Business is Marketing

THE ROCK STARS

2012-01-27T10:27:00.000+05:30

Oprah’s visit to India has created quiet a stir with everybody wanting to meet her, and why not? She is, after all, the most powerful woman in America. What’s commendable about her is that she was not born this way; but worked her way up the ladder, and the success and fame she has got is very well deserved. She is a true ‘rock star’. She was poor and she had no parents to pamper her and take care of her (she was born to two teenagers who ended their relationship once she was born). She however had one quality – she learned to read before the age of three. That was the only possession she had and she used it to develop herself and her career. She was a great student and was able to impress everybody with her knowledge (because she read more than others). Today, any book that Oprah picks up is guaranteed to become an international best-seller. A strong will and a steely determination are what made her a success.

Another child born to unwed parents not just rocked his career but also the world. Steve Jobs had the passion to follow his dreams and face all the ups and downs in his career without ever giving up. He was the biggest ‘rock star’ of business.

NEVER SAY DIE

The ‘V’ sign made using the index finger and the middle finger used to be considered a rude English hand sign in the Middle Ages. The French would cut off the middle and index fingers of any English bowman so that they could never shoot again. The English would taunt the French by raising their fingers to say, “I can still shoot you…” However, this ‘V’ sign changed its complete meaning when Winston Churchill raised his fingers to depict ‘victory’. He was the man who was the ‘rock star’ of World War II, for he never gave up and told his people to do the same. He prepared the nation for battle with the Nazi army and after five years of fighting and a near defeat, victory was finally theirs. It was this attitude that brought them success and ‘victory’. He was one of the finest leaders of Britain and his leadership capabilities were best displayed during the Second World War. Consider the fact that this was the same boy who stuttered as a child, did poorly in school and was rejected by both Oxford and Cambridge. Churchill never gave up till he succeeded.

He also did not do well in school, so he decided to grow Christmas trees and raise budgerigars. Both his projects failed. However, by the age of 16, he was able to publish a magazine and start a small mail-order business. Today his group ‘Virgin’ is a conglomerate of 200 companies present in 30 countries. Not just this world, Richard Branson soon plans to expand his business beyond the planet. He plans to take ordinary people into space on Virgin Galactic. The man thinks, looks and works like a rock star.

He grew up in an orphanage as his widowed mother could not support him. He worked in a factory that made moulds for auto parts and frames of eyeglasses. At 23, he opened his own eyeglass frame shop and today, his company ‘Luxottica’ is the world’s largest maker of eyeglasses, glares, et al. Today, Leonardo Del Vecchio is valued at $10 billion!

It’s been noted that two-thirds of the world’s billionaires made their fortunes by starting from zero. It was not inheritance but persistence that made them succeed.

Easier said than done, but this is the true spirit of a ‘rock star’. They never give up, they never say die.

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE YOURSELF

Just a mention of his name brings a smile to anyone’s face; yet this man lived a childhood that gave him very few reasons to smile. Jim Carrey, the rock star comedian of Hollywood, had to work long hours while still in school. He and his family used to live in a camper van. But Jim knew that he had the ability to make people laugh. He decided to pursue his passion and at 16; he dropped out of school and moved to LA. It was a big risk, but he knew that he had something different to offer. Most importantly, he knew that this was what he wanted to do most; so he put everything at stake to follow his dream. If you are focused, you are bound to succeed. He landed himself in a part in a sitcom called ‘The Duck Factory’ and soon, his career was rocking!

As Steve Jobs had once said, “Life is too short. Don’t live with the result of other peoples thinking.”

She was divorced & had a small child to take care of; yet she decided to follow her heart and do what she knew she was best at – that was to write. So she did not pick up a regular job and instead wrote a book based on an idea that came to her on a train ride. Her book summary was rejected by many publishing houses till one liked it. J. K. Rowling took a huge gamble, for it is very difficult to be noticed in the publishing world; but she believed in herself. Today, she is the first author to become a billionaire and her book sales rocked the publishing world and set new benchmarks.

The one business Lakshmi Niwas Mittal understood best was his family business of steel-making. So he ventured out to do what he knew he was best at and did not hesitate to buy a run-down plant in Indonesia and start Mittal Steel. Today, ArcelorMittal is the largest steel company in the world!

He always had a knack for business. As a young boy, he found an easy way to make money. He would buy matches, fish, pens, Christmas decorations, et al in bulk and sell them for a profit to his neighbors. He knew he was best at business; so when he got good grades in school, he asked his father for a loan and started his mail-order business. He knew the importance of keeping prices low if one wanted to make it big. This business acumen has made IKEA the biggest furniture company in the world today and its founder Ingvar Kampard is one of the world’s richest.

Think deep and find out what it is you can be the best at in the whole world, and then devote all your energies to that; without bothering about initial failures, without bothering about other’s opinions. Stay focused and success is bound to happen. All stars will tell you this.

NEVER LET MONEY MOTIVATE YOU

“I was worth over $1000,000 when I was 23, and over $10,000,000 when I was 24, and over $100,000,000 when I was 25, and it wasn’t that important because I never did it for the money.” These were the words of Steve Jobs, who showed the world how to live life on your own terms. His stepfather chased him out of his house when he was a child. He became a salesman but lost his job and his wife left him. He had only one mission, and that was to be able to keep his son happy. He slept in the subway station bathrooms, but he did all that he could to keep his son happy. A job in Bear Stearns, days and nights of hard work and things finally did change for Chris Gardner, when he finally could manage to open his own brokerage firm Gardner Rich & Co. His story became the theme for the Will Smith starrer movie “In Pursuit of Happyness”. Life is actually not very different from the movie title. Pursue happiness and not money, and it (money) will eventually come to you on its own.

Traditionally, rock stars were defined as people who were part of a rock band. But today, rock stars have come to be known as people who don’t follow rules. They are not happy being good, but go out of their way to be extraordinarily good. There is something totally unique about them. Today, in business, those are the ‘miracle workers’ who are called rock stars. Some call them ‘rock stars’ because they are the best of the best and super experts in their field. For some, ‘rock stars’ are ‘brands’ of success. They are larger than life. For still others, they are those who believed in themselves and went ahead and did exactly what they believed in.

Whatever your definition of a rock star, remember that anyone can become one, and in whichever field he chooses. If you have the faith, if you believe in yourself and if you are ready to put everything at stake to achieve your goal; then you too could be a rock star!

A NEW YEAR, A NEW START!

2012-01-13T11:01:00.001+05:30

Another year, another chance to accomplish all that we could not in the last year, another hope, another new beginning! Yes, every new year brings about a sense of freshness with it and lots of hope and high spirits. It’s the time to think afresh, plan new things, change your outlook and approach your problems with a more positive mindset.

Every year promises something new and every year witnesses a new change. This year too, we as marketers should be ready to face new challenges and plan new strategies. The rules of doing business are going to change and if we want to stay ahead, we better be prepared.

THE VIRTUAL WORLD WILL OVERTAKE THE REAL WORLD

The traditional way of marketing has changed. Marketers will focus more on the new media and the traditional will take a back seat. This change is for good and will intensify even more as marketers discover more and more innovative ways to reach out to the consumer online.

Last year (in June, 2011) the marketing genius Nike premiered its new ad campaign titled “The Chosen” not on TV, but on Facebook. The campaign was used to launch a video contest, which asked people to submit their videos of extreme action sports (like snowboarding, surfing, skateboarding et al) and create the maximum buzz around their entries. The finalists were then judged by a group of professionals within Nike and the winner was selected; the winner was titled the ‘chosen one’, for he got the chance to live like a Nike Pro athlete for a year. Apart from the very interesting and engaging campaign, the point to be noted is that Nike decided to launch its campaign on Facebook nearly three days before it featured the same on TV during the NBA finals.

Not just shoe brands, even cars are using the social platform to debut their goods. Last year, Ford unveiled its new model – the Ford Explorer – not in an auto show, something that it has been doing consistently for the past 50 years, but on Facebook. It even randomly selected a ‘fan’ to give away a free Explorer! If you consider the fact that Ford has been doing relatively well as compared to its competitors, it seems like the choice of spending twice as much as its competitors on digital media is not a bad choice at all.

This month (January 14), Ikea is hosting a “Bring Your Own Friends” (BYOF) event in its stores in USA. Every time you ‘Like’ the Ikea page, the company makes a donation to the non-profit organization ‘Save the Children’. That’s not all; once you like the page, you get to see the various freebies and discounts that the retailer is offering in its various stores on January 14. You are then asked to invite your friends to the event happening in the stores on the day. For every invite you send, you become eligible for various contests and have a chance to win a free ‘shopping spree’. To add to this, the company pledges to donate $1 to ‘Save the Children’, whether your friend/s turn up for the event or not. Yes, earlier too, Facebook has been used for social causes by companies, but this one goes a step further. Ikea is hoping to increase ‘in store foot traffic’ using Facebook. This only goes on to prove that the coming year will see marketers using the ‘social platform’ more aggressively. If your brand has a page on Facebook, it’s time you made sure that it becomes more interactive and engaging, for that’s going to be the key to success in the future. Or else, God help you… well, literally. The most engaging and interactive pages on Facebook have been those dedicated to religion, with ‘Jesus Daily’ leading the list. At more than 4 million interactions weekly, the page leaves all other pages way behind. This just proves that if you have content that is engaging, you have takers too (after all, there are 800 million people on Facebook and each could be your potential consumer). God could help you get some good ideas for this one for sure!

One of the key factors to keep in mind would be ‘online engagement’ between customers and the brand. Apart from the number of followers, it will also be important to keep your followers engaged this time. When your consumers are being bombarded with so many messages, it’s critical to focus on loyalty and make your brand’s ‘voice’ the loudest and the most unique. One way of doing it online is to keep interacting with them. The cosmetic company ‘Benefit’ did just that. With no marketing on TV or in the print media, Benefit used only the ‘virtual platform’ for all its marketing endeavors. Using fun and quirky online content and giving away freebies and having beauty sessions online, the company built an awareness around its products and kept its fans engaged with the brand. It asked its fans to review its products on its Facebook page and even rewarded its most active reviewers. These ‘reviewers’, in turn, told their other Facebook friends about this brand; and soon, Benefit became the most talked about brand in the virtual space. It’s akin to generating ‘word of mouth’; just that this time, it’s happening online, for that is where most of your consumers will be in the future. All the rules of marketing will remain the same; however, the one who is able to adapt these rules to the ‘virtual world’ will be able to stay ahead of the competition.

It’s going to be an era of the ‘virtual’. Be it brand building or increasing market share, everybody is thinking ‘virtual’. Starbucks launched a ‘mobile payment system’, which turned the smart phones of consumers into wallets. Every time a customer ordered from Starbucks, his/her account was automatically credited; and discounts, if any, were applied. Starbucks claims to have 3.6 million customers who have joined this program, very aptly named ‘My Starbucks Rewards Programme’. This will be a year when ‘virtual innovations’ will help companies reap rich dividends.

THE CONSUMER WILL OVERTAKE MARKETERS

On the flip side, the consumer of tomorrow will be very difficult to impress. He has seen it all and is armed with the technology and the know-how for avoiding your advertisements and marketing messages. You need to be totally different and very creative to actually get his attention.

One strategy that most marketers have been seen adopting is ‘shocking’ the consumer. Most of the times, it has worked. Remember the recent ‘Unhate’ campaign of Benetton, which featured some of the world’s top leaders who were not the closest of friends kissing each other on the lips? The campaign featured photos of Barack Obama kissing the Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, France’s Nicolas Sarkozy kissing Germany’s Angela Merkel and the Pope kissing an Egyptian man. The latter did not take too kindly to it and the Vatican has vowed to take legal action against Benetton this year. But from the marketer’s point of view, the campaign worked as people remembered it, and reacted.

World Wildlife Fund (WWF) had released an ad that showed dozens of planes bearing down on New York with a tag line that read “The Tsunami Killed 100 Times More People Than 9/11”. The copy of the ad continued to state “The planet is brutally powerful. Respect it. Preserve it.” The advertisement, which was created by Brazilian design firm DDB Brasil, was globally condemned by all and had to be hastily withdrawn. Considering the fact that this advertisement appeared just once in a small local paper in Sao Paulo, it was pretty effective, for it had the power to generate a global buzz.

Consumers of tomorrow will appreciate brands that push the boundaries. Diesel did it with its “Be Stupid” campaign, which was loved by the youth everywhere. Whether the ‘shock tactics’ will work or not is debatable. However, one thing is for certain – you need to think really different. You need to be hard hitting to get noticed and be remembered. Only the best will get a reaction from the consumers, and the rest would be conveniently ignored.

The consumer of tomorrow will be impressed by the truly responsible marketer. One who genuinely takes care of its customers and the environment will have more loyal consumers. Brands like Nike and Garnier (French beauty brand) are recycling their products and the consumers are loving them for it. Nike has already recycled 25 million pairs of worn out shoes. Garnier recycles its packaging and uses it to make playground equipment. The consumer tomorrow will like you and remain loyal if, along with a good product, you show him a good recycling plan.

Be responsible and be honest if you want to impress the consumer of tomorrow. If you make a mistake, accept it. Last month, Tata Motors called back over a lakh Nano owners for an upgrade to change their starter motors free of cost. As instances of the car catching fire increased, the company took this action. Toyota, too, did the same when it called back all Etios sedans manufactured before October 8, 2011 to check their filler hose and replace them if found defective. Again, of course, it was done free of cost. More than service, it’s an intelligent strategy to build goodwill and reduce the damages done to the brand’s image.

The coming year is going to be filled with new challenges and new ways of doing business. This time, the old ways will not work. Only the one who is daringly innovative and supremely aggressive will survive.

It’s time to give your brand and your marketing plans a face-lift. It’s time to do new things this new year and discover a new you!

WHY THIS KOLAVERI DI

2011-12-16T10:16:00.002+05:30

“Why this murderous rage, girl?” has become the rage of the nation. It’s the ultimate song for the youth and almost everybody below 20 has made it their anthem. Come to think of it, the lyrics are ridiculously funny, the tune is very simple and yet this ‘soup song’ (meaning, a heartbreak song) just gets on you. It’s so easy to remember and so hummable that you cant stop singing after hearing it! But most importantly, it’s a song that every music company would want in their kitty today, it’s a viral campaign that every marketer dreams of making, it has such crazy levels of popularity that would be a dream for any celebrity and, it has reached an iconic status that every brand would die for. It is an excellent example of how to establish a name, an idea, in today’s crowded market place, filled with consumers who understand all marketing gimmicks; who hate being marketed to and who are a most aware and a sceptic lot.

WHY KOLAVERI?

Why has ‘Kolaveri’ become so popular? It’s the simplicity of the message and the magic of the internet that have made it so popular. Gone are the days when one had to wait for the mainstream media to pick up your story and make it popular by writing about it in their newspapers and magazines or showing it on TV. Today, thanks to the internet, you can go directly to the consumer and be heard. If your message is interesting, it will spread like, well, a viral ! This is exactly what happened to the ‘Kolaveri’ video when it was posted online a few weeks ago. Shot inside the recording studio, the rough version of the song made it to the internet through the backdoor, making it an instant hit and forcing Sony Music to release the song much earlier than planned. Its foot tapping beats made it irresistible to anyone who heard it, and today, it has got more than 22 million hits on YouTube. In fact, so much is the craze for this song that anything associated with it is becoming a hit too. Sonu Nigam’s son has sung a ‘milk version’ of the soup song and that, too, is set to become a rage on the internet. A good and interesting idea spreads like wildfire. You must know what the audience wants and give it to them, as John St., a Toronto based ad firm did. To market its services, it circulated a viral based on a satirical idea of how ‘catvertising’, that is videos with cats in them, would be the most watched videos on the internet by 2015! Tongue in cheek, the advertising agency explains how it has now opened the world’s first ‘cat video’ division to stay on top of competition, for everyone likes to see videos of cats, and cats are good for business. Considering the fact that everything in the world today is just a ‘mouse-click’ away, the ‘cat videos’ are bound to be a hit. Not surprising, then, that the ‘catvertising’ viral has got more than a million hits already. What is it that makes these videos become such a craze? From the ‘Kolaveri’ viral in India to the ‘catvertising’ one in Canada, what is it that makes them so popular? They have the ability to connect with the viewers instantly. They have a simple message told quickly and in an interesting manner. Most importantly they are fun!

WORD-OF-MOUSE

The web can make you famous instantly, and it can make your brand the most talked about. After all, the most powerful tool of marketing is word-of-mouth. Nowadays, of course, it’s the word-of-mouse with the web gaining importance. It is a tool that is being used by marketers across the globe. You could be selling any product; if you have a great viral also in place, it will help your brand in becoming more popular and talked about.

The most popular viral advertising campaign of 2011 has been that of Volkswagen Passat featuring an adorable kid in a Darth Vader mask, trying to use his ‘Force’ to move and control things right from his dog to his toy and even his sandwich. Much to his disappointment, nothing seems to work till his Dad comes home in the Passat. He tries his ‘powers’ on the car and voilà, it starts! The kid is elated and totally overjoyed with the fact that the ‘force’ finally worked, not realising that his father had secretly turned the car on with his remote. What an endearing way of highlighting the new feature of the car that it could be started with a remote. It is so lovable and so watchable, which is why it has been viewed more than 62 million times on YouTube.

To get people interested in its new range of shoes, Nike made Kobe Bryant jump over a whole lot of crazy things like an Aston Martin, a pool of snakes, et al. The videos and the feats shown were nearly impossible to believe and generated a lot of comments online. Whatever the comments, Nike had managed to draw the people’s attention, which is the basic purpose of all marketing campaigns.

When it comes to drawing attention, there are two viral campaigns that literally changed the world of online marketing. The first one was the viral released for the movie ‘The Blair Witch’. The world was new to the internet and its new users thought that they had ‘chanced’ upon a video footage of some vanished teenagers showing supernatural events. The word spread like wildfire and soon mainstream media too was carrying this story and talking about it. It’s only later when people realised that this was actually a campaign for a movie. The viral had built so much excitement around the movie, making it one of the most profitable movies of all times. The second most remarkable viral campaign has been that of Barack Obama. One of the first to realise the importance of the internet and the social networking sites, he used it to campaign extensively and actually go on to become the President of USA.

A good viral can grant you popularity but if the product is not good, it cannot help much. To give a boost to its sagging sales, Fiat, too, launched a viral campaign featuring Jennifer Lopez. The star was big, the script was great and the views were huge. With more than 27 million views, this viral is one of the most popular virals of 2011; yet it did nothing for the sales of the car, for it was more about Ms. Lopez and less about Fiat. As a result, everyone conveniently forgot about the car as they ogled at Lopez. The sales did not turn out to be even half as exciting as the viral.

A great marketing campaign has to be backed with an equally great product to be able to fight competitors, or else all the extra attention that you get from the great marketing campaign could actually prove fatal for you and your brand. In today’s day and age, it is extremely easy to film a video and it costs nothing to upload it on YouTube. The tough part is making it work for you.

So while the internet is filled with opportunities, it is a medium that has to be handled cautiously too. While a great viral campaign can do wonders for your bottom lines, a wrong one could conversely generate immense negative publicity for your brand. It is, nevertheless, a place where it’s not the size of your budget but your creativity that can help you beat even the biggest of competitors. A man was looking for a job and wanted to get the attention of some of the best marketing companies. Instead of working on a great CV, he worked on an e-book and called it ‘Marketing Apple’. The free ebook got some of the top bloggers talking about him and soon, he was a popular name; making more money an hour than he could have dreamt of. When Universal Studios wanted to launch the new Harry Potter area in its theme park, it did not work on making an advertisement; instead, it worked on identifying the biggest Harry Potter fan sites on the internet. The owners of these sites (just seven of them) were told that they had been especially selected to break the news to the Harry Potter fans, for the fans should be the first to know and they should not see it in an advertisement. The strategy worked like magic and within days, the new addition to Universal Studios was a mega hit. The best part is that the company hardly spent any money in promoting it.

Great brands have always been built on simple ideas. Great brands under-promise and over-deliver; much like the Kolaveri song, which is so down to earth and yet, it’s pure entertainment.

So as you sit and plan out your viral marketing campaign, remember that it needn’t be very professional, it needn’t be long; but what it must be is simple, endearing, give a clear message, and soon you too could be singing ‘Kolaveri’ on your way to the bank, and not asking your boss, “Why this Kolaveri, Sir?”.

A TRUE HERO KEEPS HIS PROMISE!

2011-12-02T11:14:00.001+05:30

Apple is a unique company for it’s loved by many and envied too by an equal number of people, especially its competitors. First, every mobile phone company tried to copy the iPhone; and now, taking subtle shots at the iPhone is a gimmick being used by all. However, in November 2011, Apple’s most aggressive competitor Samsung went a step further as it blatantly compared its Galaxy S II model with the iPhone. The advertisements poked fun at the iPhone buyers who were shown as people ready to stand in a queue for days to get their hands on the latest iPhone, while a better phone (meaning the Galaxy) was already there with the smarter ones. The ad mocked the iPhone users for buying the iPhone4S when in fact there was no visible difference between iPhone4 and 4S. Moreover it did not have a great battery life and its screen was not as wide as that of the Galaxy. Whether the Galaxy is better than the iPhone is secondary, the debate is, “Is this kind of advertising going to work for Samsung?” It has managed to get everybody’s attention with its provocative ads; but would this help it sustain in the market place?

Talking of ‘provocative’ advertisements Unilever found itself in a tight spot when its internet campaign for Lynx deodorants was banned by Advertising Standards Authority (US) as it was considered degrading to women. To prevent further damage, on November 25, 2011, Unilever immediately posted a “Sorry from Lynx” video on YouTube, which featured the same model (this time, less provocatively dressed) returning all the props she had used in the ad and saying sorry to the viewers. Sometimes brands lose focus and do things, which appear to give quick results but can actually prove fatal for the brand in the long run. It was named one of America’s hottest brands in 2010. After spending close to $23 million in advertising (in 2009) on its ‘Easy- Tone’ shoes, Reebok was hot property as its shoes sold like hot cakes. Approximately 5 million pairs of ‘EasyTones’ were sold in 2010 alone. Every woman wanted these ‘magic’ shoes that could do wonders to her figure without much effort. It seemed too good to be true. Well, it probably was, for in September 2011, the Federal Trade Commission (US) announced that Reebok had deceptively advertised toning shoes and apparel; subsequently, Reebok was asked to withdraw its advertisements and pay $25 million as settlement charges. The marketer, though still standing by its claims, said that it agreed to pay to avoid a protracted legal battle. For a company that spent $23 million in 2009, then another $31 million in 2010 and add to that another $10 million in 2011 in marketing its ‘toning’ products, this was a big blow. It was after all a brand positioning strategy that was created and nurtured for 3 years. Now the company will not be able to use this strategy anymore.

Yes, the market place is tough and times are even tougher nowadays, but this growing competitiveness should not force marketers (and definitely not the big ones) to succumb to pressure and take recourse to unethical means. Poking fun, using sexual innuendos or making promises that are just not true are not things that the consumer of today likes.

The consumer is very finicky and your unethical means may put him off.

BEWARE OF COMPETITORS

As products get similar, as market shares get reduced, companies are doing what it takes to win in the market place. Even before the consumer responds, it’s your competitor who responds to your marketing strategy immediately. The response could be a counter advertisement or even a complaint. Gone are the days when companies were content to fight on TV through commercials or in the grocery-aisles; today, increasingly, the battle is fought in the courtrooms. Not surprising that the number of complaints to get the competitor’s advertisements withdrawn have increased manifold. In fact, according to an article in the New York Times, never have there been so many complaints been lodged by brands against their competing brands as have been done in the past few years. The number of legal battles has increased dramatically too, especially after the recession. The goal is not to get money, but to snatch away market share. Everybody is keeping an eagle watch on everybody else. Brands are going to any extent to pull the competitor down. Pantene Conditioner challenged Dove on its claim that it ‘repaired’ hair better than Pantene. To prove its claim, Dove did a study which measured the ‘combing force’ required for treated hair, it also provided statistics on number of hair breakages in a 200- strokes-per-tresses test. Finally, it got an expert to defend its decision of using ‘wet combing’ instead of ‘dry combing’.

You need to go to ridiculous heights to stay in business. Most importantly, you need to be alert or else you could get sued and lose out to your competitors. A few months back, Molson Coors was quick to complain that its competitor Heineken’s ads, which showed a man at a party impressing the guests with his stylish moves, was an irresponsible ad because it gave the impression that alcohol could enhance personal qualities and talents. Heinekin managed to prove that this was not so as nowhere was the man actually shown drinking the beer. It saved a good ad from being taken off air by irrational complaints from competitors. The point is, right or wrong, you will have competitors gunning after you, trying their best to pull you down; so just making a good advertisement is not enough. You must have your defenses, your justifications planned even before you release the advertisement, or else you might not be able to save your best campaign and you may lose the market share!

THE REAL LOSERS

It’s true that brands are doing everything possible to pull their competitors down. Is it worth the trouble? In 2008, Campbell Soup claimed that its soups were made with ‘tender love and care’ while those of General Mills were made with MSG (a banned chemical). As expected, General Mills too immediately retaliated. Then both companies went and complained to the advertising review division. The outcome of the complaint and counter complaint is not important. What’s interesting to note is that the sales of the soups of both companies have kept declining ever since. The consumer refused to trust either of them.

When healthy comparisons turn to mud slinging, both parties lose. A brand is a promise and all brand makers should remember this fact and honor it. As consumers, we love our brands and listen to their claims and trust those claims. An intelligent marketer will never ever mess with the trust his consumers put on him. He will not use dirty tricks to outsmart his competitors, as in the long run, it’s the stronger brand that survives and wins. These petty tricks do manage to get attention, but they tend to put the consumer off too. The flip side is that today, the market is a very rough place and you need to be on your toes all the time. One wrong move could be disastrous.

There are better ways of increasing market share. Some of the good old things never get old-fashioned. Dove realized this as this year has seen its sales soar globally. No cheap gimmicks, it just concentrated on giving better products and its advertisements managed to strike an emotional chord with the consumers. Similarly, Chevrolet Cruze this year has become GM’s hottest selling car brand. When it comes to cars today, the consumer is looking for fuel efficiency and that is exactly what the brand promised in its advertisements: “40 miles per litre...”

It was not lawsuits and unethical ads that ensured that the Korean car manufacturer Kia became the most successful car of the year, but rather its focus on the consumer. Its target were young buyers so it focused on things this group liked; for example, an upmarket sound system, a robust engine, good mileage and some hamsters too! It used three cute hamsters in its advertisements to showcase the merits of its car ‘Soul’ – and voila, the car and the company today feature in America’s list of hottest brands! No poking fun at the competitor; but just a serious focus on brand building, and this mobile phone company has beaten the Goliaths hollow. It sold more smartphones in the third quarter than Apple or Samsung! HTC set out on its own just two years back (it used to be a nameless manufacturer that made phones for other brands) and today, this brand tops the US smartphone market.

There is no shortcut to success and nothing succeeds like simple hard work. The laws of business have probably not changed much as all these brands have shown. If you want to win, play with sincerity; for a brand is a promise and those who keep promises are loved the most. As with people so with brands, don’t let the other person lose trust in you. It’s the only way to become a true hero !

IS INDIA REALLY 4 NATIONS?

2011-11-25T09:25:00.009+05:30

SO FAR, MARKETERS HAVE LARGELY PAID ONLY LIP SERVICE TO THE CULTURAL DIVERSITY WITHIN INDIA. IT’S TIME THEY DO MUCH MORE TO LEVERAGE IT TO THEIR ADVANTAGE

Companies are worried about the coveted FDI regulations for this market. Economists are worried about its massive poverty indicators and growing inequality. Politicians are worried about their next elections as usual, but perhaps much more today about simply getting caught! Business in general is worried about favourable government policies and reforms and also about the appalling Indian version of the term “infrastructure”. And on top of all these, the common man is worried about (including infrastructure, of course) rising prices on all fronts, corrupt and inefficient systems, uncertain markets, lack of a social security net… the list is quite endless.

Welcome to “Incredible India”, the term itself a perfect fit for this country, and not just because the words are catchy and rhyme well. It’s also because of their meaning. Not great, or awesome; but ‘incredible’, in simple terms, hard to believe. And that’s how intellectuals at different points of time have described the ascent of the Indian economy.

