Train ticket not confirmed? We’ll pay for your flight – and other offers as marketeers face less spending

In a period of high inflation and low consumption, companies are resorting to innovative marketing techniques to make customers spend more. Albeit, by giving offers that give the impression of a good deal. And who doesn’t know that Indians love a good deal?

The period running from Navaratras peaking with Diwali and then trundling into the Christmas-New Year party season is the peak business season for most consumer-facing companies in India, and the sales graph of anything from cars and bikes to electronics and home appliances stands testament to that. With that ‘high season’ not yet delivering the kind of business India Inc might have hoped for – some businesses notch up as much as half their yearly targets during this three-month period, innovative marketing models are being tried by many.

In the booming domestic travel scene, ixigo hopes to rework the rules of the game with its 'Travel Guarantee' scheme announced this weekend. The proposition is simple – pay a nominal fee (starting at 49 rupees and going up depending on the train) to take this offer, and the travel site will ensure you travel – even if your waitlisted booking doesn’t get confirmed once the railway chart is prepared. How? Those on ‘Travel Guarantee' will get the full fare credited back via original mode of payment and will get double that fare as 'Travel Guarantee' coupon, which they can redeem for a flight, train or bus booking on the site.

“This...empowers travellers to rebook their journey through alternate travel options without having to worry about last-minute fare hikes,” said Dinesh Kumar Kotha, CEO of ixigo Trains, “With this initiative, we aim to make train travel more reliable, convenient and worry-free for everyone.”

The strategy is simple: by assuring surety of travel, the travel booking site hopes to attract more travellers on trains where tickets not getting confirmed is a constant reality, especially during the peak season like the ongoing Christmas-New Year period. Not only is the signing up amount a tidy revenue, the offer of double the train fare is not issued to the traveller directly, but as a coupon which is redeemable only on the ixigo site.

This would mean if the passenger is opting for a last-minute travel option, it will most likely be a flight (since charts are prepared just a few hours before the train departs), where three times the train fare would also not be sufficient to get a ticket, meaning the passenger spends more. Win, win, at least for ixigo.

Another interesting pricing innovation announced this week is the one from the nation’s top film exhibitor, PVR-Inox. Its new ‘Pay for What You Watch’ model lets you pay only for the bit of the film that you watch. So if you leave halfway through a screening, you apparently only need to pay that much. Renaud Palliere of PVR told Business Standard newspaper that the company will use advanced technology such as AI-powered video analytics to monitor who is seated in the auditorium, when they arrive and when they leave.

Here, too, the trick is that audiences who opt for this will have to pay a 10 per cent premium on the ticket price.

In an era of low outlook and even lower consumer sentiment, the trick is all in selling your proposition. Like Thai Air Asia X which launched flights from Delhi to Bangkok this week. Touting its competitive fares of Rs 7,990 (the fine print tells you it is one way), a senior official said, “You don’t have to pay for what you don’t use – don’t want to seat selection, don’t pay; don’t want food and drinks, don’t pay! etc etc...