BRAToSPHERE

Tag: marketing

  • >ZooZoo’istan

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    Tonight after a battle for more than a month, the best team is about to be crowned. The IPL final is scheduled for tonight, and DC and RCB – the bottom two teams in the last season are battling out for the top honours. I am sure this would be some soothing news for SRK, and his KKR. They can expect to sweep the IPL, next year.

    It was a wonderful 5 week odd thing, and a complete entertainer. The evening talk at the beach was totally filled with animated expressions of the previous day matches, and we even had to go to the extent of rescheduling our timings at the beach, depending on the IPL matches.

    Who won, who lost? Who was the gainer, who was the loser? These are all cases for analysis by better cricket enthusiasts than myself, who just watches the match if there is no better thing on TV, or the remote control happens to be in my brother’s control. Whoever wins tonight – The clear winner all along the way is – the ZOOZOO’s. Yes, welcome to “ZOOZOOistan.”

    Vodafone has managed to come out with such fine simple ads, that these slim legged egg headed creatures have caught the imagination of the whole nation. Everywhere people are talking about this new mascot. Forty-four years after legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray created the iconic dwarf Ang, which was adapted by Hollywood director Steven Spielberg as the E.T., India now has a new cult of queer beings – the Zoozoos.

    In the first place – What is a zoozoo?

    Zoo´zoo`

    n. 1. (Zool.) The wood pigeon.

    This is the dictionary meaning.

    Some find these cute characters similar to aliens, others say they are just cartoon characters while there is a huge majority who just does not know what to make out of it. Yet, the white, funny creatures have been invading us on the huge screens all through the IPL.

    Vodafone has managed it again – last year’s IPL saw HAPPY TO HELP, to promote their customer service, and this year the ZooZoo’s to convey the value added services (VAS) offering in each of the commercials.

    The best part being the many number of different ads being aired. About 30 odd ads are having been created so as to maintain the interest and create a spur. It’s no mean feat to unleash so many commercials at a go, with the risk of consumers not grasping them as fast as the brand churns them out.

    Media spends and visibility for brands peak during the IPL, so no doubt Vodafone obviously wanted a piece of the pie. Ogilvy – the ad agency behind these characters and ads, experimented with several characters and finally took its love for the term ‘egghead’ one step too far, creating characters that don the colour white (with black dots for eyes and a mouth), have heads resembling eggs, and disproportionately thin bodies. You egghead!

    The idea was to tell the VAS stories in a world akin to, yet different, from humans. The creatures were then given a characterisation: they are to lead simple lives, speak a language of their own (something that sounds like gibberish), move in a certain way, and even emote like human beings, with big frowns or big grins to do the trick. The execution is almost like emoticons.

    The naming of them as “the Zoozoos”, has no science to it – the name is just something fun, memorable and catchy, and not a clever one that’s difficult to pronounce.

    Zoozoo trivia: Ironically, nowhere in the communication does the Zoozoo name pop up.

    Making of the Zoozoo

    As thought initially, No, they aren’t animated characters created using the software at www.makewebvideo.com/en/templates/logo-stings. They are human beings who were made to wear body suits. The design of the characters is such that one gets fooled into thinking it is animation. It is ‘live’ animation!” The emails of the pictures of the people behind the masks have been doing rounds of late.

    A fabric with wrinkles would have shown when the characters moved, thereby shattering the illusion of animation, so a more thicker fabric was chosen as it was more practical.

    Zoozoo trivia: human head would typically reach up to the mouth level of this giant Zoozoo head.

    The thin limbs, contrasted with big bellies and a bulbous head, all add to the illusion that these creatures are ‘smaller’ than humans. Sets were created to suit the size of the Zoozoos. Cinematically, this ‘size’ was a trick: the creatures look smaller than they actually are on screen, to portray a different world of sorts. For this, the speed of shooting was altered. They were shot on a high-speed format to make them look the size that they do.

    Even in the digital world

    In the digital space, Zoozoos are currently featured on a specially created microsite, where one can partake in quizzes and contests, including the ‘What kind of Zoozoo are you?’ quiz. Each Zoozoo has a unique set of characteristics and traits allotted to it. The microsite also allows for goodies to be downloaded (including wallpapers, screensavers and ringtones), and offers details on the IPL. With a specially created YouTube channel on the site, the TVCs are provided there for people to watch and share.

