The Fun Gun!!!

Q: What's the speed limit of sex?

A: Sixty-eight -- at 69, you have to turn around.



How I hope all questions that clients asked in Advertising could be answered with such ease and fun....



Week end wishes people and excuse me for my absense from blogging , entire next week, as I am scheduled to travel like a nomad ..... Hope to return with some salvation and more........... !!!!

Cadbury's Diary Milk- In No man's Land... !

What are the different ways of experimenting with a brand and taking it from place to place and market to market…? Ask O&M, or just sit and watch the ads they make time and again for Cadburys Diary Milk, which once was good in connecting to its right TG but has slowly lost both, the idea of who is their TG and how to connect to them….

The new ad is about celebration again (that has been the platform for years now and it is extended here again) with a song 'Khush hai zamana aaj pehli tarikh hai, Meetha hai khana aaj pehli tarikh hai” which just means sing and rejoice, it's salary day today… this ad is getting a lot of recall for the money being spend… the media agency is doing its job(!) .. a hell lot of road blocking and the ad is there everywhere....... the idea stares from the newspaper and blares its horn from the TV of course….from FM radio’s and as SMS’s every first day it pooh-pooh’s ( they have tied up with BSNL, MTV, Star channels, with HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank to send out text messages to account holders on pay day etc etc)….. But the big question is: - what is the big Idea?

Cadbury’s is the undisputed leader in the Rs 2,000-crore per annum chocolate market and Cadbury Dairy Milk is its warhorse with some 34-35 % market share….. Though it is strong in bars (Five Star) and tablets (Cadbury Dairy Milk), Nestle has made inroads with its light offerings like KitKat and Munch. Worse now is an increasing health awareness, among the larger public which is attracting consumers towards lighter chocolates — a trend that will only get stronger in the days to come.

In this given scenario is this a strategy?

The conception of this new ad relates more to the old India which was socialist, stupid and loved the license Raj and famed protectionism….. Come on guys….. Take a long walk….…. The India of today doesn't wait for salary day to do a bit of indulge and that too on a piece of chocolate…. I have nothing against any brand going down the socio economic ladder as DM is doing with every new ad trying to sell to more masses, but the question is- are you retaining the original buyers..?

Is this an endeavor to move this product which is of variety seeking nature to a habitual category… Can it happen?

Is it just an effort to break the clutter? Then yes they have broken it.. but what next… is it making more people buy more than they bought before?

Is it an attempt to get synonymous with the Mithai category after being generic with the name chcolates…? If yes ALAS.. God save you guys….

Pay day is surely an occasion to celebrate but that is all? You want people to stop buying on other days… ? like I do.. every week end.. every time I walk in to a friends home, every time I visit a super market with my Kids… From every day buying to one day (JUST ONE DAY) buying? I sure don’t belong to the SEC to which you now talk to, but does that mean that I cannot be your buyer…..?

Diary milk and its ads by O&M have enchanted an entire generation and that provokes this outburst when I see the world’s most creative agency parading the wonderful brand as Radha and Miss Palampur ( in a gross under utilisation of the great Big B) and now this one.. This one for sure is better than the Radha and the Big B ads which was probably the biggest disservice to the brand….here at least (as compared to Radha) there seems to be an idea (no Big Idea still) which is let out half baked and it will lead to indigestion…..The celebration platform was and is kept intact all this years but….. See these ads from the past and then let us continue….






Now….can one compare these ads made in 1993 (or 94?) with the Radha ads? With the Big B ads where Pappu passes his 12’th grade, the Kenya ads? With the new Pehli tarikh ones?… The celebration platform is intact but isn’t the big idea missing….?

Pehli taarikh (the first day of the month= salary day) is important, I admit......I am a salaried guy and live life on the first week of ever month.. But I would rather plan, prepare and purchase a pair of jeans or a shoe on the Pehli taarikh and sing a song when I buy it…… a bar of chocolate is intuitive for me… and it has to be that way for the seller.. Or is it not..?

When you feel like eating chocolate you will have it & you wouldn't for sure wait for the pay to come to buy the chocolate......it is not such a big deal to buy a chocolate and no decision or planning is required for it….

It is surely a big deal to market chocolates.. the big players have bigger headaches... Next time when I have a celebration -Will I buy a diary milk? is the question.

The Fun Gun !!!

Ad guys usually face this.. not a banana but the arrogance.... and why not it is they who are screwed very often...

Have a happy blasting bombastic week end folks !!!!

Garnier men- perfect match !

What is so great about this ad?

I would say nothing except that it has John Abraham in it….. But that makes all the difference. Garnier for men ( a new extension from Garnier ) from International cosmetic giant L'Oreal has roped in Bollywood hunk John Abraham as the brand ambassador for its new product Garnier Men and the ads are going around catching the eye balls everywhere and everytime .( good media planning I must say)… Garnier MEN will "take care” of the tough male skin with a line of products that combine a high performance and unique formulae that fuse nature, science and technology.. ahem.. sounds great….

Why John?

Its simple..

The brand stands for “natural energy that fuels your skin”.

The brand want to be seen as “youthful and edgy” (in a positive sense I guess !), “that emanates positive energy”. It believes in “Taking Care – taking care of yourself and the world around”. John Abraham represents this value (and why not!) for Garnier. He’s got the charisma, and the attitude. He is the face of the new Indian man who is confident and has got tremendous self-belief. I know many young lads in my GYM where they come for working out just because their Girl friends LOVE JOHN…

Garnier is young and edgy, and John is an icon for the youth who is edgy as well. He wants the best for himself but he is also fun, someone who enjoys being himself, and same with the youth the GEN Y kids……. I feel a right connect and the celebrity-brand match looks perfect …

Where is this taking us?

A tremendous launch and then an expansion and surge in grooming products for men, happened in the last few years with the launch of brands such as Elder Pharmaceuticals’ Fair One Man, Saka Bleach Cream for Men, Emami’s Fair and Handsome, HUL’s Menz Activ, and Nivea for Men and the likes… (Have I left out anything…? ). Not that men didn’t care about looks before but largely had to depend on products aimed for the fairer sex…The Indian male grooming market now is growing faster than the global cosmetic market,and as per the industries estimate, the Indian male grooming market is around Rs 750 crore (without the shaving gels and brushes that is !)..,,,, The market is growing at a rate of 30-40 per cent annually and could keep growing at the rate and with increasing number of men wanting to look and feel good its just a non stop express. Now that is quite phenomenal for a category that didn’t exist some 10 years back.. aint it?