Nevertheless, marketers love stories, and the Indian story attracts them like few do. Goldman Sachs’ BRIC report laid the groundwork followed by many others. Another exhaustive report by McKinsey in 2007 gave some important indications of where India could potentially be. It projected, with an assumed CAGR of 7.3%, that India would triple its income levels by 2025. That will bring around 291 million people out of poverty and the middle class will rise by ten times over the period to around 500 million. What’s more, 23 million people would count among the wealthy, which would be more than Australia’s current population (around 22.7 million, Australian Bureau of Statistics, October 17). And the most exciting part, of course, is that the country has a combined young & working age population (14-60 years of age) that comprises nearly 54% of the total (UN, 2009 figures). Another 31.3% are in the wings to enter this group (age 0-14 years). India’s working age population is expected to edge out China by 2028.

This is a brief of the larger India story that marketers across the globe have grown to believe; and all it seems to say is that – unless you want to be a bit player on the global stage a few decades from now; it’s imperative that you invest in India. Of course, it’s a great story for shareholders of a number of MNCs as well, who have been terribly short of good news lately. However, before you hop on to the India bandwagon, you have to understand the fact that although the macro picture makes a valid case, it’s very easy to get lost in a maze if you are unable to grasp the intricacies unique to this market.

One of the most critical and overlooked aspects of this market is culture. Generally, marketers and analysts have attempted to either club the entire India as one (using economic segmentation) and look for a unifying theme, or considered it just too diverse to really merit the time and energy in segmenting it in this manner. Either approach is dangerous. In fact, my ongoing research provides compelling logic that supports the existence of India as 4 nations – North, South, East & West – and this has profound implications for today’s marketers. These divisions have a strong historical context and continue to be extremely relevant even today.

CONSUMER PARADIGMS

Art is a very apt reflection of life. And if you look at our movies, there are a number of stereotypes that have been used to define Indians in different zones. A Punjabi is often pictured as brash, impulsive, imposing and ready to pick up a brawl, or even join an ongoing one for company sake! Conversely, a person from Tamil Nadu is pictured as relatively submissive and also deeply rigid about his style of living. Mumbai residents are typically shown as immensely practical and down to earth. And a person from the city of Kolkata will be portrayed as too passionate about his state, ready to revolt at the slightest excuse and be ready for an intellectual solution to every problem, if not a practical one.

While extreme, these stereotypes are not without basis! Some research into consumer buying habits also brings out some vital differences in the four zones. A small perception-based survey across 4 metros revealed some interesting characteristics. West Bengal, for instance, has a strong history of revolution, and they harbor a fierce sense of pride in their culture. They are highly intellectual and able to achieve their goals (financial or otherwise) through proper planning. Purchases made by them are skewed towards long term assets like real estate. New Delhi has been an epicenter of power and also attracted a mix of cultures from across India, with a larger influence from the neighbouring states of Punjab and Haryana. There is a great obsession with earning money, and perhaps an even greater one with flaunting it. Down south in Chennai, one sees a conservative society that has a deep sense of traditionalism as well as a bit of a colonial hangover. Higher education rates and rise of industries like IT here have attracted wealth to a great degree from abroad, and people here do invest in certain luxuries as well. But customs and traditions are strong influencers, visible with the amount of jewellery they buy; an integral part of traditional attire. When you look west in a city like Mumbai, there is a very strong influence of the British Raj as well as of the traders that frequented the city’s shores. The city works strongly on the ‘time is money’ mentality and is tremendously practical and pragmatic; a vivid barometer of which are the local trains, used by people of all economic classes.

Now take a look at how this reflects on purchases. The benchmark J.D. Power Asia Pacific 2011 India Escaped Shopper Study talks about how regional patterns affect purchases. Exterior designing and style dominates in the North, while the West looks for acquisition costs as well as total running costs. The South in comparison looks for utility, is extremely sensitive on price and even considers opinions of friends and family before taking a purchase decision. The Vizisense New Age Shopaholics survey analysed the trends of users on group buying sites and saw West and South leading over the North when it came to online shopping. An eBay India study showed that South Indians were the most active buyers at the site at 41% followed by West at 27%. North seems more skewed towards offline buying. Divisions in the zones also reflect in reading habits. The National Youth Readership survey 2010 reveals that the southern region leads with 24% youth readers, followed by the west and east with 22%, the north with 13%, central with 12% and north-east with 7% readers. Food patterns are a very obvious differentiator across regions. For instance, mustard and soya oil is preferred in the north, sunflower oil is used commonly in the west and cottonseed/groundnut oil is used in the south.

Besides, there is a definite distinction in terms of the kind of advertising. Milward Brown studied nearly a thousand advertisements across markets in India and concluded that only one in seven had a pan-Indian appeal. Leading advertising agency Ogilvy launched a unique initiative Ogilvy Dakshin, in recognition of the marked differences in which North and South India perceived advertising and the observation that brands who were simply doing language translations were only spending money on further disconnecting from customers. By using local actors, dialects, songs, et al, Ogilvy Dakshin campaigns have successfully delivered visible growth for brands like Coke, Thums Up, Asian Paints & Fortune Sunflower Oil. One campaign worth discussing is the Fortune Sunflower campaign, since the brand was totally out of consideration for Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The agency devised a series of campaigns showing south Indians confessing on their issues with eating restrictions and the advertisements talked about how having food cooked in Sunflower Oil was light and one could eat to his/her heart’s content. The campaign took Fortune Oil to number 2 in Tamil Nadu. The characters were so successful that the agency created a kind of serial (actually a series of ads with them). They also held roadshows that honoured women and gave them free snacks and had other entertainment activities. But the killer was the shuttle service they organised from one music sabha to another (Chennai has a plethora of these sabhas playing Carnatic music towards the end of the year). They distributed snacks cooked in Fortune oil in the buses, roped in caterers at these sabhas to use Fortune Oil and promoted all this through a media campaign. When you get that much into the local flavor, success can’t be far away.

MAKING CULTURE WORK

When it comes to success stories, there are in fact three broad categories that you can define – Indian companies successfully adopting regional positioning, regional Indian players becoming national/ global brands and MNCs leveraging regional diversity.

In the first category, one brand that comes to mind is The Times of India (TOI). Till a little over a decade back, the English daily market in India was broadly defined as TOI in Mumbai, Statesman in Kolkata, Hindustan Times in Delhi and Hindu in Chennai. It is said that changing newspapers is as difficult as changing your cup of tea/coffee. But within a few years, TOI raised the stakes with its invitation pricing strategy and became the leading English broadsheet of not just India, but also the world (readership of 7.47 million by June 2011 as per IRS). Its success mantra to a large extent was also customisation of content to suit local audiences. Rahul Kansal, CMO, Bennett, Coleman & Co., affirms, “Kolkata for example, is a group with a highly eclectic set of interests. So we have kept an eclecticmix of contents in our Calcutta Times. We may have, on the other hand, a far more Bollywood-oriented mix in some other markets like Delhi for instance; as I don’t think it is as wide (the readership orientation). Chennai is a city where even the English reader seems far more comfortable with his own traditions. The newspaper there reflects that.” Dabur is another instance, which successfully forayed into South India using local branding, marketing strategy and brand names. For instance, it renamed its ‘Dabur’s Lal Dant Manjan’ as ‘Dabur Sivappu Pal Podi’ (red toothpowder in Tamil) for the South Indian market. It launched Dabur Herbal Toothpaste in Kerala and Tamil Nadu due to their preference for Southern products and Dabur Shwaasamrit in Karnataka and Kerala as it provides relief from cough, cold and bronchitis that’s quite common in these regions. TV advertisements were also customised to provide a more rational appeal since that works more with South Indian audiences. Parle acquired Tops and the brand successfully took around 10% of the market in West Bengal & Assam in direct competition to a strong regional brand like Bisk Farm. It also took its Jhalmuri flavoured wafers national. Similarly, ITC launched Bingo Masala Chips for North India and then took the flavour across India. Local flavours in general do have a certain appeal across the nation. Apollo Tyres used the concept of diversity as well. Company Chairman O. S. Kanwar emphasised on this thus, “North Indian truck drivers tend to overload their trucks as compared to South Indian drivers. So we researched and developed different tyres for the two segments!”

When it comes to regional brands going national, the telecom sector is full of them. Bharti Airtel itself started from New Delhi and went into more circles across India and went global through a spate of acquisitions. The most recent case of a regional brand going national is Aircel. Till around four years back, it was limited to South India. With aggressive national intent, it launched simultaneously in eight new circles. Then it made a bid for 3G licences and did a national branding for itself by using Indian cricket team captain M. S. Dhoni. It has also brought customised offers for various regions. In Odisha, it launched the Rs.30p/min. call for STD from Aircel to any other operator and a balance transfer facility for its pre-paid subscribers in Odisha and unlimited free Aircel to Aircel calling in Bihar and Jharkhand for 30 days at a price of Rs.349/-. Its 3G services are now available across India barring 3 circles. The company, which had around 31 million subscribers by end-2009, crossed 50 million in January this year. Cavincare’s story is well known, which started from founder C. K. Ranganathan’s initiative of selling Chik shampoo satchets through bicycle vendors. He later took the brand to overseas markets like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Another instance is Amrapali Jewels, which started with one retail store in Jaipur. Rather than being conservative, they selected the most unique pieces of jewellery from across India and set up a luxury jewellery business, which has a presence across India and in UK, US, Sri Lanka, Spain & Nigeria (they designed the entire jewellery for the Hollywood flick Troy, which really launched them on the global stage). Waghbakri tea and MTR Foods are other instances of brands that leveraged their regional strengths to go national and global.

Some MNCs have also got equal to the task. Unilever’s India arm has understood it only too well after a number of setbacks from regional players like Wipro’s Santoor, Anchor Health & Beauty, Godrej’s No.1, Ghadi & Sasa. Now it wants to act like a regional player. An interesting instance is HUL’s launch of Brooke Bond Sehatmand tea, a tea they developed for the regional (more specifically rural) market with vitamins fused into each granule, positioning it as a health supplement. They further ensured that they customised tastes to regions, like catering to South Indian taste for strong flavours and dark colours. The Bharti-Wal-Mart venture, rather than go pan-India at the outset, decided to start with Amritsar in Punjab and then go further to North India with its cash & carry stores as it found the agri-rich state to be a lucrative starting point where it could start building a strong supply chain. Actually, the company strongly believes that supply chains have to be regional in India at least for now, since national supply chains aren’t so strong yet. Nestle’s Maggi has been a traditional success story of launching regional flavours from time to time and so has Lays from Pepsico.

There have been instances of failures or setbacks for major brands too, like HUL mentioned above. Wipro’s Santoor overtook Lux in south India while Godrej No.1 overtook Lux and Lifebuoy in the north in 2009. It’s amazing how Maruti, which is considered more apt for conservative and tradition loving customers, was not accepted too well in the South as it was perceived as a North Indian firm (south just accounted for around 20% of national sales till a few years back). Through innovative campaigns like the annual Dakshin Dare rally and launch of more economical diesel variants, the company claims to have improved its standing. Coca Cola faced a different kind of failure when it refused to acknowledge or appreciate local farmer concerns over water shortages in Plachimada, Kerala, and had to shut down its plant.

All in all, it’s time marketers understood the relevance of cultural diversity in India and bring it into this ‘4 nation’ framework. And like their environment keeps telling them everyday, they cannot rest at that, as they have to also then look at diversity within regions! Besides, the post-1991 generation, which accounts for over 50% of India, is confronting traditional values as well as getting exposed to modern, global ways of living. Not much research has been done on what kind of cultural orientations this youth market will display in the coming time and whether the diversity of previous generations will diminish or get stronger. Food for thought, isn’t it?

MOVE OVER CRICKET, HERE COME THE CARS

2011-11-18T11:03:00.002+05:30

We are a nation that lives and breathes cricket, yet many feel that they are now getting an overdose of it. The 15-20 year olds today do not identify so much with cricket. They want something different, something fast and something trendy. Formula One seems to be the answer.

CARS VS CRICKET FOR SPONSORS

Kingfisher went ballistic with the promotions of its beer at the Indian Grand Prix held in Noida last month. Airtel was the title sponsor of the event. It ended its sponsorship of the Champions League Twenty-20 cricket even before the three-year deal ended. For a nation that is obsessed with cricket and for a sport that dominates advertising in India, when a big sponsor like Airtel backs out, is it an indication that things are changing? Is cricket facing boredom? Is there oversaturation of cricket? Perhaps. Think about it, Neo Sports, the official broadcaster of the India-West Indies series gave a 40-60% discount for a 10 second ad spot; add to that the falling viewership rating of the sport and you have your answer. Today, advertisers are looking for big sports properties other than cricket. Agreed, cricket was and will remain a religion in India, but the youth wants something more, and F1 is the sport that’s fashionable to follow and appeals to the young and restless. In spite of initial scepticism, the inaugural Formula One race was a success. To the surprise of many, the 3-day event drew a crowd of 95,000 spectators on race day.

FORMULA FOR SUCCESS

When it comes to sports, India has never really left a lasting impression. Except for cricket, there is hardly any other sport where it stands out. When it comes to international sporting events, then most often we have been left red-faced. Take the Commonwealth Games for instance, which generated a lot of bad publicity for India, and showed us in shoddy light. In contrast, the inaugural F1 race was loved by all. Finally, an international event was executed flawlessly by India. With only private players and with no government support, the event did well.

It makes complete business sense to be a part of the Formula One event. It offers global reach to both sponsors and fans alike. F1 is a far more lucrative sport than cricket. It has a reach that is much wider than cricket. The Indian Grand Prix was telecasted to 550 million viewers in 200 countries. It provides a global platform to brands, which events like T20 cricket fail to do. Consider this, there is zero audience for cricket in major economies like France, Germany, Italy, Brazil and Russia. At the end of the day, it is imperative for any sport to reach out to more people and F1 has that mass appeal.

Today, growth in businesses is going to come from emerging market like Brazil, China etc, and cricket does not excite many of them. If a global sponsor has to reach them, he needs a sport like F1 with a more global appeal. Indian companies are going global too. Many of our home-grown brands are growing fast and becoming big players in the new emerging markets.

Bagging the ‘title’ sponsorship was definitely a big deal for Airtel. For a game like Formula One, where team title sponsorships are rarely available, this was a golden opportunity for Airtel. Being the title sponsor gives one the maximum branding presence. The advantages are huge. Petronas, the international oil and gas corporation, last year renewed its title sponsorship of the Malaysian round of the Formula One and will hold the rights till 2015. In fact, this year the championship will be known as the ‘Petronas Malaysia Grand Prix’ (just as the Indian one is known as the Airtel Grand Prix). Not only will the event give Petronas huge visibility and global appeal, but will position Malaysia as a major motorsport hub and tourist destination.

In fact, that is why it is so difficult to get the title sponsorship, and it is usually contracted for a minimum of five years. The big title sponsors of Formula One have been, Vodafone, Renault, Virgin, DHL, Etihad Airways and Red Bull.

Red Bull in fact is an interesting case study. The sports drink manufacturer has spent more than $600 million in the last five years on F1 sponsorships and has its logo emblazoned on two teams’ cars. It was worth the money and effort for last year Red Bull received more than four hours of ‘free’ television airtime during the first fifteen F1 races. No one even came close to that amount of coverage save LG (LG incidentally did not invest much in cricket in India this festive season in spite of being a key player in IPL 4). More than being seen, it’s also important to be seen in the right places and F1 is ‘the’ place to be seen at for everybody. No wonder the US company Gulf Oil, which believes in being at the right place at the right time, decided to make its presence felt at the Indian F1 too.

F1 is bigger in all terms. Be it the money involved, the viewership, or even the duration of the event , it beats all sports including cricket or football. Many sports events finish in a day. F1 is a three day event where the biggest of sponsors, the biggest of companies and the biggest of business leaders hobnob. It’s a sport of big monies. Delta 3 is a company that receives all its revenues from fees that TV stations pay to screen F1 as well as the fees paid by circuits and sponsors of the sport. Despite facing the worst recession in living memory, in 2009, Delta 3 saw its revenues grow 6.4% to a record of $1.1billion. Bernie Ecclestone the founder of F1 and the CEO of Delta 3’s ultimate owner Delta Topco sure knows what will work and he definitely has a winner in his hands.

F1 NEEDS ASIA

However, with Europe reaching its saturation, with France backing out from the GP, Bernie needs a new and thriving market. Add to this the fact that UK has abolished tobacco advertising, along with the European Union , that has banned tobacco companies from sponsoring or advertising within sporting events, leaving Marlboro (from the Philip Morris International group), one of the biggest sponsors of F1, looking for new places to advertise. In fact, Marlboro had to remove its logo from the F1 Ferrari cars due to this ban. However, so high is the advantage of being associated with this sport that neither Ferrari nor Marlboro want to end their association. So they have found a new way to get out of this tricky situation. The Ferrari cars now do not (or rather cannot) carry the Marlboro logo but they now carry a ‘bar code’ design which is exactly like the bottom of the Marlboro cigarette pack! The team, after all, has a contract with Marlboro till 2011 worth a total of $1 billion and the team’s official name even now is “Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro”. Seems like a tough association to break.

Though F1 was primarily a European sport, the last decade has seen a shift ,with half the races being held in Asia (Korea, Japan, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, India, Singapore and China) as many of the Asian countries are moving from the developing to developed nation status.

For the F1 organizers too, it makes business sense. India is a big market andits middle class is finally getting introduced to global brands. India is on the fast lane today, with its trillion-plus-dollar economy, it is Asia’s largest after Japan and China.

If F1 has helped improve India’s image on the international stage (after the debacle of the CWG), then on the flip-side India is a market with a vast potential that cannot be ignored by F1. According to a survey conducted by TAM Sports, the Indian Grand Prix garnered six times more average TRPs (television rating points) than any other Grand Prix ever held. Bookmyshow.com in three hours sold tickets worth Rs.1.5 crores.

The sponsors for long have been investing in cricket and there seems to be a fatigue creeping in. With such excitement around F1 among the Indian audience, sponsors have suddenly found new avenues to advertise in and diversify their portfolio. Not surprisingly, Amul decided to sponsor the Swiss F1 team Sauber. The sponsors are slowly warming up to the idea as is visible from the number of local brands that have associated with the sport. Red Bull and Tag Heuer have been old loyalists of the sport, but now we have Reebok, Gitanjali, Lifestyle, JK Tyre and many others joining in.

The sport is here to stay and slowly but surely it will develop a strong foothold in this market too, and give cricket a run for its money.

Be it the viewers, or the sponsors or the organizers, suddenly everybody is talking about and is excited about a new player in town. Move over cricket, the cars are here!

TO SELL YOUR PRODUCT, GO TO THE MOVIES!

2011-10-07T10:19:00.000+05:30

Last month, a beautiful film named Dolphin Tale hit the theatres. Based on a true story, it’s a ‘tale’ about a dolphin without a ‘tail’. It’s the story about a young boy’s efforts to convince scientists to create a prosthetic tail for this dolphin named Winter , whose tail had got amputated. In doing so, he not just changes the life of the dolphin but also of the people around him. It’s a story of grit and determination. It made the audiences cry and the producers fly high – in North America, the movie grossed $14 million from Friday to Sunday. It opened at #3 but rose to the #1 spot in the second week, something not very common.

A GOOD STORY HAS THE POWER TO CHANGE ALL BOX OFFICE RULES!

Not just is Warner Bros very happy with the performance of the film, but so is ‘Clearwater Marine Aquarium’. This is the water-park in Florida where the movie was filmed, and Clearwater cannot thank its stars enough. Even before the movie opened, visitors to the water park increased tremendously. The impact of the movie has been so great that the aquarium is now spending $12 million in expansion including a new “Dolphin Tale” exhibit. The aquarium now also has a new website and calls itself “The home of Winter”.

The dolphin’s tale of survival has worked wonders for a lot of people and a lot of brands too, apart from the Clearwater aquarium.

It shows the little boy doing all his searches, not on Google but on Gigablast which calls itself the ‘leading clean-energy search engine’ as it uses wind energy to provide 90% of the power required to run its servers. The movie also features Dell laptops and a whole lot of other brands. Both marketers and viewers are more than familiar with this form of marketing. The trick is to do it intelligently so that it creates an impact and does not look tacky. There is hardly any big film released today without brands being an integral part of them. This medium is after all the most powerful of all and can do wonders for a brand.

THE POWER OF FILMS

Some products that have benefitted the most out of in-film branding have not just been ‘products’ but rather countries. Just as Clearwater Aquarium has benefitted from the movie Dolphin Tale, so have a whole lot of other places. After Lost in Translation was released, everyone wanted to go to Tokyo. Almost all of Yash Chopra’s films have worked as powerful advertisements for Switzerland. Hrithik’s debut film Kaho Na Pyar Hai was responsible for doubling the Indian tourism to New Zealand. The latest to hit the Indian box office, Zindagi Na Milege Dobara, will do wonders for Spain.

If there is one city that has been featured innumerable times in films , then it is New York. Every year, hundreds of films feature New York and the city understands the impact this has on its tourism. So the Mayor’s Office in New York offers free filming permits, police assistance and even gives you location advice if you want to shoot a film there. After all, product placement of the city will help both the parties – for if a film is able to capture the essence of a city on camera, then it becomes the most powerful promotional tool for the city.

James Bond films have been most famous for in-film branding. When the Aston Martin was featured in the Bond film Goldfinger, it was such a big hit that the company put it on its brochure. Product placement specialist Karen Sortito ensured that BMW’s new model Z3 shone as bright as James Bond in the film Golden Eye. In fact, the in film placement was so successful that not just did the sales of the BMW, Z4 skyrocket after the movie’s release, but Karen found a long line of brands waiting at her doorstep to help them get visibility. For the next Bond film, Tomorrow Never Dies, she could well rope in $100 million worth of tie-ups with brands like Omega, L’Oreal, Avis etc.

Your product might be good but it needs the right ‘image’ to stand out in the marketplace. It has to have a distinct personality which its buyers can associate with. In film branding helps it do just that.

If there is one company that understands the power of in-film branding, it’s Apple. Think of any hit movie and chances are you will find an Apple product. Be it blockbusters like Ironman, The Social Network, Tron, The Twilight Saga, 17 Again, Transformers, Cars 2 , Green Lantern, or Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Apple has been the constant star.

When it comes to product placement dominance, this brand leads. For more than three years in a row, Apple has been the most visible brand in films. This year, it featured in 13 films. The next visible brand is Chevrolet that featured in 9 movies. In 2009, it topped the charts by featuring in 19 movies; then, again in 2010, it ranked one, for it was seen in 10 films. The next in line on visibility in movies is Nike. It appeared in 8 films. There is no formula yet to calculate ROI but it’s clear that it pays to be in the limelight! The wine company ‘Clos Du Val’ ensured that it made an appearance in 100 films by simply sending the directors of the movies free cases of its wine. The winery reported an increase of 50 percent in its sales after this!

THE IMAGE GAME

Movies do influence our buying decisions. As Andy Warhol put it beautifully years ago, “It’s the movies that have really been running things in America ever since they were invented. They show you what to do, how to do it, when to do it, how to feel about it, and how to look how you feel about it.”

Once a brand is featured in a movie, it changes its image totally. The brand develops a personality of its own based on which star uses it in the movie, where it’s used and how it’s used. Think about it – if Pepsi succeeds in convincing Spiderman to drink Pepsi in the movie, I am sure it would defeat Coke, for every child would want it, to become like Spiderman. It’s all about personality. Be it politics or business, the one with the ‘coolest’ personality always outshines others. Movies develop an aura around a brand and give it a unique personality which helps it differentiate itself from competitors and win market share. Years ago, Morgan Spurlock made a documentary on McDonald’s, titled Supersize Me. In this docu, Morgan ate only at Mc-Donald’s for a month and showed how he gained weight and developed a whole lot of health problems, proving how dangerous fast food is. The film got everyone thinking, including McDonald’s which now has introduced healthier options in its menu. That’s the power of a strong image and nothing can get stronger than the images one sees on that huge screen in the movie hall. It creates the strongest of impressions. To prove how strong ‘images’ are, Spurlock made a documentary again which got everyone talking, yet again. The documentary was titled “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold” He shows the effect of product placement and advertorial tie-ups at the movies. In fact, the title of his film itself proves how strong an impact a movie can create. The full name of his documentary is “POM Wonderful Presents the Greatest Movie Ever Sold” and the pomegranate juice manufacturer Pom Wonderful paid him $1 million for the title. Morgan made his point even before one saw the first scene of the film. He says after seeing his documentary the public would change their whole perceptions about the movies.

Yes, the key word is perception. That’s exactly what movies build and once your brand is featured in a blockbuster, it will change the way the audience looks at your brand.

So if you really want your brand to become a star, you need to head for the movies, for that’s the place where stars are made.

HEAL THE WORLD, MAKE IT A BETTER PLACE!

2011-09-23T09:48:00.000+05:30

Early this month, Nike did something a lot of movie fans and shoe collectors were waiting for. It created the exact replica of the shoes worn by Michael J. Fox in the popular 1989 flick ‘Back to the Future’. He wore the shoes when he travelled to 2015 in the movie. 1500 shoes were put on e-bay for auction – they were sold out faster than one could imagine; the campaign has been evidently massively successful. This sneaker is getting Nike extra attention not just because of the ‘limited edition’ of the shoes but also because all the proceeds will be donated to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s disease research. To top it all, Sergey Brin has pledged to match the donations made to the foundation up to the next year (to a maximum of $50 million). The shoes have been auctioned for anywhere between $3,500 to $10,000 with the British rapper Tinie Tempah even paying $37,500 for his pair! The purchase of the year did help Tinie jump into the spotlight, but this has kept Nike in the news too and for some good reasons.

Brands need to be in the news for the right things. When a brand associates itself with the right cause, it gets noticed and spoken about, and that’s where it has a chance to overtake its competitors. Hugo Boss released a campaign this month for its perfume Boss Orange. However it was not the regular ‘glamour shoot’ that most perfume advertisements are about; instead, it talked of development of schools in Madagascar. Boss Orange has donated $300,000 to the ‘Schools of Africa’ initiative and through this campaign, it hopes to help at least 60,000 pre-school children in Africa. It used celebrities Sienna Miller and Orlando Bloom to propagate the idea that ‘every child has the right to an education’ – and Boss, along with UNICEF, would help do this “Today. To Help. Together”. When Bloom was chosen as the perfume’s brand ambassador in 2010, he said he identified with Boss Orange immediately because “it had a laid back spontaneous quality,” much like he had. So while Boss and Orlando were working on giving the brand a distinct identity, associating it with a cause made it stand out.

When a brand associates itself with a cause, it changes the total image and reputation of the company. Research has proved that firms that are socially responsible are considered by consumers to have a good reputation. In a study done by British Telecom in 2002, as much as 25% of a company’s reputation was dependant on its commitment to society.

She was called the ‘Mother Teresa’ of the business world, because she believed in not just doing business, but doing it with some heart too. Anita Roddick never forgot the African women who shared their skin care secrets with her, which she used to make her creams and lotions for her cosmetics brand ‘Body Shop’. The key to Body Shop’s success was not just its interesting products but the numerous social causes the brand stood for. It played an active role in Save the Whales campaign in 1985; again in 1989, it stood behind the cause of saving the Brazilian forests; and again in 1990, it energetically supported the petition against testing of animals. These were some of the numerous causes that Anita Roddick and Body Shop fought for and her customers (the young women) just loved her for it. This dynamic woman breathed her last four years ago in September 2007, but she showed the world how business does not just mean a crazy obsession with profits, but also a crazy obsession with the society. Body Shop gave crazily and the more it gave, the bigger it grew – and Anita Roddick soon became the fourth richest woman in Britain in 1990. CSR is a powerful tool and cannot be ignored. With the youth of today having a greater and louder voice in purchase decisions, companies that look after the society find increased customer loyalty as they increase their commitment towards the society. Customer loyalty is the one factor all brands would give their right arm for, and socially responsible organizations get it, since the customers respect them, and the word-of-mouth around these companies is so good that customers perceive their products to be more reliable and of better quality. As a result, they are ready to pay a higher price for these products and feel good about it.

When Bono, the legendary singer of the rock band U2, launched his brand ‘Product Red’, he got himself some real heavyweight partners. From American Express, Gap, Nike, to Armani, everyone announced their range of RED products, the sales of which would go to Bono’s Product Red to help fight AIDS in Africa. These brands and their products instantly got a lot of buzz and shot to fame and Bono raised $140 million.

Marks and Spencer has found a cause that is close to our hearts... useless hangers! According to a survey, some 100 million hangers are thrown away and they take as much as 100 years to degrade. So in July this year, Marks & Spencer tied up with UNICEF to launch a new campaign, which urged customers not to take the hangers home when they bought clothes from the store – and for every such purchase, the company would donate 50p to UNICEF to help it transform the lives of some of the poorest children in the world. All people had to do was make a simple choice and it made them feel good about it. Isn’t branding all about making the customer feel good? When you undertake socially responsible work, you not just make the customer feel good but you also do good to the world.