    Apart from the microsite, a Zoozoo fan page has been created on Facebook, which has more than 220,807 fans (on Sunday, May 24, 2009 at 4:09PM. Dude, the number is increasing exponentially every day!), who have access to special tag-me images, Zoozoo sounds (such as Zoozoo laughter and music tracks) and ad previews.

    The page creators are clearly facebook savvy. They have uploaded albums, shared links and even created innovative zoozoo type products based on popular trends on facebook. That ludicrous “tag your friends into this sheet of cartoons depicting personality stereotypes” craze for instance. They have created two (admittedly very cute) pictures various zoozoos depicting personality stereotypes for people to tag. Hats off. Not only are the page managers homing in on a popular trend on the social networking site, they are also pulling off a clever piece of viral marketing. Now as more and more people tag their friends on these pages, it would just increase the brand recall of the campaign.

    People are also following Zoozoos on Twitter and get updates whenever new commercials go on air.

    So, from the famous hutch pug, to zoozoo’s now, Vodafone here has a complete winner.

    Awards

    The cannes and other advertising and marketing awards can wait. The zoozoo’s have already earned its first award – People for Ethical Treatment for Animals (PETA) 2009 Glitterbox Award, for taking advantage of humane alternatives to the use of real animals in their ZooZoo ads.

    The “Pug” commercial led to viewers purchasing pugs, and breeders cranking out as many puppies as they could. Later, when the appeal wore off, the dogs ended up in shelters or were abandoned. So you know what needs to be donw for the award:

    1. Create an ad using animals and publicize them
    2. Create your next ad again with the animals.
    3. One more with the same animals..
    9. Now create an ad, with equally random creatures but no animals.

    While the zoozoo’s are there busy creating a spur for Vodafone, there is this one guy who just can’t keep out of trouble – Varun Gandhi. Even after winning the election, he realized he was not being talked about anymore, and there he is misbehaving with journalists.

  • >INDEX’08

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    INDEX- Information through Disguised Experimentation – this effort is aimed at tapping into the sub-conscious of the consumer. Businesses try to do this using conventional marketing tools, but at a high cost in terms of money, time and the inevitable biases that creep in. INDEX is IIM Lucknow’s endeavour to provide to the industry quality market research from desensitized data.

    Initially, about one and a half years back, when I got into IIML and introduced to these committees, I don’t know what? But I was attracted to the INDEX. I so desperately wanted to get into it. But well, destiny had something else scripted for me, and I could not get INDEXed for life, as they would call it. No regrets. I got into Student Exchange Committee (STEX). But then, this pinch that I need to do something about INDEX.

     
     

    I was already in a team – W.I.N. – Whats in a Name?. I did have lots of fun while in the team. Made some great friends. Many mentors among seniors – Prashant (Uncle), the team lead; Abhishek Bhatia; Mandal; Bhunia, and so many others. Also had many memorable memories, exciting adventures and also some learning. In whole, it was an amazing experience, and I had then decided that I would form a team.

    I opted out of the exchange program, in my dearth to lead a team in INDEX. We started forming the team right in march with Tanuj and Srinivas as the first members. I had this zealous enthusiasm that I want to win INDEX’08. During my summers I always had this INDEX thing on the back of my mind. I also spoke to Mukesh Patnaik in detail about the whole process. (He is my senior and the INDEX winner last year. I had the chance to catch up with him in vizag during my summers). When the second year started, we were done with the senior team formation (comprising ten members) and after lots of heated discussion named the team – TOTAL RECALL. (The name was suggested by Varun Reddy).

     
     

    As soon as the facchas came in, as suggested by Mukesh, we started scouting for them. Getting to know them, interviewing them, explaining them INDEX and then finally taking them in on the three point evaluator – Creative, Jugaad, BhakChod. The process of the junior team formation was tedious and it also raised healthy competition among teams fostering into camaraderie. Tha faccha team was formed and we partied out at nashwa.