…Last to, jump into the male narcissism bandwagon is Garnier Men…. the market is tough, if not saturated and one will have to wait and see how far the new brand will capture the share of the voice and the noise and the market….If my knowledge is right, John is the first major celebrity and the first one to make a connect with its intended target audience and the brand. What more does a brand need? ( It is not that I did not see Bipasha basu and her miserable endorsement of Fa men, I prefer to ignore the ignorance of the agency and the apathy of the client and the perfect mismatch) . Now I am told that, Surya the Tamil actor and the King Khan SRK have endorsed male products well before John did, but the match factor still remains a question

Last but not the least: -

John is an icon for the Gen Y and the modern kids for sure,

…..and an icon to the metro sexual (fashionable guys who live in clean apartments, they have chiseled abs and thighs, they are mom loving, man scaping but not a gay himself, they are hair styled- cant live without gels, creams and the stuff and groomed to perfection and likes to be noted and admired by all ,including men )

……and an icon to gays as well.. (With the repelling of the controversial article 377 the LGBT movements will be more active and more faces will move out of the closet and for them john is the ultimate sex symbol) … Remember Dostana and the awe it created. Being a metro sexual himself, John loves the attention he gets, including from gays….

Simple and good !! Kudos to Garnier and Publicis India for the great marketing communication !!!

Also read :-

Hire the star..Rent a bath tub..

Jyotika weds Surya...ahhaaaa...!!!!!

The Bermuda Triangle !!!!

Lights...camera..action....

Abhi, ash and all the cash!!!

Clinic All clear...Kiss of good bye !!!

Wow! Wow Sports Brands!

celebrity circus...

Tail piece:-

In a hospital, a gentleman had made several attempts to get into the men's restroom, but it had always been occupied. A nurse noticed his predicament.

Sir, she said "You may use the ladies room if you promise not to touch any of the buttons on the wall."

He did what he needed to, and as he sat there he noticed the buttons he had promised not to touch.

Each button was identified by letters: WW, WA, PP, and a red one labeled ATR.

Who would know if he touched them?

He couldn't resist.. He pushed WW. Warm water was sprayed gently upon his bottom.

What a nice feeling, he thought. Men restrooms don't have nice things like this. Anticipating greater pleasure, he pushed the WA button. Warm air replaced the warm water, gently drying his underside.

When this stopped, he pushed the PP button. A large powder puff caressed his bottom adding a fragile scent of spring flower to this unbelievable pleasure.. The ladies restroom was more than a restroom, it is tender loving pleasure.

When the powder puff completed its pleasure, he couldn't wait to push the ATR button which he knew would be supreme ecstasy.

Next thing he knew he opened his eyes, he was in a hospital bed, and a nurse was staring down at him.

"What happened?" he exclaimed. The last thing I remember was pushing the ATR button.

The nurse said softly ..."The button ATR is an Automatic Tampon Remover. Your penis is under your pillow."

******************************************************

See my other blogs as well :- chicken curry & continuous confusion...

Videocon- Oscillate and be bald !

“Harsh necessity, and the newness of my kingdom, force me to do such things and to guard my frontiers everywhere.” Says an ancient quote…

It seems the latest in the new logo- new identity- me too modern bandwagon, Videocon is a bit confused…. Dull that they always were in their ads and communication, no matter the Shahrukhs and Dhoni’s who danced and exchanged their roles to promote the brand , now this new logo and the logo logic looks more boring and mundane than one could imagine….

In the past we have seen a parade of new logo unveilings and all the logo logic..Everytime I see a logo change, I laugh… the guys behind will have a tough time designing it, placing it, selling it, reaching it to the people, selling its logic and yet the general feel is the same.. all the banks who did such change in the past-Canara bank, South Indian bank etc etc are still the same as far as the customer is concerned…well leaving that and taking on the Logo logic part, the Uniliver logo logic was the biggest one and yet the most convincing… Union bank of India too did a reasonably fair job, Axis bank was wonderful .. Hutch to Vodafone was awesome.. Even India post did a better job than this VIDEOCON thing,,,,




Not that the new logo is bad, but the way the ads are made out, and the way the logo logic appears in media… Videocon ostensibly has poor PR, no media management and absolutely have never heard of 360 degree communication….

Aspiring to get international ..? ahem ahem… !


Until October 2006, Videocon called itself "the Indian multinational". When O&M came on board in January 2007 (taking over from R K Swamy BBDO), the agency opined that the tagline, although suitably corporate, did not strike a chord with consumers. ( New Agency as a matter of rule will replace everything and anything that the old agency has left behind... ) Thus the Indian MNC got the "Whatever role life gives you, play it big’'.. I doubt whether the guys at Videocon understood it because by May 2008 they started searching for a new bed partner.. O&M really became the mistress who fell out of the masters favour.

The reasons were plenty ,including an incredible amount of management churn at Videocon, with an exodus of sorts coming into play. In the midst of all that chaos, Videocon expressed dissatisfaction with its agency and called for a pitch. Even as the pitch progressed, Videocon was struggling to put its marketing team in place... and by the time they put a team in place O&M lost the account and Satchi& Satchi won it...The stud that Videocon is, now I am told that Satchi is sidelined into a few divisions and the corporate brand per se is handles my TAG Mccann... The rest is history...

The new symbol of Videocon asserts its passion for global impact, and the two ‘E’s on either side represent the Group’s wide spectrum of interests ranging from ‘Electronics to Energy’. Along with the steely glint, this communicates the group's global ambition, its strength, sterling credentials and innovative drive. A symbol that proclaims a paradigm shift. A sign that represents the new force that is Videocon. Thus recapitulating our principle of reaching out and touching the lives of millions of people. Worldwide.


Goes the Logo logic……. why is simple thing called life made complex by certain people..

What is that ad all about? What is it trying to say? Will some one from TAG or Satchi or some one new,,,(?) please explain...?


