Docomo - the new silly !

I have been teaching marketing and Advertising for quite some years now.. Even yesterday I was waxing eloquent about the first mover advantage and the like… Does Marketing theory anywhere talk about a last mover advantage? If not I guess its time that some one makes a theory of it and about it… Seeing DOCOMO doing a new every time, I feel like being the last to enter (in spite of all the barriers and scope of falling into a clutter) has its own merits as well…

Much has been written and blogged (already) about how the timing ( IPL and the world cup), about the charm and personality of Ranbir Kapoor, India’s young and fastest-rising Bollywood icon and how he is Refreshingly Different and hence all fit and perfect match for the brand persona… Much has been said (again) about how this ad reminds us of the great stand up comedians like George Carlin and our own Raju Srivastava ..I doubt that part though !

Ranbir for sure has a charm which is unique to him and his style and wit simply gels perfectly with the selling idea ‘keep it simple… silly ’. Among all the brands he now endorses ( and that includes Hero Honda (from February, 2011), John Player, Nissan, Virgin Mobile, Pepsico and Panasonic India)- this one seems to be a perfect endorser personality – brand personality fit . It focuses mostly on how Tata DOCOMO make things easier for the average telecom consumer, by providing differentiated products and services (?) …Again I doubt about the so called perfection that this guys offer.. To my knowledge all of them are the same….. 

Each individual advertisement starts by illustrating a complexity in the category, and presents the Tata DOCOMO product and/or service as a means of simplifying things… as of now, this series of ads are simple and silly… and hence reaching where it is actually intending to… the viewers minds… !

Three cheers !!!

The Fun Gun!!!

Should I say more?... Week end again...  have fun people... !!!!!!!!!!

The Fun Gun !!!

Five Important Qualities that men should look for in Woman !

1. It's important to have a woman, who helps at home, who cooks from time to time, cleans up and has a job.
2. It's important to have a woman, who can make you laugh.
3. It's important to have a woman, who you can trust and who doesn't lie to you.
4. It's important to have a woman, who is good in bed and who likes to be with you.
5. It's very, very important that these four women do not know each other.

Have fun poeple... God bless !!!

"Nike Curse" - of phobias and superstitions..! (part I)

What is common between Tiger Woods scandal, Wayne Rooni and his sex scandal, Henry’s infamous handball that took France to the last world cup, the Indian teams poor show in T 20 And Roger Federer loosing his cake walk in Wimbledon this year? 

For many the answer would be vague, for others (you) would have guessed it already… all of them are (were) celebrity endorsers of Nike and got INTO SOUP and thereby spoiling Nike image, this year.. They call it the Nike Curse and that made me sit and ponder a bit more on superstitions that rule my beloved industry… what the hell the brand has to do with the mistakes/errors/goof ups that its endorsers end up with?

A lot many factors affect (negatively) business performance like paraskevidekatriaphobia—(well that is fear of Friday the 13^th) if you go for a survey among people in the western world. Their fear and love (at the same time) of superstitions are well known secrets….But friends with experience of having done business with Americans tell me that a sizable number of the western folks have this fear. I searched for data and it says in US alone about $800 million to $900 million in business revenue is lost on that ‘ill-omened’ date. Indians aren’t that bad you say? Well let me tell you more…

In all probability all of us have in some ways or other, have indulged in some kind of superstitious behavior in a business settings and otherwise, be it starting to meetings on auspicious moments ( Muhurat ) , scheduling an important meeting in alignment with a our horoscope or by wearing a auspicious set of clothes to an interview. I know people who wear the same set of stuff for days together to win clients, their stars may smile at the them but the stink will stare the clients off for sure. It may sound irrational but it seems this whole lot of seemingly irrational stuff has reason behind this, according to psychologists. 

I had a friend in EURO RSCG who strongly believed that having a cup of coffee from a particular vending machine would help us win accounts… he not only propagated this ridiculous belief but also could win over followers with his evangelism. People made fun of him and yet when a D day approached the LUCKY vending machine had a long queue in its front …strange but true!!

