Ad Funda --- Account review

Account review is by definition ,the process undertaken by an organisation to review the quality of service that it is getting from its ADVERTISING AGENCY ,with a view to determine whether it can get better or more profesisonal service from that agency OR A NEW ONE .The phrase often in practise disguises an ardous, tedious and tiresome (and costly too) process that is emotionally disturbing and draining , the end of which a winning agency is selected...

There is no standard set of rules and do's and dont's as to how to conduct an account review. Accounts( clients) generally compile a list of outside agencies ( the ones with which they are not already doing business) and scan their work to know their expertise, experience and reputation. They can also include other agencies that are handling their other brands( one client like LEVER has many brands and each brand is dealt with a different agency in a system called 'Roster') and ask them to pitch for the brand whose advertising is in review. the incumbent agency is required to fight against all these new ones...Questionnaires are sent out, a lot of discussions with peers of the marketing world happens and some 4-5 agencies get shortlisted for the final game called as 'pitching'. The end of which in theory clears the air, but in practise again more vagueness remains...

Dissatisfaction with a client or turnover in the chief-marketers/brand manager's post at the clients side may cause a review but in some cases it happens as a routine also.. yet other cases as I have seen the Marketing team would be glad at its agency but the others will have a problem that will lead to a review !... In the first scenario, the decision to participate in the review is one heck of a pain for the incumbent agency because the chances according to some studies, to hold back the account is just 10%...

As some one said..

"if you have a shitty relationship, and the business goes up for review, it’s going to be difficult to suddenly become something great for them from that starting point.....If the relationship is good, then, of course, you defend it with everything you’ve got.”

And shitty it will be unless the relation has been total, permanent, and equal.....

The famous case of Crispin ,Porter & Bogusky getting back with 'thanks but no thanks' when Volkswagen invited its agency of four years to repitch its $200-million-plus ad account last month, raised many an eyebrow........ the agency logic :-“As a rule, we do not participate in reviews for our current accounts, and this will not be an exception.” The outsider may be a little perplexed at this refusal to DEFEND its creativity but for the agency it is a question of pride ,made to look like practicality. The raised eyebrows because, declining to defend when the consequence is waving goodbye to a fat and prestigious ad budget in a poor economic environment is simply and audacious statement that an agency makes... critics apart, when the pitch and review is unjustified from the agency point of view, then why the farce of a pitch and presentation again....?

And when the fact is that nine out of 10 times, defending is a waste of time and money the incumbent agency either says a 'thanks but let me go', or participates 'for the heck of it'... If the agency has failed to demonstrate its value in a way the client appreciates during their normal relations,then when a review happens, you’re staring from a much deeper hole than the bright shiny new objects of desire that a pitch offers....

Some times ( or is it too often ?) the clients go over board to review and review ,again and again in vain attempts to shift the blame and balls for its own failures or simply to proove 'who is the boss'..... the recent case of 'Reckitt Benckiser forcing Euro RSCG (my former agency), its incumbent global agency, to defend a chunk (the Nurofen account) of its £800 million advertising business twice in last four months.....!!!

As they say..."What counts in making a happy relation is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility."

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Ad Funda--- Account Planning

Account planning is supposedly an agency department which ensures that understanding of CONSUMER attitudes and reaction is brought to bear at every stage of ADVERTISING development. Account planners use MARKET RESEARCH data to guide the process of devising advertising strategy and producing effective CREATIVE WORK. They have ultimate responsibility for the strategy and CREATIVE BRIEF. Their mantra is “relevant plus distinctive equals more effective”.

The best way to describe the role of the planner is as follows.

The FINANCIAL DIRECTOR says: “My Money”.
The CLIENT says: “My product”.
The ACCOUNT DIRECTOR says: “My client”.
The CREATIVE DIRECTOR says: “My ad”.
The ACCOUNT PLANNER says: “My consumer”.

From its beginnings in the UK in the 1960s, account planning has developed into a job function in most advertising agencies. It was imported to the United States, initially by the CHIAT DAY agency and gradually send world over. The initial concept of account planning was devised in the mid – 1960s by the late Stanley Pollitt (one of the founders of Boase Massimi Pollitt in 1968), who felt that as more data became available to agencies it was being used incompetently or inexpediently by account managers.

Pollitt suggested that a specially trained researcher should work with that account manager as an equal partner. The concept was more-or-less simultaneously adopted by J. Walter Thompson, which established a new department called account planning under Stephen King in 1968. When Boase Massimi Pollitt was formed in the same year, Stanley Pollitt introduced a slightly revised version of the concept there.