"The biggest challenge for the agency will be to retain the business,” told a friend at that point of time when Satchi won the 250 cr account, because “Videocon tends to be fickle with its agencies. ..."


My kids surely giggled and got amused seeing the cartoon stuff but is it why Videocon spend all the money through their bleeding ass to revamp its brand identity?


Who is to blame?


There was a rich old man...in his late 40's who got married the second time to a young beautiful but poor lady. After the initial rosy days the young lady started repenting....She wanted the old man to look a BIT more young... she plucked his white hairs one by one ,in what she thought as the best idea to make him look young.

The problem was just to begin. The man's first wife discovered this and thought that he should be really taught a lesson... strangely but ,she too saw the man's hair as the problem... she when he lay asleep pluck all his black hairs....

Oscillation, guys make people bald !!!

Some one is listening?

Also read... My previous post on Brand revamps...

Bank on me !!!

Geojith-BNP paribas- where Copying is an art !

“Man is an idiot. He doesn't know how to do anything without copying, without imitating, without plagiarizing, without aping. It might even have been that man invented generation by coitus after seeing the grasshopper copulate.”

See this ad… for those who have seen it already see it again….



Great isn’t it.. ? What an idea! What a matching tagline! What an execution!.. What transparency! I’m thrilled ….

Now see this Argentine ad which runs back to 2000 …..



Euro RSCG Mumbai and their client Geojith – BNP Paribas... No idea who fooled whom but remember the old saying …..”None but blockheads copy each other”.....

Tail piece :-

COPYING once in an exam hall in a remote village, a boy was continuously peeping at another students answer sheet. The subject was English. The teacher noticed him & asked as to what he was trying to copy when the question paper was not delivered.
The boy said : Miss, spelling of English.

Avista-simplicity scores !

Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail. ~Henry David Thoreau

The ability to simplify simply shows the ability to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak and the unnecessary will keep quiet . Now having said that How SIMPLE is that? Could that be made any more complex? Why then I keep writing about simple communication as the most powerful one and the most reached one… KISS rule.. ( dats one of my favourite rules in advertising for obvious reasons !!!)

The reason is simple…Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction… the Avista language school ad from Sweden and made long back in 2000 is proof enough (again!) of the simple fact that simple ads score, reach, hit and last long in the TG….

Remember… Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication ….

Celebrity circus.... Recession time Advertising....

Recession has hit all of us as different reasons, for most of us as an excuse or a pretext ....

It’s a mad rush for young blood in the celebrity endorsement scene….the recession that has hit the world so badly seems to have chucked the age old celebrity circus that ruled the roost .The Venerable guys who sat on the thrones of the Indian celebrity endorsement empire are all now slowly being shaken… some are already our and some are there in the queue…

Post March ,the new financial year has given the brand owners a lot of scope to rethink on the wrinkled faces that sold their wares… recession as some one said is a reason, and excuse and an apology for anyone to do anything….and here we are seeing the likes to the great SRK, Aishwarya Rai, Rani Mukherjee, Sushmita Sen, Priety Zinta etc etc etc giving way to the likes of Katrina, Deepika, Priyanka, Genilia ( the stupid Cadbury’s perks ad is disgusting though!!) and the hot Dhoni who sells anything from Bikes to Fans…

The Pepsi youngistan campaign was a bit odd considering the fact that it was led by an SRK who was 40 plus… Recession has taken its toll on the deal when Pepsi refused to renew the contract and instead felt happy and YOUNG with Deepika, Ranbir Kapoor and Dhioni….Sachin got out from Pepsi as well, and so did Hrithik Roshan from Coke…

It seems the bad times for SRK is giving him sleepless nights.. Hyundai ended the long association with the Fauji Guy whilst Toyota said a sweet goodbye to Amir khan…Katrina Kaif has deseated the most beautiful Aishwarya in Nakhstara diamonds while she did the same with Sushmita in Pantene..L’ oreal is now with Sonam Kapoor, loss Aishwarya, and BSNL ( the amazingly rich and blissfully boring ) is now with Deepika, loss Priety Zinta…

Genelia displaced the old Rani from Perks ( her ads were better I guess ) and from Fanta (no comments !)…Asin ( the slim mallu girl) who shot to fame after Gajni is now with every brand and every market, so much so that her brand is under dilution than the brands that she endorses.. but who cares? When the sun shines, the clever ones make the hay!!!

Now this is definitely eye catching and attention grabbing but is it going to be a change that the ad industry was looking for?

The money part, is the same… considering the fact that a Deepika will charge no less than a Rani, if not more…

The old faces are too familiar and hence people may not have the charm in spite of the brand spending crores on the contract is an argument that I thought will stand closer to reality..But hey…. Isn’t Deepika over exposed…? Isn’t Dhoni seen everywhere? Every damn product and brand..? (Thank God he don’t sell Mysore sandal soap any more)….

Is this the change the ad world wanted?

Will this oscillation from Tom and Dick to Harry and Martha help??

The comfort zones in which the people in Advertising (the agency, the clients and the others) is often a no entry zone for others…. Its often known to everyone that there could be a better solution and a better option but what is it?

In normal circumstances, normal actions would do…. But in abnormal circumstances………., should people go MAD?

Need not be, for sure but people got to think really really abnormal… For me at least for God’s sake it doesn’t make a bloody difference whether it is Genelia, Deepika or Preity Zinta who cries, convinces ,cajoles ,seduces and stops me to buy what they sell…

I am living with a cut in my salary … Damn it !!!!

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Tail Piece :-

A rich, dying man, laid on his deathbed, requested to be joined at his bedside by his vicar, his bank manager and his lawyer.

He instructed them that he wished to be buried, when he finally passed away, along with all his money. He gave each of them fifty thousand pounds and asked them to throw the money on top of his coffin, in the burial plot, when he died.

A couple of days later the old man passed away and was buried within the week. At the wake, the three men were chatting and the vicar was suddenly overcome with guilt. He confessed to the other two that he had only thrown only half of the money onto the coffin, as the church needed urgent repairs to the roof.

The bank manager thought, ‘What the heck if we are having a confession,’ and told the other two men that he had also only thrown half the money in, as the ‘Credit Crunch’ was hitting hard and he needed some money for the bank to stop it going bust.