I was never a proponent of such stupidity, I felt that pitching is won on merit and hard work, and some greasing and back door activities of course, but having coffee from a certain machine would be the last factor in getting an agency win an account.. I knew this, so did many others, and yet we all did the coffee ritual and the logic was,- Crazy or not, you feel better having done it/them… I admit to have had the coffee a couple of times and have won accounts,,,, HUH !

Just like Friday the 13 th is a bad day, there are some good days as well. Iceland air, for example, ran a promotion in 2007 allowing customers to add on excursions for $7 each, provided they booked by 7/7/07. Now that speaks how much ‘7’ is a lucky number. Another example of the clout of ‘7’ is Wal-Mart's "Lucky in Love Wedding Search," which granted seven couples a free wedding ceremony and reception for 77 guests on the lucky date. Bharti chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal and his fascination to the number 23 is famous. 

The more apt example in Indian scene would be of  jewelry sales and purchase of gold which rockets by at least 15-20% during Akshaya Tritiya, a day considered auspicious for the Hindus but lesser known till a couple of years back (at least in the south) ..Similarly during Dhanteras last year the car sales in India went up three times.. Good examples of how Marketing enters into a marriage of convenience with beliefs /superstition. 

In the west, hundreds of millions of dollars are lost on Friday the 13th because people (even the well read ones) are logically risk-averse. Just like in India people don’t like to buy metal on Saturday, so car sales ( and any metals) are usually low on Saturdays …I still remember that at my first agency in Chennai, the boss had wanted me to go back to office and start again after we had reached the main gates of our office , for a client meeting… the reason- a black cat which waded across our path unabashedly and seemingly unconcerned about Lowe or its client Saint Gobain…


Foot note :- I thank my lucky stars I’m not superstitious!
 
To be continued...>>>>>

Idea and Abhishek - language doesnt matter.. !

“An invasion of armies can be resisted, but not an idea whose time has come.”

IDEA Cellular has launched this new ad under the popular What an Idea, Sirji! Campaign series, to demonstrate the power of telephony, in a country where 850 mother tongues and 22,000 dialects are spoken…most of you would have seen it for sure and when I saw it amused me for the fact that it is so far the best in the series… remember all those various avatars such as the sarpanch, tourist guide, school principal, politician’s aide, doctor, and even a tree…... 

Sirji this time has come up with an idea to sell Idea to people who have lucrative job offers (from far flung cities in India- most jobs these days are far flung...) The setting is quite familiar and all of us have gone through the same scene, in spite of the offer exciting us, the thought of living in a place where a different language is spoken, makes one unconvinced and uncomfortable. 

Adformula had been a critic of some of the ads in the series (in the past) but this one for sure catches the attention of the average viewer in the TG….. India and its possibilities/ opportunities for the young, PLUS the challenges (language barrier for instance) is ably displayed in this ad. The diversity and vastness, at times, create an impediment in the growth of this country…. Not that Sirji has a solution for all that but it is one ray of hope for a nation kept purposefully fragmented for narrow political gains…

The new ad is yet another improvement in the series of Idea’s campaigns with the popular tag line – What an Idea, Sirji! ,this campaign has all the elements of what a picture perfect campaign should have… a new Idea (which keeps improving every time), a tagline which enjoyed such massive recall, and a celebrity who matches the brand and its charm ( except for south where the small B isn’t much of a charm). .. no wonder why the subscriber base of Idea has hit such heights in the last few years…

The happy brand said so… (as per media reports). “Almost every Indian has gone through a situation where one has struggled to communicate with another fellow Indian just because of language. The new Idea campaign offers a Champion idea to address this concern of our society, through the power of mobile telephony. We are confident that the new brand campaign will build a strong connect with the audience and further grow Idea’s over 70 million subscriber base” and why not… as said again and again, the longer clients stick on to its agency, the trust base gets stronger and the quality of its creative output goes up…… there is no substitute for long lasting and strong client – agency relationships in advertising… Here the credit goes to the client an well as Lowe , the agency behind… 

The preceding campaigns – ‘Championing a world without caste’; ‘Championing a world in which no one suffers from the disability to communicate’; ‘Education for All’, ‘Participative Governance’, ‘Walk When You Talk’, and the recent ‘Use Mobile, Save Paper’ campaign – all abide by the essential brand promise of providing a simple, fresh and imaginative solution to a complex problem of the society… and now this one which is no different and in fact better…

In a campaign , each succeeding ad should be better than its preceding one… It is like having beer… the second one should taste better than the first one , and the third one should taste better than the second one and so on…… As said by John Steinbeck … .Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple, learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.