    Now comes the first step. Proposal making. We needed to win a proposal. We as a team recognised that this was our weakest link, and I had so many nightmares that I would land up without a proposal. A terrible thing to happen. The dynamics are so – there are 13 teams in campus, and INDEX core would get about 9 or maximum 10 projects to be executed. So about 3-4 teams would get dissolved. I at no cost wanted to be in that 3-4 teams. We did work hard and smart, and finally lapped in CITIBANK. That called for a celebration, in an ‘unconventional’ party. Everyone dressed and ready for the party and we all head to Fauji Dhaba outside campus in a open truck. One party that I am sure everyone would remember. Iit could not not get more weird than that.

    Then the unexpected pleasant shock. I got a PPO from Cadbury, and everyone started believing I would have no more motivation. Actually yes, the CV did not matter anymore and I did not see any reason I should work for it. But well, how do I explain that INDEX is something that I was not doing just for the CV. I had things to prove. I still work, of course not with the same rigour, as lethargy and relaxedness had taken toll on me.

     
     

    INDEX’08 was scheduled on 22nd and 23rd November. We started off with the prop design and the questionnaire design, along with the game design well in advance. It all went smooth, and our props were like one of the best among the teams, I can vouch. The process in place for prop preparation was intact and it showed in the results. The two days at the fair were tiring and fun at the same time. I slept for not more that 4 hrs in those two days. It was a very gratifying experience. We did party out a lot during those two days. Went out to Ritz for team dinner on both days, and also followed it up the nest week with a team outing for dinner. Also, in the tent itself, we arranged for alcohol, and even invited INDEX core for it. All the actors were having their glass ready while enacting their parts to the respondents!!

    Now comes the final lag – the report and the presentation. Everyone had lost enthusiasm, and that includes me. The data was not being coded in spite of repeated requests. Mahale was busy preparing for TOEFL, and so were others in their own pursuits. The final blow, I was leaving town and would not be available when the report has to be submitted. Even Srinivas is out of town, and well tanuj was out long back (different story!). So only gaur left, and I hand him over everything with a request to everyone to follow Gaur. On Monday evening, when I was busy having fun in Jaipur at the wedding, I get reddy’s message – “Dude, Please talk to gaur. No work is happening“. I was like shit; I call up srini instead, and ask him to please complete the formality. Whatever little chances of winning were left are all forgotten, and now it has reduced to just a formality. The report does get submitted.

     
     

    Saturday night is the deadline for the presentation to be submitted. I try and divide the work among the team members, but to no avail. No one seems to be interested. Why should i? I don’t have anything at stake. Chuck it. Finally, after lots of persuasion, I and Srini start working on the ppt at about 10PM, with some inputs from Mahale on quantitative analysis. We complete some crap by 12 midnight. We then go out to the mess and eat lightly just to follow it up with some pegs of Royal Stag – My lucky charm. Trump card it is Abhinav if you want to call it so.

    Presentation at 9:30AM on Sunday morning. My hair is oiled so I necessarily have to bath in that cold chilling fog filled weather. I mail the entire team to be present without much hope, and then mail some key members separately asking them to join me compulsorily. In Vain, I realise next day morning. I wake up baka and ask him to wake up Gaur and Mahale at least. Gaur replies back blatantly – “NO, I am not coming”. Srini asks him some details about his part, and then me and Srini head to Mahale’s room. After lots of requesting, he agrees to come but not in formals. We were like, “come in whatever way you like. Just come and present the quantitative part” He replies back, stopping where he is, “no Dude, I am not presenting anything. If they ask any questions I would defend you”. With the fear that he would retract back to his cozy blanket, we agreed.

     
     

