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Marketing in India

Political Advertising in India 2014 – Worth it?

May 5, 2014

Did I just hear that this year the estimated spend on political campaigns in India is $5 billion? $5 billion? That’s like 30,000 crores in INR! $5 billion? That’s just $2 billion short of what they spent in last presidential election in US! $5 billion? That’s way beyond the permissible spend-limit on election campaigns in India. And from where did all this money come from? Curious, like really! But let’s leave it at that. There has to be something because of which everybody is discussing the campaign, the new age strategies, the messaging, the spend but not the real source of spend :). Partly we know the reasons of it, don’t we?

Now coming down to the campaign this year – I think it’s been phenomenal, be it the massive scale at which it has been managed or the diversity in messaging and medium that has been tried out. At least there has been an attempt of targeting different types of audience with different communication strategies this year. Hats off to the agencies and associates involved with these campaigns. As a marketer, I think this year’s campaign was noticeable and impactful and BIG!

But as a consumer? Well, I’m sure we have read this hundred times before – “No amount of good advertising can actually save a bad product”! And how relevant this seems for political advertising in India this year? Every time I see the ads like this or this on TV, I cringe. Neither the creative route is wrong, nor it has got to do with my being pro or anti any party. It’s simply the messaging, the commitment or the positioning that these ads are trying to make – those are false, just so blatantly false. And the leaders who are the faces of these ads just do not have any connect with the messages being communicated. The more I see these ads, the more irritated I get. Not to forget the bombardment that happens on radio, hoardings & digital media. Again reminds me of yet another famous saying in marketing world – “Nothing kills a bad product or service faster than good advertising”. These ads at least to me are just reminders of false promises by these political brands.

And then there are videos like these on women safety that has been doing rounds on social media. I’m sure it can’t be the work of formal advertising agency associated with that party but whosoever has done it, it’s such a trash. This is not just one video, I have also seen official videos speaking of women empowerment or safety in India. After all the incidents that has happened in last few years as gang rapes, molestation, rapes of minors, this is such a sensitive subject that perhaps should not have been used in any campaign. It’s not one or other party but we know that this is one issue that many parties have failed to fulfill their promises multiple times and at multiple levels. The consequences of such false commitments are so huge, then why even dare to bring these in your campaigns?

When the core itself is not in place, when there is a lack of trust in the prime product promoted, when the product has failed many times on its own commitments in past, then do you think any advertising can actually save such product? Yes, I know campaigns are required but did it change your perception?

Would love to know your views on Political Advertising in India for Elections this year. Liked it? Believed in it? Worth it?

As for me, how I wish that after every such political commercial on Television, we the viewers would have got to view this “No Ullu Banaoing” campaign by IDEA! Good sequencing, what say readers :)? And on that note, must say that love these IDEA ads and I think these IDEA ads are surely the highlights of Junior Bachchan’s career more than any of his movies.

*And a post on this blog after more than one and half years. Must thank political campaigns that finally compelled me to write here after this long gap 🙂

Social Media ‘Experts’! Really?

July 9, 2012

I had thought to write a post on this earlier too but for some or other reason never wrote one. But my last few interactions at different occasions made me think about this term Social Media “Experts” yet again. “Experts” and that too with 6-7 years of experience in Social Media! Like really? Every time I hear this term, I feel exactly same as when I hear about being Startup “Gurus” from the mouths of those who have never run or worked in a startup even once.

Was interacting with this one such so-called expert who is supposedly consulting many startups on marketing and social media strategies. Well, in the name of expertise all that he had to offer was ideas to increase “likes” on Facebook pages. To add to that, one of his ‘killer’ strategies for low cost marketing was make ‘viral’ films for clients. If I have to quote verbatim – “we make viral films for clients which will increase their fans on their Facebook pages”. Felt like telling – dude, being an expert the least you could have done is avoided using jargons like “make viral films”. I have no idea what does that really mean? I think you can only make films and expect it to go viral, how exactly can you “make a viral film” directly? Needless to mention that at least I have not come across any of the viral films made by them naturally on my FB or Twitter timeline.