What an Idea Sirji !!!

The Fun Gun !!!

As the man began walking toward the door, his wife asked, "Where are you going?"

The man replied, "I'm going to the doctor."

"Why? Are you sick?" the wife asked.

"No," the husband replied. "I'm going to get me some of them new Viagra pills."

His wife got up out of her rocker and started putting on her coat. The husband turned to her and asked, "Where are you going?"

The wife replied, "I'm going to the doctor, too."

"Why?" asked her husband.

His wife replied, "If you're going to start using that rusty old thing again, I'm going to get me a tetanus shot."

CelebTrack- the game of endorser ranking!!!

Percept talent management and Hansa research has done it again – their second leg of the survey tracking India's most powerful celebrities which they call as Celeb Track….

CelebTrack first phase in April 2009, happened with inputs from 6,000 people, rated celebrities on attributes like media presence,physique, popularity, power of persuasion and exposure had put Amitabh Bachan as the most powerful celebrity in India scoring high in most of the attributes that was studied…

Now Celeb Track second phase has come out with the results and MS Dhoni has taken over others as the most liked celebrity in India ,thanks partly due to the survey which happened soon after IPL and partly due to the lackluster show by his other team mates and the over exposure of celebs like SRK ….Dhoni has pushed Shah Rukh Khan to the second place and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan to the third. Amitabh Bachchan and Sachin Tendulkar have moved down many places compared to the last round of survey….

Ahem !

Well ….for the uninitiated, the research measured more than 400 celebrities across the country to generate a celebrity power score (CPS) by ranking them on the above said parameters .

The main facets of the latest study goes like this …

“Among the male actors, Shah Rukh Khan, Amitabh Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar and Salman Khan feature in that order in the power list. Among the female actors, it is Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Katrina Kaif, Priyanka Chopra, Hema Malini and Kareena Kapoor. Among cricketers, the list includes MS Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid.

According to the wave 2 (phase 2)of the study, Salman Khan, Sachin Tendulkar, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Sania Mirza top their respective genres as the most recognised stars. In terms of likeability, Amitabh Bachchan replaces Salman Khan. The latter scores low on persuasion, exposure and image parameters. In terms of popularity, cricketers score among the classes while actors score higher among the masses.

The top five most persuasive stars are Amitabh Bachchan among male actors, Yuvraj Singh among cricketers, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan among female actors and Sania Mirza among other sports personalities. Higher classes and men get more influenced by the top ten stars, while the masses get more influenced by women, the study suggests.

While Sachin Tendulkar falls below Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh in terms of power of persuasion, he still holds on for products needing maturity and stature, such as financial products.

The respondents did not wish to read more about Rakhi Sawant, Mallika Sherawat and Sreesanth, while they wished to read more about celebrities such as Aishwarya Rai, Akshay Kumar and Sachin Tendulkar”

I wouldn’t agree with the rakhi thing here ( lol) but for sure sree santh I know more and enough.. Please stop glorifying the lil lad media folks!!!!..

Now brands can make informed and learned decisions, as per the percept team who is behind this work, and no longer the big brands who bet huge money on stars have to rely on gut feeling and anecdotal learning. Also, celebrities can yardstick themselves in comparison with their viewers and for that reason price their participation with brands.

Males and the ones of the higher SEC’s seems to be liking the cricketers more than the cinema stars but then cricket in India seems to be revolving around Dhoni, Tendulkar and Yuvaraj . And for me one shocker is the study fact which says that most people have heard most of the cricketers names but wouldn’t connect their faces with names.. if that is the case, what would happen to an Abhinav Bindra?

I mean people would have for sure heard the name but if they don’t know that he is HE when they se him on screen, will the brands that he endorse benefit?