From Oprah to Lady Gaga, everyone knows what a strong impact these activities have on their fans. When Japan was hit by the earthquake this year, Lady Gaga was the first to quickly offer the ‘We pray for Japan’ wristband and encouraged her fans the ‘little monsters’ to buy the band to help the country. In just two days the bracelets made gross sales above $250,000. It was Nike that started this craze for bracelets in 2004 when it teamed up with Lance Armstrong and came up with this idea to raise funds for cancer. No one in their wildest of imaginations thought this would become a fashion item as youngsters proudly wore their cause on their wrists! Till date, more than 70 million of these bracelets have been sold and millions of dollars raised.

Last year, Oprah took up the cause of distracted driving, an issue that has led to many accidents. Oprah asked her fans to fill up a “No phone pledge” form, where they would pledge to not text or call while driving.

What’s business without a little giving! And one such self-made businessman is Renzo Rosso, the founder of Diesel clothing company. His foundation ‘Only the Brave’ pledges to change villages in Africa and remove extreme poverty. He believes brands can be used to do a lot more than just being fashion labels. Business is not just about earning but also about giving.

SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE ADVERTISING

Business is marketing and marketing is a lot about advertising. Not just our business vision, but our advertising also should be responsible. After all, it pays to be responsible. Last month, Nivea For Men launched an advertisement for its cream, which showed a short haired, black model tossing the head of a black man with an Afro-American hair and beard. That head represented his ‘before- Nivea self’. The ad ended with the caption, “Look Like You Give A Damn…. Re-Civilize Yourself”. The ad did not go down well with the viewers as it alluded that Afro-Americans were not civilized, and people decided to not buy Nivea if it believed in such racist stuff. Nivea realized its irresponsible behaviour and quickly posted an apology on its Facebook page and withdrew the advertisement.

Advertising is a potent tool and needs to be used very carefully. Cadbury too tread on the danger line when the ad for its ‘Bliss’ range of dark chocolates ran into slight trouble this year. The chocolate bars were promoted with a strapline, “Move over Naomi, there is a new diva in town”. The black model Naomi Campbell did not take it too well and said she found it insulting, hurtful and racist. The ads were pulled out and Cadbury had to apologize to Naomi.

A little bit of sensitivity goes a long way in building a strong brand reputation. With competition increasing and with the consumer confused about product quality, these are the cues on the basis of which a consumer builds a perception about your product. Marketers should be careful about their image.

SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE EMPLOYEES

It’s been proved that employees who work in ethically and socially responsible organizations are more committed to it. The young are choosing organizations that show a commitment towards society and are ethical. Finally, employees are your first customers, and it makes business sense to keep them happy. They have the strongest influence on ‘word of mouth’ about your brand and your business.

Be good, be responsible. That is what will help you sustain in this highly competitive world. Let’s make a commitment to not just make profits but in our own way heal the world, make it a better place.

CRAZY AND LOVING IT

2011-09-09T11:03:00.000+05:30

Early this month, the UK Daily Telegraph ran a strange story that went like this: “Domino’s Pizza has announced plans to conquer the final frontier by opening the first pizza restaurant on the moon”. As expected, the story became the most read story in the newspaper and got people talking. Some even smiled and wondered if its “free if not delivered in 30 minutes” rule would be applicable for this branch! Domino’s is known for its wacky marketing and this one got everybody talking. You need to get noticed if you want to stay on top of the consumer’s mind. There is too much of clutter and only the ones who dare to be different stand out and lead.

A few years back (1993), D.C. Comics released a comic book The Death of Superman. A character that had been a part of our lives for decades (Superman was born in 1938) would suddenly be no more – this created a ripple and the media covered it almost as seriously as if a head of state had passed away. As expected, the comic book sold out on the first day itself. Numerous other issues were released after this and eventually the company came out with another iconic issue, which was titled Return of the Superman. Just when D.C. Comics found the interest of the customers falling, it decided to get the excitement back into the brand by announcing the death of its most popular character! It worked.

BEAT BOREDOM TO BEAT COMPETITORS

You need to keep the excitement levels up to retain interest. Be it business or be it personal relationships; if things get stagnant, the relationship starts to falter. You may have a popular product, you may have the best quality product too, but if it gets boring, it is doomed.

Beating boredom was a challenge that these brands had to overcome. One was Ariel. A detergent is not a very interesting product category but Ariel did some interesting stuff, which got people talking about washing. At the Stockholm railway station, it set up a glass box which had clothes revolving on a stand. In front was a robot which squirted out chocolate, ketchup, jam etc. The game was, if you managed to aim well and stain a cloth, it would be washed then and there with Ariel and given to you for free (of course, stain free). The best part was that you could play this game on Facebook too! Washing suddenly became fun and got people talking about it.

So when the movie Green Lantern was about to be launched in Brazil last month, the moviemakers thought of an interesting idea. They put green LED lights on bicycle tyres and when the wheels started spinning, the lights made the logo of Green Lantern on the wheel, along with the release date of the movie. It caught the attention of the young viewers who found it cool, apart from making the cycles more visible to car drivers… which was an added bonus!

Apart from giving a good product, give people something to talk about, give them a good story and it will sell your product more. Marketing is not a one-time activity; rather, it’s a continuous process and many a time, doing something out of the ordinary just works like magic. Amazon.com has launched a new feature on Kindle (its e-reader). While reading a book, you can also send tweets to the author of the book and ask him questions. His answers will come in your e-mail. It just makes reading a bit more interactive and fun!

After all, you need to break the monotony and do different and interesting things to remain relevant. Throughout history, great entrepreneurs have not just worked on making a good product, but also on finding interesting and engaging ways to inform the public about them. Many of these stunts today have become historical events. When newspaper publisher Henri Desgrange started a bicycle race to promote his newspaper, he never in his wildest imagination thought that it would be the world’s most awaited bicycle race. Tour de France, started more than 100 years ago, today promotes a whole lot of brands and is one of the most loved events. Similarly, when Atlantic City wanted to attract tourists to its city, it thought of a novel idea of starting the Miss America Pageant in 1921. The event has snowballed into a big show watched by millions even today. Pillsbury launched its Pillsbury Bake-Off as a one time event never knowing that the idea would be such a hit that this would become its annual event. Even today, the event has not lost its popularity.

Many of these ideas are simple and not really expensive, but they work – much like some low-budget movies that work in spite of being made in a simple manner. This one gave Hollywood its famous star apart from five sequels. The movie in question is Rocky, inspired by Chuck Wepner’s fight against Ali, made on a small budget of $1000,000 the movie broke all expectations and records as it became a super hit and grossed $225,000,000!

SOUNDS CRAZY? IT WORKS!

In the 1990s, National Mutual (now a part of AXA Group) became very successful selling life insurance policies via mail. The company was doing very well and then one crazy young guy thought of offering a torch or a travel clock as an incentive. Everyone thought it was ridiculous; after all, people were taking a very important investment decision and these petty incentives would not change anything much. Nevertheless, the company went ahead with it. This crazy idea brought about a 37 percent increase in response rates!

If women can have a ‘walk-in’ closet in their homes, then why can’t boys have a ‘walk-in fridge’? Heineken Beer worked on this crazy idea and in 2009 released an online video where, in one part of the house, the girls jumped and shrieked at the sight of the hostess’ new walk-in closet, the guys in the other room freaked out at the sight of the ‘walk-in fridge’ lined with chilled Heineken! The crazy idea gave people something fresh and different to talk about and made it stand out vis-à-vis its competitors.

To promote dental hygiene, Colgate decided to make the sticks inside an ice cream bar in the shape of a tooth brush. As the child finished the ice cream, he saw the toothbrush shaped stick with a reminder, “Don’t forget”! Mothers loved it and the company got a huge PR boost.

They may sound crazy but some wacky ideas just hit the imagination of the customers – and they love it, making your brand the most talked about and remembered.

In today’s world, when it’s nearly impossible to decide rationally which product to buy solely on the basis of its attributes, it becomes absolutely necessary to ensure that your product is marketed differently and retains its freshness, is talked about and remembered.

CRAZY BUT DISASTROUS

Paramount Pictures came out with a novel way of promoting their movie Mission Impossible. They teamed up with the newspaper Los Angeles Times and selected some 4,500 newspaper boxes. Every time the customer opened his box, the theme song of the movie would start playing. The problem was that the device which played the music looked like an explosive with red wires sticking out. It terrified the unwitting customers. Some got scared and called the bomb squads, while one actually blew up a news rack and caused quite a ruckus before people realized what it was all about!

Every book that Oprah Winfrey used to talk about on her talk show became a bestseller. So Pontiac decided to use her popularity to market its cars. It teamed up with Oprah and one day all the audiences on her show got a free Pontiac. It did create a lot of buzz as everybody talked about Oprah’s generosity of giving a car to her audience; but not many remembered the brand; add to that the anger of the people who received the free gift when they were asked to pay a huge tax for it. The idea crashed. Some crazy ideas may actually be crazy. Implement them with caution.

THINK DIFFERENT

It pays to think different. As Bob Thacker of the company OfficeMax says, “Don’t make ads. Make news.” This philosophy has ensured that he spends much lesser in advertising as compared to his competitors but always catches everybody’s attention, in spite of his business being most boring. An office supply store may not be interesting but its marketing can be. During Christmas, it created a website that allowed customers to turn themselves into elves. “Elf yourself” became a hit with people sending their animated ‘elf’ avatars to their family and friends. It got 17 million unique visitors in the first year (2007) and the idea still works!

Quoting from the very famous ad of Apple, which marked the return of Steve Jobs, “Here’s to the crazy ones. The rebels. The troublemakers. The ones who see things differently. While some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people, who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

So go ahead and let go, fear not to do the crazy stuff, your crazy idea could change the world!

Do not worry if you are different. Say it with pride, “I am crazy and I love it”.

THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE INDIA

2011-08-26T11:51:00.002+05:30

We all love ‘Anna’! He seems to have united India and its youth. But is India really one, especially when it comes to business? This is one country where all the laws of marketing will fail, because it’s so diverse. If you have just one theory, then it will not take you anywhere. India changes every 200 km. Yes, a few basics remain the same across India, but a lot changes too. For starters, language changes (we have 192 official languages and dialects), culture changes, traditions and festivals change, food habits change. If this is not enough, think about it – even the geography and political views change. Yes, it is vast, but it is not an easy market. Only the hardy marketers will be able to survive and thrive here.

THOSE WHO MISUNDERSTOOD INDIA

A lot of multinationals have come into India but failed – not because their products were not good, but because they failed to understand India’s culture. Globalisation has been the new trend, but ‘standardisation’ will not work always. As a marketer, you need to be sensitive to each culture’s identities and its unique regional preferences and customise your product offerings.

Our local markets are not barren as many multinationals thought. There are very strong players in almost every local market. Take the case of Kellogg’s. Apart from the taste not really matching the Indian palette (we like to put warm milk with sugar in our cereals, unlike the west that has it with cold milk), it under estimated the presence of local competitors like Mohun cornflakes (priced lesser than Kellogg’s) and Champion (whose price is almost half as that of Kellogg’s). Retail chains may never be able to understand the bonhomie that people share with their local kirana shops or the Mom & Pop stores as they are popularly called in the West. They share a bond and enjoy a mutual level of trust (giving things even on credit to their favorite customers) that big retail chains will never be able to enjoy. CavinKare challenged the multinationals in various segments. Earlier, it was Clinic shampoo and Fair & Lovely fairness cream (both from HUL) that were touted as the only good options. But homegrown brands like CavinKare are giving them a tough fight. CavinKare used sachets to sell its shampoos. It understood that the consumer was not willing to buy a whole bottle. But a small sachet was a luxury she could indulge in. [Today, 40% of the shampoo market consists of sachet buyers.] It used India’s weakness for ayurvedic products and ensured that its fairness cream Fairever – with saffron and milk – promised not just fairness but also good skin, and quickly cornered a significant chunk of the market share from the giant HUL and its brand Fair & Lovely. So strong has been this positioning that it made Fair & Lovely change its positioning from “badle aap, badle zindagi” to “gorepan se kahi zyaada, saaf gorapan”, meaning “not just fairness but a clear skin too”. CavinKare understood the Indian consumer and her changing needs, and this homegrown brand has become a formidable competitor today.

Going the ayurveda way, Emami too has managed to keep the biggies out of the way with unique Indian brands like Boroplus, Navratan oil and Fair & Handsome cream, that command a significant market share today. Marico’s Parachute oil is way ahead of HUL’s Nihaar. Agreed. Products like hair oil are distinctly Indian and MNCs may not have an edge here, but even when it comes to products like toothpaste and hair color, our Indian brands are doing a pretty good job! Dabur toothpaste is giving Colgate and HUL a tough fight. In the hair color sector, Godrej still has the largest market share (more than 30%),with L’Oreal coming a distant second (a market share of 19%).

Just because a brand has a foreign tag is no guarantee that it will be perceived as superior. It needs to match the local sensibilities too. KFC entered India with its American menu of chicken wings and wraps in Bangalore. The Indian consumer did not identify with it and it had to pack its bags and leave. In 2004 when it did come back it had a vegetarian menu, rice meals and Indianised chicken recipes. It survived.

Tupperware designed a beautiful ergonomically sound, rectangle spice box for the Indian housewife. It bombed. She was used to a round one for years and however good the rectangle box it did not work for her.

Marketers with a keen sense of observation have succeeded here. Maybe not many people can afford an Omega or a Rolex, but people love to own a good watch, and no one grabbed this opportunity better than Titan. It realised that the only watches available in India for the low-end were poor in quality and lacked after-sales services or even warranties. Today, Titan dominates the watch market and offers very good quality watches with warranties and service networks for not just the consumers at the low-end but also, pure gold watches for the ones with deeper pockets. This local hero is a big, dominant player.

These local champions have overcome all obstacles and have made their own roads. If Indian roads were not good, then Tata Motors came up with cars and trucks that had a strong and rigid suspension system. Not state of the art, but its vehicles had easy maintenance. Poor infrastructure could not deter Amul from going ahead and conquering the market. If farmers could not reach out to the company, then the company decided to go to them. Amul is an amalgamation of more than 13,000 cooperatives. It installed Automatic Milk Collection Systems in the villages, where farmers went and deposited their milk. It was immediately measured for volume and fat content and the farmer was paid instantly. It worked well for both the parties, and till date, Amul rules the Indian markets. Open your refrigerator and you will find the Amul butter packet there too!

The reason some Indian brands have become so strong is that they have understood this country and its problems well, and have found innovative ways to work around them. ITC (which began operations as an MNC in India in 1910, but whose ownership has progressively Indianised over the years) – has been in India for close to 100 years now and has understood its problems like no one else has. It realised that farmers had no access to markets or any information about markets. So it installed a PC in the house of the largest farmer in the village, providing him and the rest of the village, a window to the world. This not just improved the knowledge and awareness of the farmers, but made them fall in love with ITC. Any competitor would find it tough to break this bond. It also ensured that ITC got a steady supply of good quality soybean for its processing plant.

It takes just one strong homegrown brand to shut out a huge multinational. Only those have got it right can do so.

THOSE WHO UNDERSTOOD INDIA

While many MNCs faltered because some assumed the Indian market was behind their home market, or thought it was not yet ready for superior products, other failures thought that the “foreign” tag would be enough to attract the consumers. Thus they became myopic and failed to adapt or innovate. Such brands failed or were forced to leave the Indian market, even as so many local brands filled the void. However, there have been a whole lot of MNCs who have kept their eyes open and survived. They realised that the product could be made in any part of the world but it was important that the product be “Made FOR India” for it to succeed in this market.

McDonalds knows that food is the most culturally sensitive product, and everywhere it has gone, it has ensured that its menu is customised to suit Indian tastes. Pizza Hut has a full-vegetarian restaurant in places like Gujarat et al, where the population is mostly Jains. Nowhere in the world will you find another only vegetarian Pizza Hut. LG believes not just in localisation but micro-localisation. Its microwaves have an idli mould for the south- Indian market, and a plate for heating kulchas for the north. It sells bright colored refrigerators in Punjab, for it does not get stained easily with the strong spicy and oily cooking of that region. Samsung’s phones now have an Indian calendar too. Perfetti Van Melle knew its old distribution system was weak, so it created its own network of 5000 distributors, did not give up on the rural market and today, is way ahead of competitors. Hyundai saw that most foreign car manufacturers were selling their old models in India. It entered with new models. It even customised the Santro to suit Indian roads. It used its technical expertise, which the local manufacturers did not have and today, it holds the number 2 spot in the automarket – just behind Maruti, which has been in this market for 25 years.

THOSE WHO WILL BE THE NEW MNCS

As these homegrown brands learnt the hard way to survive in developing markets like India, they found a whole new set of business opportunities opening up for them in other developing markets. These markets had similar problems and opportunities. So Tata Motors found that its vehicles were in demand in many African countries where the infrastructure was not good either. ICICI Bank and many others too saw an opportunity to do business in the emerging markets of Sri Lanka, Africa, China, Bangladesh, Indonesia et al. They have mastered the art of functioning and adapting in difficult markets, and are thriving like never before in these places. These new emerging markets are the future of business, and with markets of the developed world shrinking, it is only those companies who can do business in these very markets that will survive and thrive. The MNCs of the developed world are suddenly realising that the companies they once brushed aside as small homegrown brands, have become the new and powerful multi -national giants of the emerging markets.

India is diverse and difficult. But it has proven to be an apt training ground for its homegrown brands, to prepare themselves for the future. Those who have succeeded and survived here, will be able to survive anywhere, after all there is no place in the world like India!

LOVE ME OR HATE ME, BUT YOU CAN’T IGNORE ME

2011-08-12T11:00:00.005+05:30

This is a brand that has made the world sit up and take notice, for not only is it worth millions, but it also teaches us important lessons in Brand Building. The day she changed her name from Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta and rebranded herself as Lady Gaga, a star was born, both for the music world and the business world. Single handedly, this ‘Lady’ has shown the world how to build a brand and how to do business in today’s crowded market place.

A BUSINESS MODEL OF THE FUTURE

Lady Gaga is not just a singer, she is the way of doing business in the future. If you want to ensure that your brand will survive in 2025, it’s time to learn some quick lessons from the Lady. She understands the system the best.

The business model of the future has some new rules now. However, some ground rules never change. For starters, your product has to be good. Everything depends on this. Like all good brands, she first ensured that her product is good. Yes, her music is good and she can sing. She works hard on her lyrics, writes them, conceptualizes the music, the video and the costumes. Working on her piano, she ensures that her “core product” i.e. her music is of great quality. We all know one simple fact; no amount of brand building will do you good if your product is not world class. Secondly, you need to understand your audience very well. You need to keep a finger on the pulse of the audience. No one has been able to understand the market the way she does.

She knows what excites them and what intrigues them. Many may find her costumes outlandish, but they work for her and her fans wait for her next appearance, just to see what it is that she would wear next. Whatever she does, she has them eating out of her hands. The third lesson one learns from this entertainer is the benefit of staying “in-the-news” all the time. This is not an option, but it’s a necessity of today.

In today’s market place, if you are ignored, you are doomed. That is one thing this Lady has mastered. She cannot be ignored. Every appearance of hers is well thought of and crafted. Be it a bird’s nest, a model of the solar system on her head, or be it her meat dress, she never fails to grab attention. In fact, she will go to any extent to grab attention. In one of her interviews, she recalled an incident where, during her early days of struggle, she was playing at a bar (in USA) filled with drunken NYU students and no one paid a hoot to what she was playing. She says, “I started playing in underwear at the piano,” and suddenly everyone was looking at her and listening to her song.

Just creating a buzz is not enough; you need to know the right places to create the buzz. The audience of the future will be spending a lot of time in cyberspace. Whenever Lady Gaga makes an appearance, she does it with one intention – to create the maximum buzz there. With over 145 million blogs in cyberspace, more than 50,000 new blogs being created everyday and over one million new blog posts being posted each day, the internet is a very crowded place today. To get noticed, to be written about by maximum people, requires a very sharp marketing mind. Gaga has her moves scripted so well, for she knows exactly how to get talked about. Just a great product will not get you noticed. You need to get the tongues wagging. Gaga cares not whether or not you like her, all she cares aboutis the degree of buzz that every act of hers will generate. While she works on her music, she meticulously works on how to make clips that would be lapped up by YouTube, how to dress and what to speak, so that the twitter world will start chattering! Brands too have to ensure that if they want to survive, they must have a strong presence in the cyber world, for the audience of the future is going to be here.

Her every act is a practiced, well prepared and well targeted marketing gimmick, to help build the Lady Gaga Brand. She obsesses about every little detail and it pays. Businesses of tomorrow have to remember, that if their products are not being talked about, they would disappear soon, however good their quality.

CHANGE YOURSELF AND YOUR CUSTOMERS

To be constantly talked about, you need to keep doing new and different things. Your brand needs to keep innovating all the time to grab that “top-of-the-mind” awareness in the consumer’s mind. Be it Madonna, or Kishore Kumar, or Lady Gaga or Big B. They all kept experimenting, kept changing, kept reinventing themselves and dared to do things others would not. They survived. Probably a lot more talented artists didn’t.

There is no perfect recipe for success. In today’s market place, brands need to move quickly. They need to know what’s cool, what’s new, and change themselves accordingly. At Cannes 2011, in June, Publicis & Contagious introduced a new concept called the “Five Percent Club”. They urged brands to take risks and invest 5 percent of their media spends into something different, something creative, outrageous and not just depend on the mundane, 30 second advertising commercial to build their brands. Heineken found a new way of engaging viewers during a football game. No, they did not just advertise, but introduced an interesting iPhone application, which rewarded viewers with points (that they could redeem later) every time they guessed the winner correctly before the game ended.

To survive, one needs to change their way of thinking. The companies of tomorrow will only be those who are willing to scrap conventional ideas, who are willing to try out new stuff and most importantly, who are willing to fail – just like Gaga who has never been spotted in an ordinary pair of jeans ever. She is always dressed to suit her image, for every second she is doing some different stuff – with just one purpose – to be noticed. Your marketing plan too should be such that every penny spent is for the purpose of making your brandstand distinctly apart from the competitor. Get noticed, you will get customers.

Until now, it was the job of the advertisers and marketers to change the audience. Before 1948, diamond rings were not synonymous with engagement or marriage the world over. Then came a campaign, “A Diamond is Forever,” and changed our thinking forever. Even in India, marriages used to be traditionally associated with gold jewellery, but De Beers, with its intelligent advertising changed that too. By linking the eternity of a diamond (it’s the hardest substance on Earth) to the eternity of a bond, it changed cultures. While everybody in America was manufacturing, marketing and selling long, sleek cars, the VW Beetle changed the people’s perceptions with the help of its “Think Small” ad campaign. Santa Clause used to be depicted as a skinny, stern, and scary figure, until Coca Cola created the chubby, cute and cherry Santa, and changed the perceptions of the world. All sports shoes were more or less similar until Nike changed it all. It is impossible to differentiate vodka on the basis of mere taste, but Absolute differentiated its product on the basis of its unique advertising and created a niche market where none existed. Marketers have changed audiences and their perceptions, but this new generation of customers is different & marketers need to change their ways to adapt to this audience.

Times are changing fast and so are the rules of marketing. Today, you need to stand out, shout out, and look out (for new trends) or else be prepared to be shut out (forgotten) by the consumers. The biggest fear for a brand is if it fails to get attention. Lady Gaga and other shrewd marketers know only one success principle, “Love me or hate me, but you can’t ignore me.”

MAINE KAROO TO CHARACTER DHEELA HAI!

2011-06-16T16:52:00.001+05:30

What makes this song so entertaining? Is it Salman or is it the lyrics or both? Probably both. The words were as important as Bhai’s unique style in making it such a big hit. Mind it, the language you speak can change the fortunes of your brand, your company and your movie!

MUNNI AND SHEILA, TO MCDONALD’S & SONY

Language has the power to attract and this new language has taken everyone in its grip & its here to stay. From Bollywood to the business world, from babes to brands, everybody is using it. Hinglish is the language of today. It’s trendy, young and happening and it’s keeping the cash registers ringing for all who use it. Today’s most popular songs – from “Munni darling” to “Pappu can’t dance saala” to “My name is Shiela” and the current craze “...Character dheela hai” – have Hinglish lyrics. It makes the songs catchy and very entertaining and the audiences love them.

Not just Bollywood, smart businessmen the world over have realized that it’s this “street English” that works like magic to attract the consumers, so much so that even foreign brands are speaking it. Pepsi now says “Youngistaan ka wow!” Cadbury says it is not just a chocolate but “meetha” to be had after meals (a typical Indian custom). Domino’s for years has been asking “Hungry kya.” Lehar says “Control nahi hota,” and they all have successfully managed to connect to their customers! The verdict: The one who speaks the language the customer loves, rules.

HINGLISH – FOR SURVIVAL

“Kitne aadmi ko text karna hai?” Wondering which company’s tagline this is? Not Airtel, Aircell, Vodafone or even Idea. It’s the tagline of Rogers, Canada’s leading telecommunications company. Foreign brands too are using Hinglish to reach out to the Indian consumer in foreign lands. Bell Canada called on its consumers to “Put some bang in your Bhangra” as it celebrated Baisakhi with them in Canada. Across the border in America, McDonald’s sent small cards to various Indian households asking them to taste its ice-creams and shakes, with a tagline, “Taste ki baat hai.” And the Indian- American population loved it.

Wells Fargo used Hinglish too, on its hoardings in America to reach out. “Safalta aapki, solutions hamare” was the tagline plastered on various billboards.

Hinglish today is a global language and even the Brits have accepted it. Demos, an influential British think-tank, came out with a report stating language blends like Hinglish were the way forward, adding, “With non-native English speakers set to top two billion in as little as five years, Britain’s influence, relationships and access to markets across the globe are at risk unless we change our outmoded attitude to language.” It’s no more the Queen’s English; rather, to survive, one needs to master “The Queen’s Hinglish,” the new language of the new culture. This is the new law of survival. This is the way to reach out to your customers.

CHANGE YOUR PRODUCT, NOT JUST YOUR LANGUAGE

A famous Indian proverb says, “If you live in the river, you should make friends with the crocodile.” The one who adjusts best, wins. The one who understands not just the local language, but the local culture and way of life too, beats competitors. When Whirlpool launched its washing machines in India, it realized they were not suitable for washing saris. It immediately redesigned them to suit local preferences. KFC today has a vegetarian thali. An outlet that gained popularity because of its fried chicken, has removed chicken from some of its dishes to suit local tastes. Smuckers Foods of Canada has a ‘Golden Temple’ brand of atta, for the brand name – leaving the political incorrectness of it aside – plays a big role in motivating NRIs to reach out for it.

Intelligence is not measured by IQ scores, but by one’s ability to adapt. The most intelligent species are those that have found ways to adapt, and no one has adapted better than humans, who have learnt to adapt to almost any situation, any climate – so have some of the most successful brands. Nokia made dust resistant keypads for the Indian market. Sony built dust resistant TVs for India. HLL understood the rural consumer and introduced shampoos in sachets priced at Re.1, which became big money spinners for the company. Subway serves no beef in India.

The biggest of global brands with the best of products had to think local and even change some of their best strategies to succeed in foreign lands. The ‘Dell Dude’, a know-it-all, speak-fearlessly-to-strangers, kind of character was used by Dell on American TV – and he was a big hit. But this cool guy was not featured in Japanese ads for they would not appreciate a character like that.

Unilever launched coconut ice-creams with fruits in Bangkok to suit the Thai palette. Wall’s ensured that its ice-creams tasted different in Asia; no wonder in 2000, its share of the Asian market was 41% as compared to 15% of Nestle’s. Disneyland realized that if it had to make money in Hong Kong, it had to lower its prices, change its decor and settings to suit local tastes. Starbucks is making sure its outlets blend with the culture of the place and look less foreign. Just because it worked in one place is no guarantee that it will work everywhere, and brands should be ready to discard even their best ideas if they don’t match the local market’s choices.

Maxwell House Coffee was one of the first to realize that it pays to understand local culture. It was one of the first to pitch its coffee directly to the Jewish consumers. Nine years back, it noticed that sales of coffee fell drastically among Jews during ‘Passover’, a Jewish festival. It quickly hired an Orthodox rabbi who declared coffee was a berry (a fruit) and hence was totally acceptable to be had during the 8 days of Passover. It even came out with a booklet, ‘Passover Haggadah, Brought to you by Maxwell House’. This instantly made Maxwell an integral part of the Jewish community and its traditions. Today, anybody who wants to get instructions of how to celebrate Passover reaches out for Maxwell’s booklet, which can be picked up for free from the ‘Passover aisle’ or the ‘coffee aisle’. The very same coffee aisle which some years ago no Jew looked at during Passover, adapted and survived.

