Wednesday, January 9, 2013

“We will use the pug and zoozoos selectively”

Anuradha Aggarwal clarifies Vodafone’s stand on many issues, from Zoozoos to IPL to the new ad... Here’s the 4Ps B&M marketing interview

Among the many reasons behind the popularity of Vodafone in India and its ability to continuously retain its position among the top three telecom players in the market, its consistent focus on advertising it right stands tall. With the launch of eight ad films spanning three different campaigns in less than three months, Vodafone is asserting itself in the advertising world with renewed vigour. It has developed several innovative and interesting themes for its ads, and has never really hesitated to reinvent the wheel. In its latest campaign this year, it is making a departure from its popular Zoozoo campaign and experimenting with a new method of storytelling. The strategic brain behind the change is Anuradha Aggarwal, Senior Vice President, Brand & Consumer Insights, Vodafone. She tells us about the reviews and the feedback that the company has received and its marketing plans for 2012.

What is your marketing budget for the network ad campaign launched in February this year and what percentage of it has been kept aside for running the TVCs? What media mix are you following for the campaign? Also, how are you planning to take the campaign forward from here on?
We are using the entire spectrum for this campaign, which is spread across print, TV, online and outdoor. The campaign, as you are aware, has been created by Ogilvy & Mather. It includes three TVCs that are communicating ‘Instant Connections’, ‘Voice Clarity’ and ‘Uninterrupted Conversations’ on our network. We would not like to discuss our budgets allocations within our mix. Suffice it to say that we always optimise our budgets as against the value we desire from our investment.

What are your marketing plans for year 2012 and where does this campaign fit in it?
The adorable pug Cheeka is back in a series of television commercials promoting ‘Instant Connections’, ‘Voice Clarity’ and ‘Uninterrupted Conversations’ on our network. The new communication campaign is to reinforce the belief that Vodafone offers a superior network. Additionally, we also came up with the “Blackberry Boys Campaign” to coincide with the Asia Cup. At present, we are focussing on the IPL.

How important is the IPL in your scheme of things?
In a cricket crazy nation, IPL is definitely a platform that guarantees targeted eyeballs. At Vodafone, we plan all our campaigns in a manner that they reach out to maximum people as well as resonate in the consumer’s mind. Our aggressive advertising during the ongoing IPL explains how critical it is for us.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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Tuesday, January 8, 2013

They came, we saw and everybody reviewed!

An Ad is a product of painstaking craftsmanship. Various elements, ranging from positioning of the product, clarity of the idea behind the product to visibility of the brand, its persona and the power of communication have to be intelligently weaved together. But while some Ads manage to rewrite preset creative benchmarks, some go the wrong way, fall by the side & fail to excite viewers. In this section, we review three Ads that came out tops, for the right and the wrong reasons this fortnight.

The axe defect [...YAWN...]

Advertiser: HUL
Baseline: Find VJ Jose
Agency: NA

4Ps B&M Take: When you are bringing in a series of ads that are supposed to create and build excitement around a product launch, the key idea is to keep the audience involved and eager to know what’s going to happen next. While the term “The Axe Effect” is worth its place in the league of iconic taglines, the current series of ads by Axe about MTV VJ Jose’s kidnapping seems to have run the mile and come off quite worse on our parameters. Yes, the series did start reasonably well, when it was reported in a newslike fashion that MTV VJ Jose had been kidnapped. With MTV too dedicating a page on its website titled ‘Save Jose’, most of the audience could have been forgiven for believing that the so-called kidnapping was actually real (it actually did look considerably real). Consider how the responses would have changed, when the next ad in the series claimed that VJ Jose had been kidnapped by a gang of women whose demands were not yet known. Subsequently, it was revealed that the attackers were demanding that Axe should launch its shower gel in India. At this point, the ad-series becomes quite predictably a been-there-seen-that bore. The ‘kidnappers’ release videos of Jose getting ‘tortured’ with food, paintball guns, a knife, et al (all videos end with the kidnappers bathing him with Axe Shower Gel); the Axe top brass is shown saying that launching the gel is dangerous for Indian men as it is known to evoke reactions in women that are bordering on the vicious and violent; Roadies’ host Rannvijay is shown convincing the top management to launch the gel. Yada, yada, yada... Axe obviously would get brand recall wherever its name is used; but levity, creativity, cinematography, are all quite dismal. One can’t wait for the series to get over. Literally.
 

Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
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The internet age

A. K. Ghosh of JK Paper expresses optimism on the demand for digital printing and anytime anywhere printing in the internet age

While branding might be the next wave in the industry, how important do you feel is R&D? What is JK Paper’s expenditure on R&D activities?
Product development and branding initiatives depend on how we invest in technology and R&D. JK Copier’s status as the largest selling office paper is not just by chance but because of our R&D efforts over the years. Digital printing devices will require very high quality papers and therefore a technology compliant brand will be in high demand. JK Paper has joined the select league of the 10 world paper majors who have introduced Hewlett Packard’s path-breaking ColorLok technology. In fact, JK Paper is the first & only paper company in India to introduce ColorLok technology. It not only dramatically improves print results but also plays a very important role in saving the environment. Using ColorLok papers increases the operating life of printers by around 40-60%, hence reducing needless e-waste.

While the world moves towards the digital age, where do you see the paper industry headed?
Given our level of development and per capita use of paper, moving towards the digital age will actually help the growth of the industry at least in the near term. Having said this, I will like to caution that while this may be the aggregate picture, there are bound to be significant variations between the different segments.