According to MT Tainey, a planner and managing partner of the agency ,"Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe", three caricatures of planners emerged in the 1980s......

1) Ad tweakers, planners whose skill lies in helping their agencies develop and sell increasingly entertaining, unexpected and colloquial advertising that appeals to the sophistication of the consumer.

2) Storytellers, planners who focus on the front end of the process, giving the fullest possible picture of the product and the consumer in the belief that the secret lies in some quirky detail that will inspire the CREATIVE TEAM.

3) Planners who are knowledgeable about the brand, its competitors and its market structure, who have a close relationship with the CLIENT (who consider them to be the fountain of all wisdom), but who are comparative strangers to the creative department.

Since EGO’s run haywire in the industry, account management (of which planning is a part of) is one of the main tasks in advertising agency business. Maintaining a good relationship with the client is the prime job of the department but long term planning is a prime requisite to keep on that relation for long… and long term planning is done by the account planners whose expertise will jump from industry to industry..... they should and is expected to know all about all industries … from cars to computers and cookers to condoms…most of the account guys in practice , begin at the lower level as client executives and bear the brunt of all ego’s but with age and experience climb up and reach the glamorous positions of account planning….

Find those elements Which makes an Ad impressive!

"Since you can do it, go out and march against FARC." says the Advertisements done by Sancho BBDO Columbia. But I feel I would like to put to a careful study is because it has some suggestive elements- a lonely women suggesting depression, and fear of terrorism, a milling crowd that begin to bother as they observe the board as well as the woman, and a copy which says, we must stand together against terrorist groups. Haven't we ever tried to advertise ourselves in a helpless situation? Never!, but to bring people together for a cause, even if you were a victim is quite a lot of organising, because we although, with clear eye vision, never bother to observe and react to the needs of others!..

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.

Making Valentine's Day An Event to Market Love!

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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.

At Crossword, we are not at crossroads!

Crossword book stores, located in major cities in India is were you wouldn't lose yourself. But, you are likely to pick up some books to read. Categorized and well arranged, thinking like a bookworm, the store organisers keep books elegantly, so that we will pick up at least one of them. Allthough their advertisement says "Get Lost", we would always fall in love with books. Just look at that Ad-- is that copy cute? ( no comments, Your comments are more important )

Animated Fun

Is it wise to become animated in expressing ourselves? Some companies feel so. BP had found that fun related animations can convey their messages quickly. I feel that animated ads engage us because of its novelty, freedom in bringing flexibility to script( because we need not work with real characters) , a befitting background music and fun involved.

Look for advertisements of BP like this one. See it here.

Apple Ipod and itunes were most sought after brands, designs and electronic gadgets of 2007. Some of us have felt happy and sometimes unhappy regarding its price cut during Xmas. But they have also used animated ads in venezuela and US to impress the buyers. Watching it is worth it. Take a look here.

Look for Paul McCartney dancing for ipod tunes in a fascinating animation here.

The Brand Economist

The Economist has a brand value as one of the best magazines for general information as well as on business. It covers news from all over the world and puts it briefly and succintly with honesty. But they also do a brand building exercise. See these advertisements. I like them because they have clarity in their messages.

Seriously Thoda Zyada

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,

And he had a great fall ( or is it a jump?)

Some advertisements use acrobatics to win people and titillate their eye balls. Some of us have learned our nursery rhymes well, but some of us like to adopt them into ad scripts. In order to explain that we produce something extra ordinary, all "me too" products either create several sub categories and find their niches. Advertisements cannot be true to themselves, they can be imaginative as an Axe perfume ad! ( I would say others have tried to copy the oomph factor from them). But some can be ineffective and similar. Let us look at three such advertisements of last year, which do create a usual element of " audience attention" because of its similarities with each other.

Start...Action.... yes its only about action!.. for a Thums Up bottle. Akshay Kumar does an acrobatic stunt, jumping from one building to other and then to a truck carrying Thums Up. See it here. Now its Juhi's turn for a packet of Kurkure. She is funny even though. If a packet can reduce our gravitational acceleration ( as that in the moon)- woh kya karizma hai. It was "seriously thoda zyada', not because of the attractiveness it had, but because, a brand which wanted to tell itself as a product, that we would have with tea, shouldn't have been so..weightless!.

Cut..Cut it please... If you would like to say that, we have a royal stag advertisement too. See it here. Some of the fellows are jumping again. Oh! Indian consumers are going berserk now. They will start jumping from their terraces or falling like Humpty Dumpty, because they don't have milk or onion at home.