Attended a small meet on flexi-working culture in India last weekend, intro round of marketing professionals and here it was – 7 out of 10 participants were “Social Media Experts”! Did a quick check, one of them was somewhat active on twitter, two had less than 200 followers and remaining four were not even present on twitter. While interacting with them, realized that either they never felt the need to join Twitter or they joined but didn’t find it to be interesting enough to pursue. Yes, they all knew Facebook and Twitter but that was all about it! Few likes on whatever and few tweets on whatever gave them sufficient confidence to call themselves as “Social Media Experts”.

In yet another incident, a close acquaintance who has joined a luxury travel company in India in a senior position needed some inputs on his products and marketing. I got to analyze the product and past campaigns of the company and to my utmost surprise the company whose founders are based of India had actually spent lakhs and lakhs of rupees in online campaigns every month. The campaign was run by some digital marketing expert and in the name of online campaign, all that he did was Google SEM. In that too, client has been charged on cost per lead basis with an explanation that Google charges it like that and with rates as high as… well no idea for reference point as in my experience I have never heard of such high lead rates ever! Don’t even want to go into details of campaign management rather mismanagement, as I think it has the potential to become an independent case study on what not to do in SEM campaigns. To just give you a sneak peak – neither the campaign was configured anywhere in analytics nor the campaign code was enabled on landing or any other page for tracking! And this was of course done by yet another “expert”, yes his Linkedin profile does contain the word expert prominently :-).

Not that the misuse of this term is anything new to us but I think with each passing day, there is a noticeable growth in the number of these so called experts around us. Having managed social media accounts for companies where I have worked and few other brands, I think I can share at least my views on evaluating any candidate for social media management in general. Well this post is long enough for now, I will be back with my thoughts in a subsequent post soon.

Quick Bytes: I’m back and with a ‘bharat bandh special offer’ :-)

June 1, 2012

I’m back and this time after a really looooong break from this blog. Phew five months into Mommydom already and it seems just like yesterday. Oh yes, in case you don’t know, then let me announce it here as well that I’m actually Mommy Kanupriya now :-). It’s my new phase of life that has been keeping me busy and away from many things including my love for blogging. But I ain’t complaining. Like most new moms say, this phase of life is indeed the most special one, something which I can’t put in words ever and all the changes or adjustments are actually worth it. With things settling down a bit, I’m now looking forward to revive this blog again. Though have been somewhat active on my personal blog but was not able to manage sufficient time at a stretch to concentrate and write any post suitable for Marketing Chit-Chat.

Thanks to those who dropped me an email asking about my whereabouts and reasons for this blog being inactive. I have lot to share and lot to learn from all of you, so look forward to posts and comments exchange once again in this space. For today just a “Quick Byte” – how many of you received this email from Indiaplaza today?

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I did and for a moment I couldn’t believe it. “Bharat Bandh Special Offer” – are you serious? In the name of this Bandh, while some were busy burning buses and some ranting about it on social media, here came a gem of a communication from a brand like Indiaplaza from whom I didn’t expect something like this. I mean what was that – a #WTH, a #Facepalm or a #Fail? Well, looks like the email communication guys seriously misunderstood the holiday on account of bandh to be a festival special holiday :-P, otherwise why on earth would you announce an offer especially for Bharat Bandh? You know as I always say a prompt “chance pe dance” marketing is smart but then you better know when and how to capitalize on the chance rightly. After seeing this I think even offers in name of potato/tomato days would have been ok but a bandh special promotion? What do you think?

RA.One Marketing: Was definitely needed but how much?

November 18, 2011

Just watched another program bashing up Ra.One marketing campaign and how the film has been a dud till now despite a very well planned campaign. Well, first of all I have not watched the movie till now, so I wont be the right person to comment on the actual content of the movie. I’m aware of the basic theme, the marketing campaigns, supposedly the superior effects, technological edge, the characters and songs of the movie. But beyond that no comments on whether it’s good or bad.