The ‘Dirt is good’ campaign of Unilever started in UK, but the company took extra efforts to ensure that the campaign was adapted to suit the local cultures of different countries; and it become a hit the world over. ‘Daag ache hai’ was just as loved by everybody in India.

Nike, Coca Cola and many other MNC’s entered India with their best global advertising campaigns. None worked and succeeded like the ‘Bleed Blue’ or the ‘Thanda Matlab Coca Cola’ campaigns, which instantly made the brands a part of the local culture.

Similarly, Dove’s ‘Real Beauty’ campaign succeeded in the West, but failed in China and Japan, where traditional views of feminine beauty still hold strong. Wizard of Oz, the wonderful children’s book has been translated into 40 different languages but adapted to suit local cultures. The Tin Woodman was replaced by a snake to suit the Indian culture; in the Russian version of the book, a man-eating Ogre was introduced.

Motorola launched a phone for the young in India and named it Moto-Yuva, and its key feature was a Hinglish T9. With SMS catching up, the company ensured its brand was in-sync with the language of the youth. Brands that adjusted, stayed; others vanished. Bollywood has adjusted too. More than 30 films released this year have Hinglish titles. ‘Always Kabhi Kabhi’, ‘Bhindi Bazaar Inc’ to ‘Short Term Shaadi’, all are riding on the popularity of Hinglish to make their films sound young, trendy and interesting. It’s the title (much like the tag line in advertising) that matters too – not just the stars.

It’s said the wise are like water, which moulds itself according to the pitcher. Shakespeare never hesitated to modify theEnglish language and coined almost 1600 new English words, borrowing freely from French, German, Latin etc to help him describe better and make his narratives more engrossing and effective. Even though a lot is being debated about whether Hinglish is good – for eventually it distorts both Hindi and English – but as marketers, we need to know the pulse of the audience; and he loves this language. So do not hesitate to change and adapt to make your marketing plans more effective... Even Shakespeare did it and no one questioned him!

Adapt to the local language, the culture, to sell your goods and ideas; and if anyone points a finger, well, sing in Hinglish, “Shakespeare kare to OK, maine karoo to saala character dheela hai!” Change your language, adapt your products and you will not only survive, but lead!

IT TAKES ‘3’ TO TANGO!

2011-06-03T10:04:00.000+05:30

I’s summer once again and time to enjoy nimboo pani, mangoes, long summer holidays, trips to cool places to beat the heat. But it seems the one thing that people love the world over is going out for a good movie. Yet, in 2009, the number of films released in theaters in USA dropped by 12%... Then came the biggest hit of all times – Avatar. Ticket sales zoomed. The number of people rushing to theaters increased to crazy levels. Reason? Well everyone wanted the catch the 3D version. Despite tickets of the 3D version being priced higher, 75% of Avatar’s revenues came from them. After all, it was the only 3D movie running at that time and people just couldn’t get enough. Avatar grossed $760 million, and Fox Studios, made all other production houses sit up and rethink. Fox had shown how to revive a business.

Movie theaters are today are filled with 3D versions of films. From ‘Cars 2’, to ‘Happy Feat 2’, to Steven Spielberg’s much awaited ‘The Adventures of Tintin’, all are getting ready with their 3D versions this year for your increased viewing pleasure, and also for increased box-office collections (hopefully!)It takes 3 to increase profits!

AVATAR – A SAVIOR!

An ‘Avatar’, according to the Hindu mythology, is a descent of a deity from heaven to earth with the specific purpose of bringing back righteousness (dharma) to the social and cosmic order. Avatar, the movie, couldn’t have been more appropriately named. It’s helping a lot of businesses survive, and proving to be an ‘Avatar’ for them.

The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is the most awaited gadget exhibition of the world. This year, almost every big brand had – yes, you guessed it – a 3D version of its gadget! Chris Yewdall, the CEO of DDD Group, which is the 3D consumer technology licensing group, said “...the market for 3D devices is rapidly expanding into other segments including PCs, tablets, and smart phones.” According to research, a growth of 132% is expected in 2012 with more than 100 million 3D TVs selling in 2014. Not surprising that from Samsung to Lenovo to HP, all have entered into partnerships with DDD. Toshiba is ready with its 3D laptop, Sony and Samsung with their 3D TVs, Nintendo with its 3DS video game. From 3D photo frames to 3D cameras, to 3D mobile phones, there seems to be a sudden boom in 3D devices. The best part is that most of them do not require you to wear the bulky 3D glasses to enjoy the 3D effects.

The battle between competitors now seems to have shifted to the 3rd dimension! 3D is now being marketed as the “novel” additional feature to lure customers away from competitors. Future growth in market share depends on the 3!

“IT’S 3D ALL THE WAY”

If marketers are there, advertises cannot be far behind. On May 27, 2011, Arla Foods-owned brand ‘Anchor’ decided to celebrate its 125th birthday with the launch of the first ever 3D cinema ad. It knew this was a sure shot way of grabbing headlines! When it comes to special occasions, 3D seems to fit the bill, for another company too went 3D to celebrate its 125th birthday.

On May 11, 2011, Coca Cola too completed its 125 years; and to mark the occasion, it covered its head quarters, a 26-story high building (402 ft) with canvass and projected 3D images showcasing its 125 years in the business. It ‘opened happiness’ in 3D!

This is not the first time that advertisers have experimented with 3D. In 2010, in June, the Sun newspaper became the first newspaper in UK to publish in 3D. It had a 3D page 3, a 3D editorial, and even 3D ads. It asked its readers to keep their 3D glasses (provided free with the edition) handy for viewing future editions with amazing 3D pictures of the Football World Cup. Last year, again in June, Shiyan Evening News brought out China’s first 3D Newspaper. Not to be left behind, in June last year too, India experimented with 3D too, with Mid Day launching special editions with 3D ads, followed by Rajasthan Patrika and Dainik Bhaskar. An expensive but interesting innovation; if used intelligently, it can be the tool for brands to help break the clutter and stand distinctly apart from competitors.

One medium that has been doing this very successfully is the billboard. Recently, Vodafone captured the attention of the passers-by with its adorable Zoozoos bursting out of billboards (in 3D) announcing the launch of its 3G services. For years, numerous 3D innovations on hoardings have attracted consumers and helped brands break the clutter. But the question is, for the other mediums too, is 3 their route to success?

For the manufacturing industry, it seems things will never be the same again, thanks to 3D. Soon, printers will be available that will print in 3D – or in other words, will allow you to manufacture and create things in the comfort of your home. From jewelry, to customized football shoes , to mobile phone covers to almost anything. This new technology is going to transform the whole business of manufacturing. Earlier, these printers were used to make prototypes. Today, more than 20% of the output of 3D printers is the final product. The future, as many see it, would have consumers downloading a design the same way as they download music, customizing it to suit their tastes and pressing “” to get the product of their own choice right in their homes! Who needs a factory now, to manufacture – just a printer will do!

THE MAGIC OF TRIANGLES

‘3’ seems to have a mystical magic attached to it. Be it movies or real life, having 3 people in a relationship makes for the most intriguing of stories. Be it the royal triangle of Prince Charles, Princess Diana and Camilla or be it some of our greatest romantic films. If there is a triangle, the effect is magical.

Hollywood (with its ‘Gone With The Wind’ and ‘Casablanca’) to Bollywood (with its ‘Silsila’ and ‘Saagar’) viewers have been glued to the screens on the promise of 3. Triangles have an irresistible and mysterious charm.

Be it love triangles or the Bermuda Triangle, which for years became the source of supernatural stories, with popular folklore blaming paranormal activity to be responsible for the alleged disappearing of several aircraft and ships in that part of the North Atlantic Ocean. The Bermuda Triangle mystery was one story everyone wanted to believe. It was as fictitious as the love triangle of the movie Titanic, yet they both succeeded in intriguing the viewers and making lots of money.

THE RULE OF 3

In fact it is the ‘rule of 3’ which has a lot of significance. According to an old saying about running of businesses, “the first generation starts a business. The second generation runs it. The third generation ruins it!” So, if your business can successfully survive the 3rd generation, chances are it will live, for that means you have planned well. After all, only about 13% of businesses make it successfully past the third generation!

The rule of 3 applies not just to business, but art too. Every budding artist or photographer is told of this rule, which basically says that one must breakdown an image, a composition or a blank canvass into ‘thirds’, both horizontally and vertically to make a grid with 9 parts. The theory states that your focal points of the composition should be placed in the intersection or along the lines of the grid. This makes the photo/composition most balanced & beautiful. For professionals, the ‘rule of thirds’ becomes second nature & all their compositions follow it. It’s said that this rule is derived from the ‘Golden Ratio’. In fact, Mario Livio has written a complete book that shows how the Golden Ratio and “PHI” have influenced our lives. The book is titled “The story of PHI, the world’s most astonishing number”. He says that even Mother Nature follows this rule. It is this that determines how a sunflower’s seeds grow, or determine the path a hawk takes while diving for its prey. It even determines how the spirals in a spiral galaxy are laid out.

Beauty too is defined by this rule of 3, for it provides symmetry to things; and it’s said that symmetry is what makes things beautiful. Be it a face, a body or a building. One reason that the Mona Lisa has remained so irresistible for decades is because it’s composed of around 3 different rectangles. Vinci was an expert in geometry & the Golden Ratio can be seen in all his paintings. Our most famous ancient architectural wonders, from the Taj Mahal to the Pyramids, have all followed this rule of 3 to bring symmetry & hence beauty to the structures.

There is definitely something about 3. Look at your palm, each of your fingers are divided into 3 sections. Your body too follows the Golden Ratio; and it’s God’s most beautiful creation.

Be it business or movies, art or advertising, 3 is the magic number to remember. Two maybe is good company but three is not just a crowd – it could be your mantra to success. If you want to dance your way to success, remember, it takes 3 to tango!

STAND BY ME

2011-05-20T10:11:00.002+05:30

Osama is dead. Obama could not have been happier. Suddenly, his approval ratings have jumped up and he is being viewed as a better leader, for the man stood by his promise. People love a leader who stands by his words, his promises, his commitments.

COMMITMENT OR PASSION?

Passion is short term. Plain passion will not take you far. More than passion, it’s ‘commitment’ that makes things work. Be it a marriage, a team, a company, a country, a society, or a civilisation, it’s an individual’s commitment that makes things work. As Robert Sternberg once said: “Passion is the quickest to develop, and the quickest to fade. Intimacy develops more slowly, and commitment more gradually still.” Passion backed with commitment is the foundation of a great relationship, a great team, a great company.

Back in the 1940s, as American soldiers returned home after the World War II, there was a huge surge in demand for houses. One man’s commitment solved a near-impossible problem. Abraham Levitt perfected the art of “mass-producing houses”, something unheard of until then. Using the assembly line production technique, Levitt built all parts of the house in the factory. These could then be assembled on-site by his team of specialists ( much like the modular furniture of today). As many as 30 houses a day were being massproduced and America was able to solve its housing problem. A lot of people around the world are today wondering if this could be repeated again, for it would help a lot of countries get rid of their slums. However, what everyone is looking for is a committed businessman, someone like Levitt, who will take up the challenge and work with full commitment towards the cause of the poor.

One committed leader, a businessman who believes there is ‘fortune at the bottom of the pyramid’ and is ready to work for the poor, is all that is required and all slums of our country could be removed and our population could get a chance to live with dignity and never again would a “Slumdog Millionaire” be filmed in our country.

Like countries, great companies too have committed leaders at the top. In the book ‘The Toyota Way’, the author states that it was the top leadership’s commitment towards the customers that made the company so great. The one thing people were told to follow was – don’t generate money for yourself, but generate value for customers. Every “great” company follows this philosophy. John Scully, who was once the boss of Steve Jobs at Apple, said in an interview: “Microsoft gets it right the third time. Its philosophy is to get it out there and fix it later.” Let the product be launched, it could be improved later, is the philosophy at Microsoft. While Steve Jobs would never release a product till he was 100% sure and lived up to his commitment to the consumer of being flawless. If it’s not great, it will be thrown away, whether it’s financially viable or not, or if Wall Street likes it or not. By chance if a bad product is launched, Steve Jobs personally sets things right. When his MobileMe service got panned, within half-an-hour, Jobs berated the
group and on the spot named a new executive to run the group. He sent the message out loud & clear – nothing half-baked comes out of Apple, and people who do not get it, no matter how talented they are, have no place here. That’s commitment. That’s why it’s Apple that leads and comes out with these magical products.

Back in 1906, when an enormous earthquake hit San Francisco, the worst affected were the banks and A. P. Giannini’s Bank of Italy was in a bad shape too. While others hid behind closed doors fearing riots, A. P. knew if he did not do something, the fires following the earthquake would finish off the savings of thousands of people. He thought of a plan. He ordered his men to get him two fruit trucks – stacked with fruits and vegetables. His men were confused. How could oranges and bananas save the bank? When the fruit trucks arrived, Giannini quickly dragged out bags of gold & silver from the vaults and stuffed them at the bottom of the truck. Piled high with oranges and bananas no one even glanced at the trucks, as A. P. rode them home down the streets that were teaming with thugs and thieves that time. He hid the money under the fireplace of his house and slept in front of it. He had rescued the lifetime savings of a lot of people. While the other banks were burning, and some too scared to act, A. P. Giannini, opened his bank the next day – that too on a Sunday! Atop two large barrels, he hoisted a wooden plank that read ‘Bank of Italy’. Soon, lines formed as people came for loans. It’s said that his loans gave a kick-start to the recovery process of the state. No marble lobbies, no fancy building. Pure commitment was all it took to start his bank. So what if the money smelt like orange juice for weeks! By the time other banks reopened, Bank of Italy had doubled its assets, but more than that, it had more than doubled its reputation and goodwill... words we cannot assign to almost any bank of today. Businesses that have a commitment to stay true to their customers, always outshine, for they always look at the long term, which makes it easy for them to make short term sacrifices. It’s truly said that commitment can solve the toughest of problems.

STAND BY YOUR PRINCIPLES

When Jack Welch was heading GE, he realised the value of people, rather, of the “right” type of people. There was an interesting group of workers he came across at GE. These were those who delivered all their commitments, all the time, but did not share the company values. Most CEOs, under pressure to meet targets, would not even bother about values at this stage. Anyone who fulfilled commitments was great. Not so for Welch. Values were of supreme importance. These type of employees had no place in GE. Along with commitment, comes the strength of character. Among the 9Cs that Lee Iacocca listed in his book ‘Where have all the leaders gone?’, the one quality he stressed on was “character”.

Tiger Woods was the perfect brand ambassador, only till the time he could boast of an untarnished reputation. He was a man committed to his game, but that was not enough for the people. A strong sense of commitment comes from a strong character. Be it companies or countries, the leaders of both need both the qualities more than even talent to succeed.

“Faith” is what makes the world go round. In the business world, as in the real world, “trust” is the key factor. Stay true to yourself and your value systems, and stand by them. Donald Trump says in his book ‘How to get rich’: “Be stubborn, be determined.” Don’t get influenced or fluctuate with others ideas. Temptations are aplenty, the one who can steer clear of them rules.

On April 26, 2011 Sony of Japan revealed that names, passwords, and possibly credit card details of 77 million accounts were stolen by hackers who gained access to its Play Station online- gaming system in 60 countries. A lot of users were shocked. Not so much by the hacking, but the way Sony handled it. It took Sony a week to accept that accounts were hacked; and then it released a statement that services would be up in a week, but did not live up to it either. The name Sony symbolises ‘trust’ for millions. After all, when those 77 million entered their details on the Sony website, they did so because, well – it’s a Sony and they could trust it blindly! A lot of them are now questioning Sony’s commitment and if it can be trusted.

In today’s world, the rarest commodity is “trust”. Brands become great because of the great trust of the people. The one who enjoys trust of his people rules. A great company is one that is headed by a trustworthy and committed leader. A great country is one that has a leader committed to his people. A great brand is one that is committed to its consumers, for if you are committed, your followers, your consumers will reciprocate. Decades ago, John Lennon sang these words, and they hold true even for the business world:

“If the sky that we look upon,
Should tumble & fall,
And the mountains should crumble to the sea,
I won’t cry, I won’t cry, No I won’t shed a tear,
Just as long as you stand, stand by me”.
Stand up for a cause, stand up for your beliefs, stand up for
your country, and the world will stand by you!

THE “LIKE” BUTTON

2011-04-22T10:53:00.000+05:30

Many of us turned into “revolutionaries” this April. It required no protest marches, no dharnas, no violence, not even fasting. A mere click of the ‘Like’ button on the “India Against Corruption” Facebook page, a change of our profile picture into that of Anna Hazare’s, an updation of our “Status” message into “I support Anna” made each feel a part of the great movement. For many, just giving a missed call on 022-61550789 was enough to express their solidarity towards the movement. Anna Hazare fought, not just by fasting but also by ‘Facebooking’. It was the Internet & other communication tools that increased the voice of his anti-corruption movement. So powerful was this tool that within two days the members of the ‘India against corruption’ page increased from 5 lakhs to 12 lakhs. Some 7 lakh people showed their support by giving a missed call on a number texted to them. The revolution was “virtually there” for everyone to join in. It did not require physical presence; as long as you thought alike you could be a part of this ever increasing group, whenever you felt like, and could voice your opinions too on this “virtual” meeting place!

TWITTER - THE NEXT “NOBEL PEACE PRIZE” WINNER?

The last few days have witnessed a lot of revolutions around the world, many of which started “virtually” on the Internet. Today, the role of the social media has become more than just a place to catch up with old friends. Rather, it’s now a place where your voice can be heard – and if what you speak is sense, then there is no limit to the number of followers you can gather. Social media is now bringing about social change too.

Thousands of protesters gathered on the streets of Moldova in 2009 to protest against the communist government. Tunisia too overthrew its ruler in 29 days and many called it the “Twitter Revolution”. It was Twitter that gave protestors the courage to rock the Iranian government, and stand up for freedom and democracy. So overwhelmed was Mark Pfeifle, a former national security adviser, that he called for Twitter to be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize! Twitter was helping in bringing like-minded people together – and in the case of India, also in staging a non-violent protest... just the way Gandhi did decades ago.

The invention of the printing press gave momentum to the French Revolution . For the first time, pamphlets could be printed in bulk and thoughts and ideas could be spread faster. The invention of Twitter and Facebook has given momentum to all recent revolutions. They have provided a voice that is impossible to censor and that can spread faster than lightening! The new age revolutions have become so big largely because of this digital revolution.

While it’s true that Twitter and Facebook are very important tools to spread information, the fact is, real change requires something more. It requires a true leader, who inspires a feeling of camaraderie, of brotherhood. It’s not just a voice, but a voice filled with passion. A true revolution is not about just the number of virtual “friends” who support you, but about those real people who are ready to die for you; it’s not about the number of “media tools” one has, but about the real ‘cause’ you stand for. As Malcolm Gladwell said, “Social media alone cannot provide what social change has always required.” Yes, it gives a voice to the powerless, but a voice needs a face, the face of a leader, who has the power to attract ‘real’ followers. The ‘Like’ button is a strong indicator of your potential, but for a revolution to reach its full potential, the ‘virtual’ voice needs to be backed by a ‘real’ one too. A great leader of tomorrow will be one who will have the maximum ‘Likes’ and “followers”, both in the virtual and the real world. Both grounds will be equally important .That will be the way to change tomorrow’s world.

VIRTUALLY POWERFUL

The ‘virtual world’ has a lot of potential and one person who exploited it best is Julian Assange. It’s not just the nuclear radiation leaks that have the power to destroy the world – rather more potent has been Wikileaks for that has caused more destruction; and that too in the right places. Assange found ways of channeling information from the ‘virtual’ spaces into the hands of the common man and woke him up from his slumber. When Assange started publishing the secret cables in Al-Akhbar, the Lebanese newspaper, did the common man realize how his leaders were cheating him. The revolution started from the average man and that’s how people could finally overthrow the government.

The ‘Virtual World’ has a lot of potential and a great leader can use it intelligently to change the world. An intelligent marketer can use it to get the cash registers jingling and change the very rules of business!

FACEBOOK SHOPS

Last year, two students of Wharton launched a site named ‘Kembrel’, which was a private shopping community for just college students. The site partnered with a few well-known lifestyle brands to offer deep discounts on goods for a limited window of time. The catch was, this was a private store which students could access entirely through Facebook – a place they anyway spent a lot of time on!

Facebook commerce is the new buzzword. Retailers are exploring Facebook as a revenue channel like never before. Bulgari, the high end fashion label, has developed jewellery lines, leather goods, and perfumes which are priced right for its Facebook audience, who may hesitate to enter its store in Fifth Avenue, New York; these very consumers can access the brand in the comfort of their Facebook world. This year, FCUK [French Connection] and Dove also opened shops on Facebook, enabling their followers to buy their products directly from the page. P&G had already tasted success when it launched its Max-Factor brand on Facebook last year. Again, last year, Tesco Clothing generated £2 mn in sales as a result of their UK Facebook page. Using vouchers, it tracked its activity on Facebook and found out that its campaign “Friday Frenzy” resulted in more sales in two hours, than it would usually get in a week.

Facebook is inarguably becoming a lucrative place for marketers. Oscar de la Renta launched his first fragrance in 10 years on Facebook. All the people who ‘Liked’ the brand’s page got a free sample. Indian designer Arjun Khanna saw his Facebook page grow so much in popularity that he opened his store in Goa. 3M came up with an innovative product to rejuvenate its Scotch Tape brand. It launched a Scotch Shoe, a tape dispenser that looked like a lady’s shoe. The launch happened only through Facebook, for that was the place where its consumers were.

According to Booz & Company, the value of goods sold through social media may rise six-fold by 2015 to reach $30 billion. In the future, many product sales/launches would happen on Facebook. It’s time for companies to seriously start working on getting more ‘Likes’ and simultaneously thinking of ways of converting the ‘Likes’ on their Facebook fan page into ‘Buys’.

The future seems to be all about ‘Likes’. The power will lie in the hands of the people who will use the ‘Like’ button to give their vote. The one with maximum ‘Likes’, be it an individual or a brand, is the one who will wield the maximum power; for that’s going to be the way to judge the potential of an idea or a brand.

As future leaders, let’s start thinking of ways of making the most of the ‘Like’ button.

BLEED BLUE!

2011-04-08T10:48:00.004+05:30

It was an unforgettable moment of pride for all. That night of April 2, 2011 every Indian forgot his caste, creed, worries, tensions, apprehensions and rejoiced with his fellow countrymen as India won the ICC Cricket World Cup. It was a long wait of 28 years and victory never earlier had tasted so sweet. A big achievement for India and most importantly for its most amazing captain M. S. Dhoni. Fearless, confident, cool and unflappable. He drove in unlimited self-confidence into each player, and together the team conquered the world.

The man showed the world he doesn’t play by the rules – and India loved him for that. A captain like Dhoni and a tournament like the World Cup is a combination that doesn’t come too often and it made every marketer sit up and take action. With the whole nation glued to their TV sets, there was nothing more exciting an advertiser could have asked for. Along with the nation, every brand too was eating, sleeping, breathing and singing cricket. Every brand had jumped on to the cricket bandwagon.
With cricket and only cricket on everybody’s mind, most brands changed their advertising strategy to match the mood of the audience. Those who could afford to, roped in the cricketers to endorse their brands, while the numerous others changed their advertising themes, punchlines, promotional offers to match the cricket euphoria. As this was the best way to engage with the audience, Krishidhan, India’s 5th largest seeds company changed its tagline to “Beejon Ka Tendulkar”. DSP BlackRock Mutual Fund asked people to “Prepare your investment kit”. Style Spa introduced its “Hattrick offer”. Dr. Batra’s introduced its “Super Six Offer”. LIC doled out a slew of catchy slogans, each one reflecting the spirit of the game. From “Live life on the front foot” to “Great partnerships are built on trust”, each one showed how life & cricket were not very different from each other. Relating your brand to cricket was the best way to get noticed this time. Those who did have the means – like Revital, Oakley, etc – got a cricketer to endorse their brands. However, for some, in spite of spending so much and changing their advertising themes to cricket, the magic eluded them. Very few could reflect the passion for the game in a way that would get the viewers excited and involved. Research has shown that out of the hundreds who infused “cricket” into their marketing plans, only two brands stood out head over heels above others – Nike and Pepsi.

Much like its “Just do it” slogan, which caught the imagination of youngsters across the world, Nike’s “Bleed Blue” was on the lips of every Indian as he confessed his love for the game. Nike put into words what every Indian felt when its cricket team went to play against the world. Winning the cup and defeating the world made every one weep and bleed for the men in blue.

Pepsi and its campaigns have always been young and appealed to the youth. However, its campaign around the World Cup created by the agency Taproot India, brought a smile to everyone’s lips. Humorous, irreverent, and interesting, the campaign brought out the spirit of the viewers. When it comes to cricket, every Indian thinks he’s the expert and that one could easily teach the cricketers a thing or two to improve their game. For every lost match, we have an explanation & a solution, which, if the team had followed, would have ensured they won the match. The Pepsi ad portrayed this so beautifully with everybody teaching the cricketers how to master unique batting and bowling tricks. It brought a fresh twist to the game and soon the “helicopter shot”, “the doosra”, and the “upar cut” become the new cricket lingo. They were funny and totally different from the cricket rule book. Pepsi did change the game.

NO IDEA – GET AN IDEA!

That’s the problem with most. We have no idea; or rather no new ideas. Be it in life, in schools, in politics, or even marketing, what’s lacking is original thinking. The problem starts at the grassroots. In schools, IQ scores are rising steadily because children are busy learning and increasing their IQ, but they have no time for idea generation. Whereas it’s the CQ – creativity quotient – that matters in life. A recent IBM poll of 1,500 CEOs showed that the No.1 leadership trait was “creativity”. There seems to be a creativity crisis everywhere. Creativity is not confined to art; it’s the ability to think beyond the obvious. Creativity could help leaders in solving world problems, from identifying ways to educating masses, providing health care to finding a peaceful solution for Libya, Afghanistan etc. A creative leader can change the world by thinking & doing things differently. Creative marketers can find ways of taking their messages straight to the hearts & minds of the consumers. They can design campaigns that don’t just look creative, but have a creative, powerful & meaningful message too. The sad part is that not many are doing it. Look at the advertisements of cellular service providers. Everybody is saying they are the best and we should switch to their network. Apart from Vodafone’s Zoozoos, not many names shine out distinctly. While every insurance provider was talking emotions, the adorable Bharti AXA Life Insurance ad shone out as the podgy man at the doctor’s clinic refused to accept that he had a critical lung disease – but a kidney failure was fine for his policy covered it! Somebody thought creatively and drove the point home. Tongue-in-cheek, it poked at the other insurance providers without being critical or preachy. While every advertisement of suitings looks the same with a dapper male model and an attractive girl hanging on to his arm, it was Raymond that shone out with its series of “The Complete Man”. Somebody thought there was more to a personality than just good looks; and as expected, the message was loved & remembered and Raymond stood out above the clutter.

When the stakes are so high and the rewards so lucrative, what every marketer should have stressed on was creativity. Right from the dream semi-final between India & Pakistan to the finals, this World Cup provided umpteen opportunities for creative leaders to shine out. With such unheard of advertising rates (Rs.17-18 lakhs for a ten second spot during the Indo-Pak match) it was absolutely essential for all to think different. M. S. Dhoni kept his words, thought differently and planned the match most creatively – which got us the cup finally, but not many advertisers lived up to the promise, save some like Pepsi. In fact, the Pepsi ads have worked so well that when Dhoni hit the last six, even the commentator remarked that “that was the helicopter shot”, a term that till now had never been a part of the cricket vocabulary. That’s creativity. Exotic locations, attractive models, top quality special effects can never make an advertisement successful. It works only when everything comes together with a great idea. So get new ideas.

ANOTHER “BLUE” EVENT!

Events like the World Cup, the Super Bowl, et al, are huge platforms that can provide an instant reach. They are dream events for advertisers. The men in blue always provide a huge opportunity for advertisers, at least in India. However, this month-end, another “blue” event caught the imagination of the world. It’s the Royal Wedding of the blue blooded Prince William with Kate. A wedding like this comes once in a lifetime almost, and according to some economists, it might even save the British economy. It’s expected to generate £620 million just from tourism, add to that the sale of memorabilia and other merchandise.

It’s a big event and marketers are already working overtime! While Walmart is selling tea mugs with the Royals on them, Hyatt Regency has introduced a “William & Kate. The Love Story” package; a brewery is even producing a special “Kiss Me Kate” beer... and the list goes on.