    The first presentation people re walking out, and now thankfully we also have Ankush and Ali – none in formals. The saving grace were Swati and Shwetha who came in formals. At least to show the team bonding, and the gender diversity we have something. I and Srini are on the stage trying to explain everything in the uttermost smartness we can. We do a good job I am sure. I present the major part and Srini handles one part. In the end part of the presentation was the quantitative analysis of which I knew no shit, so I just skim through it. After we end with the thank you slide, the judge from ac neilson does not seem very happy, and remarks, ” you gave a good presentation, but you know what? Somewhere in the middle I completely got lost”. He then started shooting questions along with his counterpart on the rational of using various data, and the methodology by which we arrived at the numbers. A hard core statistician. My weak area. We try fielding him for some time with some globe, but of no avail. Now enters Mahale, who was just sitting idly all the while. He replies back in the same numbers tone and speaks quant for some 5 minutes. (maybe it was greek and Latin, I did not know). Then the judge again provokes Mahale by further introspection. Mahale is raged, and gets down to the stage. He takes a chalk piece and starts drawing the most obscure signs and equations explaining things with some graphs. Now I am sure it was latin, many of the signs on the board were. After the detailed explanation he retorts, ” NOW AM I RIGHT?”, after a brief pause, ” YES, I THINK I AM”. The whole hall is silent, and the judges awestruck. (Abhinav one more trump card this is for TOTAL RECALL). Prof. DDG, who was also the judge along with those from ac nelison finally asked some question to break the silence. This I handed with élan. My core competency as Baka calls – Speaking.

     
     

    We have little hopes on the outcome, and only I and Srini attend the presentation ceremony in the evening. Shweta followed after sometime, and Ali and Ajit also were present. Other teams had a good 10-15 people representation. Great. First the traditional speeches by the judges. Thankfully they were brief. Then the individual stages results. We do not win any.

     
     

    Now for the final results. Overall INNDEX’08 winners. First the 2nd runners up..

    TOTAL RECALL

    Whoa! I and Srini were like the most surprised people on the planet. We just keep staring each other for a moment. And then after Kaushik signals to come over, do we go the stage to collect the award. Huh! Finally it paid off.

    We partied in the night at genesis club, where I got totally drunk! As usual!

     

    Top of Form

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  • >Brand Equity Ad agency Reckoner

    >While it shows in these times of recession and slowdown, that even malls are causing frustration among the people, and i am back from my trip to Manali and well into term 6, the best way to pass time is to watch ads.
    It is time again to award those who build brands. The ad agencies and the people behind it.

    Before we set out opening Youtube or google (now that it has reached 72% market share, i can safely assume that google is THE search vehicle), i guess it makes sense to take some time out and salute the people and agencies behind these wonderful ads. Why not? When we can adore Karan johar and ShahRukh Khan for hours, why should the ad people be left behind? i am sure many ads there are more fun to watch than the Dostana of karan johar (Except maybe for the venice scene where Aby excelled!!)

    yes i am talking about the annual Brand Equity Ad agency Reckoner.The annual special edition, to be out today (Am awake waiting!!) has, over the last five years, emerged as one of the most-anticipated issues of Brand Equity (Economic Times on Wednesdays). Packed with power lists, rankings and analysis, the Agency Reckoner is a concise guide to India’s most admired creative and media agencies. And a reliable barometer for the hottest names in the business.

    The question that’s foremost on many lips is whether Ogilvy will be able to hold on to the numero uno position for the sixth year running. Or will the successes of some agencies at Cannes — and the marketplace — see the rise of a new No 1? There’s also curiosity over which agency will top the Media Agency rankings — Mindshare, Madison or Starcom? And will there be dramatic changes in the Most Influential People lists? All we can say is there are surprises galore.

    For the first time, this year’s Reckoner has also ranked agencies in three new verticals — Brand Promotion Companies, Digital Agencies and Design Specialists. This is in recognition of the emerging trend in marketing communications, where advertising spends are slowly but steadily being diverted into specialist channels. As always, Brand Equity is ahead of the curve in acknowledging the dynamics of a changing communications environment. Source : Economic Times

    The thing that has really caught my eye is the way the edition and the event have been marketed, with these innovative ads. If not anyone else, probably the agency behind these ads should be given away the prizes. Subtle, made with low cost, but in line and very effective with an underlying humour. All speaking out the truth about the ad industry. probably Fashion conscious Madhur bhandarkar can get inspired and go on make Ad-War-Teasing (Sourced from PRISM – The marketing cell of IIML). Have a look at the award winning ads. Er! I mean the ads on the awards.



    So, while i have a look into the latest scandal to hit the US markets and wait for the ET copy, do have a look around. Also, Hold your fingers close for my new blog on leadership Discovery as a compulsory part of my elective with the same name. it is being taught by Professor Debashis Chatterjee. He was described as one of the “thought leaders” of the world by Professor John Kotter of the Harvard Business School for his contribution to the theory and practice of leadership. So looking eager for more classes by him.

