Once upon a time we played Cricket !!! - Part IV

Part IV of Guest article by Vipin Nambiar - Manager (Space selling) at Indian Express, Mumbai who also happens to be one of my beloved students......

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IPL – A Property for All…

The packed DY Patil stadium with more than 50k spectators bid a fascinating farewell to IPL 3. The show is over. Chennai Super Kings became the King of IPL. Hard Luck for Mumbai Indians, being the most favourites throughout the season.. IPL 3 thus ended with all its Glitz, Glamour and Excitement intact. Thanks to Keiron Pollard, Sachin, Raina for an excellent finale, and the likes of A R Rahman, Shahid Kapoor, Bipasha Basu made the entire evening a sparkling and memorable one...

For all the bad publicity IPL is earning in the past so many days, I have one thing to say, just like the short format of the T20 version of cricket, the controversies, too, will be short and entertaining(it already is entertaining and nothing more). The sooner one gets sprung up; the faster it gets dusted. My passion towards cricket and IPL from the last 3 years, compelling me to pray that nothing bad should happen to put off curtains to this behemoth event called Indian Premier League. Because it’s indeed the biggest marketing extravaganza ever happened in India, by most (if not all) measures. A golden goose for all…

In this controversy, the ultimate winner is Media Companies by all means. They welcomed it with both hands ,easily filling in the slots. The controversies tearing many masks, opening the intricacies of the Big Mine Called IPL… Not getting much into the controversy side, because I don’t have Valid Proofs, which everyone is asking for… Will this havoc create a permanent dent on the credentials of IPL? Let’s wait and watch …

Have you happened to hear the Nerolac Jingle whenever the Score summary of IPL matches was being shown in CNN IBN? This one hour program on IPL is named Cricketainment. Or the Sidhuisms in the program called Cannon Summer Slam III with Sidhu in Times Now. Be it regional or national, every news channel in India has got half an hour to one hour exclusive programs on IPL. Had you missed a sixer, OOPS, sorry, a DLF Maximum or a Citi Moment of Success you would have tuned into these programs and got a glimpse of it.

Even you can have chats with all time greats like Sunil Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri, Sidhu, Harsha Bogle and many more. These are brilliantly devised marketing programs. That’s the only reason why these so called 24x7 News Channels didn’t get into more fights over the telecasting issues with the IPL governing body and SET MAX. These innovative IPL properties successfully fetched in many of the big advertisers on board.

Each and everyone was eagerly selling out IPL to make that extra buck this summer. Some days back, Lalu Prasad Yadav was demanding the nationalization of IPL, where it’s already a Universal Brand. The Top 5 News Channels registered and Average Ratings of 1.5 to 1.75 for their Exclusive IPL Programs.

IPL was not spared by the newspaper dailies. Times of India has come out with a 3-4 pager exclusive feature on IPL called IPL THREELLER. From Scorecards, to Today’s Matches, to Players Columns to whatnot, every single column of the broadsheet has been attached to a brand. Not just TOI, but all the leading dailies tried to fetch in many advertisers on board by their 20-100 sqcm box ads....( click on the first two pics attached with this article) IPL, thus creating opportunities for all, despite which and what field they are in.

Websites featured IPL also registered a healthy growth in the last 45 days. The websites’ HITS were on a high. Be it to check the scorecard, or to go through the players or teams profile, for all reasons Indian Cricket Websites pulled in more eyeballs this time.

Its not just IPLT20.COM, which is the official website of IPL, which registered steepness in their growth curve, but sites like Cricinfo, Rediff.com etc also took a greater share in the pie. Better and fast mobile browsing helped many to have a quick check while they are on the go. The easy and free browsing applications are doing a world of good for those mobile savvy cricket fans. Thanks to the live Youtube featuring also, which really enhanced the spectrum of fan base across the world.

IPL Mobile Connection

IPL thereby making fans in all strata of society right from a 3 year old to 60 year old to housewives to Chaiwalas to whonot. It’s indeed the biggest and most successful realty show India had ever produced. Let’s all wish and pray all the conspiracies, problems and probes on IPL will end up soon and expect a clean and transparent IPL 4.

I retire with a heartfelt thanks to all who read this article that got spread in four episodes… God bless !

(Pic courtesy- Financial express- Brand wagon)

Crouching audiences, hidden products - Part III

My article as appeared in the Advertising express magazine of February 2010...... continued from part II

The Audience Intolerance Threshold Quadrangle

The above discussion sufficiently makes it clear that when over used, Product placements in TV and Cinema can backfire and be counter productive. In this angle the concept of Audience Intolerance Threshold Quadrangle needs to be visited.

The Audience Intolerance Threshold Quadrangle is an after effect of four elements....

Prominence

Too much of importance to one or two products in a programme

Parade

Clumsy lining up of many products, with no editorial justification

Patter

Long-winded sales talk done by hero & heroine of TV programme, as if it is part of the story..

