you start work: 2013

What is the campaign about: The campaign was to successfully build the brand amidst challenges and make it India’s leading online fashion jewellery and accessories brand.

Goals:

To handhold the brand, ensuring continued visibility, success and growth.

To transform the business into a brand.

To make Voylla India’s leading online fashion jewellery and accessories brand by highlighting its prominence among target audience.

Also, to educate media on emerging imitation jewellery segment.

Campaign plan:

To spur business growth through strategic planning and innovative techniques.

To connect with the right audience, underlining Voylla’s story.

To highlight growth and success of the brand, in terms of the business expansion in both, Indian and International markets.

Key Achievements:

With a humble beginning from an office set up at Jaipur in the year 2012 and an initial funding of Rs 20 lacs, the company has grown by leaps and bounds in just 3 years with us:

 

BRAND JOURNEY@MEDIA MANTRA 

Milestones 

2014:

Voylla.com was portrayed as the modern-day woman’s impulse to indulge and look good at all times

Dec 2014: The Jaipur-based startup incorporated in mid-2012 has raised Rs 12.5 crore in funds so far and has a presence across 18 marketplaces online.

2015:

April - precious jewellery is a fast-growing segment in e-commerce, with a jewellery item sold every 20 seconds; company has witnessed a four-fold rise in revenue in the last fiscal from the previous year.

Oct 2015: Funding received by Peepul capital of $15 million.

Announced Kangana Ranaut as the brand ambassador.

Dec 2015: Voylla to invest Rs 25 cr for expansion; open 100 stores; Voylla ropes in retail experts for key leadership roles, goes aggressive on expansion.

Global presence indicating a small but significant aspect with the demand from global market is increasing.

Men are also buying and coming close to women buyers as the order from men are rising.

Have grown 400% year over year.

Witnessed high demand from metros such as Delhi & Bangalore but will soon have a close competition with T2 and T3 cities.

2016:

Voylla.com launches its first fashion jewellery & accessories store in Noida in March; The store offers 6000 plus jewellery designer pieces.

Bloggers meet in Delhi.

May – June - International expansion in United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Already selling products in foreign markets such as the US, Germany and Dubai through different marketplaces, including Jadopado.com, Amazon.com and Ebay.com, said that these markets drive close to 12% of its overall business currently. The aim is to expand this to at least 20% by December 2017.

Voylla has already launched 20 stores, including shop-in-shop outlets and exclusive brand options (EBOs). It plans to take the number to 100 by December 2017 across high streets and malls.

The Jaipur based brand has offline presence in Bengaluru, Delhi-NCR, Pune and Nagpur and has partnered with more than 30 online marketplaces such as Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Jabong, Yepme and Voonik

• Business Impact:

Media Mantra was able to powerfully and continuously elevate business growth and success through all aspects. This was achieved by leveraging multiple PR tools and strategic PR techniques.
 

End Result: Voylla achieved greater visibility across channels. This further helped them to effortlessly harness the power of more and more customers in business. Alongside, this also empowered Voylla to successfully expand from online to offline centers, marking its presence into the international market.

Third party campaign view by  Parul Suri, director operations and lead, Start Up Practice, PR Pundit

"The e-commerce sector has witnessed an immense growth in the last couple of years. Voylla was launched at a time when the e-commerce sector was booming and multi sector platforms were being introduced to use the power of this platform. Voylla provided an opportunity to the consumer to shift away from the traditional way of buying precious jewellery, from the family jeweler, and transact online.

With the multiple rounds of funding coming at the right time, the brand was able to expand its presence across the offline platform as well. This was a breakthrough moment as that led to winning the confidence of the customer who was still evolving from offline shopping, especially when it comes to jewellery buying. 

The 'dual platform' gave the added advantage and helped voylla stand apart in the clutter. Whilst the blogger engagement programme helped generate online buzz, in my opinion the campaign would have got an added thrust if additionally product placement opportunities were also sought. 

The strategy does not reflect how the concept seeding was done to gain acceptance for the platform. 

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