Bosses, Asses and the Packets !!!

"Against stupidity the Gods themselves contend in vain...."


A call from an old friend who still happens to be in Advertising...

hey dude...hows life??

well I am doing well.. I am no longer in advertising you see... I reply with sarcasm
hey ^%$^&*%$ ... cribs he.... times have changed man... its no longer the place which you left.. its more seasoned.. more professional and ,...

Aha... is it the end of advertising as I knew it..? I laugh....

And man... he says... we are on the look out for talents ( some people have left the team ,obviously)... and growth is ensured ( for whom is the question but I didnt ask)..

mmm... I meekly acknowledge,thinking as to how strikingly similiar was the lingua that people used when they were in dare straits when executives left all of a sudden, leaving the clients and the agency alike, in distress.

And as you know we are growing... new clients, new categories of business and new media types.. we are for ever on the look out for new people who can handle the pressures of todays advertising....

Wah wah wah ..I thought and applauded my beloved industry for the wake up call that they seem to have given for themselves...

Like for example... I enquired....

Ohhh ...digital for example... below the line ..OOH... it is all new man... exciting to be part of the change and sooner we adapt the better we adopt to the changing needs...waxed the caller eloquently...and I will tell you there is a huge huge dearth of quality people....

Oh ...I pretended ignorance... is it?

Yah man... You will not beleive the last one week I met some 21 guys and gals in my office for the Business development and client servicing executive category... and you know what... I didnt get even a single guy...

Oh that is SADDDD.... I cried into the receiver....and....

And what... here I am asking people to refer me some one.. some one good ..a couple of them I need.. smart, sensible and communicative guys...

Hey Biplob ..I woke him up from the mutter.... can I ask u one thing..?

Yes man go on...

How many guys you met you said?

21 or may be 22.. I am not sure...

I have a cousin of mine.. he is all what you want... smart.. sensible and linguistic....and has an advertising back ground....

Oh ask him to mail me his CV man... says Biplob....

Oh but what will you pay? I ask a seemingly innocent question for which I knew the answer , almost....

Well it depends.. and waise bhi.. money is not the only thing man ... You know that... its the job culture that matters...

hey man .. wait wait.. I interrupt.... tell me a direct answer... he is a smart sensible MBA grad with good comunication skills... Has put in one year at AWBT agency and now is with a call center at Chennai..good in computers, pro active and hard working,,,,,. Now you tell me how much can he expect....?

Well .......Biplob, the Bengali Acounts director, who they said was Kanjoos Number 1, mulled for a long minute and mused on..... first I have to see him.. and then may be..you know....I honestly beleive that money is secondary ..what comes first is... you know....

hahahahaha ...I laugh like a filmi villain which I am sure did get on to his nerves... Now you know why you have the 'HUGE HUGE dearth of talents"... Dont u Biplob?? every other industry gets the type of talents they want,... that is the reason why MNC's queue up here.. and here is our industry which IS more seasoned.. more professional but alas lurking in the back waters in search of talents.. In fact you guys should be searching for money... There is talent man,,,, U have to pay them to get themmmm...

Well ....said Biplob... we too pay and as they grow they will see phenomenonal rise...

Huh man... I said ... You know what I mean,, I will ask my cousin to mail you his CV if you agree to pay him atleast what the call center does... if else you will forever continue your search,,,, may be you can go to some zoo... for peanuts you will get only monkeys....

I need to think... he said and went off air...

Think he will for sure but will reach at the same conclusion....to handle the pressures of todays advertising industry we need people, but we will not pay...
we need people who will eat passion, drink commitment and live with love for the industry and nothing more, except for the big bosses up the ladder, its all grass and all the asses down are expected to remain happy that way !!

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.... I said to myself...

The Fun Gun !!!

Have fun ..folks of Advertising

!!!

Lux's Magic of Black

Have you become a princess for a while? The new "Lux Provocateur" Advertisements gives you a chance. Clad in black, tina and friends, characters in the site, will answer lot of questions and tell you amusing love stories. It implores us to delve into dark and mysterious side of life:- to become more adventurous I mean. The animators have done a nice job, as characters appear in front of you, we are likely to fall in love with them. They have a dedicated a site for the magic of black..... for glorifying the black colour!......It is a difficult to task to entice customers towards a black coloured soap as the basic perception:- like black soap leadiing to black colour ( or black is a dirty colour!) often exists, in the minds of common people. Yup, the target market is young women, but still - a story of Snow White ( as it is in the site) may not entice a young 25 year old to try, may be teenagers would like to read such fairy tales.

But the characters are cute, site very interactive and impresses for a while.

The fun gun !!!