It's all a game.. I mean the whole game of a celebrity choice…. Marketers, their agencies (like Percept) often ignore the key factors in the choice of the celebrity whom they select with fanfare and with all the logic of "his persona matching with our brands" et al….

Is the audience traits vis-à-vis persuasibility of the endorser taken care off?

Is there a study on the Monopoly of Communication source and its influence, Messages that is conveyed and its compatibility with the the belief /opinions/values of the receiver and the extent to which the Source is believed to have, expertise status/objectivity in the area of endorsement done?

Remember Rahul Dravid was a failure when he came for Bank of Baroda, so was Sania Mirza when she came for HP.. Dhoni and Mysore sandal is a classic case…

And in any case the risk of the celebrity becoming a scoundrel overnight threatens brands,,, not that it happens often but when it happens as percept would know it would be Horrible Mess…. Hansie Cronje was the key celebrity endorsers for Siyaram's J.Hampstead brand of clothing when he got caught in the max fixing scandal…..The campaign featuring Cronje had been running on the print, electronic and outdoor media and Siyaram and its advertising agency, Percept, watched in consternation and utter sadness as their celebrity endorser turned into an internationally detested sportsman during the night. Now that is quite an extreme case and let God forbid.. But the point is .. is it a safe bet to hang a brands future (entirely)to another brand whose brand value is quite volatile?

Having said that let me also add (quickly) that some study and some statistics is good... as the good old saying goes ,'something is better than nothing'!!!

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The Fun Gun !!!

A 7 year old kid walking home from the park sees some teens at the basketball course, he hears one say, "aww you f**kin id*ot!".

When he gets home he asks his mom, "Mom, what does f**kin mean?"

Mom says, "Well honey, f**king means roasting".

So the kid goes about his business until dinner time. The doorbell rings, and since mom and dad are too busy with the chicken, he answers the door.

"Grandma!! Grandpa!!" says the kid.

Grandma asks, "Oh how are you deary, where's mommy and daddy?"

The little boy responds, "Mom and dad are in the kitchen f**kin the turkey!!!"

Now have fun people..Until we meet again !!!

Pulsar 220 DTS-i -The Fastest and confused Indian ...

The wife came home early to find her husband making love to a beautiful sexy young woman.

"You unfaithful, disrespectful jerk! What are you doing? How dare you do this to me the faithful wife, the mother of your children! I'm leaving this house and I want a divorce!"

The husband, replied, "Wait! Wait a minute! Before you leave, at least listen to what happened."

"It'll be the last thing I will hear from you so make it fast, you cheating creep."

"While driving home this young lady asked for a ride. I saw her so defenseless that I went ahead and allowed her into my car. I noticed she was very thin, not well dressed and dirty. She mentioned she had not eaten for three days. Out of compassion, I brought her home and
warmed up the food I made for you last night that you wouldn't eat because you're afraid you'll
gain more weight".

"When I served them to her, the poor young thing, practically inhaled them. Since she was dirty I asked her if she'd like to bathe. While she was showering, I noticed her clothes were worn-out and full of holes so I threw them away. Since she needed clothes, I gave her the pair of jeans
that you no longer wear because they're too tight on you; I also gave her the blouse that I gave you on our anniversary and you don’t wear because I don't have good taste. "

"I gave her the pullover that my sister gave you for Christmas that you won't wear just to bother my sister and I also gave her the boots that you bought at the expensive boutique that you never wore again after you saw your co-worker wearing the same pair. "

"After she dressed, I walked the young woman to the door where she turned around and with tears of gratitude streaming down her cheeks, she asked me,

"Sir, do you have anything else your wife doesn't use?"

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The above said story strikes me every time I see this Fastest Indian ad from Pulsar 220 DTS-i bike, which is the latest evolution from the good old Pulsar that put our very own Bajaj back in the two wheeler map of India.