Possibly one of the longest marketing campaigns in the history of Indian movie marketing spanning over a period of approx 10 months & with a lavish budget of Rs. 40 crores, Ra.One had indeed one of the most discussed maniac marketing campaigns ever. From global tours, to graphic novels, to digital marketing, to brand alliances, to presence on reality shows, to innovative merchandises, to physical toys, to digital games for ipods / ipads, to youtube channel, to google plus pages… phew and yes, before I forget, to even have Akon for Chammak Challo and Lady Gaga for the premier… I mean you name it and the movie had got it. Yes, I agree the marketing campaign for Ra.One was nothing less than an attack on your senses! Words like overdrive or aggressive promotion would be understatement for a campaign of that magnitude.

But I still do not understand why link up a promotion campaign with the average or failed performance of the movie. Since when a good marketing has actually made a bad product successful in the market? Can’t recall even one case study where a crap product has been a hit because of strong marketing. Despite, all the criticism on the marketing strategies and the need for it, I for one at least think that a movie like Ra.One needed the promotion push in the market. Here’s why:

  • Content: The movie tries to venture into a different zone, the sci-fi genre that is still primarily untouched by many in Indian film industry. A third of the film’s budget has gone into special effects and Ra.One boasts of some 3,500 VFX shots in the entire movie. Considering the digital bang and effort which has gone into creating this kind of content, it does make sense to me to back it up with relevant marketing and engagement tools like digital games, innovative merchandises and graphic novels etc. Two of my movie buff friends actually commented – “when it comes to special effects, the movie has been made marvelously well. Whatever said and done, the movie has set up a benchmark and standard for others to match up to in Indian Film Industry.”

  • Character: It’s not a general Bollywood flick with a pre-decided story line. This movie is all about an Indian super hero and that too a new brand. More than the movie, a character G.One had to be introduced, defined and established in the minds of the TG. A brand different from legendaries like Spiderman or Superman of this world. Now whenever there has been a need of such introduction, promotion has to be done. Take the case of any famous Hollywood flick and you’ll see a trend.

  • Target Audience: Apart from regular SRK fan base, the movie was also targeted towards kids and anything around kids these days has to be marketed with that special imagery or the zing factor to grab their attention. In fact if we speak of the TG, it was sort of a shift from that typical SRK imagery where instead of wooing the women audience or presenting a family melodrama, it was the first time when he has tried to entertain kids primarily. And trust me I have met three kids in last one week who actually liked the movie, loved the character of G.One and merchandises of Ra.One.

Considering the attempt at a different kind of content, need to establish a brand in form of a character and an attempt to target a completely different set of audience, I think this movie needed the marketing buzz for sure. Now, whether a budget as huge as this was needed or promotion as aggressive as this was required is something really debatable. In my views, its yet another classical case of “how much is too much” and “create the hype only if you have the potential to sustain it” with which the campaign needs to be reviewed or evaluated and not with a direct correlation or one-to-one relationship solely between marketing efforts and product performance.

P.S: Despite all the criticism, I think I do want to catch up on this movie sometime for sure 🙂 and if at all my views change after watching this movie, I will update the post again.

Volkswagen Vento – From “WHAT!” to “WOW!” to “WTH!”

September 21, 2010

So, my morning started today by updating my Facebook & Twitter pages about the new Volkswagen Vento audio ad and my day is actually ending up by writing a post on the same. The first experience was shocker or eerie enough as a consumer for me, resulting in immediate reaction on social media and the whole day analysis of the buzz on the ad is reflective enough to do a complete post 🙂

Needless to say the ad has managed to create enough hum-drum all across. Undoubtedly it was a media innovation and disruptive advertising at least for the Indian market. I don’t think I had ever come across anything like this earlier. In fact my reaction was exactly from a “WHAT” to “WOW” to “WTH”. When I suddenly heard my newspaper talking, for a second I was totally confused, rather shocked. I had to rummage through newspapers to realize what actually it was. And when I realized that it’s actually an ad presented in the form of an audio chip attached with TOI today, I was totally awed. Wow, what an idea! But then after some point when the voice went on repeating the same content in loop it became irritating. To add to that there was no option to switch it off; the only option left was to either fold the newspaper back or just throw that damn thing out. For those who missed (wait, did anyone actually miss to notice it) to see this ad, can check the video (by TejasNair) embedded at the bottom of the post.