Two priests decided to go to Hawaii on vacation. They were determined to make this a real vacation by not wearing anything that would identify them as clergy.
As soon as the plane landed they headed for a store and bought some really outrageous shorts, shirts, sandals, sunglasses, etc.The next morning they went to the beach dressed in their "tourist" garb. They were sitting on beach chairs enjoying a drink, the sunshine and the scenery when a "drop dead gorgeous" blonde in a topless bikini came walking straight towards them.
They couldn't help but stare.As the blonde passed them she smiled and said "Good Morning, Father ~ Good Morning, Father," nodding and addressing each of them individually, then she passed on by.
They were both stunned.
How in the world did she know they were priests? So the next day, they went back to the store and bought even more outrageous outfits.These were so loud you could hear them before you even saw them! Once again, in their new attire, they settled down in their chairs to enjoy the sunshine. After a little while, the same gorgeous blonde,wearing a different colored topless bikini, taking her sweet time, came walking toward them. Again she nodded at each of them, said "Good morning, Father ~ Good morning, Father," and started to walk away. One of the priests couldn't stand it any longer and said,
"Just a minute, young lady."
"Yes, Father?"
"We are priests and proud of it, but I have to know, how in the world do you know we are priests, dressed as we are?"
She replied,
"Father, it's me, Sister Kathleen."

Advertising for sure, throws in such surpises day in and day out... some sweet ,some sour, some shocking and some stupid... but that is the fun in the game... aint it... Have ablasting week end folks!!!!

Zara Sochiye...Part I

Hi Friends... I am going to start a new section which is called Zara Sochiye..This section will have some of the best social awareness ads in India. Here is a very interesting Ad with a touch of humour and sarcasm!






We always talk about women's rights in India but who is gonna talk on behalf of these men??

zara sochiye....

Making Valentine's Day An Event to Market Love!

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

An End to Fatigue!!!

Made and send by good friend Erhan Ali of Wunderman Istanbul Turkey.... a cool work and Erhan and his team hopes it to make some heads turn in the Cannes ,next year!!!

Kudos mate !!

Advertised brand:Pharmaton

Advert title(s): Park

Translation of headline to English: End to fatigue.

Advertising Agency
:Wunderman İstanbul

Art Director:Hulya Muynak

Copywriter: Erhan Ali Yilmaz

Illustrator:Hulya Muynak

Published/Released Jan 2008

Catch 'em young!!

It isn’t so easy to do it, especially when you are old and cannot connect with the new generation, when value systems do not match and your ultimate dreams are just day to day facts for them. Talking to the new generation isn’t that easy, but marketers have to, taking the fact that India is a ‘young nation’, with the major share of its astronomical population falling under the ‘NEWGEN’ category. Their fun fundas and the yo yo styles are overtaking the predictable and mundane hard habits of the old order which is fading slowly.

Products and services have come in new shapes and sizes, catering to the new gen. Be it scooters or bikes, insurance and investment products, or early retirement plans, the new gen customer is the focal point. The whole business of marketing is relooking itself, and introspecting, as no one want to be left behind when the all powerful young Indian is walking down the market place. The new gen have the willingness, and the ability powered by their new gen jobs and even has a direction towards categories and brands thus making the business of marketing a funny place to be. Marketers no longer creates wants, no longer creates demands even. They just are there updating and making themselves look modern and cool and in tune with the wants and the well defined demands that the new gen seems to be possessing in abundance. They are there talking cool to the new gen, communicating to them in their language and behaving as if they are one amongst them.
Appy fizz was one ‘cool’ brand which in this case can be quoted as an example for the composed and bubbly communication that it did with the target group it was talking to. Axe does the customer engagement in a youthful way with the Axe Unlimited Academy et al, which raised many a senior eyebrows, but who cares? Bingo in India did the trick, launching itself into a category worth 1800 crores and growing at a pace of 25-30 %.The experimental youngster was the first to be in their scanner, when they wanted to decide who their TG is going to be. The fun and disconnected humour that the communication was launched with, broke the clutter of messages while the mad and vivid flavours which the product possessed, broke the clutter of similar looking ‘me too’ brands that the category is famed for. The busy youngster will see you, will listen to you and even talk back to you if the language is right, right from his point of view and not from yours.

Customer engagement nevertheless is a fiddly affair. It always was, but getting trickier these times with the Multiple Media Messages that causes the clutter for ever on an increase and with the Message Comprehending Potential of an average consumer remaining the same or even going down. The Target groups of the day do not have time for long copies and lectures, to be bored of, but are open to communication that pitches to them at their level and connects to them at the aperture, where they are and not where the advertiser wants them to be. It is not yet the age of digital advertising as it was touted, but yet it isn’t a media to be ignored. Internet is where the young man is and that is a fact that communicators seems to be waking up with. The radio is growing at 20 % while mobile is at a 40 % and the internet, even more. Now with these as statistics that are basic food for the communicators thought process and creative out flow, what else can be the communication platform for the coming years, for the New Gen?