For some one who saw the definitely male postitioning and was awed by its total difference (points of parity and yet the points of difference) with which it was conceived and positioned and storm that it created in the Indian two wheeler market, and in the process churning up the so called performance segment which was lying underperforming with the hero Honda CBZ, this new ad is not that striking…

For some one who saw the macho ness in the pulsar design ,the tagline, the ads and the sales rocketing, for some one who saw the client ( Bajaj) jumping from O&M to Leo Burnett who screwed up the positioning and the ads (Digital Biking was the new tag I guess and then to distinctly ahead and then to.. OOF!) which was a big disservice to the old one (the best in the two wheeler industry I believe)

For some one who have seen the Pulsar and the DTSI and then the Pulsar 200 and the 200 DTS-Fi and now this and having had a ride in all of them, the old one still is the best…Not the product ,its evolution is wonderful, I am here talking of the communication..... Not because I have suddenly joined the old school of advertising but cannot understand why a brand should oscillate its positioning and confuse people, with no valid reason.

If competition from the likes of YZF-R15 and the FZ-16 TVS and Apache RTR 180 etc is the reason, I would say… take a break and take a long walk.. Oscillation is not the answer….

As a product Pulsar is doing well and is constantly upgrading itself … and I love Pulsar than the Yamaha FZ that I get to drive from my brother every time I want to feel young… and why not? Bajaj Pulsar 220 cc with 21.04 PS of power and priced at Rs. 70,000 is nothing less than a wonderful product (Mind you FZ will take some 74000 Indian rupees..)…. It is the communication that is screwed up …

Where is the product shown?
Why not the product which is the best and hence showable..
Why not the product which the market would love to see at least in a frame running for 5 seconds?
Why the Psychological positioning which totally ignores the added features of the product that makes it class apart?

The ad that we saw here makes no sense… it may get a metal in some ad fest where equally arrogant creative guys will celebrate their ignorance but for the common man, who has to buy his bike, this is simply a non seller….. the tag line rocks- the fastest Indian -but clubbed with the ad it fails… it doesn’t connect .. it simply evades my common sense…. From Pulsar mania to Pulsar vacillation?

In spite of the ad screw up’s Pulsar sales are still on the high side… the proof…? Read this latest industry review …..

Bajaj Auto, which recently launched their flagship product, revamped Pulsar 220 DTSi, which is India’s fastest bike currently, along with revamped Pulsar 150 and Pulsar 180, are also going great guns selling 1,68,471 two wheelers this month (June 09) . Although there was a decline of 4.52 percent in sales compared to June 2008 sales (which were 1, 77,112), the sales are growing month after month. The company sold 1,65,697 two wheelers last month and the sales grew 29 percent Quarter on Quarter, primarily due to the successful launches since February 2009 of the XCD 135 DTS-Si, Pulsar 150 and Pulsar 180 DTSi 2009 editions.

Moral of the story…..?

Advertising beware….

People don’t essentially buy seeing ads… and worse they buy in spite of seeing bad ads.. They buy in spite of your screwing up and offering funny reasons for the screwing up….

Isn’t that a bad news for the industry?

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also read :- the b school blog and continuous confusion...

The Fun Gun !!!

It is the month of August, on the shores of the Black Sea. It is raining, and the little town looks totally deserted. It is tough times, everybody is in debt, and everybody lives on credit.
Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town. He enters the only hotel, lays a 100 Euro note on the reception counter, and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one.

The hotel proprietor takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the butcher. The butcher takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the pig grower.

The pig grower takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the supplier of his feed and fuel. The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the town's prostitute that in these hard times, gave her "services" on credit.

The hooker runs to the hotel, and pays off her debt with the 100 Euro note to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she brought her clients there.

The hotel proprietor then lays the 100 Euro note back on the counter so that the rich tourist will not suspect anything.

At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the rooms, and takes his 100 Euro note, after saying that he did not like any of the rooms, and leaves town.

No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism.

Recession time money flow is what keeps the world flowing.. anyways enjoy the week end folks...recession will go soon, enjoy the week end....!!!

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 !!!

Virgin Mobile... Muuaah baby!!!

This week the ad that caught my attention is the new Virgin mobile ad.. free SMS series…Not that they never have got hooked in my eyes before but this time it got hooked a bit longer and stronger…. Right from the launch ads….which in the two-week launch campaign created flutter and a lot of eyeballs to rotate, Virgin aired two commercials where youngsters find ways to win approval in sticky situations.