The lawyer jumped up and said to the other two, ‘I think that is a shameful act on both of you. I threw a cheque in for the full amount!”......

Times Of India - Lead India in style!

“I am unable to understand how a man of honor could take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust.” Said the renowned French poet Charles Baudelaire and let me begin this episode of ad formula here.

News papers have all changed and why not. This are times when people and societies have changed. Markets have changes and marketing has changed. Selling is no longer selling alone and many things added to it. News papers (long lost is there nobility and the reverence with which people saw them, the emotions with which people attached to them and the trustworthiness with which they identified with them) in the changed world have to compete to win and to excel … The Times Of India “lead India” campaign, I would not say is one plain and naked attempt in that direction but it shows that it ,in spite of the noble cause ( vote/ change/ youth and all the bla bla bla) the hidden motive is sales and more sales for TOI. (ot that it is a crime!)

According to TOI, this campaign is about “Awakening the countrymen to vote for right candidates and before that, making political parties to bring right & eligible candidates for representing them” .For that, Times Of India will be reviewing all the candidates from tens of constituencies and publishing details of those political candidates…. OOH….I felt once I thought about how taxing this could be… How hard it would be to TOI to actually analyse and come out with real news and real facts about this guys…? Will it happen considering the fact that a major news paper group like TOI ,has many dealings and many allainces with the same politicians whom they are trying to change?

Every day the TOI devotes a large space ( sacrifice for the nation eh !!! pooh poohs the crtitiques ) , and spends a hell lot on TV, glares us from the outdoors, bill boards and OOH, and wherever and exhorts us to wake up and save this nation. Shouldn’t we be thankful? We are ..I am atleast not that I don’t see the business in it, but I see the cause.. I see the comunication behind it…

The ads are simple, powerful, well written, well reaching and hiting the target- right at the weakpoint. I am sure the TV version which is making me to think, and wriggle in discomfort ,given the fact that I have never voted( for want of a choice) is doing the same with many. It has far reaching effects on many a viewers as I understand from my analysis and election talk with friends.

The campaign began in early 2007 with a single print ad that asked, "Are we going to simply shrug our shoulders, blame our infrastructure, our bureaucracy and our political system?" .The effort grew to include TV, Internet, mobile, street-level activation and reality TV and later went on to win the grand prix lion at the Cannes… TOI and JWT had reasons to laugh!!!!

It is good and even desirable that media gets social and takes social issues head on. Media can do things which others cannot. Only media can do things which many others cannot. For the idea, for the reach out and efforts spend on the campaign, for the consistency and for keeping the idea long enough to tickle the conscience of the lazy arm chair critics of the system (Me included!) it is full marks from me….

Rules of Marketing communication are all simple…. It takes a lot of stupidity to spoil your communication. These guys haven’t done it…


Kudos!!!






Tail piece:- if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, here we go !!!

Advertising -the Axe effect>>>> Part III

Dear Ann:

I have a problem. I have two brothers.

One brother is in advertising, the other was put to death in the electric chair for murder.

My mother died from insanity when I was three years old.

My two sisters are prostitutes, and my father sells narcotics to high-school students.

Recently I met a girl who was just re­leased from a reformatory, where she served time for smothering her illegitimate child to death, and I want to marry her.

My problem is, if I marry this girl, should I tell her about my brother who is in advertising?

(Plaque presented to Arnold Barban by the staff of Leo Burnett on his retirement from the agency.)

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Media and its role...

Media is commercialized. Profit is the very idea and competition is very much around, threatening. Recession and the resultant media expenditure cuts are eating into the revenue streams of media houses. (IPL may be an exception though.)

Just like Coca-Cola having Pepsi, Colgate having Pepsodent and Hero Honda having Bajaj, Star Plus has Sony, Sun has Vijay and x has y…... The more the competition, the more you have to commercialize and then, it is the sponsor or the ad agency that decides on what program should be on air and when….. if you think this is MISERABLE, so be it… watch a channel like Asianet and you will know how media violates all the norms to show ads than the actual programmes and make money ,I guess I should say mint money….Here I guess one should also admit the fact that some programmes, or many of them of the serial and reality show genre are disgusting watch than the commercials that interrupt them... care fully observe when you get home today, this phenomenon is there happening even at your home...

Practically all the shows and soaps, which we see are controlled by the advertisers…. ( I know that it is not news for you ..many of you..!!) Many people wonder why there are so many ads around. The simple fact is that without ads all these media will be costlier- more price for newspapers and magazines and more money for the cable operator. And as the corporate preferences about media change,( new media forms come up every day) media has to stoop many times for existence.

Reports show that local media which has largely ignored by the corporate before, now has started gathering more attention. Local cable channels mop up any where between 15% - 30% of audience share in prime time as per a recent Business World report. The fact that Grocery store chains like Food World, with many outlets across , spends pittance on mass media budget, but in abundance on local media is proof enough…

Print ads are generally considered less effective and hence less offensive, because they can be easily ignored but T.V and internet ads are more intrusive and often distasteful T.V ads appeal to all senses, they encircle, capture us in a carefully woven web.

The question of ethics ?

Giants like Hindustan Lever with its gigantic product mix and multitudes of brands and varieties of each brand in each product line, hence adopt a strategy of continuous communication with the customer in a well planned “pull strategy” and they are what they are today. Seemingly harmless ads, which appeal to our emotions like love and fear, are also not so harmless on a second thought. Hue and cry was raised against media for having shown some ads. Kamasutra and Moods resorted to enact a bedroom with all the sensuality associated with it in their ads only to be opposed far and wide.

Indian hypocrisy has now to a large extent died down, compared to the olden days when even the Liril girl in her bikini was considered a blasphemy and moral police troops worked overnight to send her into a bath room… When Marc Robinson and the girl in the KS ads were seen like devils, when Milind and Madhu were accused of being the reason for all the ill’s of thei otherwise heavenly nation…

Having said that, I must also say that Ad makers also go over board some times….How can any one substantiate the use of half – naked women in coffee and tea ads, talcum powders “for men” which drives women behind and lipstick stains on a man’s body? There was some coffee ad which showed a bed room, with its full glory and action, and 20 seconds of a 30 sec commercial went for the jerking of the bed leaving a mere 10 second for the brand name and the product to be shown and sold. No one wonder I don’t remember the brand name ( read it again !! I said SOME coffee ad )…Most of the people who saw the ad didn’t see the coffee thing… those few who saw it kept wondering whether to have coffee before bed or after bed !!!!