How to Sell Themselves!..

Advertisements are a platform for models and the film fraternity to speak about themselves and say how stylish they are. But recently, we have found a trend, as we have seen in KANK, , OM Shanthi OM, and some other films, were actors parade themselves to just remind all of us, that they are back in films, especially someones like Shilpa, Anil Kapoor, Akshay Kumar and some others. It becomes " a point of sale" of their own charming skills for a few seconds in the screen. I think that also is the political game of cricket, waiting for roles to shine, retire, and say oops I have lost my...

Hope, it does not happen in advertising, just like we are happening to see old bollywood songs played in background for many ads like LG and Fiat Palio. Yes, its the same with everyone everywhere- the noted ones being Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, who cannot sleep without new scoops and gossips about themselves.

So one day Naseerudin Hoja decided to advertise himself. He didn't find anything better than wearing rags , sitting on a horse back turned to other side of horse's face, drumming a baja, and singing loudly as the best attempt to impress others, as clumsy as he is! somebody asked him why he is sitting turned to other side? he replied, " hey , why are you asking me? You ask the horse why it is running the other way?'.. It seems to be the same with all of these actors and pop singers too.. for one thing, they feel they are ignored, they donno what to do to charm others, so let it be like this!...

So, friends...... should we bother about glamour and glitz, as long as it seems like..desperate people's attempt of foolishness to impress others!

Saying Yes and No

Go, look for the green,
Go, look for the red,
But, whether it will give you, your daily bread?

I hope, you wouldn't have read what I had meant. Sometimes we make our advertisements colourful, filling it with unidentified flying objects to develop curiosity. Sometimes it makes us feel blunt and make a remark- " Oh, these ad guys are crazy, what is it?."

I would suggest the creatives to think twice before they feel, they have done their best. The Sprite ad says " make sure you don't look thirsty".. but I would like to say:- Do we always drink Sprite just to impress girls? or are the girls so annoyed that they can't tolerate a guy's look?

And for the next:- May be Britney overdid it in the media, so we have just begun to listen to Britney's tears. They are just cashing in on her popularity again.

May be the last one is better. Nothing begins in a day nor ends. But we would like to know everyday, something about yesterday, which every news paper brings.

So shouldn't we think again:

Ads can be made to please.

It can also be made to tease.

But, will it always make us say cheese?

Oh! We cannot forget these oldies!

How many of us recall the advertisements in the '80s and the '90s, when the Indian advertising industry, mainly concentrated on the print to influnce the populace. we have often found Aishwarya in the newest ones, like that of Nakshatra, which was considered one of the best among recent ones.

The Garden Vareli advertisement is sensual and who wouldn't fall in love with sarees?

This is a co-branding effort : Lee Cooper and Sheetal. Its abstract, simple and conveying the message.

Vimal Suitings- Its not one of those- just in case ads that anybody would put, just to remind customers. It stands unique because of its copy, presentation and the background.

Oh! In those days too..Who wouldn't ogle? yes, if you were looking for something trendy, just to make yourself more popular among social circle, you would have tried it!..That was what the advertisers and Phoenix shoes makers would like you to do!

Most Effective Television Ads- An Afterthought!

JuxtConsult's Ad Box office report says among urban consumers, who are often clouded with ads have found among the top 5- Vodafone ads as the best among them ( the Pug is the common factor!), Airtel as the second best ( SRK and A.R.Rahaman as the common factors), and the list moves like Nokia, Pepsi, Reliance Mobile, Colgate LIC, Fevicol, ICICI Prudential Life, Surf Excel in that order. But see the list of celebrities associated with- SRK, AB, Dhoni, Sachin, Aishwarya Rai, Akshay Kumar, Abhishek, Hrithik, John and Salman.

But do you feel it is alarming that it is Bollywood mania, even in advertisements . We find them the most popular and recognised, especially among women if we could say, Rani Mukherjee and Preethi Zinta, and so films have been influencing a lot, especially the ad-makers. Lets sit and brood a little while? I feel we are depending a lot in this bollywood worship that we are a bit cliched in our story lines- Isn't it time to get more creative folks !

Artwork in Ads

Art work in ads can be beautifully woven into a message. It is not only respect for the art and the artist, that brings attention of a normal observer, but it makes it easier to convey even difficult messages in the form of cartoons, caricature or collage. It becomes easy to portray human behaviour. Although, these advertisements are for a recording company, wine maker, and for a fruit drink as shown, they follow colourful tones to convey meaning. I suppose, lot of colours spoil the drawing. I feel instead of giving mixed meanings, by making it simple and emphasising on clarity, artwork is a good advertising tool.