For example, demand for paper from digital printing is on a sharp rise and this would mean a sharp rise in demand for high quality office papers. We are also likely to see demand for ‘green’ papers to rise or environmental friendly paper that will help increasing life of printing devices, enabling lower cost per print page and better ROI for customers. The introduction of smart phones and tablets will actually enhance the need to print anytime and from anywhere through wireless devices. The launch of SkyRoom by HP in North America & Europe has already triggered the need for more printing. The industry will also, as I observed earlier, go for modern technology that saves on resources like water and energy and this in turn would mean a better quality paper as well.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
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Monday, January 7, 2013

RAINWATER: HARVESTING

The biggest issue of this century will be preservation of water
 
BBC predicts water wars to happen in the near future while in West Africa, Ganges-Brahmaputra belt, and in Peru there already seems to be a huge risk of violent conflict. David Zhang, a geographer at Hong Kong University, had analysed 8,000 wars over 500 years and concluded that water shortage had played a far greater role as a catalyst in these wars than previously supposed. It’s a wonder today that nations have not yet declared diplomatic wars.

On the positive side, as UN Water comments, “The world’s six billion people are appropriating 54 percent of all the accessible freshwater contained in rivers, lakes and underground aquifers.” That means that there is still a huge scope for optimal sourcing of freshwater. But as in the case of food, there has to be a globally coordinated effort to fight water scarcity. Though UN Water is a body focused on the issue (they have good policy papers), yet the organisation has still not even identified strategic issues and priorities. What’re they waiting for? Ice Age 4?


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.


 
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Saturday, January 5, 2013

Stung by tourism

Joining the list of species affected by man, stingrays bear the brunt of underwater tourism

During my vacation in Maldives some years ago, I would eagerly wait for the evening to feed, touch and watch the stingrays swimming in the shallow sandy waters. Although I had heard of the ‘Crocodile Hunter’, Steve Irwin’s death caused by a stingray sting, I still waded through the water without the slightest of fear! As it turns out, there aren’t just a handful of enthusiasts like me, but several yearning to get close to these usually docile fishes. The ‘Stingray City’ at Cayman Islands has been in much controversy lately, due to a research conducted by Simon Fraser University, Canada, which indicates that human interaction with the stingrays is turning out to be injurious to these aquatic animals.

The Grand Cayman Sandbank is known for its population of stingrays, which also happens to be the reason of it being swarmed with up to 2500 visitors at one time. Apart from enjoying a look at these aquatic animals, tourists also shell out a handsome amount to feed and swim with the stingrays, which in turn is affecting their immune system and making them vulnerable to diseases. There’s no doubt that these creatures evoke people’s curiosity and therefore, also enable places like Cayman Islands mint some money through tourism. But researches reveal that crowded conditions give birth to parasites, which cause health problems in stingrays and reduce their longevity and reproduction rate. Unhealthy stingrays are also rather unsightly and can affect tourism. “It comes as no surprise that stingrays are being affected due to contact with humans, and that’s because people don’t just watch them. The stingrays are captured in a confinement and fed with squids etc., which are not their usual meal,” says Upasna Khanna, an ecologist. She adds, “In the past, dolphins and penguins, which came in close contact with people for long durations have also been affected.”


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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Friday, January 4, 2013

The Dalit gambit

Meira Kumar’s elevation as Speaker is the Congress’s first major offensive to retake the Dalit vote.

When Meira Kumar left the Congress in a huff nine years ago for a very short freelance stint and returned after promises made by Sonia Gandhi, she could scarcely believe that the Congress president would keep her words in such grand style.

Her elevation as Speaker of the Lok Sabha recently could be rightly considered Sonia’s first deft move to get back the estranged Dalit vote bank and would be seen to be particularly helpful in the case of Bihar where Meira’s father Jagjivan Ram once constituted the Dalit bulwark of the Congress party.

Meira’s estrangement with the Congress began in 2000, reportedly at the instigation of Sitaram Kesri. Kesri seems to have sensed Meira’s dark mood. According to party insiders, she was considered as close to Kesri, a fact not unknown to Sonia. The fact was that Jagjivan Ram’s high profile daughter was sidelined in party affairs because Congress had all but forgotten Ram’s contribution to strengthening its great rainbow coalition. Things reached such a pass that the Congress party was unwilling to accommodate her demand of declaring 10 Krishna Menon marg as a Smarak or memorial in memory of her legendary ‘Babuji’. It took then a BJP Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, to do the honours. But Sonia Gandhi was keen to make amends. Veteran Bhajan Lal – once a foot solider of her father – was deputed to woo her back. Meira was positively reassured when she talked directly to Sonia herself. Her return then was a question of detail.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
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Thursday, January 3, 2013

SRI LANKA: LTTE

Peace can now be restored, but only if Tamilians are successfully restored to the mainstream

After protracted negotiations failed, Rajapaksa never, even for a moment, relented in venting the State’s fury on the Tigers. The general thinking is that this extreme strategy will not help bring the Tamil minority closer to the Sinhala-dominated mainstream. And the Sri Lankan army behaved much like the Russians did in the early phases of the Chechen rebellion. They used brute force – cutting off all possibilities of a reconciliation. There is growing consensus that the Sri Lankan government needs to learn from earlier conflicts in different parts of the world. The Irish and Chechnya models are just two to have found followers in recent times.

But the good part of this evil business is that regardless of the means that were used, the demise of LTTE means that Tamil parties in Sri Lanka can now contest freely and canvas among a wider range of Tamil population. This could not have been possible till Prabhakaran breathed incessant fire. What is now urgently required is greater social and economic equality. Self-rule alone can help bridge the Sinhala-Tamil divide better than the brute engagement that was witnessed of late. Finally, should Rajapaksa fail, he can always fall back on the good old doctrine of carrot & stick! The least he can do is to ensure that Prabhakaran himself does n’t become a role model!


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
For More IIPM Info, Visit below mentioned IIPM articles.
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