Even liquor is advertised, mostly in disguise as a soda or a plan water of the same brand name…. this is when it is clear to the thinking common man ( that is a new tribe in India) that a Vijay Mallya does not need a Kingfisher Mineral water to survive…..

The media, it is clear should play a more reasonable role but then the big question comes – on what cost and at whose expense?

Tail piece :Advertising tells us what unnecessary luxuries we can't do without....

Also read my other blogs chicken curry & confusion.....

Airtel- magic realism...

There is a kid in every one .. even in the most moronic of us… and the kid somewhere at some point of time would have done this … this self assuring phone call to his dad and its desired effect is simple and we all have done it, some way or the other and that makes this a good one….

Done by Rediffusion Y&R a new angle … the trust angle, which is a hygiene factor, is bought in to the Airtel communication which the agency believes and claims to be having a far more fascinating than the network angle… Airtel which shocks(often) the poor viewers with out of the world crazy stuff, often infected with an overdose of celebrity virus, comes down to earth some times, gets sensible and talk to us in simple terms and makes us smile.. smile in agreement.. this ad is one of them.. no big hungama,,,, no brouhaha , no quagmires and hardwork to some how fit in a parade of stars who at the end of the day outsmarts and outlives the brand…

Magic realism as someone called such stuff, this realization that with Airtel you are never disconnected is a subtle message that gets into the information cluttered minds in a passive way… Even though in my flat in the heart of the city, Airtel simply fools me by refusing to show signal, this conspicuously uncomplicated ad baffled me the first time I saw it…then the more I saw I fell in love… Virej Dasani the kid, has done a wonderful job by not acting and just living, and the guys who made it ostensibly didn’t try to cultivate any bogus innocence out of the boy… Kudos for that…

Kudos to the entire team…Ramanuj Shastry, national creative director, Rediffusion Y&R, Deepesh Jha, creative head for the script, Vinyl Matthew of Footcandles for the direction…. And others…

Let this ground sense prevail…..

Tailpiece: Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising........ Mark Twain

Read my other blogs also... Chickencurry & Confusion .....................

The Recession conundrum& Agency blues...

The husband leans over and asks his wife, 'Do you remember the first time we had sex together over fifty years ago? We went behind the village tavern where you leaned against the back fence and I made love to you.'

'Yes', she says, 'I remember it well.'

'OK,' he says, 'How about taking a stroll around there again and we can do it for old time's sake?'

'Oh Jim, you old devil, that sounds like a crazy, but good idea!'

A police officer sitting in the next booth heard their conversation and, having a chuckle to himself, he thinks to himself, I've got to see these two old-timers having sex against a fence. I'll just keep an eye on them so there's no trouble. So he follows them.

The elderly couple walks haltingly along, leaning on each other for support aided by walking sticks. Finally, they get to the back of the tavern and make their way to the fence. The old lady lifts her skirt and the old man drops his trousers. As she leans against the fence, the old man moves in.. Then suddenly they erupt into the most furious sex that the policeman has ever seen. This goes on for about ten minutes while both are making loud noises and moaning and screaming. Finally, they both collapse, panting on the ground.

The policeman is amazed. He thinks he has learned something about life and old age that he didn't know..After about half an hour of lying on the ground recovering, the old couple struggle to their feet and put their clothes back on. The policeman, is still watching and thinks to himself, this is truly amazing, I've got to ask them what their secret is.

So, as the couple passes, he says to them, 'Excuse me, but that was something else. You must've had a fantastic sex life together. Is there some sort of secret to this?'

Shaking, the old man is barely able to reply, 'Fifty years ago that wasn't an electric fence' ……

My good old friend Raj who works as a Client servicing sup in a reputed Ad agency came online and was available to chat after a LONG time... recession and the related under employement I guessed, when he suddenly said Hi...

Raj: Hi man...

me: hey dude.. wassup?

Raj: cool man…njoying…

me: hehehe you sound like you just had an orgasm?

Raj: well nothing much to do so yeah kinda orgasm…now we face (like most of agencies here another probs….we can't release ads

me: ?

Raj: huge payment backlog to publications…

me: hmmmmmm

Raj: so they are not accepting the material that we send them for publishing…

me: ohhhh why u guys aren’t clearing it???

Raj: so we tried another 2-3 agencies to release through them atleast…. they also have same probs….

me: sounds tricky…..

Raj: so if they are insisting on a no release, we can very well close down….

me: shit……but who is keeping it pending….you guys or the clients?

Raj: client is paying us it seems….we roll it for some other things…. complete goof up

me: now that is totally unfair… now how u expect media to accept it?

Raj: True.. I am handling the account and now I don't know what to tell them…

me: u ask your bosses… the rolling stones…..

Raj: hehehe… you will be shocked…they are also clueless

me: huh.. what the fuck man…?

Raj: they are all ready to leave… it looks like no one has any idea about what it is going to be… recession is the reason.. but I don’t understand how in March it is affecting us.. it should be after March only….We even thought its like Austerity you know... but now we know its all goof up....

I left Raj there and started wondering… why do some people, never come back to life in spite of electric shocks?

Why is my beloved industry like this?

Tail piece:- So-called austerity, the stoic injunction, is the path towards universal destruction. It is the old, the fatal, competitive path. Pull in your belt is a slogan closely related to gird up your loins, or the guns-butter metaphor.....


Also read my other BLOGS... Chicken curry & Confusion

Advertising... behind the axe effect>>> Part II

Continued from Part I>>>>>


The very first law in advertising is to avoid the concrete promise and cultivate the delightfully vague. ~Bill Cosby



Ads are glossy, glamorous and often larger than real life. Consumer products often try to sell itself, not for the product but for what the product promises. It is plain fact that, by using a product it is not possible to become or feel like some other person- a film star or a cricketer, still fair and lovely claims glowing fairness within days and abundantly sells itself capitalizing on the weakness of the Indian public for a fair skin. Equating light skin with beauty is a deeply rooted perception across Asia and in pursuit of brand success corporate giants like Ponds and Fair & Lovely has kicked up more fuming controversies that fairer skin . It has been seen more and enough in this blog in the past and hence let me leave it alone here…..