Well, no doubt the ad was damn interesting and managed to grab the attention of almost everybody. Twenty two lakh chips were specially sourced for the one time exercise and the ad was targeted at the readers in 5 cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai & Pune. Total media spend estimated towards this 5 city campaign is close to INR 5 crores! Definitely a daring stand to spend this kind of money in just one day and that too only in 5 cities. But so what if it was only 5 cities, after all the consumers in these 5 cities have ensured to share their reaction with other consumers not only nationally but also globally.
Idea was great, so was the operational implementation but when it comes to execution of the idea, I do think that it was not properly thought through. Here is my feedback as far as the execution is concerned:

  • The content was really boring considering it was an audio ad. Come on, you can’t just have the written content run word by word in the form of an audio clipping. There was definitely scope for a better tone, better sound quality & better content.

  • Why O why there was no switch off button in that box? The loop presentation with repetitive content was the biggest reason for putting people off.

  • Don’t you think there was an opportunity to brand that box with Volkswagen Vento? When you have spent so much, maybe a little bit extra could have added more zing.

  • But this branding would have made sense if the device came with a switch on & off button and people would have liked to keep it. In its current state, many people decided to throw it off to shut it down! Bad call for action, no?

BTW was there any call for action in that clipping? Or Volkswagen Vento just wanted to create the stir amongst consumers by spending this amount of money? Whether this kind of spend is justified for such buzz is debatable. The ad definitely managed to be the talk of town everywhere, though it could have been executed better to serve other purposes of any campaign too. Overall good to observe this innovation coming from Indian market.

Aside: Wondering if this ad will give ideas to other money spenders to do something similar? OMG what will happen if say our politicians get inspired by all this and decide to take similar route? Will we have to hear their election speeches every morning along with our newspapers during political campaigns? Anyways they love to talk, don’t they???  Or say some Mr. Mahajan & Ms. Sawant decide to furthermore promote their swayamvars in their most happening voices through these talking newspapers? Eeeekkks!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXGYPUBrmmo]

Movie Marketing: Rajneeti

June 7, 2010

Had sort of stopped updating any post on movie marketing, as for past few months most of the Bollywood releases have been doing almost the same stuffs for promotion – websites, social media, television presence, reality shows participation, some general on ground events, radio messages etc. Their marketing strategies looked repetitive and formulaic. But with Rajneeti, things seem to be different. Not only the movie is in news because of its political semblances but their promotion campaign which is revolving around the integration between reel theme and real issues is also attracting enough eyeballs amongst interested common man & the media fraternity.

After Aamir touring across India for the promotion of 3 idiots amongst mass, now its stars like Katrina Kaif & Ranbir Kapoor who are on a nationwide on-ground campaign to promote their upcoming movie Rajneeti.  Keeping the political theme in mind, Ranbir Kapoor and Katrina Kaif have been on a run, hosting debates called “Aaj ki Rajneeti” in colleges in Bangalore, Delhi, Chandigarh, Lucknow, Kolkata, Indore and Ahmedabad. The groups discuss political and social topics concerning youth. For instance, at  IIM Bangalore the discussion was on youth taking active part in politics. As a part of this discussion cum promotion drive, the team is raising issues such as whether voting should be compulsory in the country; whether a year’s military training should be mandatory for every citizen; and whether film stars should join politics. The producers have organized many such rallies in various cities and each rally attracted a crowd of about 500-1,000 people. These rallies were turned into a televised property by STAR News. For a month, 30-minute episodes about the rallies were aired on the news channel at 8:30 pm. Apart from these events, as far as outdoor campaigns are concerned, this movie has tried to create a difference by using branding properties which resemble the hoardings used in real life political campaigns. Individual cut-outs of the movie’s characters, along with signages have been used extensively in different cities, to create an impression of a real-life election campaign in progress. Also, a special video which features the cast of the movie rendering the national anthem is being showcased in theatres, prior to the screening of the movie.

Going by the buzz it has created, the marketing campaign definitely seems to be interesting enough and bit different but let’s see how does the movie perform overall on the box office? As far as the opening is concerned, Rajneeti had a tremendous opening weekend, which is second only to 3 Idiots. The movie did net business of Rs 34 crore in its opening weekend as compared to 3 Idiots’ Rs 40.50 crore (source). Public verdict on social media has been mixed – some liked it while others have bashed it. Now let’s see when do I get the time to watch it and evaluate if the movie is really different or just another saga on politics and corruption in India.