Partnership

The unholy relation between the media, advertiser, his agencies and the producer of the programme ignoring the TG


These four elements of the Audience intolerance threshold quadrangle need to be analyzed in the changed conditions and the better audiences that watch TV and cinema as compared to the past. Marketers need to understand the reason why not all communication (ads and product placements including) do not work with the market place.

Marketers have to get more realistic about the common sense of the average TV viewer /movie-goer and analyze the four factors before finalizing on a product placement deal next. The audience who grabs the remote on a commercial break cannot be made intolerant by showing long advertisements that pretend to be part of the show/movie which in any case will compromise the artistic quality of the show/movie.

Marketers have to bear the Separation principle, where it is a must to maintain appropriate separation between the programme and the advertising content. How appropriate is appropriate, is a question that marketers have to ask themselves before adventuring with a parade of products and brands, to glare from the story with prominence, to bore the people with patter and to reveal the unholy partnership to the angry target audience. People in countries like ours will not understand that this is a method of revenue generation for the producer of the film and hence tolerate it.

Greedy marketers will have to take care of the prominence part, the brand staying on in the show/movie and irritating the viewer. It is better to pass off and be remembered than remain there and not to be seen at all. Greedy channels will have to avoid parading, (the naked display of brands in an easy route to make money) to avoid people switching off the show and going to other channels. Greedy script writers will have to rethink, next time they pen dialogues that starts and ends with brand names, an easy recipe to disaster. And the greedy who is who in the marketing world- the advertiser, the ad agency, the product placement agency, the TV channel/cinema producer-director-script writer, the sponsors- each one will have to think how fair it is to over do this?

How long will this last?

How much over cooking can you do?

When TV programmes go abroad this ends up in even bigger troubles. For instance the UK media regulation authority Ofcom came heavily on Sony TV and its Indian Idol programme for blatant use of “LG KP199 mobile phone” and its virtues which violated the rules there.(This was when the programme was shown in UK for the people of Indian origin who lives there)

Guidelines for making it better

1. Distinguish between serious involvement and low involvement, whether in TV or in cinema and treat them suitably. Avoid serious programmes.

2. Product integration should be the aim, not some how product insertion which will look artificial.

3. Do not treat product placements as an opportunity to advertise alcohol and cigarettes in surrogate.

4. Use it only when editorially justifiable and to enhance practicality.

5. Try being in the back ground-Remember, passive placements with a trigger, scores more than others.

6. Bring in regulation- self is better, and ASCI can also form guidelines, at the earliest.

7. Measuring the effectiveness of product placements should be more seriously dealt with and care should be taken to make it believable.

8. Be innovative- Like Maruthi Swift which introduced the car for the first time in the film “Bunty aur Bubbly”

9. Be target specific… If you are selling women’s wear ,insert your brand and its message in a “Balika badhu” and not in “the buck stops here”.

10. Look for noticeability . It doesn’t help you being in the parade.


Summary

Product placements are a wonderful opportunity to reach the target audience, who are captive, without transferring to them a feeling of ‘being sold’. Since it is a best tool for passive learning, it can work wonders as seen in this article. It requires co ordination of all the parties involved, proper planning, and a realistic and long term approach to reap the benefits without throwing the audience into intolerance. The rule is simple- reaching more eyeballs and /or staying more time in those eyeballs need not mean more sales.

It is the proverbial golden goose, this whole business of product placements in the content, but greed should not kill it like the one in fables.

Alvida Patidev !

They're doing a new show: Celebrity Corpse, where you dig up someone after five years and try to guess who they were. -- Paul Merton [on the epidemic of tv celebrity shows]


The channel office looked like a disco on a Sunday morning….

Quite a mayhem which was the left over of the brain storming that was going on… the program team, the marketing team, the strategy people and who not… they stormed and stormed and what was left was misery and miserable looking faces….

Now what do we do? …. said the program head…. All the internal concepts seem to be non starters….

Rakhi is married off and now they are parading Rahul Mahajan as the groom… said some one.. Disgusting….

Jealousy was the raison d'être behind the whole discussion at the main meeting room of Channel U that day… all other entertainment channels were scoring well with the Such Ka Samna’s, Dus ka Dum’s and the Swayamvar’s…

I thought the Rakhi drama will bomb.. Who in the world would have thought that people will sit and watch and even adapt to this bizarre concept..? HUH… Rakhi and Marriage.. What a contradiction…?

3.5 TVR to 6.3 TVR the final day.. said some one with anguish and derision …. Our viewers also… sab ke sab budhu hai….

I had thought that the Star guys have gone bonkers …said the programme head as if in revelation… Rakhi would be the last one any sensible guy would want to marry…
But see what happened?

People laughed …… the Marketing guy quoted from Einstein… “As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality”

We should think in that angle.. Something so vague and shocking…? Far from reality?

May be we should take a list of all controversy kids… and…said the Marketing head..

And… disrupted some one … marry them off???????…

What are we ..? …..A TV channel or a matrimony agency… ?