The human desire is to look young, smart, beautiful, handsome, cool, slim, happy, glowing, rich, pompous, different and what not…Each such desire is an opening for the marketer and advertising is the greatest weapon for the purpose. To put it simply if we have desire to reduce obesity we have a score of products from VLCC to suction therapy, Sugar free and Herbal tea to Diet Coke and Pepsi and all those TSN products, advertised through poorly dubbed stupid looking hour long miserable programmes which often question our commonsense.

India with its middle class (one of the largest in the world) and with the on going task of globalization, with all the 100 plus TV channels and numerous magazines and newspapers, all the websites and portals, and an average of six thousand messages passed on through every educated Indian mind (MAD index), on any given day and a barrage of products from LCD to local agarbathies and from laptop computers to loose garments in various brand names, the task of the advertisers is getting tougher day after day. He not only has the difficult job of telling the viewers that his product is the best, to build a brand preference, but has to, by hook or cook, tell and make them believe that the “other” products are useless. Comparative advertising; stooping below a certain level becomes a dirty mocking game as the cola war demonstrated and recently the Horlicks vs Complan war amply described. Thumps-Up and Pepsi, pooh-poohing each other using a khan or other and Sprite with its new set of realty ads, flavored with humour, after every new ad by the other one are all bearing testimony.

Can marketers create needs? As per the theory, NO. But in practice, he can create an unnecessary want. A middle class family has a need for daily washing their clothes but may not necessarily want a washing machine for that purpose. A successful marketer through the advertisement and campaigns fits into this “gap of thought” and makes the selling possible.

For a middle class man the resources are less and the wants are more. Living in a world saturated of advertisements, designed as scientific and informative, somewhere down the line, he obliges. He resists the temptation ultimately by yielding. Sometimes, the appeals are so strong and touches the viewers so intensely that there is no rethinking. As an end result, any average family today has to budge by compulsion rather than conviction. Horlicks or Viva for the “complete growth of children”, use Pepsodent, Colgate or Close- Up for “hundred percent germfree teeth” and total protection, feed new born babies with Nestle grow-up milk or Junior Horlicks, and worse use a Johnson’s baby soap to wash a two year old to keep its skin soft and “same to same” as a just born baby.

The Dandi salt Ad, which claimed the vital importance of salt that too, Dandi salt for the intellectual growth and brain development of children which hit the air some time back is still my favourite example of a STUPID ad…. This ad pretending to be scientific and rational hide the fact that dogs and dolphins do not consume salt and even before the advent of this salt there were intelligent people living in this country. And to be scientific and simple, salt has nothing to do with intelligence.

There are questions we never ask ourselves. We see an ad and ignore it. We repeatedly see an ad, we remember it, so that next time we walk to department store for purchase, it works and positively influences our brand preference. There is no such thing called as brand loyalty, in many consumer products like salt because of the habitual buying process associated with it, and it is proven fact that consumer have low involvement with most low cost, frequently purchased products. So the marketers have to repeat because ad repetition creates brand familiarity rather than brand conviction. Lie or no lie- repetition is the mantra.

Now the world is so small and so flooded with products and brands. The USP and ESP’s have changed. Health of children and of the family and wellness and beauty is a main concern for upper class and middle class people and this weak spot is gently but tactfully touched in many ads. Hence all the claims of 24 hours are oral protection, slimness in 30 days and fairness in a week. Pretentious USP’s like –“stain champions” from Henko, “colour guard” from Sunlight, “stain cutters” from Vim bar and “kid stains” from Surf and “friendly chemicals” from Friendly wash are examples of how “creative” our advertisers can be. Such newly coined words and ideas generally create wonders in the market but how long is an omnipresent question….

Close-Up released “shade card” with its toothpaste only to be matched by a “germ indicator” from Pepsodent. “Bio” was the buzzword and being bio or herbal was a short cut to success. Marketers understood the growing awareness among the educated class about the merits of vegetarianism and being close to nature and hence we had “bio fresh L.G.” and “Eco-freshetarian” Samsung and even “Eco drive watches” from Citizen. Fair and Lovely promoted its herbal version made with “Kumkumadhi Thailam” and it worked in the market. With celebrities like Meneka Gandhi endorsing products like Chandrika soap more credibility got associated with such products….

But this game was not to last for ever….


Tail piece: Advertising is like marriage. There may be a better way, but what is it?

Also read my other BLOGS... CHICKENCURRY & CONFUSION

Advertising... behind the axe effect>>> Part I

Advertisers constantly invent cures to which there is no disease. ~Author Unknown

The Ad war is always on, fiercely and ferociously with all the Khans and Bachans, Gangulies and Tendulkars, as weapons on either side in this battle of ideas, designed and executed by ad agencies through various media in varying combination, for the corporate with loads of money, in pursuit of attaining their business objectives-sales volumes, profit or competitive edge.

Advertisements are generally considered as torture or at least an unwanted intrusion in between our valuable hours of infotainment says my class where I last taught Marketing and this topic accidentally came into discussion… Is it so? Not exactly was my answer (biased that I am to the ad world)….. Some recent studies, I told them reveal that many people, youngsters in particular see commercial breaks as more interesting and entertaining than the main programmes in between where these ads peep in…. There the class got struck.. they didn’t protest and it looked that they to an extent agree to that study… The variety of Pepsi ads related to a world cup cricket some years back was chosen as the most interesting TV show by youngsters and college students in a survey conducted in Chennai city at that time… It was shocking for the researcher but that was it…

What does this mean? Does that mean that these ads are doing their jobs? They are reaching their intend targets and are driving people in herds to drink Pepsi or Coca Cola? It doesn’t matter, which brand… come summer the cola sales are up and this summer is no different….. “What is Coca Cola?, it is really water and syrup. But the stuff about the brand is so big and Americanized and refreshing it makes the product really big” … now who doesn’t know that and yet why people buy the yankee stuff and gulp down?