What’s Your Raashee on Facebook

September 24, 2009

While doing some random surfing on Facebook, stumbled upon this app for horoscope and compatibility check, in fact it came as a friend’s update. On visiting I realized it to be an app from the makers of the movie “What’s your Raashee”. Indeed another interesting example of movie marketing from Bollywood. After websites, communities, forums, twitter and other social media marketing, it was good to see an app based on the theme of the movie i.e., zodiac signs. The application requires the user to answer questions about their personal preferences and then based on the common characteristics with other signs, they will be shown a list of users whom they are compatible with while offering them an opportunity to add those people as friends on Facebook.

Considering my interest in movie marketing, I did install that app immediately but well I must say that I was bit disappointed with the overall impact. Horoscope, compatibility tests or fortune cookies are definitely some of the most commonly used apps on facebook, every third update on my friend’s feed is actually related to horoscope or zodiac signs. So potentially this app could have created a great viral effect if there were enough interactivity and feed triggers available in it. The feed functionality is available only while installing the app, for rest of the actions actually there is no way to publish your updates. The way it tests the compatibility between you and your partner is quite confusing. Now if the app is allowing you to check the compatibility and if your partner is available on facebook, the fun would have been if there was a way to inform the partner about the compatibility result, same is missing from this app. Also it would have established a better connect with the movie if somewhere the zodiac result of any person could have been associated with the relevant character of the movie:

  • For e.g., in my case the result reads something like this: “Kark, About Your Raashee – Consider starting a small business on the side…”; instead of showing it like any other zodiac trait announcement if it would have read something like this: “Karka, About Your Raashee – So, you’re like Hansa (Cancerain character in the movie) who is also a Kark and…” then I think along with fun this app would have led to subtle promotion of the movie as well.

Overall a great idea and I loved the initiative but execution could have been thought about more. Let’s see how the movie fairs at BO tomorrow, I for sure gonna watch it soon as I love Ashutosh Gowarikar’s movies.

In-film advertising is FASHIONable

November 9, 2008

Watched Madhur Bhandarkar’s Fashion yesterday, I liked the movie…really liked it, though I think the name of the movie should have been “Kimaya’s Fashion” or “Fashion from Kimaya” J. Another interesting case of in-film advertising with not one or two brands rather many. To name a few, which I can remember – Kimaya, Lenovo, Sunsilk, Café Coffee Day, Reebok, LG, Cellucom were the key brands with Kimaya and Lenovo being the most prominent ones. In fact in-film advertisements were so loud and clear that I couldn’t help myself noticing a Godrej carton as well while Priyanka was relocating but guess Godrej’s presence was just by chance and not planned as it was shown hardly for a second or two.

But the good thing about in-film advertising in Fashion was that the brands were chosen carefully and the presentation was perfectly in sync with the scenes and sequences. Nowhere they looked jarring or force-fitted and instead of being just used in background they were properly integrated with the script esp. Kimaya considering the last round of fashion shows in the movie were critical part of the script. Overall good example of in-film advertising otherwise we have seen some horrible examples of in-film advertisement in Bollywood – remember Subhash Ghai’s Yaadein and those numerous brands within the movie…oh God those were very irritating. Good thing is that commercially the movie has made quite some money by these in-film advertisements. Out of total 220 million investments in Fashion, the producer has made 85 million by just these branded advertisements only! Now that’s approx 39% of the overall investment and definitely is some money to make through in-film advertisements.

In-film advertising in Bollywood is getting popular day by day and advertisers are coming out with interesting ways of integration. If done in the right way, it’s definitely an interesting promotional strategy which is mutually beneficial for the brands as well as the movie – brands get the right kind of visibility and registration in the minds of consumers whereas producers get to make some good money to cover up their cost of production. But such in-film advertisements only make sense if they are done in the right way like the recent example of Fashion otherwise in most of the cases they just end up in being logo showcased in background for few seconds.