Choot bole Kawwa kate… said some one.. Why not we do the other side of sach ka samna…

Ridiculous… thundered a director… cant we have something original? I cannot believe that we have only copy paste ideas …

By the way sir.. came a rejoinder … none of this programmes are original… they all have parentage in the west…

Then scan the west… said some one.. What is left..?

Ohhh that is like plenty… but what do we want? Controversy? Or TVR with controversy? .. or just to redefine the reality TV genre and create a grand daddy of Reality TV like Allen Funt's Candid Camera..?

Now that was like the real issue… FINALLY !!!

A long minute of silence…

Think about this……. finally said the programme head… I don’t claim this to be true but this is what I think of it.. the success of reality television is due to its ability to provide humiliation……

Question marks bloomed in faces across the room…..

I know….. I know ….said the guy .... what I said was that the general viewer have a desire to see others humiliated and we will provide it in plenty…..

A Shame show…? Humiliation TV? …………Said some one quite unconvincedly

Ahem… the task is tough but we want something or else we shall be dumped into oblivion…

And we don’t want Bakra , we don’t want KBC or Indian Idol, no no to Sa Re Ga Ma, and never a laughter challenge or a boogie woogie…

Idea… shouted some one….

Why don’t we have a “Dump your Husbands” show… said the guy standing up…. We will call it Al vida pati dev!!! It will be a shock for the viewer… a shame for the abandoned and a lot of money for the channel and the sponser…

Silence rained ….

For sure it will create controversy…chat shows will feature it… MP’s will discuss it, moral police will attack it, but people will see it…..

No one clapped for they knew it was not what they want probably…

No one said a NO for they knew that MAY BE this is an IDEA that can redefine the reality TV genre,,,,,

Tailpiece: There used to be a time when you would come home, and reality was so crappy, you would turn on TV to watch stuff that people had made up, so that you could escape from the crappy reality. Now, you go out and deal with d**kheads and morons all day, and you come home and go, 'I just want to go home so I can watch d**kheads and morons on TV.'…

---Patton Oswalt

Adspeak- Roadblocking ..!!!

Signboard outside a prostitute's house:-

"Married MEN not allowed. We serve the needy,not the greedy".

The term "roadblock" is obviously taken from the traffic vocabulary, but in Advertising it means something quite different…... ' it is an aggressive form of media buying where tactically media space is bought in bulk so that on a given day or on a giver duration of time, the TG sees the ad/ communication of the spender in all the similiar media vehicles...'.

In print media it means that space is bought in every news paper for the same day and in television advertising, an ad is shown on multiple stations simultaneously or as near simultaneously as possible.

Media buyers have been greedy like their clients who demand more return and more reach as well as frequency ,defying logic, and hence resort to practices like road blocking,,,,, so a user is confronted with the same ad on numerous channels…a remote wouldn’t be of much help in such a case since it is the same every where… .Online roadblocks ( the one done in web sites) are able to mimic the effects of a TV roadblock in this manner by exposing their ad to massive home page audiences and expanding their reach beyond a single site buy. The ultimate objective, of course, is to obtain 100 percent share of voice.

This is very useful for advertisers who need to promote something significant and timely, like the arrival of a new film in theaters; the series premiere of a popular TV series; a major political, entertainment, or sporting event; or the launch of a new product. For this reason -- along with the ability to show video and employ rich media with a large page footprint, and their sizeable price tag -- roadblock campaigns have been particularly popular among entertainment companies and big-name brands.

The Hutch to Vodafone transmission roadblock in the Star channels was much discussed at that point of time( 2007) and now it is the HUL road block that is happening today across the star network channels…(Star Plus, Star One, Star Gold, Star Utsav, Star Movies, Star World, Channel [v], Star Jalsha, Star Pravah and Star Vijay etc etc )
… Lifebuoy will the lead it seems.. so if you want to see Lifebuoy and Lifebuoy only, keep watching star today….

Impression levels of course goes up as people are forced to see..

Reach (as media planners say) is attained by roadblocking but does the MESSAGE actually REACH( as the ad means it.. reaching the heart,,,,,) the TG?

Clutter is broken and there is no competition so its all yours, even though for just one day… but does the message stay where it REACHed?

In the internet world it happens more often and more smartly….Recently, pizza chain Papa John's ran a roadblock ad on Facebook promoting a free pizza for every user who became a fan of the brand on its Facebook Page. Thanks to the home page ad and an associated e-mail campaign, Papa John's garnered 131,000 new fans in a single day. As of March, it was the second fastest-growing brand on Facebook after Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps. But it is not easy in the still old TV and print world…

The big question is…..

Isn’t the strategy leaving a somewhat objectionable impression of "blocking" consumers choice to see what they want?…

Isn’t it forceful showing ? Isn’t it that they may get bored and stop buying…?

“I am one who believes that one of the greatest dangers of advertising is not that of misleading people, but that of boring them to death” said the legend Leo Burnett… the advertising world of Media planners, buyers and strategizing isn’t bothered about the reach as the creative means it..

And there lies the problem…
Amen !