Welcome to the new-look OATS Global Bulletin. At first glance, little may have changed. However, like the lubes industry itself, below the surface there is plenty going on. This includes a re-design of the OATS Lubes Resource Centre which is now fully responsive for use with mobile devices.
Without question, the global lubricants market has increased in both scale and complexity. Local and regional players are challenging the majors for their share of the marketplace; emissions legislation and other environmental controls are driving up product quality and the internet is adding more layers of channels to feed customer supply and demand.
A move toward omni-channel supply chain models seems inevitable. A recent survey of UK and US retailers is claiming that in the UK alone, non-food retailers are set to spend around £5bn on developing omni business models within the next five years. This is no small amount and, the report concludes, those organisations failing to look towards an omni model may well struggle to compete at all.
This complexity has not gone un-noticed by lubricants marketers, a fact that OATS encounters in almost every conversation with clients and industry leaders. Understanding that complexity is a key to the future of the lubricants sector and OATS is now providing expertise to help both lubes suppliers and their customers address this marketing challenge. We have identified four key components that are interacting in a way that makes the marketing of lubricants so challenging:
- OEM recommendations
- Lubes Technical aspects
- Internet Marketing
- Lubes Marketing
For each element , there are a wide number of factors that influence lubes manufacturing, marketing and consumption choices made. This, getting each of these elements right is a constant balancing act which requires accurate and current data, combined with marketing intuition and experience.
Lubricant recommendation is, like the market itself, an increasingly complex task, for both marketing and technical teams.
To make the right recommendation the expert has to know and understand the specifications – of which there are now hundreds of thousands. For the non-expert - i.e. 99.99% of the planet - the recommendation of products for purchase has to be clear and understandable. This process has to be balanced against the risk of failure and marketers’ attitude to equipment failure risk.
The new OATS Bulletin will now more closely reflect the elements of the Marketing Challenge, focussing on the news, research and opinion that directly and indirectly affect the lubricants marketplace. This includes an entirely new section Internet Marketing section, where we will follow trends and ‘hot topics’ on all aspects of web channels.
Over the coming months there will be other changes which will be highlighted in our Bulletins and will reflect the changing lubricants world and OATS’ place within it. This includes rebuilding our systems to reflect the future requirements of this highly dynamic environment.
In the meantime, more than ever, we would welcome your feedback, suggestions and comments on our Bulletin in particular and lubes marketing in general by simply clicking here.
Enjoy the journey.
Sebastian Crawshaw
Chairman, OATS