Analyzed by: Risvico
Advertisement as one of marketing strategies plays a very important role in an attempt to persuade and influence consumers to buy a product. One of Japanese big motorcycle companies, Yamaha, has applied this strategy to counter and oppose its competitors’ products like Honda, Suzuki, and Kawasaki.
To support the advertisements, Yamaha has done many innovations in the motorcycle marketing world. Yamaha has also successfully built a branding image to consumers in every advertisement by involving high class actors like Dedy Mizwar, Didi Petet, and Komeng.
From the advertisements, I am interested in analyzing what is behind the “SELALU TERDEPAN” Yamaha slogan.
At first, Yamaha creates spectacular ads to promote one of its products. The spectacular achievement can be seen from the increasing sale of Yamaha in 2006 up to 28% compared to the decreasing rate of Motor Cycle demands which was 24% (http://www.swa.co.id/swamajalah/tren/details.php?cid=1&id=4885) and the increasing of sales growth up to 40.1% (SWA magazine, 08th edition, 20 April 2006). Also due to the ads, in March 2007, the sales increase of Yamaha nationally already defeated Honda. In this month, Yamaha was able to sell 159,035 units or covered 43.7% of market segment while Honda reached only 151,074 units or covered 41.5% of market segment (http://www.radarbanten.com/mod.php?mod=publisher&op=printarticle&artid=11835). Moreover when Yamaha introduced and launched Jupiter products (Jupiter, Jupiter Z, and Jupiter MX). In their debut, they are very successful to be the fastest motorcycles in their class.
Please, pay attention to Komeng in one of the Yamaha ads. His shirt is in rags due to he is driving Jupiter motorcycle too fast. Besides that, it also causes the area he is passing by messy. At the end of the ad, Komeng is shown flying over Jupiter MX while steering it and it causes the bridge ruined and fell down.
Marketing method like this is usually called as Gimmick Marketing, or in Indonesian means “Tipuan Pemasaran”. Is it allowed for everyone to ride on motorcycle as fast as that? Of course not. It is too exaggerated to offer services or products like that. That is the picture of marketing world. There is no care whether the ads are cheating. The most important thing is how to be able to reach the company’s goal as efficient and effective as possible.
In this case, Yamaha only tries to draw consumers’ attention that Jupiter is a very fast motorcycle and it really touches the consumers’ heart.
Now, take a look at the following Yamaha Jupiter ad:
Didi Petet : “Nih, ue kemenakan saya… Tuh Joko beli Jupiter jet yang baru!”
Ue : “Ko’ beli Yamaha? Kenapa gak beli yang… irit-irit itu?”
Komeng : “Yee… jaman sekarang, semua nyaris sama irit!”
Dedi Mizwar : “Betul, kan semua merek pake mesin 4 tak”.
Komeng : “Dan onderdil Yamaha, lebih murrah…!”
Ue : “Ooo... Kalo gitu lebih baik beli Yamaha!”
Didi Petet : “Betul!”
Didi Mizwar : “Ahhh mantan kemenakan…”
Komeng : “Asal Yamaha…yang lain pasti ketinggalan”.
From the above ad, Yamaha tries to emphasize that Yamaha is not lost its thrifty with its competitors as allusioned. Each competitor has its own slogan like “si gesit irit” form Suzuki New Smass and “sepeda motor paling irit” from Honda.
Then Komeng says “Semua nyaris sama irit”. It means that fuel consumed by Yamaha motorcycle is as economical as the other four-stroke engines motorcycles produced by its competitors. From the Komeng’s sentence, Yamaha just wanna stress again its concern mainly on the innovations, not on the economical side of fuel consumption.
Besides that, Yamaha in its advertisement shows the other advantages of using its product. First is the cheap price of Yamaha spare parts, the second is derived from the expression of “Asal Yamaha… yang lain pasti ketinggalan” which means that Jupiter Z is the fastest and the others are left far behind, and the third is about the more powerful first starter of Yamaha motorcycle.
Now, please notice the following “Vega R” ad:
Dedy Mizwar : ”He…mana Vega R baru yang 110 cc”.
Joko : ”Belum Om, Bapak mau yang irit…irit…irit itu!
Dedy Mizwar : ”Yaaa ketinggalan jaman!. Kan semua merek sudah 4 tak, iritnya nyaris
sama!”
Joko : ”Oh sama? Irit semua? Tapi harga jual kembalinya?”
Dedy Mizwar : ”Justru Yamaha paling tinggi. Bebek lain, aaah...