Marketing Apparels

We like to wear clothes, not just to cover up, to look sophisticated, to look simple, to look stylish and for what not. To sell clothes is more difficult, as each individual bargains for his own terms and preferences- variety matters, as well as brand names. It is unexpected, because as surprises, consumers go on shopping and shopping and one day they stop!.. They just stop buying any more denims!- who knows, it is likely. But no wonder, most of the ads are focused on developing a wardrobe full of stylish individualistic clothes, just like assortment of chocolates, for the consumers. They focus on their brands, and become as creative as possible to attract the multitude. These advertisements are worth its efforts- Lee and Reebok

The Fun Gun

An advertising team is working very late at night on a project due the next morning. Suddenly, a Genie appears before them and offers to each of them one wish.

The copywriter says: "I've always dreamed of writing the great American novel and having my work studied in schools across the land. I'd like to go to a tropical island where I can concentrate and write my masterpiece."The Genie says, "No problem!" and poof! The copywriter is gone.

The art director says: "I want to create a painting so beautiful that it would hang in the Louvre Museum in Paris for all the world to admire. I want to go to the French countryside to work on my painting."The Genie says, "Your wish is granted!" and poof! The art director is gone.

The Genie then turns to the account executive and says, "And what is your wish?"The account executive says, "I want those two assholes back here right now."

PS: God loves this kind of fun. And so we are not born as advertising professionals, yet we become. Happy weekend folks!

Some ads are not bad!!

Some ideas are intimidating. Some are the results of hours of brain storming. As one of my teachers used to say " some questions are simple, but the road to get simple answers to them is more complex.".

I feel that in this ad, a simple and subtle idea is executed well with a combination of nice words in the copy and fitting imagination.

A cliched imagination, but a creative result. Although the idea of charming the surroundings is not new, we can't help it nor we can ignore it.

This advertisement has got an idea into it. Stare at it closely or you will miss it!

We Are Crazy About Pepsi.

It is not just we who are crazy about Pepsi. This would have been a challenge for the makers of this advertisement . These pachyderms are unpredictable-gentle at times and ferocious sometimes. Kudos to the makers! It was worth watching!

PS: Are they thinking that Pepsi drinkers are thick-skinned? or Are they targeting the zoo population? These questions are meant for a joke.

From Baby Boomers to Gadget Lovers!- What we have to learn!..

Even though we wouldn't agree that age reflects in our decisions and that we can find age subcultures among the vast majority of people. We have often read major age subcultures like- the wannabe Gen Y, the sophisticated Gen X , the narcissistic baby boomers and now the new generation is a set of " Gizmo(gadget) lovers! Often these characteristics will influence in their normal decision making processes and in developing a loyalty towards any product or a service.

The baby boomers, who were born between 1946 and 1964, are in the age category, in between 40 and 60. This was one of the most sought after segment as they wanted themselves to look young, lively, attractive and often bought for themselves many things, dwelling in a world of indulgence. As they were brand loyal, by building powerful brands, marketers could maintain a rapport with them.

The Gen X ( born between 1965 and 1979) wee more materialistic but quite cost - conscious and often ignored hype. They were not so impulsive in their decisions and they portrayed complex buying behaviour with lot of judgemental decisions. They gave more importance to subtle things and believed in enjoying life and often preferred freedom and flexibility. And, therefore marketing to them had to be more creative; focused on style, fashion and language!

But the Gen Y ( born between 1977 and 1994) were more pragmatic, technology savvy and were value oriented. They turned tables and always searched for a price-quality balance, but they were more brand embracing!.

But while the baby boomers are now getting old, the new category of gizmo lovers, the new generation have their own characteristics. Although they are very proud, stylish and adventurous, they are not as much brand loyal. They are technology savvy and spend their life in the web and in their mobiles, and marketing to them needs to be more innovative and media savvy!

Gizmo lovers are trendy, young, innovative, early adapters and net savvy. They are likely to be influenced from online advertisements and mobile phone ads, rather than newspapers and hoardings! They experience technology and embrace the most recent ones, leaving the lesser tech savvy versions behind. Innovations become the major requirement, in order to market, sell and satisfy the needs of these Gizmo lovers. We have to take cues from all these hints, as they are likely to be the decision makers in coming future!..

For advertisers, Living in the Present would be the major catchline!