It’s time again to put on our creative hats and make the most of this “blue blooded” event, for the one who thinks differently is the one who will profit the most. And David Cameroon, you can save your economy too! In whatever you do, be creative, be original, and just like our super captain Dhoni, think from your heart and bleed blue with passion.

‘EAST’ IS THE NEW ‘WEST’

2011-03-25T10:26:00.007+05:30

“The King’s Speech” won the 83rd Annual Academy Award this year for the ‘Best Picture’. However, instead of the Oscars, those were youngsters of China, India, Brazil, et al that the big movie studios were looking at this time. Today, the success of a film depends on how it does in foreign markets and not on how many Oscars it gets. From Harry Potter to Sherlock Holmes to even Inception; all were declared hits because they did big business outside America. Avatar, the highest grosser of all times, made 3/4th of its money outside US & Canada. The markets with the biggest growth potential are Russia, China India, et al. There seems to be a ‘cinema boom’ in these countries and they are lapping up Hollywood films like nobody’s business. So, for Hollywood movie production houses, the most important task today is to distribute their films in these markets and make the maximum money. The focus is not just on a good script, but also on choosing the right actors and locations that will appeal to the audience of these markets, Success lies in accurately predicting foreign tastes. No more is it important to predict what the jury of the Oscars will like. Money flows into Hollywood when the youngsters of India, Brazil, China & Russia flock to the theaters.

COOL CONSUMERS ARE HOT PROPERTY

Not just Hollywood, a whole lot of brands are looking eastwards to help increase their market share today. In fact, you need to look at the youngsters of the world to survive – the largest percentage of which resides outside Europe & America. Consider this; the combined population of India and China is about 2.6 billion people, that’s approximately 37% of humanity. China Mobile had 301 million cell phone subscribers in 2007. The estimated population of United States then was 298 million!!

In 2001, Jim O’ Neill, the economist at Goldman Sachs, had coined the term BRIC and predicted that by 2050, these countries would gather so much might that they would overshadow the biggies like USA, Europe and Japan.

He said there was one way these countries would change the world – ‘by shopping!!’ It’s true, as the ‘shoppers’, i.e. the consumers of these nations, have been contributing more to global GDP than other nations. Those are the ‘super consumers’ of these ‘super nations’, who are today deciding the future of many brands – not just Hollywood! The brand, which manages to catch the imagination of these consumers, will survive and thrive.

Last year, an Italian brand tried to do it and managed to get a lot of attention. Diesel launched its “Be Stupid” campaign, which spoke the language that the youth wanted to hear. It said, “Be smart is what your parents & teachers always told you to be, but we are with the stupid, for ‘Stupid’ is the relentless pursuit of a regret free life!”

It came out with a series of advertisements that shocked and inspired and got talked about for their visuals and slogans. The slogans were just what the youth of today loved. “Smart critiques, Stupid creates”, showed the power of a free mind. Another one went thus, “Smart many have the brains, but stupid has the balls.” Their logic was simple – you can’t outsmart stupid. So don’t even try !!

“Be Stupid” was a campaign to build an image of Diesel, as the brand that was ‘brave’ and not scared of taking risks. For the cool consumers – the youngsters – Diesel became the ‘hit’ and the most talked about brand.

This new brand of ‘cool’ consumers is deciding restless endeciding the ways of the world. He is rest less and needs constant gratification. For him, shopping is entertainment, and every brand is doing all it can to keep him engaged & entertained.

TIME magazine even reduced the size of its cover story from 4,500 words (a pattern it had followed for the last 20 years) to 2,800 words to make it more relevant for today’s consumer.

The maximum growth is happening in the BRIC countries & the youth here is actually deciding the future. There are more Chinese youth who own computer phones, digital video cameras and at-home broadband internet than their American counterparts. Nielsen Media Research says that Russia will be the fourth largest consumer market in the world by 2025. India has the largest number of engineers, science graduates & post graduates. India & China will become the highest spenders on entertainment & media.

Yes, it’s true that it’s the BRIC consumer who will rule and if you want to survive, you need to understand them & market to them – for they are a different generation.

THE EMERGING GIANTS

It’s not just the consumers of the east who are changing the rules of the game, but it’s also the eastern companies who are taking on the world. Those are the multinationals from China, India, Brazil who are hungry for consumers, hungry for success, hungry to rule and are doing just that.

After Hurricane Katrina hit America, the residents were looking for a tractor that be strong enough & fast enough to the debris. Some of them chose Mahindra 5500. It was priced right & had The sale of Mahindra vehicles in American markets, where big names like Deere & Co. have dominated for years, showed that the ‘old world’ order was changing – and changing fast.

These companies were not scared of risks and doing ‘stupid’ things and today, the world is looking up at them. Till a few years back, Huawei was known as a company that was caught copying designs of Cisco systems. The company spent more than $500 million in R&D & is today cutting sharply into Cisco’s market share across Asia & Latin America. Lenovo of China bought the IBM PC business. Infosys, Tata Consultancy services and Wipro have captured the global technology services market. Brazil’s Embraer has surged past Canada’s Bombardier to become the world’s No.3 aircraft maker and is taking away orders for aircraft that earlier were given to companies like Airbus & Boeing.

When Ranbaxy started marketing in Europe, its sales staff used to be kept waiting for hours before the skeptical Europeans heard their sales pitch. Today Ranbaxy is a top supplier in much of Europe. Its $1-aday AIDS treatment to Africa has got it immense respect, making it a leader in nations like Nigeria & Brazil. The most remarkable is, of course, the Tata group. From cars to steel to hotels, they are leaders everywhere. It’s truly a global force to reckon with.

These companies have taken on the West and launched exciting new products, which are turning into great brands. This companies has fought stiff competition and has mastered the art of producing goods at lowest costs. Look at India itself – from providing cheapest cellular rates to cheapest cars, we have it all here and no Western firm can beat us easily in this game.

The new world order is emerging. South Africa’s SAB Miller is ready to take on Budweiser of USA. The world’s biggest cellular provider would soon be Mexico’s América Móvil. According to Boston Consulting Group, there are 100 emerging multinationals – none of whom is American or European – who in 2005 had a combined $715 billion in revenue, $145 billion in operating profits and a half-trillion dollars in assets. For years, the east looked up to the west, but now it’s time for the west to learn a few things from the east. It’s time to take the new brands of the east more seriously as well as get to know better the new generation of consumers of this part of the world, for they are the future.

Let the old brands beware. Here comes a new brigade of companies, who understand the consumers best; as they are one of them, have understood the rules of the game & are ready to defeat the old players. They are ‘stupid’ and ‘hungry’ just like their consumers and ready to rule.

Steve Jobs in his very famous speech at Stanford had said, “Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition... stay hungry... stay foolish,” and you will succeed. It seems like some companies took his advice very seriously. They dared to dream, dared to do & rewrote history. They dared to turn ‘East’ into the new ‘West’.

SEEDHI BAAT, NO BAKWAS

2011-03-11T10:28:00.000+05:30

“How to get your roommate to clean the room?”

“How to survive the boring talks of your girlfriend?”

“How to stare at other women, in front of your girlfriend?”

Find all your answers at the “University of Freshology”. These new advertisements of Sprite which ask you to “first drink, then think” are bringing a smile on many faces! The new advertisements take a fresh look at Sprite while keeping the ‘Brand Image’ the same. From the beginning, Sprite has believed in one thought – unlike other innumerable products / brands that promised you impossible benefits, Sprite offered you only freshness. From the time it was launched in India in 1999, with the tagline “Sprite bujhay only pyaas, baki all bakwaas”, it has stuck to its image of being the no-nonsense- just-thirst-quencher brand. This time too, its advertisements are interesting and, well, obviously refreshing.

POWER OF WORDS

They are really more powerful than a bomb if handled well. The right words can spark a revolution, can make people even give up their lives for you. Many a time, they even change the world. When Mother Teresa said, “If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one” she changed the perspectives of a lot of people who thought how helping just one person could change the world? She showed them how – with her words. Martin Luther King spoke about apartheid & its indignities and people cried after they heard his famous speech “I have a dream”. He even told people to speak up when they saw injustice; and for that he said: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” In his own humorous way, Woody Allen echoed our anxiety about death when he said, “It’s not that I’m afraid to die. I just don’t want to be there when it happens.”

It’s more often than not that great words make an advertisement more memorable. Sometimes witty, sometimes crisp, sometimes direct, sometimes funny, never boring, but always simple and easy to remember. Consider these, “Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia”, or “Because, you’re worth it – L’Oréal”, or “Let your fingers do the walking – Yellow Pages”. These short and very simple sentences defined the whole business, the benefits of buying or using the brand, and stuck to our memory like glue! In fact, some great advertising punch-lines consisted of only two words. Here are some, “Connecting People – Nokia”, “Life’s Good – LG”, “Hello Moto – Motorola”, “Live Unboring – Ikea”, “Intel Inside – Intel”. In fact, it took just two words to unite our country against the British: “Quit India!” Sometimes, even one word did the trick. Budweiser’s “Wassup” tagline made the brand look young and super cool!

Some ad jingles and slogans became so famous and were etched so firmly in people’s memory that they were used to make a point by famous people to prove their point. When Burger King came out with its tagline “Where’s the beef?” indicating that its burgers were beefier and hence better than the competitor’s where you hardly spotted the beef, the three words became a rage. Even some presidential candidates quoted them to show their superiority over their competitors.

“Just Do It” is again one of those very famous taglines that has been used by all of us during our conversations. It not just became a part of our lingo, but catapulted Nike to great heights, making it a Power Brand! A survey showed that 45% of Britons regularly use the line from Guinness commercials, “Good things come to those who wait.” It’s amazing, the impact advertisements have on our lives, our thoughts, and our speech. Some 80% people have claimed to use advertising slogans in their day to day conversations. Time to think which ones do you use most frequently! That’s the power of advertising and “I’m lovin’ it”. After all, its advertising that’s “The Real Thing”.

IBM was the big daddy of computing. Back in 1914, its tagline “Think” became a big hit. Then, a few decades later, came Apple with its tagline “Think Different”, to show the world that the rules of the game were different now and the world of computing had a new Godfather!

WORDS – LIVE FOREVER

A great slogan or tagline comes with no expiry date. It lives on almost forever. “Utterly... butterly...” You know which brand I am referring to. “Thanda matlab...” Again, I don’t need to complete the slogan. A great tagline is sometimes all you need to increase your sales and beat your competitors. After all, with so much choice, the consumer most of the time buys on impulse and those are his emotions many a time that help him decide when he is confused with too many choices. The right combination of words helps create those positive feelings. Onida’s slogan “Neighbour’s envy, owner’s pride” made you feel proud about owning it (wish they would bring back the slogan again in their ad campaigns). LIC’s slogan “Jeevan ke saath bhi, jeevan ke baad bhi” gently and in a non-threatening manner told you about the benefits of a life insurance policy.

Words live on, even after the people who spoke them are gone. In fact, sometimes your last words become the image that people remember you with. The last words Karl Marx spoke were “Go on, get out. Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough.” William Wallace, the Scottish Patriot, screamed “Freedom” even as he was tortured to death, according to the film based on his life Braveheart. In fact, some words have made films immortal. From Scarlett O’Hara’s very famous last words in the film Gone with the Wind (“After all, tomorrow is another day”) to Amjad Khan in Sholay (“Kitne aadmi the”), words live on in our memories & remain a part of our daily language forever almost!

WORDS – DON’T MESS WITH THEM

Just as words have the power to make fortunes, they can destroy them too. Verbal slips, gaffes can prove to be disastrous. One person who was very famous for this was George Bush. In fact, his gaffes are so famous & so many that they can be published as a book of “Bushisms”. One of his famous gaffes is, “We are concerned about AIDS inside our White House – make no mistake about it.” Take another one – it’s even better than the previous one, “Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.”

The one who has a command over his words truly leads. Every word that Gandhi spoke was a treasure house of wisdom. He knew and understood freedom and the power of the mind, and expressed it like no other. He said, “You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.” His words broke the spirit of the British. Rabindranath’s words strengthened the spirits of the freedom fighters as they repeated his lines, “Where the mind is without fear and the head held high, ... into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake.”

Our greatest heroes gave us the greatest quotes & words of wisdom. Our greatest brands have the best worded slogans and tag lines. If you want to inspire, lead, conquer the world or the markets, the first thing you need to do is develop a masteryover the words you speak. From children, to workers, to consumers, everybody loves “Seedhi baat, no bakwaas!”

LOVE PEOPLE!

2011-02-11T10:05:00.000+05:30

It’s once again that time of the year when love is in the air and all around you, or as Jay Leno once described it, “Today is Valentine’s Day – or as men like to call it, Extortion Day!”

GREAT MARKETERS ARE GREAT LOVERS

A great marketer loves people. He observes them well, and is quick to find out what they want, many times even before the consumer himself! They call him the “accidental billionaire.” But one thing the man knew as well as software programming was what people his age liked and wanted. Mark Zuckerberg knew that kids on campus want to always be in touch with each other, apart from of course knowing who was dating whom. He probably was right; no wonder Facebook has over 500 million users, and the “status” tab is the most talked about feature! For a great marketer, the consumer is king.

The rule is simple, give them what they love and you will have them eating out of your hand.

There is nothing more attractive than this four-letter word. No, it’s not ‘LOVE’ but ‘FREE’! If you understand consumers, you will know the magical power of this word. Add to this another four-letter word ‘EASY’ and you have a blockbuster brand in your hands. If you are not convinced, look at Google. It’s so successful because it’s free and it’s so easy to use. It even corrects your spellings. Look at Facebook. It’s free and so easy and simple a concept. In 2007, suddenly everybody was talking about Ryanair, making it Britain’s most loved airline. Why? They gave away 1 million free air tickets. In 4 hours, 4 million people hit its website, making it the most talked about & popular airline service.

Price is the key driving factor and getting it right is one of the key qualities of a great marketer. Bata was always famous for its prices. Though there may not be much difference between Rs.100 and Rs.99.95, somehow Rs.99.95 is always perceived as much lesser than Rs.100. A keen observer of human nature discovered this & Bata sold more shoes.

What’s marketing without advertising! And a great advertisement is one which makes people go out and buy the product! The one advertisement that has burnt up cyberspace, TV, and newspapers in the US recently is the ad for Chrysler’s new sedan. It was shown on Sunday (Feb 6, 2011) and in two days, the ad had gone viral and racked up more than 3.5 million views on the YouTube. Everybody was talking about it. The ad has the one thing everybody loves – honesty. It tells the story of a city that has been to hell and back. It tells the story of an underdog. The world loves this kind of a story. People cried after seeing the ad. And it worked like nobody’s business, for according to Autometrics, within 10 minutes of the ad going on air, 131 people inquired about the sedan’s price. The ad featured Eminem, a rapper, who himself comes back from tough times – much like Detroit. The combination was deadly and worked superbly for Chrysler and Eminem. After all, a good ad reflects the state of the consumer’s psyche and this one echoed what Americans wanted to hear… that the good times would be back again soon.

Tata Nano seems to be doing just that here. Its cute advertisement, where the little girl cuddles her first cute car, pulls at your heart strings; and as you smile, you almost feel a part of this family and share their happiness.

Boroplus too understood a woman like none other. It knew what a woman loves – appreciation. The advertisements of Boroplus moisturising lotion did just that by showing men going crazy over the complexion of women! Women loved it and Boroplus knew it did not need Amitabh Bachchan to sell its product, for it had hit the right chord with its audience.

The appeal of an advertisement also lies in its slogan, its punchline. “Virginia is for lovers” – the slogan worked so well that every resident of the city had this provocative slogan emblazoned on their car bumper stickers. Catch the imagination of the people and you will be able to bowl them over.

Understand what people want and innovate accordingly. The reason why Super Bowl was watched by 111 million people in America last Sunday was because it knew that to increase viewership, it had to promote the game among women and Hispanics. It did just that and made it the most popular show of the year. The reason why Suhaana of the Hindi soap ‘Sasural Genda Phool’ has been voted the most popular character by Indians is because she was just the person they loved to watch & talkabout (according to survey done by ‘Characters India Loves’).

A great ad guy understands human insecurities, wants and desires, and touches those very chords. Just the way Ali Ali and Maged Nassar, two ad guys of Cairo did. They knew what the people of Egypt were thinking and they used their creativity to transfer the feelings of people into one image. They took a decade-old photo of Hosni Mubarak, added the Hitler moustache & floppy hair, found a printer who agreed to print the image secretly, and behold, the revolution got an “image” to bash, and unify against.

Give people what they want. China loves a price war. It always increases sales of the brands that do it. After all, one of the best selling books of that region is The Art of War and they love a war to see the strongest one survive. Not so in America. They don’t like price wars (guess the real ones are more than enough for them to handle!).

GREAT MARKETING IS ABOUT GREAT RELATIONSHIPS

Business is about building relationships with clients and ensuring that they are genuinely happy. Business is not aboutjust “closing a deal,” it’s about genuinely caring for the people and finding out what they want.

Getting good customer insights is most important for not just survival but also to be really loved by your customers. 3M thought it had made a world-class innovation with “Post-it” notes. Then sales started falling. A keen observer of people, 3M immediately realised that this was the era of iPads & smartphones and no one wrote notes on paper but typed them into their gadgets. However, it also saw that these gadgets had made digital photography extremely popular. It took a team of one marketer and two lab-scientists to hit upon the idea of “Post-It-Picture-Paper,” an adhesive coated photo paper on which people could stick their photos & easily display them on their walls. The company found a way to survive!

Sitting in Finland, Nokia did not realise that just making low-cost phones would not help it capture the Indian market. A little thorough research showed that a lot of people could not read & hence were unable to use the phone in places like China, India and Nepal. A simple innovation helped it survive. It made a contact list, where images could be stored. Everyone found it easy. It worked!

All great relationships are based on the ability to really listen to your partner. Infosys does just that. It listens to its youngest recruits. N. R. Narayana Murthy introduced the “voice of youth” programme where each year, 9 very young & very bright recruitswere allowed to attend the very senior management council meeting to discuss their ideas with the top guys. In fact, every great company from P&G to RIM (makers of Blackberry) have at the top a CEO who sets a culture of listening. This way you understand people better, create marketing campaigns that work and build strong ever-lasting relationships, with both your customers and employees. That’s the most important aspect of marketing!

THE GREATEST EMOTION IS LOVE

It’s the right time of the year to acknowledge the power of this great emotion. Think about it, our best songs are love songs (love for spouse, parents, nation, children,family, whatever), our best movies are those where love finally wins, our best success stories are of people we love to love – the underdogs. The failures, whom no one gave a chance, but who fought all adversities & made it. Our best leaders are those who taught us love – be they our parents or Mahatma Gandhi, who in this issue of the TIME magazine tops the list of “Top 25 Political Icons” of all time. No one tilldate could beat Gandhiji’s philosophy of “ahimsa”. He showed the world how to win a war with love.

Our best campaigns are the ones that are most honest and the ones that speak the language people want to hear. If you can understand human nature, then you will always get a “YES” as an answer whenever you ask, “Will you be mine?” Love people. They’ll love you back!

BREAK KE BAAD… OOPS, SORRY… PEHLE!

2011-01-28T10:14:00.000+05:30

The movie was insipid, I agree! However, marketers have important lessons to learn – no, not from the film, but its title. Think about it, all our marketing activities are centered around the “Break”. The “breaks” are our lifelines. On TV, it’s the commercial break where all the action happens for marketers!

But does TV still work? Does it hold as much promise today as it did earlier?

IS TV DEAD?

TV has almost become a dirty word in today’s marketing world. Most people, especially the younger generations, seem to be spending all their time online. So who is watching TV?

According to the Association of National Advertisers, a survey done on US marketers showed that 62% of them believed that TV advertising had become less effective in the last couple of years.

However, they were in for a surprise as according to Deloitte’s 2009 State of the Media Democracy report, Americans were watching 18 hours of TV in 2009 as compared to 16 hours in 2008 – and 26% more people in 2009 than in 2008 choose TV as their favorite media! According to the 2009 Three Screens Report of Nielson, Americans were watching more TV than ever before. Out of the three screens, i.e, TV, internet and mobile, the former beat the others hallow, be it UK or USA. The Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) comes out with the most thorough surveys of media habits of consumers. According to its Touchpoint 3 survey, people in UK too were watching 3.7 hours of TV daily as compared to 1.8 hours of internet. In India, where TVscreens are more common than other screens, it’s definitely TV that wins!

The one gadget that is owned by most of the population of any country is TV. Also, the number of TV’s in each household is increasing. Some say that youths are watching less TV, whereas data suggests that historically, youngsters have always watched less TV and there has always been a positive correlation between age and TV viewership.

While it may sound trendier to talk of online and emerging media, the fact is that nothing motivates consumers to buy like TV spots can! So Fox Network focused on selling its TV spots and not its digital platform. Unlike other TV networks like NBC and CBS, who went to marketers with presentations showcasing not just their TV media but digital too, Fox decided to focus on only its TV networks. Their logic was simple. Nothing motivates a consumer to buy like a TV spot can.

According to a customized research done by the firm Marketing Evolution, TV accounts for almost 70 percent of the impact on a consumer’s purchase decisions. It’s an undisputed fact that the mass reach of TV and the power it has to build mass awareness is leaps and bounds ahead of any other media, be it radio, internet, out-ofhome or even cinema. This was reconfirmed by Price water house Coopers in a study to find the correlation between brand value and communication effectiveness. Out of all the forms of media, i.e, TV, press, internet, radio, direct mail and outdoors, the study concluded that on an average, £1 million increase in TV marketing investment yields £4.5 million in sales. There was a very high correlation between increase in brand value and advertising investment on TV. It just proved one old fact – nothing can build brands like TV can.

The internet has not been able to erode the power of TV. Rather, according to the study done by Les Binet and Peter Field (which incidentally is the most quoted study), campaigns that used the TV medium have been growing in effectiveness over the past three decades! In fact, TV advertising today has become more effective over time, and every possible research is proving it. Yes, direct mail is fast being replaced by the internet, but no one can replace TV. Where else will you find the comfort of snuggling up on a couch in the living room watching your favorite soap and sipping a hot bowl of “mom-made” soup? TV is alive like never before and every research is proving that.

HOW DO I GET NOTICED?!

Yes, agreed that we all love watching TV. But do we love watching the ads? Do we notice the zillions of them shown during the break? Actually, it’s the “Breaks” that are a problem and not the TV! Like in life, so in marketing, we spend most of our time thinking of the “Break”, be it the break up, or the big break, or the lunch break – or for marketing men, the commercial break! Not for life, but yes, an interesting innovation seems to be happening for marketing men. It’s called “virtual advertising”. A digital image of the product/brand appears on TV screens while one is viewing a sports match or a programme. So, I don’t need to advertise during the break. Rather, digitization helps me insert my brand during the programme. Of course, if it’s a match, the stadium audience does not see the products or the advertisements, as they are, well, virtual! But the TV audience does! This new innovation can be seen during the cricket matches. Since it all happens during the match, nobody can miss it. Advertisers don’t need to wait for the commercial break where chances of getting lost are very high. They can now digitally and very creatively put their ads during the show – virtually breaking the clutter!

Vikram Tanwar, the CEO of the sports management company Planman Stars, who is responsible for getting this technology to India, says that it’s much more effective than the regular TV commercials.

For one, it makes your ad “zapper proof”. It can be changed according to regions. If the programme is being aired in Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, each audience gets to see its own brands in the virtual advertisements. Sponsors can choose to show their advertisements on a country-bycountry, region-by-region, or even marketby- market basis! The advertisement can stay on the screen for 30 seconds... or 30 minutes, depending on where and how you insert it. It can come on a virtual billboard, or on the ground, or pop-out from the ground, or fall from heaven, or emerge from the spectators – the way you can innovate is limitless. It’s an astonishing technology, exploiting the simple fact that people pay more attention during a show than during a commercial break – so put your advertisement right there.

This technology debuted in the USA in 1998, and now Zee’s Ten Sports is doing the same with Micromax Mobiles, Royal Stag and McDowell’s “virtually” reaching out to their audiences – before the break!

These advertisements are being inserted in absolutely novel, innovative ways into almost all TV programmes; sports and nonsports. Because it’s so different, the recall of these advertisements is as high as 84%. Since they are interesting, more than half the audience did not mind them.

Virtual is the new way to grab eyeballs this year!

A NECESSARY EVIL

Call it what you may, but TV is here to stay. For even though ‘online’ is at the top of everybody’s minds, it’s not resulting in increased sales or brand building – at least, not yet. The lure of TV is immense and you just need to look at the Super Bowl rates to understand the impact of TV. On February 6, almost 100 million Americans (and many more in other parts of the world) would be watching the game. No wonder, CBS is charging $2.5 million for a 30 second commercial – and all its commercial slots have already been sold out! That’s the power of this media.

Groupon, the company that sells bargain deals online, knows that it’s not the help of Google, but of TV that it requires in order to grow. (Google tried to acquire it for $6bn, but couldn’t) It could not find a slot during the game, but it has settled for the pregame spot. After all, TV builds brands, like no other. Even the internet biggies know it and are not leaving a chance to be seen on it! One man who really needs brand building and knows how to do it is Obama. He, like every year, is not going to miss TV on February 6. No, not watching it, but coming on it. He has agreed to be interviewed on Fox Sports sometime during the fourhour pre-game show. Super Bowl is after all the world’s most watched programme; and no one, not the big brands or even the President, wants to miss it.

If you need to build a big brand, you have to think “TV”. Use your creativity to “virtually” rise up from the clutter. A new way is of course to air your advertisement “break ke pehle” – before the break! It works!

DON’T BREAK YOUR NEW YEAR RESOLUTION THIS YEAR

2010-12-30T10:49:00.000+05:30

It’s time again to make New Year resolutions, make new promises, set new targets and make new plans. For most of us, it’s also a time to “wish-I-haddone-more”, wish I had planned better, worked harder, quit smoking, kept my new year resolution of 2010! This new year would also be the same as last year, if we do not start thinking differently. The last decade proved that in business, as in personal life, those brands and people who reinvented, stayed in business. You need to be alert and look out for new trends; but more than that, you need to be more aggressive in observing what’s not working and then changing it fast. Being in love with your old ways (however successful they were in the past) can be disastrous.

OLD NEED NOT BE GOLD

If you want to raise a happy child, the rule is, “Till he is five years old, treat him like a king. Till he is 13, treat him like a prince. From 13 to 18, treat him like a pauper. After 18, become his best friend.” The crux is that good parents change their ways as their children grow. Good marketers too change their strategies as markets and times change.

What worked this decade will be outdated in the new one. In the 1970s, the hottest marketing invention was the ‘Direct Mailer’. It is known as ‘Junk Mail’ today. The 1980s was dominated by “collect tokens; and exchange for gifts.” You were encouraged to collect bottle caps, tokens, labels and encouraged to exchange them for gifts, discounts etc. Today, you log on to Groupon.com or snapdeal.com and find out exciting discount offers of the day. After all, who has the patience today to wait and collect a desired number of tokens and then get the discounts. The 1990s saw the explosion of ‘Loyalty Cards’. Every retailer had a loyalty programme, which promised discounts and freebies. Today, the consumer is not motivated by just discounts. He wants more. He wants to take charge – and Smirnoff showed him how. It launched a campaign named “Be There”. You were invited to a nightclub, but there was more it. Loyal consumers even got a chance to plan which music they wanted to hear and everything else they wanted to do that night via Smirnoff’s Facebook page. Today, those are the Fan Pages on Facebook that do more business for a brand, than loyalty cards do.

The new decade is all about ‘interactivity’. On December 14, 2010, Apple launched its first iAd for the iPad with the advertisement of Disney’s new film Tron Legacy. The advertisement featured 10 minutes of video and movie stills. Ipad had a movie theater locator with showtimings and a preview of the sound track, which you, as a privileged user, had the option of purchasing from iTunes. With the iPad becoming the “it” thing for gifting this holiday season, and with already more than 7.5 million iPad users worldwide, advertising professionals would soon have to reinvent and start thinking beyond the 30 or 60 second spots on TV, for those are the interactive advertisements that will be the next new exciting trend of the coming years.

All that you learnt about marketing in school is going to change totally. So be ready to give up your favourite ideas and start adopting new ones.

INNOVATION IS NOT GOOD SOMETIMES

A great leader, like a great parent, changes and moulds his ways first. More importantly, a good leader never fails to accept his mistakes. It helps him to remove the shackles, free himself from the burden of his faults and move faster.