In one ad, a girl gives a fright to her parents saying she is not interested in men. She cuts a call from a male friend in front of her nervous parents announcing, "I don't want to go to Goa with them," as if to strengthen the point. In a volte-face that takes even them by shock, her parents insist she goes on the trip -- which, obviously, is what the girl had been aiming for, all along.





In the second TVC, a young man who has broken traffic rules wins the compassion of the policeman when his angry father asks for him to be shown no mercy. The 'father' is later shown to be his college mate….. Typical youngistan type ads that made a dent for sure.. ( I am reminded of the Mentos- Dimag ki bati jale de ads..)…

Then the Yo Yo tariff plan ads.. Remember the two young men in a hospital bed…

Well the point is made.. it is for the THINK HATKE TYPES… the young and young at heart… if others (read its as OLD ones) are not liking the ads which smells irreverence and is spiced with arrogance and insensitivity that is simply because they don’t fall in the intended TG that virgin wants to reach.. The TG likes it and that is what matters…

Why the young men and women…? Which Richard Branson jumped from a Mumbai hotel (Drama and Branson are like twin brothers) on March 2008 prelude to the launch of Virgin he would have really know the facts and would have been sure that it is not easy to take the millions of mobile users in India to Jump along with him….The mobile services market in India is already crowded -- operators offering GSM and CDMA services account for about 250 million subscriptions (source: Trai) and the category leaders have had a decade to build their brand equity. High-decibel launches, ad campaigns and lower-than-you tariffs may not be enough to win customers….


Even youngistan customers in India aren’t that easy to be wooed into… Lack of portability is an issue in India and the young chaps whose numbers are there everywhere and who has every one else’s numbers in their SIM would find it difficult to change numbers , even if Virgin is here and comes with sops and pacifiers…

While the bulk of existing operators are all pursuing the same strategy….. to get as many subscribers as quickly as possible Virgin’s strategy is to deliver a more tailored, more relevant offering for a single, distinct segment and that is the young of this country.. with a tie up with Tata Teleservices in place with a brand franchise agreement with Virgin, Virgin has not and need not spend a fortune for establishing networks and hence can afford to cater to a niche which others cannot…There are 215 million Indians aged between 14 and 25 years, of whom 70 million own mobile phones… Mind you this is bigger than many filthy rich European nations….

Over the next three years, this segment may add another 50 million new mobile phone subscribers. Young subscribers may account for less than 30 per cent of the total, but they contributed over 50 per cent of the telecom industry's Rs 50,000 crore (Rs 500 billion) revenues in 2007-08. By 2010, this group is expected to earn the industry over Rs 35,000 crore (Rs 350 billion). Combined with news shall be seen the fact that younger customers are the biggest users of SMS and their handset up gradation cycle too is much more frequent as compared to guys like me…. Now forget all that numbers, the fact is glaring, the segment is not a niche per se at least if we know the definition of NICHE in the dictionary….

How easy was it for virgin? … the segment that they cater to is not that easy… the insights are like a magic wand if properly used… for instance the handset up gradation cycle,,,,, the more the frequency is, the more is the trouble for the CSP particularly if he is into CDMA and not GSM… Tata Tele came with CDMA and Virgin had to wriggle out of this with its new Virgin had to ensure its RUIM (removable user identity module) technology, similar to GSM phones, offering users the convenience of upgrading their phones without having to change their number or re-entering their address book which happens in a CDMA connection and thus dreaded by the YOUNG lads….

Being pocket friendly was the next challenge, which is true both for handsets as well as recharge coupons.. the young man wants COOL sets with looks, features, cutting-edge technology and style and at AFFORDABLE prizes….so came vKewl which retailed at Rs 3,999, while vBling sells for Rs 2,500, which was about half the price at which competitors were selling similar handsets. Allowing free incoming calls, no matter whichever is the service provider, even after you have ran out of validity and talk time was a good move in this direction….