The hype and hoopla created by the continuous and persistent influx of advertisements, termed as ad campaign so influence the consumers psyche, that there will be no place for logical reasoning or to be more genuine many a times logic slowly hides behind hype and slowly fades into oblivion … Repetition is the key and our ad guys know it… Joseph Goebels , the propaganda guru of Adolf Hitler is the inspiration for the Ad world… “tell a lie and it shall remain a lie”.. said he… “but repeat it and it becomes the truth”

Advertising, as per the American Advertising Association, is “any paid form or non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods or services by an identified sponsor”. In the process of advertising, the partners at work are the sponsor (manufacturer/marketer), the ad agency and the media, with the consumer or the prospective consumers as the target. The degree of compatibility and like levels of thinking between these partners is the most important ingredients towards success. The agency creates message contents for the sponsor, and executes through the media to the target audience and such messages should be able to gain attention, hold interest, arouse desire and elicit action as far as the audience is concerned…

Regardless of whether an advertisement uses rational or an emotional appeal, regardless of the USP or ESP used, ads work, only if it is identified and owned by the segment of the audience for whom they are designed and executed. New ideas may be resisted or even be counterproductive if the message is poorly designed. This becomes a headache for international marketers in particular because of the cultural, linguistic and racial variations from continent to continent, country to country and even within a single country.

As per Keegan, there are five international product and promotional strategies namely ‘Straight Extensions’ – into the new market, “Product Adaptation” – as per the new market, “communication adaptation” –for the new market, “Dual Adaptation” –where the product and promotion changes for the new market and “Product Invention” – creating new products ….Read your Marketing text books guys… It is a wonderful Model by Keegan….

Theories apart, in practical market, every new entry is a nightmare for the sponsor and the agency, through which they communicate to the consumer. Successful ad agencies do their homework keeping in mind the cultural difference and behavioral pattern of the target audience … But it is easier said than done… This home work thing… is it not??


Tail Piece:-
Ram: I can't understand why you failed in business...
Guru: Too much advertising
Ram: What do you mean too much advertising? You never spent a dime on advertising.
Guru: That's true, but my competitors did.

God !!!..was she faking????

Republished under the best of adformula series...


oh ! what an entangled web we weave ,when we first learn to deceive...

Last night I got a call from an agency friend of mine...(I have non agency friends too) who wasnt able to attend my repeated calls during the week and was full of apologies for not able to do so..

The time was about 11.30, I was about to sleep after a hard days slogging."Tired of pitching preparations yaar".. she lamented..."and our hits are far less than the misses". We last week went to pitch for the new car account , you know the small car guy who announced a change from their current agency owing to non compatibility issues".

I got curious... having left the world of advertising when it started getting internationally and intentionally murky, such field reports keep me in touch with the industry.

"We shed all the intellectual laziness you know"- she chuckled- "for a long period and got our act together,, we pursued the account as hunters would pursue animals"..

I chuckled too, for a moment, visualising the familiar lazy gooses of agencies whiling time in the name of creativity and research......An account review by some client is a time generally when, agencies wake up from slumber, some even from their death beds and get into action. It is a mix of comedy, politics, apathy, latenights, peeping Johnies, blame games, expectations, courage, creative oupour and a lot of celebrated humbug.Agency heads directly take charge, if the client is big,(now a days even for the smallest corporates) - lavishing his divine charm and diplomatic aristocrazy-- people are given special charges.. even expertise from outside is hired if needed so(if the agency have not experienced/worked for similiar accounts)..individuals are identified for specific tasks..research guys spring in action,questionnares and key boards,assuming, tabulating concluding what the consumers need , want , demand...media guys burn their midnight and early morn oil to find some media where the new ads(assuming that the account is won) could be placed..Vox pops.. field interviews..focus interviews... dealer opinion records ..brainstorming, ...creative blockbusting...Dictums like....“You can’t have an ego in this business, but be aware that everybody has lots of them"...7 day weeks.. Friends meaning four letter words.....positioning statements............creative teams and briefs-who "will weave from its plain threads the rich tapestry of flackery that envelops a big idea" and then with all the hype and hoopla ,baggage and politics- proceed to the clients side for what the industry calls as 'pitching'..

"We got the big idea.. we cracked an amazing one" -she continued

"hhmmmm"... I listened with patience."How big is your family? that is the idea..in which the small family in the small car is shot in different locales and shown.. to demonstate how the car becomes an essential part of the family"

"Not bad"- I commended.

"Exactly'...she said .."and that is what they also said"...

"Then"...I threatened her stony silence..

" Then what .. liars.. scoundrels..that was a ploy...you know they didnt drop their agency,they stole all the ideas that we dumbos, gave them in the pitch"....she wailed..." and now my guys tell me that the 'How big is your family ' idea will soon appear on screen and in print with their tag"..

"Amen" ..I managed to say as I gasped for breath.

" We are blacklisting them"..she muttered.."never again, we will try or work for such bad clients"

"Thats good"- I said even as I laughed over the BLACKLISTING thing,,,- "may be now you can start a new agency with tired old people and try again"

******************************************************************

If you try and dont succeed ,cheat.. repeat until caught..then lie..

Stop Smoking !!!

How better can it get? I mean the communication that this ad is making with a bang... old one yes, done by FCB in Paris and a Winner at the Cannes, this made heads turn, people thought before they took another puff....

The Fun Gun !!!

A physician, an engineer, and an attorney were discussing who among them belonged to the oldest of the three professions represented.

The physician said, "Remember, on the sixth day God took a rib from Adam and fashioned Eve, making him the first surgeon. Therefore, medicine is the oldest profession."

The engineer replied, "But, before that, God created the heavens and earth from chaos and confusion, and thus he was the first engineer. Therefore, engineering is an older profession than medicine."

Then, the lawyer spoke up. "Yes," he said, "But who do you think created all of the chaos and confusion?"

Some clients are like Lawyers... aint they? just confusion and chaos....

Happy week end folks...

Jimbo bumbo ..Jargons in Advertising... part I

For those ad guys who happen the attend the typical client meetings and then their own meeting with the genius’s of the account and brand planning division these are the terms that comes out with every foul breath….

