Developers Resort to Clever Branding For Address-Conscious Buyers

Bangalore: Up-market address is always an attraction for potential home buyers. To increase home sales, developers are adopting various new strategies to lure home buyers and branding of attractive addresses is one among them.

Developers are launching projects using names of up-market addresses to attract address-conscious home buyers. For instance, in South Mumbai, Cuffe Parade is one among the posh residential locality in India where per square foot costs around 1 lakh for an apartment. Such apartments in such prime locations are unaffordable for many but cravings to get such addresses are also a dream for home buyers. Therefore, developers are trying smart branding of projects where they are offering homes for 15000 per square feet in New Cuffe Parade. This New Cuffe Parade is not exactly related or adjacent to the original prime location but lying in far-flung location from Mumbai called Wadala, reports Kailash Babar of Economic Times.

However, Lodha Group is coming up with this New Cuffe Parade project where buyers can enjoy the prime address at least on paper.

R Karthik, chief marketing officer, Lodha Group said that "New Cuffe Parade bears a striking resemblance to its roots in Cuffe Parade in terms of size, creator and type of development.” He further added that this project is a "long-term, futuristic product category, a name gives our customers a visual representation of what the development envisions and gives it a unique identity."

Not only developers are associating posh Indian locations with their projects but also international locations are on the list. For example, Napa Valley of California fame that considered as a premier wine regions in the world is now a residential project of Nitesh Group’s in Bellary Road, North Bangalore. Imagery of Central Park has now shifted from Manhattan to Gurgaon and Hyde Park to Khargar, a suburb in Mumbai.

"Customers are not paying a premium just for the project's name, but for imagery, architecture and finishing they expect from such an association. In most cases, the promised theme or lifestyle remains only in the marketing brochures, while execution remains a key concern area," said Samarjit Singh, MD of IndiaHomes, reports Economic Times.

"This is like hiring a great brand ambassador without actually hiring one; the brand name itself is doing that job for you," says Harish Bijoor, Business Strategy Specialist and CEO of Harish Bijoor Consults.