On April 10 this year, Microsoft launched its social networking phones Kin1 and Kin2. Exactly 79 days later, on June 30, 2010, it killed the products. A record! No other products till date had had such a short lifespan. To survive, you need to innovate; but to sustain success, you need to quickly kill innovations that went wrong. Sometimes, there is no second chance for flops. Intelligent marketers know that. ESPN launched its mobile phones in 2006 with the idea of offering exclusive ESPN content. No one bought either the product or the idea. ESPN withdrew the concept within eight months. HD DVD was supposed to be the next big thing after the traditional DVD. However, Blu–ray of Sony took away the cake and the Toshiba led HD DVD disappeared from the forefront within two years.

In their haste to outperform their competitors, sometimes apparently great sounding innovations fail to perform. An intelligent marketer should not hesitate to accept defeat, drop the idea and move on. It’s more cost effective that way, than trying to pump in more money in marketing a flop idea. Sometimes, it is argued that marketing kills the spirit of innovation. A dead idea, with excellent marketing can extend the life of that idea. We need to watch out for such ideas and kill them at the right time. Microsoft launched Zune in 2006, to compete with the iPod. It came nowhere close. Even today, Zune is struggling. Time you gave up the fight Bill Gates and dropped it. After all, when it comes to innovation, the one man, the one company that defeats all by miles is Steve Jobs and Apple. The 1990s saw Apple losing out to competitors and almost fading away; but the last decade belonged to Steve Jobs. Jobs has set new benchmarks, created and started new trends and changed marketers and consumers forever.

REINVENT & REJOICE

The key to successful reinvention is consistent investment and focus on innovation. The one company that dared to challenge and even defeat the biggies is Samsung. Whoever thought that this Korean company could defeat Japanese electronic giants – but Samsung did just that. Consistent investment in innovation has helped it beat giants like Sony; and now, Apple too is feeling threatened by it.

It is innovation that has transformed HP from an under performing printer-reliant giant to the world’s largest tech company. Huawei Technologies managed to become the #2 telecom-equipment provider and to beat big competitors like Nokia Siemens through constant product updates. The biggest innovator of the decade award definitely goes to Facebook. It is gobbling up competitors and making the whole world its consumer. By constantly innovating, it’s ensured that no one will come even remotely close to it.

Success makes us comfortable. No matter how impressive, we cannot rest on past laurels. The key is to identify when a successful idea has reached its full potential and is ready to be discarded or reinvented or rejuvenated. Leaders who reinvent themselves are the ones who reinvent their companies too. IBM was famous for its big mainframe computing systems. Today, the company has a large services component, responsible for its growth and profitability.

The decade started with the burst of the dot-com bubble in the year 2000. Thousands and thousands lost all their money, hundreds of companies closed down. Then in 2004, Tim O’Reilly and John Batelle held the first Web 2.0 conference and shocased to the world the immense benefits of “the web as a platform.” This resulted in a plethora of social media sites being created, which changed our world forever. The internet was reinvented and rejuvenated. Like never before. Today, it’s the internet & the social networking sites that are turning our world around.

Failures are a part of life and the strong reinvent and take failures in their stride. However, the players who leave the maximum impact are the ones who don’t take success for granted. They genuinely believe that it is only constant change that will give them sustained success.

It’s time to reinvent as the New Year approaches. It’s time to think deep, to really feel the urge to live your life. So, all that you have wanted to do but never did – go ahead, do it! Start with yourself; give up one bad habit. Stop smoking, give up on junk food, eat less and reinvent yourself. You deserve it. As you start reinventing yourself, you will not hesitate to reinvent your team, your leadership style, your marketing campaign and your brand.

Let’s end the New Year in truly believing in the power of reinvention, for that will help us to keep our New Year resolutions.

YOU DON’T KNOCK. YOU JUST WALK ON IN!

2010-12-16T10:38:00.000+05:30

Yes, it’s too time consuming to wait to be let in. If you want to create an impact, you have to be quick. You have to be aggressive. You don’t knock. You just walk on in! In marketing too, a lot of brands have done it by catching our attention and our imaginations and walking right into our lives.

In fact, when you do so, it doesn’t matter whether you are big or small, old or new. What matters is how aggressive you are. If you put your energies in the right direction, even the mighty will crumble in front of you.

DARE TO DO THE NEW

The person topping the list of “Dares” seems to be Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, who is spilling the beans on the Pentagon, the Government, and even on corporations. He has shown what “being bold” can do. A single man who has dared to take on the Goliaths, much like some brands, the Davids, who took on themighty Goliaths and defeated them.

A new player in the telecommunications sector, this brand has shaken the old players. Its advertising campaign said it all. “Do the new and the world will follow, like other mobile networks did, or at least tried to. 1 paisa per second. Across India. Any network. No special packs. For life. Do the new.” Tata Docomo changed the rules of the game with its innovative pricing strategy. Another new entrant created waves in the Indian markets. Yes, it’s always been bold, been different and even irreverent, and that’s what makes consumers love it so much. Virgin entered the Indian shores with its Virgin mobile with STD rates @ 20 paise/min, and started the “Indian Panga League”. A series of telephonic conversations between fans of IPL teams. Eight passionate IPL fans from eight different states fighting all day long over STD calls. The tongue-in-cheek humour was a first of its kind to be seen on Indian shores. It was daring, delighted the fans and even dared to challenge the biggies in the business. Much like its founder Richard Branson who has always challenged the norms and the big players and managed to snatch his piece of the market share pie from them.

A clear favourite of the customers and with a market share of around 80%, Hero Honda stands way ahead of its competitors. Yet, this small player used a creative strategy to challenge the Goliath. Bajaj knew the best way was to target ‘mileage’, something that Indians value the most. Hero Honda had become famous because of its “Fill it. Shut it. Forget it.” campaign, which showed consumers how fuel efficient its bikes were. Bajaj did the same. Its “Discover India with the power of 1 litre” campaign highlighted the Discover bike’s super mileage power in an extremely interesting manner. The travellers on a Bajaj bike discovered amazing places like Mattur, near Manglore, where people still speak Sanskrit, places like the Magnetic Hill near Ladhak, which has magnetic properties strong enough to pull bikes uphill. The ads truly helped us discover India and helped the company discover new markets. The challenger ads helped Discover surpass its monthly target of 30,000 bikes, as sales touched 75,000! It sure made a big dent in the leader’s market share.

Just a good product will not solve your problems. You need to aggressively market it and many times you need to take on competitors headlong, challenge them and shake them up, so that the consumers notice you.

FIGHT FOR THE NO.1 SPOT

It’s not easy to reach the No.1 spot; you need to fight hard, and sometimes even snatch that spot, like Rin did. It came out with advertisements which clearly mentioned it was superior. The ads stated, “Tide se kahin behatar safedi de Rin”. Of course, Tide filed a case and Rin got into a controversy; but it helped generate a buzz – which is most important. Audi joined the top league when it came out with the advertisement which mentioned, “Audi is growing faster than BMW, Lexus & Mercedes.” Now, whether it was actually growing faster or not, did not bother the consumer much. However, it changed people’s perceptions about the car. Now, they clubbed it along with BMW and Mercedes. Audi jumped the rungs and established itself as the premium brand. Yes, sales increased too.

Sometimes, the fight for the top spot is taken public, consumers love it, and it never fails to grab eyeballs. Coke and Pepsi have been doing it for years. Apple and its humorous takes on Microsoft defined its brand personality and brand image as uber cool in comparison to the fuddy duddy one that competitor Microsoft had.

FIGHT NOT JUST FOR NO.1 BUT THE NO.2 SPOT TOO

With the marketplace getting so cluttered for the No.2 was neglected. Of course, not always. Some very intelligent marketers knew that when there is no space at the top, it pays to be clearly labelled as No.2, for that makes people notice you. Avis did that years ago. Hertz was the leader and had the maximum awareness when it came to car rentals. So, Avis brought out its iconic ad, “We are number 2, that’s why we try harder.” Everyone knew who was No.1, but now for the first time a new slot was defined. So, if for some reason, a consumer could not get Hertz, he knew whom to call next. Avis carved a niche for itself, and did brisk business for now the consumer knew, maybe not No.1, but Avis was as good, and definitely better than hoards of others.

Hindustan Times (HT) seems to be doing the same in Mumbai. Its ads claim that “Hindustan Times beats DNA to become No.2 in Mumbai.” The beginning of this month saw HT advertising how it was now very close to the market leader, The Times of India, with a readership of 5.92 lakhs, a lead of 17,000 over DNA.

Sometimes, it pays to play the second fiddle. Miller High Life has always positioned itself as the “good” beer, providing “good” value for money. Miller Coors is America’s second largest company and it decided to take the second position seriously. In 2009, when the market leaders were paying $3 million for 30 seconds of airtime during the Super Bowl, Miller said it was No.2 and did not believe in spending so much and thought a “one-second ad” during the Super Bowl Sunday was enough to make its point. So, days before the Super Bowl, it started its 30 second teasers, promoting its 1-second-ad that it would air on Super Bowl Sunday, for its commonsense philosophy could be conveyed in just one second. The No.2, with a tiny ad budget drew more attention than the big spenders.

CALLING YOURSELF NO.2 ALWAYS WORKS – WE ALL LOVE THE UNDERDOGS!

If you are sure about your product and your philosophy, you can tackle not one, not two, but many competitors at one go – much like our Bollywood heroes who cansingle-handedly fight all the bad guys and emerge victorious. That’s exactly what Brita water filter system did. It came out with ads which claimed that tap water in developed countries was excellent and there was no need to spend money on bottled water and increase pollution, for 16 million gallons of oil were consumed to make plastic water bottles – which could be totally avoided by using the reusable Brita water filter bottles. It asked you to drink responsibly and avoid buying bottled water in plastic bottles. Tap water was as good after all!

It takes vision and guts to speak out against the leader. But if you have a better product, it’s best to just bulldoze your way into the minds of the consumer with an aggressive marketing campaign. It works! Don’t knock ! Just barge in!

SPACE TO STREET DANCING THE FUTURE OF BUSINESS!

2010-12-03T10:30:00.001+05:30

His business plans go a little beyond – well, infinity, if I may put it that way. The vision of his company is to make us a multiplanetary civilization. Yes, we needn’t fear being stuck on Earth forever when some unforeseen tragedy strikes. For that 39 year old Elon Musk and his company Space X, are inventing a reusable orbit-class rocket, which according to him, will be one of the most important inventions in history. He plans to take us to various planets and he may be successful, faster than we think he can. However far flung his vision may sound, for starters, the man has managed to win a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to help deliver cargo to the International Space Station located 200 miles above the Earth.

Wow! That’s what dreamers are made of, those who dare to think beyond – in this case, way beyond the ordinary. Elon is also one entrepreneur who has his eyes set on the future. He has a car company. It’s no ordinary car company but an electric car company named Tesla. He also has a power firm; no ordinary power firm, but a solar power firm named Solar City. In the distant future, probably those are the businesses that will thrive, and survive.

FORGET ALL THAT YOU LEARNT! IT’S OUTDATED!

Traditionally, the companies that traded in oil were the ones who made the maximum money and became the world’s biggest companies. So you had companies like Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP etc dominating the lists. They were soon joined by companies that used this oil to run their products. So those were the carmakers who started sharing space with them; and you saw companies like Toyota Motors, General Motors, et al join the group. However, the new trend is different today. The world’s largest corporation is one that manufactures more or less nothing – forget thriving on natural resources. Today, the world’s largest corporation is Walmart. From being a discount retailer chain to one that believes in selling energy-efficient bulbs (it sold 145 million of these in 15 months) to joining the Clinton Climate Initiative, Walmart knew that just giving discounts was not going to be enough. It had to show customers that it was progressive too. That and some quick global expansions validating that perspective have today made it No.1.

Things are changing fast. The Hotmail is hot no more. Gmail replaced it; and even that too could be a gone-mail soon, for now you have Facemail – the new service provided by Facebook. A lot of youngsters today don’t even remember when they last sent an e-mail. Its so passé... You message or mail via Facebook now.

It was the leader in car-rentals and ruled the business. It was the undisputed leader. Even its competitors acknowledged that. That’s why, when Avis wanted to catch the attention of consumers, it did what all others had done – acknowledged the leader. Hertz was the leader and Avis said so in its advertisement that read, “We are No.2, that’s why we try harder.” The advertisements shot Avis to fame, but little did they know that things would change soon for both Avis and Hertz. Here came a company that defined business. Its mission: “We are redefining the way people think about transportation.” This company went beyond car rentals. Now, you could rent a car for even an hour and at very nominal rates. Zipcar found that 77% of Manhattan (New York) households don’t own a car and knew instantly that America was ready for a carsharing company. Zipcar beat Hertz in its own game. Today, Hertz is trying hard to cope up by introducing its own car-sharing business model “Connect by Hertz” to get some share of the car-sharing segment. Zipcar is, however, cooler. Its members are called Zipsters. They are modern and believe in car-sharing more than in car-owning as the way to live. Everybody from students to businesses now hire a car of their choice, that too at rock-bottom rates. It’s simple, fun and will help change the world for the better. It’s the future of travelling. It’s the business of the future.

DON’T FORGET WHAT MOMMA TAUGHT YOU

Remember what mom told us as kids; “Sharing is caring.” Today, that’s the business model that’s giving the maximum profits. The future of business is sharing, as Lisa Gansky very appropriately mentions in her new book The Mesh.

From a consumer’s point of view, it’s much easier to hire (share) than buy. If it were not so, Netflix (the iconic DVD rental company) would not have been so successful. Bagborroworsteal.com would not have been so popular; so much so that it even featured in the movie Sex and the City. Why buy when you can hire it at a fraction of the price? It’s no more just music that people are sharing on the Internet.

ThredUp.com is an interesting website where you can send a box of clothes your child has outgrown and swap them for another box of clothes that fit your child. All you do is pay $5 plus shipping charges every time you swap. A box-full of clothes for just $5 is not a bad deal! Not bad at all, considering the company has already raised $1.4 million, which brings its total funding to $1.7 million. A startup couldn’t have asked for more. It’s already got 12,000 members, saved families an estimated $195,000 in children’s clothing, all in a year’s time. That’s what makes for a great business idea. Sharing saves money and makes money for you too.

“A great deal everyday” – that’s what makes Groupon a company everybody is salivating for. Be it restaurants, bars, films, sports, there is a money-saving deal everyday that Groupon sends to its members via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. It could even be a simple 50% off on a spa treatment. However, the offer is valid if a certain number of people opt for it. So, if you find an interesting deal, you need to “share” it with your friends. If the required number of people don’t choose it, the offer expires. It’s crazily good and everybody loves to save money. The company started in 2008, and today boasts of revenues upwards of $50 million a month. This April, it was valued at $1 billion. With 20 million subscribers, and presence in 29 countries, the business model has inspired hundreds of clones.

Everybody wants a share of the lucrative business idea, and everybody wants Groupon. In early December 2010, it was rumoured that not only was Google attempting to takeover Groupon in a $2.5 billion bid, but also that Yahoo was willing to pay $4 billion for the firm. This sure seems to be one of the best ways to ‘share’ & earn.

Even its clone in India snapdeal.com is today listed among India’s most visited websites. Not bad for a company started 8-9 months ago.

‘Sharing’ is the new business model. Share a car, a deal, clothes, dvds, bags, anything and chances are you’ll make it big. There’s an old saying, “You become successful by helping others become successful.” In this business too, you earn when you help others save by sharing.

THE FUTURE IS HERE

Street dancing just became the next big thing. A group of street dancers decided to show the world how beautiful street dancing could be. When Miley Cyrus (then 15 years old) left a message with one of the dancers that she loved their show Step Up 2, the group saw this as an opportunity. They didn’t know her number, so they challenged her on YouTube to an online dance battle. Whoever thought that that would work, got it perfectly right. It worked like hell and the online battle got a million hits within a week. Soon, Lindsay Lohan, Diana Ross, Adam Sandler all joined the battle and this group, LXD (The Legion of Extraordinary Dancers), became the biggest hit. It’s now a web series broadcast exclusively on Hulu. It’s more popular than the regular dance shows on TV. LXD showed the world a new way of viewing art and making money. They have become so popular that from the Oscars to Bill Gates, everyone has seen them and loves them.

If you thought charity meant donating old books and clothes to the needy, think again. Worldreader is an organization that believes in putting a whole library in the hands of the needy. It’s distributing Kindles (e-readers) to the children of the villages of Ghana in Africa, for now they can get any book from anywhere in the world and even “listen” to a book if they don’t know how to read. The e-readers are not just opening up their minds, but are opening up a whole new world for these people. That’s the charity of the future.

If you have an idea, you can change the rules, for in today’s world, the rule is – there are no rules. That’s the future of business. Have you got your idea for the future?

HOW TO KISS AND TELL!

2010-11-19T10:34:00.000+05:30

Your first kiss, your first love, listening to an old song, walking in the rain, receiving a mail from an old acquaintance, watching your child sleep, watching the sunset, waking up to find you still have an hour to sleep, getting a gift that you were planning to buy, seeing your parents smile, sipping coffee in the winter sun! Guess these are just some of the moments that are our ‘bestest’ ones. Life is full of challenges, heartbreaks, pressures and tensions, but true satisfaction and long lasting happiness comes from some of the simplest things that life has to offer.

As in life, so in business, the best things are the simplest. Let’s take a closer look.

THE BEST COMMUNICATION IS THE SIMPLEST

The most famous scientist who ever lived, and the person responsible for giving the most famous equation of the world: E=mc2, was, yes we all know, Albert Einstein. What made this man so famous and made his theories create the maximum impact was not just his genius in analysing things, but in his ability to explain even the most complicated theories in the simplest manner possible. Even a layman, a non-scientific brain could understand them. One of the simplest explanations of Einstein’s ‘Theory of Relativity’ was given by a young fellow, and this is what he said: “When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute and it seems longer than an hour. That’s the crux of the Theory of Relativity.” Einstein too could simplify the various laws of physics and make everyone understand them.

We live in an “over communicated” society where an avalanche of news, messages, ads, et al, greet us every single day. If you want to stand out, you need to be simple; it’s the best way to beat the clutter.

Think of the punch line of any advertisement you like. Chances are, it will be short and simple. The most memorable advertisements have been the simplest ones.

Ask a creative guy and he will tell you how difficult it is to be simple. Simplicity is an art, and as one of the most famous artists of our times Leonardo Da Vinci said: “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” A great machine is not necessarily the most sophisticated one; it’s rather the one that’s simplest to understand by the person who will use it. The corollary? A great marketing message is the one that’s absolutely clear to the consumers. “Iodex maliye, kaam pe chaliye” is the simplest way to describe a quick-pain relief ointment. “The ultimate driving machine” best describes the pleasure that money could buy! BMW remains the world’s hottest brand. Alka Seltzer’s punch line “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh what a relief it is!” made the brand an instant hit. From Nike’s “Just do it” to McDonald’s “I’m lovin it” to Coca Cola’s “It’s the real thing”, those are simple sentences that have been responsible for creating the magic and making the brand name stick in the mind of the consumers.

In today’s world, it’s of utmost importance to focus on simplicity. In fact, your future survival will depend on it. According to UNICEF, “Nearly a billion people will enter the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names and a third of them are women.” According to the National Adult Literacy Survey (1992), some 47% of the US population demonstrated low levels of literacy. The case would not be better for most other economies. As business people, we need to understand that these are our consumers and if we really want to sell them, or tell them anything, it better be simple for them to truly understand and appreciate the message.

A simple marketing campaign, breaks through the clutter, is cost effective and works! Yes, simplicity works! Not surprising then that this year, the New York Festival, which awards the world’s best advertising campaigns, has introduced a new category “Marketing Effectiveness” which awards the simplest and most effective campaigns.

In the long run, those will be simple things that last. As Richard Bach said: “The simplest things are often the truest.” The simplest campaigns are the most honest – no wonder they work

THE BEST BUSINESSES ARE THE SIMPLEST

This man is responsible for creating the world’s most competitive enterprise. When he became the CEO in 1981, its market capitalisation was $13 billion. In 2000, when Jack Welch stepped down, GE’s market cap was at $500 billion. His prescription for winning: “Have the courage to be simple.” He says keeping things simple is the key. Simple messages travel faster, simple designs work better, simple ideas impact the world and consumers more.

The world’s most successful investor and self-made billionaire, Warren Buffet, says it’s a simple business made complicated by investment advisors and analysts. His advice is simple; his way of working is simple too. He spends most of his day alone, thinking and analysing. If he wants to invest, he studies the financials himself. His advice, “Don’t follow the crowd, don’t rely on an outsider, but [do] your own research and invest in a company that has a strong foundation.” That’s the way he made his billions; not with the help of complicated models and charts but by finding good companies built on simple but strong foundations.

Simplicity is the route to success. While others were making complicated marketing strategies, this company decided to simplify the purchase process of the consumers. It took the product directly to consumers’ homes where one could see, touch, experience the product and then buy it. Dell made a fortune by just simplifying the way computers were sold. This direct marketing strategy showed the world a new and easy way of doing business.

Google would not have been such a hit so soon had it not been so simple to use. Right from the design of its page to the process, everything was kept as simple as possible.

Whoever thought something as basic and simple as a flip-flop could build a business empire and a world famous brand! Inspired by the Zori, the Japanese sandals made of fabric straps and rice straw soles, the Havaiana flip flops took the world by storm with their colorful, trendy designs and catchy slogans. Today, it is the hottest brand of Brazil. The brand has an exclusive outlet everywhere, as the ad slogan goes: “Havaianas. Everyone wears them.” Today, everybody wants to own a pair. Their product promise is simple – here is a slipper that would not lose its shape, not smell and the straps would not get loose. A simple product, a simple promise of quality and an iconic brand was born!

Nick Robertson was in the business of entertainment, but he noticed how much people loved the clothes, accessories, et al, that celebrities wore. He started a website with a simple idea of giving fans information about who was wearing what and called it ASOS (As seen on screen). Today, ASOS, not just gives info, but sells the labels that celebrities wear and its own line of clothes too! A simple business idea, snowballed into a huge profitable venture!

Tsubaki, a hair-care brand of Shiseido, saw that most beauty brands used Western models in their advertisements. Tsubaki realised that if Japanese women were supposed to buy their product, then it was best to show Japanese models. Their ad campaign did just that and showed how Japanese women were just as beautiful, if not more, than Western models. The brand, with a simple change in its strategy, won the hearts of the consumers and market share.

Facebook has changed the way people communicate, do business, advertise and search and now even send e-mails. It became a rage because of its simplicity. Just a click could get you going. This is the key to any good website too. Simple sites are not so expensive; and they even work better. Expensive ‘Flash’ sites give you no added edge. Most people don’t watch the flash and the few who do don’t do it more than once. It’s best to keep the site simple. Look at Apple’s website – its clean & clutter free. Twitter is being touted as the best designed website for its absolute simplicity.

According to the survey done by Advertising Age of the World’s Hottest Brands, two brands stood out in India, the Nano, and the Fullerton India Credit Co. Both businesses had a simple goal. The first one wanted to build a car for the common man about whom no one had thought of earlier; and the second decided to give loans to the simple, small-business owners of rural India for whom no bank had given any importance earlier. These small businessmen were scared to approach the big brands for loans, so Fullerton went to them and simplified the process. With the help of mobile vans, it went from village to village and helped in giving loans to these people to build their businesses – and in the process, they built a great brand for themselves too.

You de-cluttered your house this Diwali to make way for the goddess of wealth to enter. It’s time you did the same with your business. You need to win over your customers and the best way is to KISS them – Keep It Simple Silly. Keep your business ideas, vision statements, websites, your product design, your communication, as simple as possible, for that’s the best way to sell.

THE ART OF GIVING

2010-10-22T11:06:00.001+05:30

Once again it’s that time of the year when the world gets into a festive mood. It’s going to be Christmas soon and marketers are already, ready with their plans and their campaigns. Back in India, Dussehra just got over, but festivities have only just begun, with the grand-dad of all festivals – “Diwali”, just around the corner. It’s that time of the year when everyone goes on a buying spree. Consumption reigns supreme this time.

However at the heart of all this frantic activity lies a simple thought – “the power of giving”. Yes gift giving is central to Diwali. It’s a way of paying homage to the deity of wealth – Goddess Lakshmi. No wonder Diwali is the largest gift giving and shopping festival of India. Gifts symbolise one’s prayers to the almighty for the prosperity and well being of the recipient. “Giving” is at the heart of all festivities, and “giving” should also be at the heart of all marketing activities.

GIVE TO GET

This kind of giving is one of the oldest tricks in the books – a free gift! An interesting ‘freebie’ to help sell products. It’s something marketers have been using for decades to lure customers away from the competition.

Giving is powerful. It is a very strong way of communicating. It is “emotional communication”, which is one form of communication that creates the maximum impact. Be it in business, where you need to build relations with consumers or be it in personal relationships, one needs to develop and build emotional intelligence skills, to have and to maintain enriching relationships.

The effectiveness of “giving” (read as Freebies) is not something new. Marketers world over know the lure that the word ‘FREE’ holds for consumers. It somehow always works. An interesting discovery happened at Amazon.com. This was at a time when one was supposed to pay an additional $3.95 for shipping if one purchased a book worth $16.95. Then they introduced a new scheme, which said if the customers bought another book & the total became more than $31.90, the shipping would be FREE! The FREE Shipping was so tempting that even though many did not want a second book, but for availing the free shipping, they were ready to pay for the second book!

“Consumers respond to the allure of FREE like starving people at a buffet,” says Dan Ariely in his book Predictably Irrational. Getting something at “zero cost” seems totally irresistible. No wonder, as you get ready to shop for Diwali, you will be lured by these free, “zero cost” products for every purchase. A TV stand “free” with the TV could swing your choice away from the competitor who does not make a similar offer.

Yes India contributed “ZERO” to the world, but did not realise how important a marketing tool it would become. A “free gift” is one of the best ways to improve sagging sales. After all, who does not like products that come at ‘zero’ cost. So deep is our love for ‘zero’ that Pepsi discovered that if it put “Zero calories” on its cans, the sales were more than even if it put “one calorie”!!

This festive season, marketers world over will be tempting consumers with “gifts” for every purchase they make. It’s the best way to build an emotional connect with the consumers.

GIVE TO GET BETTER

However ‘giving’ is now acquiring a whole new meaning today. The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) celebrated its 100-year anniversary last week in Orlando. The biggies of marketing attended the convention. There was P&G, and Coca-Cola and Dell, and all of them agreed on one thing – “the power of a gift”. The “gift” in question was not just a “freebie”, but a gift that would make the world a better place. Tide started its ‘Loads of Hope’ campaign after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans. It sent a mobile laundermat to the affected area and washed, dried & folded the clothes of the families hit by the hurricane – for free. They realized what a big difference such a little thing as clean clothes made to the people. Not just this, P&G seems to be giving a whole new meaning to its business statement. It says, “We are in the business of helping moms”. It’s no more just a company that makes household and personal care products. This time it’s “giving” moms everywhere what they deserve most – “recognition”. It signed up this July, with the International Olympic Committee, which would give P&G global sponsorship rights for the next five Olympic Games, from London 2010 to 2020. This will help it to “give” back to moms globally. Under its “Proud sponsor of Moms” campaign, it took 25 moms to watch their children contest in the Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010. It’s even planning to make a documentary video series called “Raising an Olympian”, which would tell stories of Olympic hopefuls as seen through the eyes of their moms. All this has resulted in 30% higher recall among target audiences and of all the Olympic advertisements, P&G Olympic ads showed a 62% higher message recall! That’s the power of “giving back”.

Brands today are looking beyond “freebies” and “giving” to causes that are relevant to their brand. It makes them more likeable, people connect better. Agreed that the purpose of a business is to make a profit, but no business can truly succeed if that’s its sole motivation. Your business should stand for a purpose, a cause too.

Giving with a twist of humor makes the campaign even more interesting & memorable. “Deforest yourself. Reforest the World” is an interesting campaign that was launched by Philips Norelco this year in May, where it challenged the hairiest men of New York to have their chest “deforested” by actress Carmen Electra! For every Body groom product sold, Philips would donate one tree. After all, it believed that ‘deforestation’ was today acceptable only on the human body!!

When you give to help make the world a better place, you win more hearts. This strategy is not just good for the world, but your bottom lines too.

GIVE TO GET BETTER, OR GET BEATEN

An organization can stand the tests of time if it has a solid purpose for its existence defi ned by its founders. Business with a sense of responsibility is what makes for a strong business house that won’t be over in one generation.