Connecting the brand and the consumer is a dream and constant brand engagement is a way to it. I pill with its entire if’s and buts, and the controversies that surrounded it, did the engagement part right. Keeping aside the ethical question, it worked- both as a product and as a communication and that is a challenge that wasn’t that easy. Nike and I pod is into a co branding and co marketing spree which seems to be getting a lot of attention from its intended TG .Moods planet, a heavily personalized website from Moods condoms, is designed to make the young man and women spend time in pursuit of knowledge, and in the process get the brand sink in to his overcrowded head. Sunsilk Gang of Girls is an oft discussed case in point, but Mentos and its fun site are also to be noted. 7up and its Fido Dido rocks in their interactive site which attracts the young eye balls. It isn’t about jumping to the new media, on the assumption that the young people of today do not see you until you are also in the net. The Bajaj XCD TV ads where graphics are used in abundance and with brand name appearing only at the end, encharmed as did the Vodafone ads, with the dog and now without it.

Successful communicators though are slowly but surely getting themselves into where the youngster willfully is. Communities in Orkut, the best known social marketing and networking site is a case in point .Maggi noodles with a community membership of over 25000 is one leading example. Silky Kumar, the axe icon and his profile, created a lot of curiosity in MySpace.com and even orkut. It is here, the marketers realize that, the user not only consumes content but also seeks it, generates it and hence feels more aligned to it. Big adda, another social networking site also generates a lot of interest among its main user groups, in the addas that different brands have there, where a lot of active interaction about the brands and the associated lifestyles happen.

Instances galore and innovations seem to have no ends to it. Communication to the new gen was always a challenge and the one that we have today, is no exception for the rule. It takes more daredevilry from the marketing communicator to be braving new paths to be successfully talking and listening to them. But if you can connect with them early, you may be doing so for ever.It will however take more ‘full of life’ creative strategies and associated media strategies for reaching out to people, the young man and women. They are there, and you have to reach them where they are and that is a formidable challenge.

In short:-

Pack your communication strategy with fizzLook modern and cool, if you want them to like it ...

Live and let live - Mix your communication with passion....

Entertain their eye balls....

Use slapstick humour – They wouldn't mind it. It always gets noticed.....

Make it Interactive – Teens like itEmbrace the new media wholeheartedly, the future lies there too.....

Talk to the yo yo, not to the yore.....

Singapore Outdoor Advertising Awards 2007

Some of the best outdoor ads in Singapore'07.

Award- Silver
Category- Large billboard, Product- High Tech Computer Corp



Award- Gold
Category –Bus Shelter, Product- Guinness (Asia Pacific Breweries Singapore)/Beer



Award- Silver
Category- Ambient/Guerilla, Product- Singapore Institute of Management



Award- Silver
Category- MRT platform ( railway station) , Product- Asia Pacific Breweries



Award- Silver
Category- Taxi-top, Product- Alteco Chemical Pte Ltd



Award- Silver
Category- MRT train carriage, Product- FHM[ For Him Magazine]

Apple + HP: Where did it go wrong?

All advertisements do not have same agenda like a Chef , who makes every dish different. But we like to eat paneer makhan tikka with chappathi, and not just one thing alone. Sometimes we are afraid that there might be a mismatch between dishes and basic foods, which might develop allergy. Apple didn't mean it, even HP didn't expect it. But they launched a campaign together to inform people that both gadgets- HP's PCs are compatible with ipods and itunes.

"You are your playlist -- Use your PC to make and organize the playlists that say more about you than you even know. Brahms next to the Black Eyed Peas? You are a walking contradiction."

"You download fearlessly -- Click on the Apple iTunes icon on any new HP PC and link directly to the iTunes Music Store, where the music you want is 99 cents per song. Download up to 10,000 picks to your new Apple iPod from HP. You make your music your own."

"You introduce your PC to the band -- All new HP PCs come preloaded with Apple iTunes Software. Combined with the new Apple iPod from HP, you bring the bass without missing a beat. Your PC is a musical prodigy."

Then, apple ipod was also sold by Hp channels, now it isn't. Then, consumers were in doubt whether apple's products can be used with PCs other than Mac computers. Colourful and customer oriented, ad put "YOU" as the major factor. But as it became part of the clutter, it became a "run of the mill" one.

The fun gun...!!!

Funny indeed and dedicated to the FAST.. FASTER.. FASTEST souls that make the world of advertising a happeining business!!!!
Have a blast while I am off traveling for a week !!!