Synergy (O yeah!!) 1+1=5 ….
Proactive, not Reactive (that is when we can do it before target date)
Win-Win Situation (Compromise!)
Think Outside the Box (but where is the box?)
Take That Offline (SHOUT!)
Client-Focused (his ego is bigger than ours)
Strategic Fit (Jargons can confuse)
Gap Analysis (whose gap with whom?)
Best Practice ( as compared to?)
The Bottom Line (is most of the time the top line as well)
Core Business ( of most clients is to make money)
Lessons Learned ( the hard way most of the time.. the main client has just walked out..)
Revisit ( the plans and strategies often after the client kicks hard in the ass)
Game Plan ( often with open goal posts and googlies)
In the Loop ( just keep in touch)
Out of the Loop ( I hate him to talk to him)
Go the Extra Mile (often after a lots of 4 letter words)
Benchmark ( often the bench is to hide under)

To be continued >>>>>>>>>>>>>.

The animal circus !!! (part I)

Advertising is like a hard pill; many people dislike it and yet have to have it when required, for want of an option. What is the most misused term in advertising? Came a question during one of my lectures ... and I didn’t think twice to yell ...Strategy.....Why so? Having worked inside agencies for seven long years, having seen humbug being sold to clients with jargons and mystification mixed in the right proportion strategy is the most misused term in advertising for sure. Even other wise if all this claims of strategy were true what are all the dogs and kids doing in advertising?... on an after thought let me also add hens... a large numbers you have just seen....

It is not that animals are bad, spokes creatures and spoke skids are as important as spokesmen and women if used in the right way and if used with basic astuteness.... but the sad fact as seen in the above ad, which is just a sample, is that the common sense is just not that common. Most of them...a vast majority of them just plummet and ooze in multihued out of the idiot box, the music up and up, the sun shine and the plastic smiles just for ever. From every angle, at every film speed, in backlight, sidelight, stark light, animals....happy, hopeful, adoring, loving and loyal rules....Stereotyping is not a new accusation and the ad guys live up, and constantly strive hard to live up to the accusation with all the HARD WORK that they are seemingly putting. Animals and their use, over use, misuse and abuse is but the worse of all the stereotypes and clichés that seems to rule advertising- rule with an axe that is...

See this ad.. it is unimaginable that a great brand like GE will resort to such a kid play but it has...

Just like many others it has done a kid play and that is a syndrome which agencies suffer from and get away without harm and often even with accolades from the clients and even from the public... it would have been acceptable, all the claims of strategy and its implementation if the ad looked like the one below... Bridgestone and its use of animals...great in its execution, amazing in fun and the to the last shot suspense -three basic elements that make an ad interesting.

It is true that advertisements depict life and draw from it to make the right connect with consumers. Many a times, there are situations and emotions that are best conveyed in a particular way…. It may be animals that the right way is …( the Raymond’s ad with so many dogs..) So animals, or for that matter, anybody who is a part of peoples' day-to-day lives can appear in ads. But too much of anything is bad and in any case the agencies are not paid just for executing wishy-washy work ….

To be continued….

Pardon me Rooserda...

Originally published on 1 Jan 06 and republished on the "Best of Adformula series"...

A woman came home just in time to find her husband in bed with another woman.With superhuman strength borne of fury, she dragged her husband down the stairs to the garage ,tied him to a pillar and put his manhood in a loop and tied it in to the wall .Next she picked up a hacksaw.
The husband terrified, screamed, "Stop! Stop! You're not going to cut it off... are you?"

The wife, with a gleam of revenge in her eye, said, "No. You are. I'm going to lock the garage from outside and set on fire."

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Not every ad guru accepts the theory of Unique Selling Proposition (USP) which Rooser reeves of Bates made decades ago.... Many disagree with the idea that ads should have a single and strong idea to sell successfully..But none disagree that ads should have strong ideas to be able to sell , whatever you name it and too many ideas will bomb on the face for sure.. Remember vicco turmeric..?USP's can be inherent in the product- can be made along with the product and then communicated through good advertisements, or can be simply 'discovered' after the product is made and before communicationis thrown on to the air.

Contrary to popular perceptions the second route isnt that bad.. saw the latest G4H ad's ? ,which are making Kaliappa Chettiar laugh like never before..( Mr. Chettiar owns Sri kaleeshwari mills which is the proud owner of Goldwinner, the cooking oil brand)..but USP' which the ad agency discovers for and on behalf of the client ,many times do back fire.. synclova 5's made it then but today people are less idiotic.

Listen to this...Samm Sinclair Baker in his classic 'The Permissible Lie ' told us this story..

In a typical meeting, a client told his agency men... "our canned item is slipping in sales.We need some new exitement in the advertising. we are going to redesign the label to give it a NEW look. so come up with a New improved campaign with lots of big - big promises.. move fast"..

Some one asked- " any thing new or improved inside the can?"

The client glared."what the hell kind of a question is that? I would have said so if we did that..only the looks will be NEW..Whose side are you on anyhow?

The questioner wasn't on any side very long.He was fired from the agency.

Now hear this...

"You saw this"- yelled the creative guy- " fair and whatever has come up with fairness granules... what a proposition..now they are gonna make more airhostessess... God we are gonna sink"...

"And see this"- cried another guy- "fair fever guy has come up with" fairness enzymes" ...

"Goodness gracious.. what are we going to do? Our farfairest will definitely want to retaliate"..

"Let us discover a USP for him.. ummmmm" .. said the strategy guy.....what about fairness microbes?"

"Yuck"-said one guy- "it irritates..it gives me creepy feeling.. a negative image"..

"Is it? then how about' fairobes' ? "

"Wow.... wonderful"-said many

"but what is fairobes?-asked one

"who knows and who cares"?... that will be farfairest' s USP here after..

"forgive us Rooserda"- quipped the Bengali account planner.

"And we will use it until they start sensing reality, then change it .. public memory is short."-said the branch head.

"Now shall we call the client?"

*************************************************************

Advertising has really changed our thinking. This morning my wife put on eye shadow, eyeliner and eyelashes. I said, "What are you doing to your eyes?" She said, "I'm making them look natural."