    Also, soon to come is my post on my trip to Manali last weekend. So till then, have fun and look for your Rab arranged Jodi!!!

  • >Google Chrome and baba Ramdev

    >Swami Ramdev , also known as Baba Ramdev, is an Indian, Hindu swami and an ardent admiror of Swami Vivekananda and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. He is particularly well-known for his efforts in popularizing Yoga. He is also one of the founders of the Divya Yoga Mandir Trust that aims to popularize Yoga and offer Ayurvedic treatments.

    His camps are attended by a large number of people. Over 85 million people follow his yoga camps via TV channels, and video. His yog teaching sessions are for the masses and free for all. His stated principle in life is to be of help to all and as such the sessions are conducted free of charge.

    He also insists that the correct way to pronounce Yoga is Yog, as is done in Devanagari-based languages like Sanskrit.( Source: Wiki)

    Wait. What amm i doing? Talking about baba n cadre on my collegian blog. Have i got into Yoga, or Yog as baba would prefer? nah! i am still the same old Bharat Jhurani, who likes eating pani puri, and loves masala hindi movies.

    This is just to draw up a link between two very unusual things, and show where marketing can lead to. Creativity.

    Anyways, now lets talk about Google chrome, yes the google browser that has been making waves within less than a month of its launch. According to statistics reported by Market Share, Internet Explorer lost 1.63 percent of the Web browser market, falling from 72.15 percent to 71.52 percent from August to September. Mozilla’s Firefox, which has been hovering around 20 percent in share since May 2008, dipped slightly to 19.46 percent, down from 19.73 percent in August. Google’s shiny Chrome browser claimed less than 1 percent of the Web browser market, capturing .78 percent for the month of September.

    The fluctuations may not seem like much, with IE still dominating the Web browser market. But the numbers are interesting to look at on a monthly basis because they point to overall trends and browsing habits. And the biggest trend right now is that IE is losing some of its market.

    The numbers from Market Share seem to reflect the need for Web browser companies to always be in front of their users. Internet Explorer can certainly relate.

    As the numbers continue to fluctuate —and there is no indication that they’ll level off—the more visible browsers need to continue to fight to hang onto what they’ve already established.

    For Internet Explorer it was Firefox, Opera and Safari. Now that Google’s Chrome is in the mix, it will be interesting to see if and how the numbers continue to shift.

    So, google chrome has indeed been creating ripples.

    So what? What about Baba Ramdev? ” you can’t just leave that part dangling” I can hear these anguishes. Here is the link. This picture.

    Marketing at its best i should say. targeted right to the techies of Gurgaon, who in all probability were the first users of Chrome in India, and then showing them a connect to Yog. Awesome Babji, you rock. Only that it would take much more than marketing to convince a marketing student. Maybe a little motivation (not little lots of it!), and convictioin would pull me towards it. Not marketing for sure.

    S

  • >LUXOR Marketing

    >LUXOR – the company which makes markers, yes yes the same sketch pen lookalike, which we commonly use to colour our otherwise neat looking text books. It is also used by many to show that they have read the complete book. Even my cousin’s 9 year old son, uses a fluorescent luxor marker, just colouring his text book, to avoid his mom’s ire, for not studying. What he actually does is just picking up random lines from the text and ‘highlighting’ them.

    On a personal note, i use it thinking i would read this part later, and it would help me before the exams to revise. But Alas! till the day of the exam not more than one chapter is ‘highlighted’.

    Anyways, this post is about the print ads by LUXOR. The campaign for Luxor Highlighters shows a full page of copy with historical information about historical characters. This copy is then highlighted with a Luxor highlighter in such a manner that the face of the historical character is outlined. The beauty of the ad lies in the fact that the copy, which is continuous, makes complete sense only when the highlighted portion is read too. The copy for the ad was readied after much research on the characters.( source: AFAQS)



    I am not really sure about the choice of people except maybe Chaplin, but the ad speaks right of the highlighter. It does take a moment or two to really understand what it says, but a closer look clears, and the whole text seems coherent.