An interesting survey caught my eye which talked of “Good Brands of 2010”. Topping the survey were, Google at No. 1, Apple at No. 2, Jamie Oliver at No. 3 and so on. Interestingly, all were great givers. Google gave us the power to search for whatever we wanted – for free! Apple gave the world some of its best products & is actually helping every possible business do business better today. In 2009, while other business were fighting for survival, there were some who racked up double digit sales & profits growth. At number one was a company United Service Automobile Associations (USAA) ranked 132 on the 2010 Fortune 500 list. In 2009, its revenues grew by 36%. Apart from other factors, it was a simple iPhone application that its chief Joe Robles developed, which helped the company grow. The application allowed soldiers from rugged outposts like Iraq and Afghanistan to deposit money from anywhere in the world, thus making USAA a leader in mobile banking. Think about it. It’s not just the iPhone, or the stunning iPad that have made Apple score a 12.5% revenue growth in 2009, inspite of its CEO Steve Jobs being on medical leave for the first half of 2009; but it’s the zillions of applications that Apple gives for “free” which make its products most appealing. A month after iPad’s launch, Apple’s iTunes store recorded its 10 billionth download! Yes, “giving” makes a difference – and how!

Jamie Oliver does business of a different kind. Through his TV show “Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution USA”, he raised awareness about the way children eat – especially in public schools. Food was not just meant to taste good, but improve lives. Giving American children the knowledge of healthy eating helped Oliver do brisk business too.

As David Ogilvy said in his famous quote, “The consumer is not a moron, she is your wife”. Today’s consumer is quick to reject falsehoods as easily as he is ready to accept authenticity.

Yes, it’s time for business houses to think about “giving” & giving beyond freebies. This Diwali, let us pledge to give and give freely & from the heart. As Winston Churchill said, “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give”. So give, give away, your best ideas, your best thoughts, give freebies, give to the society. The best businesses are headed by great givers. Tatas, one of India’s most respected business houses, showed how to give. It gave the poor a car (Nano) a water purifier (Swach) and now it’s gone & given Rs.220 crores to Harvard, thus leaving an indelible impression on the world. You start giving too, and there is no better time than now to experience the power of giving. It’s the right time to master the art of giving.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR FIRST MILLION!

2010-10-08T09:58:00.000+05:30

There was something very interesting that happened at Christie’s (the auction house) in London on September 29, 2010. The auction was very unique. The room was packed and beyond – people had even formed queues outside Christie’s; the heightened interest made the authorities shift the auctioning to a bigger room. People were bidding not just inside the room, many were on telephone, many more were registered online, from countries all over the world. From New York to Dubai, nobody wanted to miss the action… It was the auction of 300 items from Lehman Brothers’ London headquarters – paintings, miniature battleships, et al. It’s interesting to note that while not many were interested in the sale of Lehman’s European business (which was bought by a Japanese company Nomura), this auction was evidently different – and the most interesting bid was for a large metal nameplate that used to adorn Lehman’s London headquarters. An anonymous bidder bought the sign over telephone at an exorbitant price of £42,050. It was symbolic, for these letters symbolised the beginning of something new. The collapse of Lehman Brothers had ignited the global financial crisis, which changed the world forever.

Incidentally, Lehman Brothers’ mission statement was another sign that fetched record prices! It read: “We are one firm defined by our unwavering commitment to our clients, our shareholders and each other”!

A company that once seemed invincible is today gone!

“The old order changeth, yielding place to new,” these words of Lord Alfred Tennyson from the story The Passing of Arthur should never be forgotten if you don’t want to become redundant. It’s the “mantra” to help one keep growing.

LOOK WHERE NO ONE IS LOOKING

Daimler, the world’s no.2 luxury carmaker, was in for a pleasant surprise when its largest order in Asia came from a dusty small town in India, one which most people probably have never heard about – Aurangabad. 115 Mercedes-Benz vehicles were ordered by the Aurangabad Chamber of Commerce. It seemed like a prank, but it went on to prove a point. If you don’t learn to look beyond, you may miss big opportunities. Don’t do what everybody is doing. Most multinationals, when entering a new market, simply look at the top 10 cities of that country.

If you want to race ahead, think ahead, for according to Boston Consulting Group, your next billion consumers will not come from the biggies, but small towns that have quietly grown while no one was noticing. Aurangabad drew the world’s attention by this gimmick of ordering 115 sedans (Mercedes, eventually sold some 148 cars there!). There are places like Curitiba in Brazil, Xiaochang in China, Yekaterinburg in Russia, and Amritsar in India, where the new markets lie. Not surprising, Wal-Mart has opened in Amritsar and guess what it caused – a huge traffic jam as Amritsaris in BMWs lined up to check out the new store!

If you want to make a quick buck, look beyond the obvious. The one multinational that has done this is Unilever. It never feared stepping off the beaten track and exploring new markets. It always succeeded. So can you!

SHAKIRA, CHANGE YOUR BEAT

Shakira recently sang the line: “It’s time for Africa...” Well, in business circles, the new song which hopes to set the cash registers jiggling to a happy tune is: “It’s time for Asia”!

UBS AG, Switzerland’s largest bank discovered that a large majority of its richest clients were from Asia. The number of ultra-rich Asians climbed 37% in 2009, which is double the global pace. With so much wealth-creation happening, Asia becomes a very important market. This quarter, UBS AG is focusing on its Asian clients and their needs.

India is Asia’s rising power. Its 9% growth rate, its rapidly increasing middle class, is making it the hot destination for the low-growth Western governments!

As if Slumdog Millionaire was not enough to showcase India’s dirty underbelly, the Commonwealth Games gave the Western world a display of how India functions. The world criticised our corruption, lack of planning and shoddy implementation. However, the flipside is: it’s these very nations (Canada, Australia, New Zealand) that are fighting hard to get into trade agreements with us. It’s also interesting to note that not one of the 54 participating counties backed out of India’s Commonwealth Games despite such negative publicity! India is today too important for the world. We may not work like the West, but the world has to accept “our way”, however chaotic we may be and however much we may have a habit of getting things done at the last minute. As Mr. Lee of Center for Independent Studies in Sydney quoted, “North Korea has great military parades with 2,00,000 people, but no one looks at them” even though they are executed with perfection. The world is watching India. Yes, it’s definitely time for India. If you want to test your entrepreneurial skills, look no further. India is your playground. Vijayawada, Ujjain, et al, may be difficult to find on the map of India, but you may find your best business opportunity in these places!

DON’T STOP LOOKING

“If you think you can, you are right” – I believe in this quote from the book Count Your Chickens Before They Hatch. There is nothing more powerful than a strong resolve. Napoleon Hill in his world famous book Think and Grow Rich writes: “Thoughts are things and powerful things, when mixed with purpose and persistence”. Most great entrepreneurs have started not with big money, a great education or a strong circle of influence, but a steely resolve and the will to win.

Know first where you want to go and keep going no matter how hard the going is. You know not when you will strike gold!

Who had ever imagined that the once financial powerhouse Lehman Brothers would be auctioned off, that America would lose its sheen and that the world would change? All of it happened; and those who kept working are reaping the rewards. The new emerging nations – India, Brazil and China – are making the developed nations stumble. Save one. Germany! It’s growing faster than US. Its citizens for years have accepted wage cuts in return for life-long employment. And today, unemployment there is lesser than US. Of all the developed nations, it’s the strongest right now. Today, it’s the showcase of eurozone. This year, as Germany celebrates 20 years of its unification, it has shown the world that it is ready. It’s beaten all, and as the world gets ready to come out of the recession, Germany is prepared.

However, India is ready too. It has become too important to ignore. Look no further, for the world is coming here, looking for their next billion consumers, their next growth opportunity. You get ready too. Your pot of gold could be buried right under your feet! Get ready to be a part of this growth and let’s prepare to make our first million – right here!

LEAD LIKE A CRAZY ROCK STAR

2010-09-24T11:27:00.001+05:30

“I have two instincts, I want to have fun, and I want to change the world. As a rock star I have a chance to do both,” were the words of Bono, the lead singer of the Irish rock band U2. The man is not just great at “rock-n-roll” but is also today one of the most influential global leaders. The man today symbolises ‘poverty alleviation’. Not surprising that when the famous author Jeffrey Sachs released his book “The End of Poverty”, it was Bono who was asked to write the Foreword. The man is not just a great singer but also a great and influential world leader. Apart from receiving multiple nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize, he has featured on TIME magazine as the “Person of the Year”. His campaign “ONE” boasts of over 2.4 million supporters. From the time he sang his hit single in 1984, Do they know its Christmas, to raising money for Ethiopian famine relief, the man and his band have come a long way. The man is what rock star leadership is all about.

LEADERS OF ROCK-N-ROLL

To the world, they would be remembered as great singers who loved to rock-n-roll. But look deep and you realise that each of them taught us some very important principles of leadership. They taught us that those people, no matter what their background, who remain true to themselves and fight for what they believe in, can change the world.

As a student, she dreamt of being the world’s best dancer. In spite of a series of failures, the girl persisted. Her songs inspired women and talked of the hardships they endure. She worked hard, ready to give whatever it takes, till the world stood up and took notice of her and asked “Who’s that girl?” Madonna showed the world the power of dreams. A great leader dreams, persists and finally succeeds. When her mother died while she was barely five, Madonna told herself, “If my mother can’t love me, then I will make the world love me.” She surely succeeded in doing so.

In the 1960s, when Americans started questioning authority, questioning the futility of war, the assassination of their hero J. K. Kennedy, a man gave music to their thoughts. His songs voiced the change that was in their hearts, and people adored him. Bob Dylan showed the world how “The times they are a-changin” and they sang with him. Great leaders are those who understand the needs of the new generation and have the power to harness that energy. Isn’t that similar to Barack Obama, who did not sing, but “spoke” what the new generation wanted to listen, and won their hearts and votes, like never, ever seen before?

If you really want to be that great leader, you need to behave like a ‘Rock star’. Look at those guys and you could pick up some vital clues. They believe in themselves. As Bono said in his speech to the graduating class of 2004 at the University of Pennsylvania “…sing the melody you hear in your own head; you don’t owe anybody any explanations…” They are great with people. They know what works, and what people want. As Bruce Springsteen once said, “The audiences are there as a result of my history with the band, but also as a result of my being able to reach people with a tune.” Great leaders give people hope, make them believe in the future and show them a way to face today, much like good music, which is essentially there to provide you something to face the world with.

If great leaders are like great rock stars, then so are the great brands these leaders make. Great brands share the same rapport with their consumers as a rock band does with its fans. A hit single by a rock band excites its fans like never before. A whole stadium comes to life and sings like one. Thousands of people from all over the world growing to one beat, one set of lyrics; and then, if the band later comes out with a not-so-good song, they forgive it and wait for the next big thing. Great bands have great fans who follow it dedicatedly. Much like Steve Jobs. His fans wait with baited breath for his next release. His iPhone 4 may have failed initially. In fact, the wi-fi failed to work at the high profile launch of the phone, yet people are waiting for the device. Apple TV may not have been a great idea, but the iPad blew your mind. Like a rock star leader, the man knows how to keep his fans (customers) happy.

To really “rock” the work place, you need that rock star “attitude”. You need that super confidence, that uber-cool look. Be it Bono’s trademark sunglasses, or Madonna’s “Material Girl” fashion style which made her an icon, each had a unique style that made them stand out. A great leader too should dress differently to stand out, not blend in.

And finally, add a little “madness” to work. Make it fun, make it full of energy. Your workspace should pulsate with positive energy, like a rock concert night, where excitement reaches maddening levels. It all looks chaotic, yet everyone works towards one goal – to make the evening rock. Everyone should work, do their part with complete devotion to the brand, for in its success, lies their success too! If every employee puts the organisation before self and works together with others to achieve that one goal, the business, the work place, would truly rock.

WHAT’S LIFE WITHOUT SOME LAZY, CRAZY WAYS

Baron Kurt Von Hammerstein–Equord was a great general who defined leaders using four quadrants – clever or stupid, diligent or lazy. Stupid & lazy is what 90% of the army is made of. Make them do routine work. Stupid & diligent, he said were a menace, to be gotten rid of immediately. Clever & diligent were people, who needed to be given top positions. However the leader was one who was clever & lazy!! It’s that lazy streak, which makes you delegate (the most important trait of a leader). It’s that lethal combination of laziness and cleverness that make these people find the quickest, easiest and the most efficient way of doing things.

As someone once said, “Being lazy is sometimes hard work.” You do it right the first time, so it never needs reworking again. That’s successful lazy leadership.

BE CRAZY TO MAKE PEOPLE CRAZY FOR YOU

She lived in an orphanage, yet she was crazy enough to dream big. She may not have spent her life in a rich and elegant environment but her clothes were demanded by the rich. Back in 1925, when women were beginning to go to work in offices, this lady showed them a crazy way of dressing, unheard till then. Coco Chanel taught them to cut their hair short, get rid of bone corsets, for it was impossible to work if a lady was imprisoned in one. She introduced suits made of “jersey” material, which till then was used only to make undergarments. Her crazy ideas gave women a chance to breath and feel comfortable and also fashionable.

Born into the lowest rung of rural life, made to work in the kitchens of rich families by her mother, this woman was crazy to dream of power and fame. Yet, at 27, Eva Peron became the First Lady of Argentina.

If you are crazy, you can even defy fate. Your “faith” in yourself, gives you the confidence to act like a rock star, who performs on stage and builds his fan-base, one show, one song at a time. Being ready to face failures and have the ability to come back again – that’s what craziness is all about, that’s what rock stars are all about. Today’s leader is that guy who works with passion, builds a fan-base that’s devoted to him through all his ups and downs, has the confidence to take in failures, the charm to make people love him and the power to act day in and day out, for he has a crazy, lazy streak that keeps him going!

Don’t just lead. Lead like a crazy rock star!

DON’T KNOW… DON’T CARE

2010-08-27T10:04:00.001+05:30

He doesn’t care about your claims of “good” quality. He doesn’t care if you are number one. He buys only that product which makes him feel happy and which he thinks is right. The “market” is a totally different place today, than it was earlier. There is a new generation of consumers that thrives on products that didn’t even exist as recently as five years back. Technology has created new markets (cell phones, smart phones, iPhones, Twitter, Facebook) and a new breed of consumers that is very difficult to please.

Today’s consumer is even more demanding. He wants greater value from products and services, greater transparency, greater corporate responsibility towards the environment & the less fortunate. According to a survey by Landor Associates, 50% of the 18-25 year olds said they are ready to take a pay cut to work for a socially responsible company. Add to this, the global economic downturn which not just affected many people’s wallets but also their outlook, and the way they are making choices in their lives. As Sheena S. Iyengar in her book The Art of Choosing says “…we use choice as a powerful tool to define ourselves and mould our lives.” If you want your brand to be “valued”, you need to make sure it is the one that this demanding consumer chooses which helps him define his life. Just hoping your brand will sell because it is of good quality, is correctly priced et al, won’t work. The “Don’t Know, Don’t Care” (DKDC) generation wants more. Nissan is rolling out a new ad campaign (dubbed “Innovation for All”), which showcases not price, but innovative features of its cars like keyless entry, air purifiers and smartphone apps, to appeal to this new consumer.

DKDC… IF I CAN’T IDENTIFY WITH YOU

For the fourth year in a row, Google has been ranked the world’s strongest brand by Millward Brown Optimor. What is it that has kept customers loyal to this brand for years? It’s in the business of “search” and is the best & the simplest to use. This apart, it has a unique quality that it can be “personalised”. A Google user can personalise his home page! Much similar to an Apple iPhone user, who can personalise his phone by downloading applications. It’s one of the ways to make the consumer identify with you.

To remain relevant to today’s consumers, the one who innovates, survives! Look at IBM (no wonder it ranks No. 2). Look at those that relatively innovated less – Nokia, Intel, eBay et al. They all saw their values drop.

Launched decades ago, this brand has retained its number 1 spot in sports and no challenger gets counted even closely. It has done this by constantly innovating, so that the customer of every generation can identify with it. Nike! Mark Parker, the artistic, athlete & CEO of Nike, shook up the shoe business with his passion for innovation. “Irreverence inspires me,” he says. Well, it also inspires his buyers.

At 55, this brand is smoking hot! In spite of its product being condemned, in spite of laws stopping it from advertising, it is ranked #8 on the Forbes list. It innovated not just its product, but its marketing ways too & survived. Its secret to success – a growing database of 26 million smokers, who receive birthday cards, coupons and concert tickets (where they can smoke freely). A special booklet of 50 Marlboro prizes is sent to all. You could win the most exotic prizes, depending on the Marlboro Miles you earned on each pack brought. At #8, its value is more than the next 12 cigarette brands put together! New ways of marketing & new variations in the product have made it more relevant to the youth. It’s no more the “macho” effect but the “cool & trendy” effect that works. New flavors like Dark Mint and Cool Myst have been used to market it to the youth. The Marlboro man may be dead, but Marlboro remains the leader of the pack and the consumer still identifies with it.

Market innovatively to remain relevant. Molson Beer organises music concerts in Toronto. The power of the brand and its identification with youth culture is so high, that the company just advertises the event, without even mentioning the name of the performing artists. If it’s a Molson Beer concert, it’s cool! Clothing companies are hiring parking lots to hold a sale of their products and using the Internet to spread the word about the sale… That’s cool!

Be irreverent, or innovative, if you want to be the one that today’s consumer will choose. Remember – if you are perceived as “so yesterday”, the consumer doesn’t care. Google, though number one, is facing the heat from Facebook, which just might overtake it in the future, for Facebook is the brand that the consumer of today is identifying with more and more. Not surprising, Facebook though not yet in the top 100 lists of valuable brands, made its début in the Forbes list this year. Google, watch out!

DKDC… IF I DON’T FEEL HAPPY WITH YOU

Building a great brand is serious business – but you can’t be boring consumers to buy products that just make them feel good about themselves. Instead of explaining how good the product is, explain how the product can make them more successful, happier, and closer to the vision they hold of themselves. If you can do it with humour, your brand’s value increases more. In Australia, Virgin Mobile launched a “5¢ text service”, with a new campaign called “Warren campaign”. A nerdy looking guy, Warren, was the hero of this campaign. Warren was portrayed as a loser in search of a dream date. People were encouraged to talk to Warren, through TV, radio and Internet ads. His cheeky humour made him the most lovable loser & Virgin, the most lovable brand. In 10 weeks, Warren received 600,000 texts plus calls and 2 million hits on his website. Everybody loves underdogs. Supporting them makes them happy. Look at all the reality shows and you know what I mean. This hairy, plump, short middle-aged woman, who had never been kissed before, took Britain by storm with her singing. Susan Boyle, the underdog millionaire proved how much we love underdogs. Use them in your marketing business to make the consumer smile as you smile all the way to the bank with your valuable brand!

Smirnoff encouraged people to duck their responsibilities on December 7 (2003) and asked them to take a half-day off & enjoy Smirnoff at the participating bars. You could even enter a contest, where all you did was enter the names of three friends & you stood a chance of winning $25 coupons. Those three friends in turn, got similar messages from Smirnoff to win their $25 coupons. Not just did the campaign win many awards, its brand awareness increased from 38% to 57%. People loved the brand for making them switch off their computer & head-off to the bar! The more positive feelings people associate with your brand, the greater its value!

DKDC… IF I CAN’T TRUST YOU

This year, BMW surpassed last year’s winner Toyota to become the most valuable car brand. It was not the economic downturn, rather Toyota’s failure to keep its promise of delivering quality that resulted in this fall.

With so much exposure to marketing from such an early age, kids today are becoming more sophisticated consumers. One wrong move can ruin your image forever, for these are also your future consumers. They know what is authentic. No matter how “hip” your product is, if you don’t stay true to your values, they don’t care.

In a nutshell, great branding starts with a rigorous assessment of your audience. No wonder great brands sell, and sell all the time – whatever the generation. Look at Coca-Cola – it’s no more just sugared water and fizz.

A brand is a promise. Features will get copied faster than ever. Those are the intangibles, the love, and the emotions that consumers attach to your brand that make it great, make it last and make it valuable.

It’s emotions that make Apple ‘think different’, and make Coca-Cola ‘the real thing’.

Understand your audience, & care for them. If you don’t, they don’t know you & don’t care either!

CHANGING THE RULES OF THE GAME

2010-08-12T13:36:00.001+05:30

It’s everywhere. Look around – technology is changing, customers are changing, companies are changing, values are changing, so much so even the climate is changing. As John F. Kennedy said: “Change is law of life and those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future”. Yes, change is everywhere.

General Motors (GM) is back. From bowing out in 2008 and moving towards a 2009 bankruptcy reorganisation, the company is planning to advertise in the Super Bowl, the most expensive event to advertise in, in February. GM is now ready with its new ad campaign and a new tagline for the Cadillac which says, “The new standard for the world”. From down-and-out to up-and-about! What a change!

Gadgets have changed. Just look at the iPad and see what it has done to business. Not just have they changed the computer business, but have shown different businesses like Media, Advertising, Gaming etc, how to do business better! If you thought iPads and iPods were the only ones that got thinner this year, think again. If you thought “limited-editions” were for designer clothes, watches, cars etc, think again. Huggies launched limited-edition, denim-style diapers in May this year. The new, thinner and fashionable jean diapers sent moms into a tizzy. Everyone wanted one for their tiny tot. Its tagline “The coolest you’ll look pooping your pants” brought the smiles and laughs and big bucks too for the company. This change in design helped Huggies beat P&G and get back just about all the market share it had lost when P&G launched Pampers Dry Max. It was P&G’s biggest innovation in 25 years and it lost when Huggies changed.

Change is powerful! Keeping pace with it is the key. Earlier, social activism meant protest marches, and even giving up your life. Today it’s as simple as hitting the “Like” button on the Facebook!

In fact, Facebook has changed the world. A recent survey showed how people have reduced the practice of sending e-mails and text messages. They now Facebook! Hotmail is no more Hot!

What’s “Hot” is farming online! While you were busy buying seeds, farm animals and body armour, a company racked in $500 million almost entirely by selling virtual goods on its game sites like Farmville etc! Talk of “change”, selling could not have changed more. Whoever thought selling ‘virtually’ nothing could be so lucrative! Zynga is the company that has 240 million users playing Farmville, Mafia Wars and now Frontier Ville. Not surprising that on June 27, Disney acquired Playdom for $563 million plus $200 million as incentives. It too wants to get into this new gaming business. Brands like MTV and Google are trying to grab this virtual land too. For now, virtual goods are more powerful than the real ones! Those selling virtual goods are making more money than ones who are slogging it out in the factories.

While Zynga promises to change the world too, through games by selling virtual social goods that have benefited earthquake victims, children in Haiti etc, there is one game that people didn’t like being changed. Early this year when Mattle changed the rules of the game Scrabble, for the first time in 62 years, to allow proper nouns like “Shakira” as playable words, a lot of serious players got offended. While change is important, it’s important to know what not to change too!

WHY SOME THINGS SHOULD NOT CHANGE

There are some principles that are timeless! There are some “Core Values” that define you and give a meaning to things around. People and companies that have believed in not changing this have succeeded. At HP, their core value is “respect for individual. Bill & Packard turned down big government contracts that would have forced them to adopt the “hire & fire” strategy. Disney changed, from cartoons to feature films, to videos, to Disneyland, but never forgot “wholesome entertainment for family” as its core value.

When you know what not to change, that’s when you change best!

WHY SOME THINGS JUST HAVE TO CHANGE

Business, once used to be all about finding and honing your competitive advantage. Today it’s about the ability to find your “next” advantage, which is important. If you want to survive, you need to “create” your future moves. It’s much similar to the way the “high jump” event changed over the years at the Olympics. Earlier, all high-jumpers used the “scissors style”, similar to jumping hurdles, and for years people tried to better & better this technique. Then one day someone found a better way to jump higher. Instead of jumping like hurdles, you now launched & landed on the same foot called the “Western Roll”. For 25 years athletes mastered this. Then in 1968, Dick Fosbury, a former gymnast broke the Olympic Record by three inches when he discovered a totally new way of jumping and showed the world how “creating” new techniques could leave competition far behind. This new technique became famous as the “Fosbury Flop”. While everyone was jumping with their feet first touching the ground, Fosbury landed on his head and shoulders and jumped higher than 2.3 meters. A feat that would have been impossible to achieve with the older techniques!

Today, becoming the best is also not enough. Beating competition is not enough. You need to not just beat, but defeat competition in such a manner that they find it impossible to compete with you. You change the rules such that you stand totally apart. With a zillion similar brands popping up everywhere, you need to “change” to stand apart. As Kim and Mauborgne of Blue Ocean strategy said, “by just beating competition you remain in the ‘red-waters’, but when you create a new game, competition becomes irrelevant and you move to blue waters.”

When people did not want to buy entire CDs, iTunes gave them the option of buying a song, that too, very reasonably priced. While all low-priced watch manufacturers talked of functionality, in came “Swatch” and showed how low-price could be stylish and took away all the market share. While the world thought that music stores should sell – well, music, in came Virgin with its megastores which stocked CDs, videos, games, stereo and audio equipments and changed the rules. Barnes & Noble decided that a bookshop was not just meant to sell books, but help customers cherish the pleasures of reading. It added lounges, coffee bars etc, and changed the way bookshops of the future would look and the future of their balance sheets too! While most cosmetic companies played on the emotions of consumers and showed beautiful images, Body Shop talked facts. It talked about its ingredients and their benefi ts. Soon, natural cosmetics became the rage. All these companies changed the way business used to be done and created their own blue waters which competitors could not reach fast.

It’s important to remember not to forget to change, especially when you are growing. Growth gives satisfaction and that’s no good. As Katsuaki Watanabe, the President of Toyota Motor Co. once said: “Everyone should be dissatisfi ed, with the present situation.” Don’t be satisfy ed with the status quo, even if you are the best. Don’t be afraid to change. Change is always good.

Even a thing like “Climate change” is good. In June, Guyana’s President Bharrat Jagdeo said, “Climate change is good business for us,” thus embarrassing the UN, which in April awarded him the “Champions of the Earth” award! But maybe he had a point. Climate change has opened up a plethora of new businesses – from trading of carbon credits to green energy to alternative energy and many more...

Your success in life isn’t based on your ability to simply change. It is based on your ability to change faster than your competition, customers and business.

Change is unavoidable. Change is the norm. We at 4Ps B&M have changed too. Our promise to never change our “core value” of delivering you world-class content however doesn’t change. We hope you enjoy the change. Change, can change the rules of the game. Go ahead… change something too!!!

WHAT’S YOUR WINNING LOOK?!

2010-07-30T10:46:00.000+05:30

Meet the “Man your man could smell like”. That’s the new viral-video that’s clearly broken all previous viral-video records. It features Isaiah Mustafa who has now achieved a pop-icon status. Since the time this man showed the ladies how their man could “smell” like him, even though they didn’t “look” like him, Procter & Gamble (P&G) has been “smelling” money in every market. After the viral-video produced by Wieden & Kennedy hit the Internet, the P&G brand Old Spice has been constantly gaining market share. The viral showed in an interesting tongue-in-cheek manner how anything is possible when you smell right. It may sound a little over the top, but it’s a fact – when you smell right, dress right, you have higher chances of success!

Carmine Gallo, a popular communications expert once had the chance to interview Commander Matt Eversmann. He was the military hero who led his troops into battle in Somalia in 1993, and he also inspired the movie Black Hawk Down. Gallo asked him, “What’s the secret of leadership?” Eversmann answered: “It starts with how a leader wears his uniform.” That’s not a “mantra” or “gyan” many would give about leadership. However, as Eversmann said, his whites were whiter than his subordinates’, his clothes were better ironed, his shoes shinier! That’s where leadership starts.

You never get a record chance

Great leaders, if you thought, were about great speeches, great deeds, then think again. A lot depends on that “something” which happens even before you get a chance to speak. Many a time you find someone very lively and enthusiastic and you assume he is smart, likable and successful – without any proof of him being any of those things. It’s called the ‘halo effect’. A person who complains might be viewed as boring, negative, cynical, unsociable. It’s called the ‘horns effect’. That’s the way we perceive things around us. The sad part is that you never get a second chance to create that first impression, that ‘halo or horn’ effect. People size you up and decide whether they will like you or not on the basis of first impressions which are formed in – hold your breath – three to four seconds. Yes, even before you utter a word (forget about delivering a whole speech), even before you do something, chances are that people would have categorised you. Remember telling someone, “He looks like a leader,” even without knowing anything about that ‘leader’?! Dialogues like “She has a positive aura around her,” or “He looks dependable” or “There is something disturbing about him” are often used to judge people. These are nothing but people creating first impressions, which are not just created in a jiffy, but also are nearly impossible to change.

To create that great first impression you need to wear two things: (a) good clothes; (b) a great smile. Look at any great leader, from the various Presidents of America to the heads of corporations and you realise that they all come across as likeable and dependable, depending on the way they carry themselves and the way they smile. The optimism & enthusiasm of their personalities is reflected the moment you see them, and this is an unwritten law – “Leaders always stand out and dress better than their subordinates.” Today, it’s important to know what suits you and fits you the best and makes you look good.