Having said all that it is still debatable as to what Virgin is going to be in the big Indian market where the real big players are sweating it out and where the rules of the game are not yet and fully defined… while it unravels let us see the new ad with which I started this post with… conceived and executed by Bates David enterprise it is simple, precise and right there ,hitting the target……




Muuaaahh baby !!!!

Tail piece:-

The precocious teen-ager returned late from school one afternoon and confessed to his mother that he made love to his girlfriend on the way home.

"I'm disappointed in you," his mother scolded. "But for telling the truth, you may go to the corner for a milk shake."

The next day, the boy came home late again, and this time he confessed to making love to one of the neighbors' wives. "Well, at least you're still honest," he was told, and again he was rewarded with a milk shake.

On the third day, the boy strode into the house and proudly announced to both of his parents that he had stayed after school to make love to his teacher. As his mother began to scold him, the father picked up a frying pan,

"Don't hit him," she pleaded. "At least he told the truth."

"Hit him, hell," his father exclaimed. "I'm going to cook him a steak. How long do you expect him to keep this up on those lousy milk shakes?"

For more of Virgin ads click here….

A recession letter !!!

Dear,

Recession regards!!!

I am sitting at my office where till a week back we had about 21 guys with lots of fun and frolic but as of today, this Saturday (yeah we have started working on Saturdays as well) we are just 15. I know you are bad in numbers so I will make it easy for you… 21-15=6…..the rest of 6 has gone… not in search of greener pastures but for want of a choice. You know the agency world….. Its fun… may be we have had so much and too much of fun that even God’s would have felt jealous. The sword of recession has fallen on us so sharp… every day when some one from the top calls some one to his/her cabin the heart beats go up… pink is not only a color denoting gays ..Not any longer… when the creative guys who sit opposite to me were asked to leave last week, they didn’t cry but didn’t laugh either…... they were still and didn’t talk anything… for all the beautiful verbal skills that they had and displayed in umpteen ads, that day no words in their literature could convey what their eyes did… fear… now which is reflected in mine as well … the media manager who took me in here is asked to go in what came as the ultimate recession shock for me…

Now it’s only a matter of time when I too will have to go or else some miracle should happen… The airline client that I am working on as a client service executive should up with his ad budget or at least go back to his volume of advertising before this Bloody f&^%$ng recession… or else as Chithu ( India ka FM yaar) promises things should go back to normal very soon… hey Chithu is the home minister now na… anyways… that doesn’t make any difference to the real situation here… in my agency the only creative work that is happening is to indulge in a guessing game as to who next and which client next will call up and say what… every time the phone rings we all shudder…and since I am the only guy in account management I at times feel relaxed but at times feel odd and insecure…

I love this place dear, this industry… and hence cannot really believe that when hard times come; it’s the ad money that gets cut first… what is the reason…? When you are in a plane and flying high and when there is a crisis that is developed, which fool will switch off the engine…?

Is it not the same??

Or am I in the wrong line..? if everything is coming on my way I guess I am in a wrong lane…

Will it remain the same for ever…….this beloved industry?

Regards,,,,,

What is in a name yaar??? 27-Dec-08
.

The Fun Gun !!!

A woman accompanied her husband to the doctor's office.
After the check-up, the doctor took the wife aside and
said, "If you don't do the following, your husband will
surely die".
1.Each morning, fix him a healthy breakfast and send
him off to work in a good mood.
2.At lunch time, make him a warm, nutritious meal and
put him in a good frame of mind before he goes back
to work.
3.For dinner, fix an especially nice meal, and don't
burden him with household chores.
4.Have sex with him several times a week and satisfy
his every whim.

On the way home, the husband asked his wife what the doctor
had told her.

"You're going to die," she replied.

Now you know why some clients behave the way they behave to their advertising agencies and same vice versa....
Fun is waiting... enjoy your week end folks...

Vodafone- Happy to help....

Amazingly simple and as usual to the point.. Now I love Vodafone ads more after seeing the empty vessels and noises in their market....



It is a different thing whether they are actually so happy to help... I beg to differ here as a vodafone customer but still it is great ,,,this communication ....



and this one........



and another one which makes us smile...



and this one which is truly cool...