Marketing in between the overs and the Strategic Break

This IPL season, howsoever pathetic it was and the early Indian exit notwithstanding, (thanks to a private TV in my PG accommodation in Hyderabad) I watched Television for hours which I have not notched up since my childhood days.
So what did I learn or unlearn?
Well I tried to do multi-tasking and make an observation or two about marketing whenever or in whichever form it was used:


(1) Zoo-Zoos were bigger hits than the IPL itself- well Vodafone goes more often than not right on the money. While Airtel was busy advertising the age-old and Yuk concepts of “pyar” between their “high profile” couple and over-killing the concept unlike it had ever done before, Vodafone realized that they had nothing novel to offer in terms of product, so it was left only to creativity to build and improve their brand. They came up with a flurry of low-cost videos which were shot outside India, in an attempt to stop any untimely suspense kill.
The videos although don’t market a service any unique than other service providers, were graceful in the way that they didn't become popular at the cost of Vodafone. The interest they entice in the viewer make them look up and read that it is Vodafone and not Virgin or some other service provider. Virgin did try and the "Virgins" are still trying, for reasons fathomless to me, to cash-on the cartoon themes but on the sucker scale are ranked only slightly lower than Airtel. From when "Think-hatke" became "think-crap"? They even invested in sponsoring a marketing competition in NITK, but i don't think they took any note of what we had offered. As the judge himself acknowledged that he is from print media and is not remotely associated with video ads... proves the point of how Virgin India is de-valuating a remarkable brand that Branson nurtured over the years, overseas.
Vodafone on the lines of No-Overkill have now discontinued Zoo-Zoos and are back to the puppy and girl Ads. Now i pray that this would knock some sense into Airtel Marketing.
Bottom line: use creativity to savor or revitalize your brand when you have nothing novel to offer.

(2) The rage about L’Oreal cosmetics which was found guilty on racism counts: Now lets see who is talking, in case it is France they have legitimate concerns but India, come ‘on we are the most racist country in the world! When are we going to finally accept that, now we do try our best and the Aussies are also giving their best shot to defy us of that elusive no.1 but do they stand a chance against this age-old hypocrite, divided by cast-creed left, right, north and south country, (Pause) Well I don’t think so! The interesting thing to see is how the marketers, having predicted the possibility of being found guilty with all guile and genius, had already changed the message, although subtly but so decisively. Sonam Kapoor is now given more air time, Penolope was withdrawn, “Because you are worth it” became “Because we are worth it”.
BottomLine: Being Proactive is much better off than being Reactive especially in Marketing.

(3) Nothing kills like Overkill: well IPL-2 was bust as compared to IPL-1, I don’t think a lot, would have changed had it not shifted out of country. The “strategic break”, 14 matches per side, making sides play KKR, when they themselves don’t want to might have just milked the cow to its death. Now with the WC debacle, and some of it being attributed to IPL, BCCI is treading in rather unfriendly waters, the sooner they realize this, the sooner they would be able to save “one of the biggest brand” in sports. Some thoughts about two IPLs in one year, well forget it and I bet BCCI if they do go ahead with it, they won’t even get a chance to give CPR to this brand.

(4) The Nokia Express Music ad: Of late we have seen a flurry of Touch screen phones in the market, Nokia probably the latest entrant has hit a home run though. Before Nokia, Samsung, Sony and LG marketed the emotional appeal of a touch-screen and how large screen makes viewing, touching and working a pleasure. With advent of 3G, the gap would become even wider. So what did Nokia do? Well many thanks for the emotional appeal already generated for touch screens, they decided to go right on the functional and the "Nokia" brand part. What the other mobile companies missed was that they were marketing the industry, in this case any touch screen phone and not their respective brands. Samsung does that for other phones very well with “Next is what” but missed the mark with touch screen. Nokia on the other hand added functionality to already rake up emotional appeal by adding “Now your touch will create music” and used the already established Nokia express brand.
Bottom Line: There is a distinction between marketing a product and marketing your product. However subtle it may be, but it can account for a downfall of huge marketing schemes like a pack of cards.

(5) The debacle of Sony, Bravia and the stand out Sony, Cybershot: Sony TV screens are considered as the pinnacle of technology but they didn’t even got close to it in branding. The previous ads were all good to say the least but this mother of all ridiculous ad doesn’t even come close to the novel Cybershot ad, the other SBU Sony primarily is launching in India. How come they are marketing something that envious in such a grouse manner?
The LG mother of all television, the seduction for TFTs and the “feel it to believe it” LCD ads hit a home run everytime. They came up with clear functional and emotional components.
Cybershot however focuses at first the exotic lady (as I should say in the video) and since she moves into the camera with a click of a button without much fuss about focusing the lens, it just navigates you effortlessly to the product and the brand.


(6) The Bing: Now I don’t know who in the name of god came up with that name, but if they want to make Bing synonymous with Search as Google has become over the years, they should have done a better job. I recall Bing only from “Chandler Bing” the funniest Friends' character, not as a sound indicating information on your finger tips. How a marketer is expected to market it, GO AND BING! Not appealing to my creative senses and it also fails to tickle funny bones.
Microsoft lives up to tradition of losing to Google though! Quite similar to SA in big games of Cricket.


(7) Reliance and Rithik’s (mis)adventure: it is good that Reliance have the deep pockets to finance someone as high profile as him as brand ambassador but don’t they spare some moolah for hiring some creative ad agency.
Rithik thanking just anybody he knows is all good in films but does it make any sense for establishing Reliance as a reliable network, I am at loss.
With the other misadventure of watching matches on your mobile, they have lived up to their name when it comes to using crooked methods and you-can’t-prove-them-false either-Nonsense to get customers.
Now come’ on live up to the expectation and spice up that little baby. Or Reliance-Commn. will be as doomed as their business is in UP. At least they learnt the importance of GSM, may be with time they would out grow this age-old, Ambani’s senior ad philosophy as well.
BottomLine: Hiring a high profile human as a brand ambassador is just a start of the story, one has to deliver the story-line as well. Godrej is an apt example and has used Rithik to maximise their brand value (Their strategy just backs the claim of Godrej Sr. of having handed over the beacon to his sons and daughters to reviatalize the otherwise trailing and historic brand).


(8) Intel Inside: Now here is player who is playing smart. Intel is doing the non-fancy yet effective part of marketing. Every now and then when a laptop ad comes up, comes along like a pop up, the Intel Inside, core 2 duo, 3 second clip with their particular tin-teen-ti-ting audio.
It is like marketing every laptop has Intel inside, AMD has a lot of ground to cover in India. And they better start now, with Intel becoming more and more synonymous with Computer processors in India.

There might be a few who have skipped my mind... I don't boast a heavy hard-disk! Any comments and discussions over the same are more than welcome.