Bajaj Pulsar: Definitely Male

When one think of cool bike in India, first thing that comes to mind is Bajaj Pulsar. It is one of the most loved brand for a bike rider (well if we do not consider super high end bikes). When it entered the market, it redefined its segment. Pulsar launched in 2001 is the market leader in the 150 cc + performance bike segment. More than that, this brand changed the fortune of Bajaj Auto Ltd.

Pre 2001, the Indian bike market was mainly segmented in three categories: Economy, Executive and Premium Bikes. Hero Honda launched its first 150 cc bike in the year 1999 with CBZ brand. It was successful but it didn’t excite the market that much. But then Pulsar came and redefined the whole market segment. Although it was not a pioneer technology, but its performance and brand building exercise won the heart of Indian customer.

Pulsar owes its success mainly to its advertisement campaign that triggered the pull from the customer especially its "Definitely Male " campaign. It was Bajaj's first bike without Kawasaki label. The new bike was an R&D and design marvel. Pulsar was designed by the renowned design house Tokyo R&D. O&M knew that the communication of this brand should also be different. Starting with lot of ideas, O&M stuck upon the Big Idea of India's He-Bike. Previously lot of bike take the persona of Macho bikes as being "sexy". It was position as World's first bike endowed with a gender. The campaign together with the design and performance catapulted the brand into stratospheric sales level.

Its target consumer segment was of the age of 18-24, but later it repositioned for older consumer also (21-35). It knew that Pulsar is the golden key to control the entire bike market. Hence Pulsar got undivided attention from the company. In 2003 another milestone event happened in the product lifecycle of the brand. Bajaj launched its new technology DTSI. DTSi stands for Digital Twin Spark Ignition that delivered more power and efficiency. The increased performance of the brand took Pulsar to greater heights.

Pulsar came in three variants : 200cc, 180 cc and 150 cc where 200cc and 180 cc excited the performance bikers, 150 cc was for the mileage conscious ones. The 150cc variant took lot of customers away from the executive segment to the performance segment.

But the brand had its share of issues. Bajaj used to reassigns its media campaign to two brands: O&M and Leo Burnett, alternatively for every six months. Leo Burnett changed the campaign from "Definitely Male" to "Digital Biking" during DTSi launch. Although the ads were successful in conveying the technological superiority of DTSI and making that acronym popular, it gave away its most successful tagline.