Makanya beli Vega R! Irit, bandel dan berkualitas!”… … …
Dedi Mizwar : “Vega R menjawab segala impian”
The expression of “Kan semua merek sudah 4 tak, iritnya nyaris sama!” shows that Yamaha once again tries to emphasize that Yamaha 4-stroke engine motorcycle is at the same position as its competitors.
The other strategy of Yamaha to meet its consumers’ needs is by taking sales price as a priority. The expression of “Justru Yamaha paling tinggi. Bebek lain, aaah…” means that Yamaha is the highest motorcycle in class. While the expression of “Irit, bandel, dan berkualitas!” can create an impression that Yamaha’s product is an economical one. Yamaha does understand the economic situation occurs at the moment and tries to remind that the world oil price is increasing. From the expression, Yamaha also wants to grab it consumers’ attention to choose products with economical value and helps realize its consumers’ need (based on the last expression “Vega R menjawab segala impian”.
From the battle of ad, Yamaha has approved to be the leader. Here are some comparisons between Yamaha and its number one competitor “Honda”:
- Vario vs Mio, Vario’s price is Rp 13,15 millions while Mio is Rp. 10.8 millions
- Vario CW vs Mio Sporty, Vario CW sold by Rp 14.15 millions while Mio Sporty Rp 11.58 millions
- Honda Tiger vs Yamaha Scorpio, Honda Tiger sold by Rp. 20.4 millions while Yamaha Scorpio Rp. 19.38 millions
- Supra Fit vs Vega R, Supra Fit sold by Rp. 11.4 millions while Vega R Rp. 11.2 millions
- Supra X 125R vs Jupiter Z, Supra X 125R sold by Rp. 15.4 millions while Jupiter Z Rp. 13.8 millions.
To make its “SELALU TERDEPAN” slogan which is now changed into “SEMAKIN DI DEPAN” come true, Yamaha has two good ad jingles created by a very famous musician from “DEWA” band group entitled “SELALU TERDEPAN” and “SEMAKIN DI DEPAN”. The two jingles are always used in every moments Yamaha taken when promoting Yamaha products and when having activities to build the unity among Yamaha riders and clubs. Why does Yamaha make partner with the DEWA musician (Ahmad Dhani)? It is because Yamaha targets consumers from the youngsters and it is a very strategic choice. Here are the lyrics of them:
SELALU TERDEPAN
Music & Lyric: Ahmad Dhani
Melintasi waktu demi waktu
Menjalani hari demi hari
Untuk terus SELALU TERDEPAN
#Reff:
Melintasi waktu demi waktu
Untuk terus SELALU TERDEPAN
Menjalani hari demi hari
Untuk terus SELALU TERDEPAN
SEMAKIN DIDEPAN
Music & Lyric: Ahmad Dhani
Bila kita terus rapatkan barisan
Dan tetap terus bergandengan tangan
Tentu kita SEMAKIN DI DEPAN
#Reff:
Langkah-langkah yang telah tertempuh
Melesatkan kita ke tujuan
Waktu-waktu terus buktikan
Cuma kita yang SEMAKIN DI DEPAN
The two ad’s jingles used by Yamaha are mainly as triggers to motivate its team work to be more creative, innovative, and solid to reach the company’s goal to be the first. The Reff of the second jingle shows to the Yamaha team work and consumers that Yamaha’s marketing strategy has succeeded in realizing and smoothing its dream. By doing so, Yamaha also tries hard to more deeply position its brand image to not only its loyal consumers but also other potential consumers.
From the above analysis, the answers behind the “SELALU DI DEPAN” (always goes a step ahead) and “SEMAKIN DI DEPAN” (gets a step more ahead) slogans are that Yamaha has strengths as follows:
1. Ability to competitively position its products among other 4-stroke engine motorcycle, economical, high speed, and cheap in price
2. Its bravery to launch new various models so that consumers have many alternatives to choose and products based on their taste and ability to buy
3. Its continual innovation (inovasi tiada henti) in every products, especially Yamaha Jupiter that has been known as the fastest motorcycle
4. Its cheaper spare parts compared to its competitors (Honda, Suzuki, or Kawasaki)
5. Its ambition to give the best service to consumers, especially offering warranty of higher after sales price compared to its competitors.
Recommendation:
1. If Honda is too late to anticipate Yamaha’s marketing strategies to be the first and to create different product innovations against its competitors, especially its first rival Yamaha, Honda will soon loose its loyal consumers; and if it happens, Honda will be hard to increase its sales and to re-attract its loyal consumers. These will increase not only the operational expenses to spend but also much time to take.
2. In creating innovations, it will be more strategic if Honda will not be influenced by its competitors’ marketing strategy maneuvers, but concentrate more on its specialties.