Be it Donald Trump or Arnold Schwarzenegger, each one realised that to be a leader, you need to first look like one. They all dressed best, for a first impression takes just a few seconds to be created and you don’t get a second chance.

Do you look the part?

This man is so famous that people in almost every country have heard about him. A highly educated and qualified man, he was immensely proud of his country. Once he went to see the Queen of England. Anyone else would have dressed in his best suit and tie, but this man decided to wear a ‘dhoti’. You guessed it right – the man was none other than Mahatma Gandhi. He was fighting India’s War of Independence and knew that if he had to win this war, he had to dress like the poorest of the poor of his country and if the Queen wanted to meet him, she had to accept this. She did. The world took notice and soon people were convinced that this man would take India to victory. Every part of this man showed how deeply he believed in the cause he was fighting for. You just had to see him once to realise how committed he was. He looked the part he played.

Born in a Catholic home, and christened Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, this child grew up hearing stories of Catholic missionaries. She was so inspired that she became a nun herself. Mother Teresa went on to help thousands and thousands of the poor of Calcutta. She loved them and wanted to change their world. She even dressed like them in a simple white sari with a blue border. Even when she won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, it was in this simple sari that she went to receive her award. She looked the part.

Donald Trump never really cared about the way he dressed. In his book How to Get Rich, he states that very soon he realized his folly and realised that if he had to get rich, he needed to look and behave that way too.

This determined young Indian girl worked as a receptionist from midnight to sunrise while studying in Yale, just so that she could collect $50 to buy a western suit for a job interview. Not well versed with Western wear, the young lady landed up buying a pair of trousers that reached down only to her ankles. Indra Nooyi was rejected. She went back to her professor at Yale who told her to dress like herself. She went for her next interview in a sari and was selected. She had found the “look” that would work for her.

If looks could kill

In today’s very competitive job market, it’s important to “look” your part. A well groomed appearance is as important as having a strong resume. You may have heard of killer looks, but if your looks are not right, they could definitely kill your career.

A well groomed look is simple to achieve – be fit and wear clothes that fit you well. If you dress well, it gives the other person the impression that this occasion was important for you and you put in efforts to look good. When you dress brightly and look happy, you attract attention in a positive way. Trendy dressers come across as young, lively and successful. It’s important to “look” appropriate. Barack Obama looked the right package to bring about change in America. His looks – a black man with a Muslim father – struck a chord with Americans. Making him win gave them a chance to prove once again to the world that this was a country where dreams come true.

So before you put your speech together, before you plan your presentation, check your wardrobe and dress to kill – competition that is! Today, careers, perceptions and images are built in seconds. It’s very important for you to figure out your winning look!

WAKA WAKA… LET’S DO IT TOO!

2010-07-16T12:40:00.001+05:30

The closing ceremony of the FIFA World Cup, brought a lot of things to an end, like checking scores, looking in disbelief as big teams like Italy, Argentina, Brazil etc fell, like a pack of cards, smiling & wondering whether to believe in the octopus Paul’s prophecy! As Shakira sang “Waka, Waka,” the perfect cheering song meaning “Do it” during the closing ceremony, the world held its breath in anticipation. Who would it be this time – Spain or Netherlands? However, for a few moments, everybody forgot about the finals when this person entered the stadium, as all 89,000 spectators rose to salute the great leader, who actually started it all. Nelson Mandela’s overpowering presence left many teary-eyed. South Africa became the first African nation to host the FIFA Would Cup. Years ago, it also was the same nation that was banned from FIFA due to the apartheid system.

If you have seen the heart touching film “Invictus” directed by Clint Eastwood, you would understand what a long & difficult journey Mandela tread to reach here. If there is one leader who understood the power of sports, it was this man – Nelson Mandela. In his first term as the newly elected president, in 1995, Mandela did the impossible. He united an apartheid-torn nation, brought them together using the universal language of sports, as he worked hard to make South Africa win the 1995 Rugby World Cup – where both blacks & whites of South Africa for the first time cheered together for their nation. From there to becoming a hosting nation of FIFA, all one can say – what a man!

IT’S MORE THAN SELLING SOCCER SHOES!

A few days back, Adidas launched a 60 - second viral to celebrate the success of its shoes F50 Adizero. The maximum number of goals during this World Cup were scored by players wearing the F50 Adizero shoe. While 20-year-old Thomas Mueller may have won the ‘Golden Boot Award’ and joined the club which has stars like Pele, Michael Owen etc, a totally different competition has started between Adidas & Nike. While Adidas in its viral claims its F50 to be the ‘2010 FIFA World Cup Top Scoring Boot’, Nike for its part claims the honours. After all, Iniesta who scored the winning goal for Spain was wearing Nike’s CTR360 Elite series boots.

Irrespective of whose claims are correct, this is sure, both brands would witness a surge in their sales. However, what’s interesting is FIFA or any other mega sporting events do more than just help sell sports shoes.

A month before the FIFA, people in UK were asked, “How safe is South Africa?” A good 56% responded ‘not safe’, while only 3% said ‘very safe’. Towards the end of the World Cup, 56% had changed their answer to ‘quite safe’. South Africa saw its image getting a boost after the world watched it on TV for about a month!

When Nigeria won the gold in soccer at the Olympic Games of 1996, even the Nigerian dictator General Sani Abacha saw a rise in his popularity in the eyes of the world (at least for some time) as the world lauded the Nigerian soccer team’s victory.

After the 2006 FIFA World Cup, a research was conducted which showed that the campaign launched by Germany under the slogan “Germany rolls out the red carpet” really worked. The country worked hard by training its “service ambassadors” in workshops, making its service providers aware of intercultural relations, building tolerance, learning foreign languages. After the games, in-depth interviews of people, who had never been to Germany before the games, showed that they thought Germans would be strict, unapproachable and intolerant, but found them friendly and pleasant! People actually forgot about Hitler and liked the Germans.

Yes, there are hosts of brands that use this opportunity to market their goods, but a sporting event gives a country a chance to showcase itself like never before. More than any brand, a country’s best and strongest image builders are its sporting teams. A win can leverage a country’s image, so can hosting a mega sporting event.

SPORTS – IS NO CHILD’S PLAY

A country’s image is extremely important and it makes business sense too. According to Simon Anholt, an expert on “Nations as Brands”, “...Countries with a powerful and positive image can export more products, more culture, more services and also attract more tourists, more investors, more attention and respect of other governments!”

People’s perception about countries is very very strongly linked to the country’s sporting excellence. A country that hosts a successful Olympics, or World Cup is remembered as opposed to one that hosts a “forgettable event”. Athens Olympics did nothing much for Greece. While Beijing Olympics changed China’s image in the eyes of the whole world.

The Nation Brand Index (NBI) is an important indicator of a country’s perception and it’s interesting to note that the ranking shows a direct correlation between a nation’s overall rank and its economic status.

NBI 2009 saw an interesting phenomenon. China had never changed its rank of 29 all these years; yet, this was the first time its rank moved from 29 to 22. It was because of the Olympics.

Today, countries take their branding very seriously. Last month, the International Olympics Committee announced the list of finalists who would bid for the Winter Olympics to be held in 2018. The three countries were France, Germany, and South Korea, with South Korea being seen as the front runner. A few months back, South Korea’s richest tycoon, Lee Kun Hee, the Chairman of Samsung Electronics, received a presidential pardon and was released from prison (he had been earlier arrested on criminal changes of tax evasion). The reason for his release was to help South Korea’s bid to host the 2018 Winter Olympics. Nations take sporting events very seriously and work in tandem with business houses to showcase their strengths years before the actual event.

“Image” is what counts and what matters most. Consumers in America or Europe will easily pay more for an unknown Japanese product than an identical Korean product. An Indian in a foreign market needs to work harder than, say his French counterpart, though both may be equally talented. It’s all because of the “images” of countries.

Great brands are built, when customers have “great experiences” using them. A sporting event or team gives others a chance to ‘see’, to ‘experience’ your country. An advertising campaign, however beautiful, can never make one country look ‘Incredible’. However, well organised, well planned and well marketed sporting events can make a country look grand, and get it international approval.

As one mega event comes to a close, one is left wondering – would India too be able to do this one day?

Just as corporations put in crores to build their corporate images and brand identities, it’s time countries did the same too. South Africa has probably managed to change its image from an apartheid torn country to a good host – India, it’s time you did too. Waka, Waka... let’s do it too!

MASTI KE PATHSHAALA… HAVE FUN TO GET SERIOUSLY RICH!

2010-07-02T11:42:00.001+05:30

The world over people are glued to their TV screens, taking in the excitement of FIFA. It’s pure delight, sheer happiness to see a goal being scored on football’s biggest stage. A goal brings with it instant fame, victory and of course celebrations for players and fans. However, what’s different is that for the first time in the history of FIFA, will someone be awarded for showing their passion.

This month (June) Coca-Cola revealed its plans to recognize the most entertaining “goal celebration” with its “Coca- Cola Celebration Award”. Coca-Cola believes that “Players are sure to release their African rhythm and create some iconic move that will rival the legendary celebrations…” After all what is FIFA without the jig, the jiggle, the jumps, the triumphs. You enjoy the way the players celebrate after each goal as much as the game. Now Coca-Cola has it all archived at www.fifa.com/celebrations, and it’s giving awards for the jiggle that gets the highest votes from viewers.

In fact it was Roger Milla of Cameroon who in a spontaneous release of emotions celebrated his goal with his iconic corner flag dance; and forever changed the world of “football goal celebrations”. With FIFA happening in Africa, Coca- Cola thought of this unique advertising strategy. Its final aim is to increase the company’s service from 1.8 billion servings per day to 3.2 billion by 2020. This seems to be an interesting way of blending the game, the feel of Africa and happiness all into one! So it instituted this award for the player who celebrates his goal in the most unique manner.

OPEN HAPPINESS – A GREAT STRATEGY

An interesting viral campaign caught my attention – it was called “The fun theory” campaign. The bottom line of all the video clips was – making things fun is the easiest way to change people’s behaviour. It was a series of experiments named “the fun theory” which was conducted and captured on a hidden camera to find out if the world could be made a better place by introducing the element of fun. One of the most popular ones (more than 1 million views on YouTube) shows how turning a set of subway stairs into a large piano (each step was painted as a key of a piano) encouraged people to use the stairs and not the escalator. Every time you walked, a stair played a musical rote. You could see the people playing on the steps and actually enjoying it. Another experiment had a trash can which made a sound, as if it was a 50 ft. deep well, when you threw garbage into it. This particular trash bin collected more garbage than earlier - simply because everyone enjoyed the experience. Each viral ended with one line, “The funtheory.com. An initiative of Volkswagen”

Not surprising then, that this year at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, the most prestigious award, that of ‘Advertiser of the Year’ – which is given to advertisers who have made a place for themselves when it comes to encouraging creativity and inspiring innovative marketing campaigns – went to Volkswagen. From its first win at Cannes Lion in 1961 to the current one for its ‘viral ad’, Volkswagen has showcased creativity at its best. Again, it’s not surprising that its intelligent positioning and brand building strategy will help it fulfill its aim of becoming the leading car manufacturer in the world.

When it comes to brand building, the one theme that seems to be working best is that of “fun”, be it drinks (Coca- Cola) or driving (Volkswagen) all seem to be adopting this theme.

PAPA DON’T PREACH – SMILE

The economy is sour, the people want to stretch the value of their money to the maximum, and the last thing they want is to hear someone preach! If you have to, then make it fun, the way Volkswagen did. Coca-Cola too, along with the goal celebration is pushing the idea of “RAIN”, (Replenish Africa Initiative) to help get water for schools. It has pledged $30 million to provide Africa with clean water. The focus however remains on “celebrations” in all its campaigns.

The trick is to bring a smile on the face of the consumer if you want to do well. But if you are serious about getting rich, you need to bring that “smile” in everything you do. Absolutely everything. Be it your advertising, your marketing or even your vision statement, everything should have a large dose of fun mixed in it.

Three top CEOs were asked one question: “What does your brand stand for?” Here is how they answered. Richard Branson was asked “What does Virgin Stand for?” He gave a one word answer, “Fun”!

Richard Tait, the founder of Cranium, was asked what Cranium stood for. He answered it stood for “delight”, for “shining moments”.

Toney Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, answered “Happiness”. There are two things that were common to all their answers. First their brands were all described without referring to the product. Virgin was not great music, or a great airline, Cranium, was not a board game, Zappos was not about shoes and clothes. The brands symbolised a “feeling”. The second was, all of them had an element of “fun” and “masti” in their description.

When brands are build on “Vision Statements” that have a strong dose of fun embedded in them, they grow faster and stronger. A brand is an experience, and that experience is best when it fun. Every time a consumer comes in contact with your brand, be it through actual purchase, or via a viral, or by visiting your store, he should feel the vibes of fun and excitement. It’s most addictive and he is bound to come back.

From the topmost CEO to the junior most sales person, if everyone puts “fun” into their work, efficiency is bound to increase.

A great CEO is one who makes a vision that excites people. A great salesman is one who has the confidence to be himself, because when you are yourself, and not pretending to be someone else, people like you, and when you relax and have fun, you sell better. A great telecaller is one whose voice reflects a smile. You may not see him, but can sense the smile and excitement in the voice. A great advertising campaign is one which goes beyond selling a product, rather it sells an experience. Remember what Howard Schultz tells about Starbucks, “It’s not just coffee”. Similarly, what you sell is not a product, clothes, books, cars, whatever. You sell a “feeling” and let that feeling be “fun”.

Find ways to bring fun & joy in your work, give unexpected delights to your customers and you are bound to beat your competitors hollow. All you require is creativity and not big budgets.

As Volkswagen says “Fun can change behaviour for better”, it can even change your fortunes. Think fun, have fun, if you want to get seriously rich.

Of HOST BRANDS, SYMBOLSAND ‘CULTURE BRANDING’

2010-06-18T10:11:00.001+05:30

How long does it take to summarize two hundred years of a nation’s history? Ans: Exactly 181 seconds! This is the way Argentina is celebrating its bicentennial. The story of the nation is being told through a 181-second story of the county’s most loved and strongest brands. With the help of each brand, a tale is woven around the growth and development of the nation and the brand – for these brands are no ordinary brands; their makers didn’t just believe in earning profits but in earning pride for their nation. One 181-second story is on Quilmes beer. It traces the history of how the brewery was set up, which slowly changed the fortunes and lifestyles of the people of that area. As the nation prospered, so did Quilmes. When T.V. came to the country, Quilmes became the first advertiser. Then one day, Quilmes picked up its local soccer team, backed it with sponsorship, enthusiastically supported it through the years, while the team went ahead and started playing for the nation and one day got Argentinaits fi rst World Cup.

30 such local brands are being showcased to celebrate Argentina’s 200 years. This goes on to show that brands are today symbols of our society and brand builders are even society builders. Brands have a symbolic power and some of them have so deeply ingrained themselves into our culture, that they even give consumers a way to identify themselves – I am who I am partly because of the brands I use.

Turn your brand into a ‘host’ brand

If your brand can become a part of the local culture and sneak into popular conversation, you have won the loyalty of your consumers. In my previous write-up, I mentioned how interesting ‘brand stories’ make the brand more endearing and popular than just plain facts about its various attributes. Well, the best brand stories are those that are in sync with the culture of the country. The brand that understands the cultural sensibilities of its consumers always has the upper hand. As Julien and Eric remarked in their study on branding, marketers must view branding as a “culturally malleable” mode of communication.

The FIFA World cup fever is on as everybody from Timbuktu to Tamil Nadu, from Beijing to Bhubaneswar will be engrossed in this mega event. Sab Miller, the South African beer brand, did not waste this opportunity to connect with people. It may not be the ‘offi cial beer’ of FIFA, but it found a way using its culture knowledge. “Bula Boot” is one such typically African concept. It’s all about spontaneously having a party from the ‘boot’ of your car, usually near a sports match, or music concert. SAB Miller distributed many Bula Boot kits. 100 teams of tow people went around the various football venues with South African fl ags, chairs and the beer to, well, Bula Boot. It sure booted out the offi -cial sponsor of FIFA, Budweiser, out of everyone’s mind. SAB used its cultural heritage brilliantly to gain the upper hand. Today, it’s extremely important to stay culturally relevant. The American T.V. channel Telemundo, which broadcasts in Spanish, went ahead and got research done to understand the Latin community better and to fi nd out what they identifi ed with, demanded and wanted. Gone are the days when just demographic studies were enough. This time, the research studied cultural infl uences, sexual preferences, and other such issues. They uncovered a spectrum of rich identities, which were overlooked earlier by marketers. On the basis of this, Telemundo can and will create newer, more relevant T.V. programmes – and of course, keep its lead vis-à-vis other T.V. Channels.

Brands are symbols

Clearly, brands are not just making a difference to the bottom lines of companies, but to our way of life too. They are infl uencing us socially, culturally and even po-litically. When Tunisian-born French citizen Tawfi k Mathlouthi launched the Mecca Cola in France, he was not competing against just Coke or Pepsi. It was a symbolic war against Americanism. It just goes on to prove better that brands are symbols of our society. Coke symbolized everything American, and Mecca Cola anti- American. Mecca-Cola versus Cola-Cola is a fi ght of not just cultures but politics too. Tawfi k could easily win an election, for Mecca Cola symbolizes his ideology.

This is a fact that brands have begun to aggressively leverage their intended product attributes. Disney is not just a fi lm company or a theme park. Disneysymbolizes children’s entertainment –when you choose Disney, your mind thinks, “If it’s Disney, it’s good, safe and right for my kids.” Disney is very careful about this image. It will not make fi lms or products, which are not 100% family safe. Similarly, Nike is loved because of its symbolism and its rich stories woven around culture. It used the African- American vernacular and imagery in its advertising. Using the ‘ghetto culture’, it subtly told Americans to participate actively in sports.

For your brand to last in the memory of consumers and outlast competition, it needs to represent something. While all beer brands advertised fun and relaxation in their ads, Corona beer decided to be a little different. Corona’s ads promoted the concept that relaxation meant an ideal American holiday – that is, a tranquil beach vacation, beer and getting away from it all. Americans loved the positioning and soon, this bargain basement-beer became the choice of overworked Americans. You could escape from mundane routines and ‘chill out’ with Corona.

Escape you could also with another drink, which studied culture deeply andused it to market their brand, a move that shook up even biggies like Coke and Pepsi. Launched as a small start-up, the company began to symbolize the ‘hillbillies’, the not-so-sophisticated and uncultured gentry, as being the consumers of their drink. Sales blew through the roof in the non-urban, working class of the country. When the society changed its profi le, Mountain Dew changed its symbolizations too. In the nineties, it was ‘Do the Dew’. Bored of mundane jobs, the youth wanted something to get their adrenaline juices fl owing. So Mountain Dew now symbolized extreme sports and daredevil stunts. The society was looking for symbols to show their masculinity – a Mountain Dew in hand gave them that. A long time back, the Marlboro cowboy had done the same symbolisation. But the Marlboro Man is dead today and smoking is ‘uncool’.

Today’s consumers use brands to build their own identities. Some even like to be known by the brands that they use. If your brand can give them that, it will survive, and if the identity takes into account the cultural aspects of the consumers, they will love your brand and make it immortal.

FIFA – the global benchmark

Brands need to value the culture, using the uniqueness of target groups to market themselves accordingly. Those who have done that, have been the most successful. McDonald’s may be the most global brand, but it has customised the most to suit each culture. Tesco in UK recognized a large Polish community, so it launched the “own-brand” products for the home-sick Poles in UK. A mobile operator in Germany launched brands specifi cally targeting the Turkish population in Germany. In south India, Meera Hair Powder is what people reach out to once their hair problems start. Shampoos are good, modern, convenient, but we go back to traditional solutions when in trouble. By keeping its name, packaging and promotion totally traditional, Meera has been able to compete with the so called ‘Western’ concepts of hair shampoo!

It pays to be in touch with your culture and build brands around it. After all, very few brands enjoy global acceptance like FIFA – the only truly global game and global brand. Kofi Annan once remarked how he envied the football World Cup, as the “only truly global game, played in every country by every race and religion,” was more universal than UN – FIFA has 207 members, while the UN has only 191. The whole planet loves FIFA and being a part of the World Cup is a matter of national pride for any country – except of course the UN!

Few brands, corporations can transcend all barriers to be like FIFA and become global favorites. For the lesser mortals, let us look deeply into the cultures, pull out relevant stories and weave our brands into them. It’s the most long-lasting strategy and might someday turn your brand into a globally mesmerizing identity like FIFA.

WHAT’S YOUR STORY?

2010-06-04T11:44:00.002+05:30

It started with a rivet. Born in Germany this man migrated to USA, settled in San Francisco and became a trader. Jacob Davis a tailor, started buying cloth from him to stitch pants. One of his customers kept ripping his pockets on his pants & Jacob had a tough time repairing it time & again, till he came upon the idea of putting copper rivets at the stress points on the pocket corner. His “riveted work pants” very quickly became a craze. Worried that someone would steal his idea, he called on his friend, the trader. Together they patented his invention. For twenty years Jacob and his friend Levi were the only company allowed to make riveted work pants. This is how the story of Levis “jeans” started – with a rivet.

In today’s world too, its “riveting” stories that bring success. Every time you look at a Levis jeans you remember the rivet story. Good stories stick on and make the brand name stick on too.

Stories don’t just save lives

There was woman named Scheherazade who was one of the many slaves of the Sultan. The Sultan was known for beheading anyone who displeased him. The intelligent woman found a unique way to save her life… every night she told him a story, but would stop at the most exciting part and make the Sultan wait until the next evening to hear the end. For 1001 nights she did this. It impressed the king so much that he not only granted her life, but also married her.

A great story is what is responsible for the survival of great brands too. We all love stories. We love to listen to them, narrate them & we all love great story tellers. Great stories never die – look at the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. Similarly great brands built on great stories live on.

“Intel Inside” is one of the shortest, yet one of the most successful stories ever told. Not many know or understand the benefit of an Intel processor in their computer, yet it’s these two words that make them feel confident that they have made the right choice.

According to some thinkers what really turns a product into a “brand” is intelligent “PR” (Public Relations). You need to let out an interesting story to the media, for people to notice you. Later on, advertising can be used to sustain the brand & survive. One company that used it the best to its advantage was the UK-based “Innocent” brand of smoothies. There was a “story” woven into every ‘P’ of marketing, right from the name – well chosen, to represent that everything in the bottle was “fresh and unadulterated” to the packaging. Short on budget, they launched the drink from a stall put up in a little music festival in London. On top of their stall they put up a sign which read thus: “Do you think we should give up our jobs to make these smoothies?” and put two bins labeled “Yes” & “No”. If you liked the smoothies you had to put the empty bottles in the “Yes” bin. At the end of the weekend the “Yes” bin was full. The two friends resigned from their jobs, and “Innocent” was born. Not just the brand name, even the logo & the packaging was designed in such a manner as to tell the story of their company’s philosophy. Their aim was to design the packaging such that it told a three word story i.e. the contents are “home-made, natural, and posh.” This helped them differentiate from the hundreds of “fresh juice” brands crowding the marketplace. The space behind the logo on the bottle was used to put down a “banana phone” number where you could call and let the company know what you thought about smoothies. You could even mail them. The unique way of telling your story via the packaging caught the fancy of consumers & shook up the beverage market. The company showed it was a good story & not big budgets that was required to win over customers & market share.

Look at great brands, and you are bound to find an interesting story. Coca- Cola, has the story of its secret formula locked up in the headquarters in Atlanta, KFC has stories of its 11 secret spices that make its chicken so “finger lick in’ good”. It’s not because Harley Davidson is the best bike in the world that people are ready to wait for months to get their dream machine, willing to pay a premium for it. When they buy a Harley, they buy a little bit of its heritage, its history too! What’s history but a great story told down the generations, which gives the brands that enigma, that power to stand out.

Stories don’t just build market share

Think of your favourite advertisements & most of them would be those that tell a story, which does not necessarily brag about the products’ attributes. The Zoozoo ads are so watchable not because the characters are so cute, but also because each ad has a short story to tell.

“They laughed when I sat down at the Pram, but when I started to play…” one of the most memorable headlines in advertising, Why? Because it told a story. Stories help build emotional connections with people. For years Coors beer told the world about its “unrelenting commitment to brewing with only Rocky mountain water” through its advertisement. This created a perception in the minds of consumers that the beer must be crisp & great to taste because of the mountain water.

If you can tell an interesting story in 60 seconds you can build a great brand. FedEx, made a whole new business model on the basis of a simple story line “wherever your destination, in the United States, your parcel would reach by 10 am the next day”. People loved it & even used it in a movie. As Julia Roberts jumps onto a FedEx truck to escape from her marriage in the movie “The Runaway Bride”, a spectator remarks, “Where’s she going?” His friend answers “Wherever it is, she will reach by 10 AM.” Great stories live on. The Aesop’s fables were written in 300 B.C. and we still read them & enjoy them today. There are some stories that are always a hit. The “rags-toriches” stories, the “underdog” stories and the “Cinderella” stories always work. Look at Hollywood or Bollywood to see how year after year, such stories are churned out and continue to keep the cash registers jingling.

Bedtime stories to Brand stories

As children, we found bedtime stories irresistible. As adult consumers, it’s ‘Brand’ stories that intrigue us. Barack Obama, built his ‘brand’ on an interesting story of “Change”. America’s first black President – it was a story every kid liked and wanted to turn to reality. Princess Diana was an interesting story of a simple girl turning into the “People’s Princess”. It is claimed that Oprah Winfrey cooked-up stories of her povertystricken childhood because they worked. Everyone loves the rags-to-riches story… Shahrukh is one of them.

In the 1890s, William Foster added spikes to the soles of his shoes to help athletes run faster. Soon the best athletes were wearing them. The runners featured in the film Chariots of Fire, wore them. Which brand? If you guessed “Nike”, I just proved my point! The brand was not Nike, it was Reebok. Nike came a full 70 years later. Phil Knight understood the power of a story & never failed to talk about one, be it the fact that Nike was named after the Greek Goddess of victory (Reebok too was named after an ancient God) or how he added a special waffle e pattern to help athletes run faster. Reebok never used stories to build on its heritage. Nike did. A good brand comes not just with good quality but good stories too. Similarly a good ad is no more about telling your USP (Unique Selling Proposition), but your “unique story proposition”.

Be it a family, a society, a country, everyone needs a good story teller to guide, & motivate others & make the world a happy place. Stories stimulate imaginations, changes or help build perceptions. They touch our deepest human emotions. Winston Churchill used his story of “Hope”. Hitler was one of the greatest story teller too!

Stories build leaders & brands. Remember, the charm of Camp Fire Nights were stories. So as you build your brand ask yourself “What’s my story”.

THEY ARE COMING TO GET YOU – NOT ALIENS SILLY

2010-05-21T10:03:00.004+05:30

He is more popular than Jesus… well, at least on Twitter and he is just 16 years old. His mom posted a video of his on YouTube, which triggered a series of events and shot him to fame. Today every girl from the age group of 7-16 dreams of how it would be to be his girlfriend.

She did in 18 months what Madonna took nearly a decade to accomplish. She is 23. She features in the 2010 Time Magazine’s listing of the 100 most influential people in the world. Who are these people? How will they affect business?

Get to know them better
Welcome to the new world. Generations come and generations go and they leave their impact on the world. The generation of ‘Baby Boomers’ is retiring and a whole new, and totally different one is emerging, ready to take on the world. Look around you they are everywhere, in sports (Maria Sharapova, b.1987), in business (Mark Zuckerberg, Founder Facebook, b.1984, Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter, b.1981), in music (Britney Spears, Miley Cyrus of the Hannah Montana fame, b: 1992, and of course Justin Bieber, remember he is more famous than Jesus, and Lady GaGa, who beat Madonna in her own game) in Hollywood (Daniel Radcliffe of Harry Potter fame, Megan Fox, b.1986 , Hilary Duff and the very pretty Scarlett Johansson, b.1984). They are even the new face of Royalty! Move over Lady Diana, it’s time for Princes, William and Harry. These are the people who are not just bringing the gold medals for sports, but also the Oscars, and the moolah for businesses.

In fact, they seem to be popping-up just about everywhere. Look at more characters being modeled behind them. In the fi lm ‘Up in the Air’, the young recruit changes the whole work place and shakes up George Clooney, as he gets a close view of the way this generation functions. He realises that they nowadays use SMS to even break up a relationship. Look at movies like the Devil Wears Prada, (500) Days of Summers etc. and you will get to understand them better. The latest ad of Intel in some way mirrors this new generation’s thought process. The tagline goes – “they come from around the world. Then they go out and change it”. Intel: Sponsors of Tomorrow. The copy of the advertisement goes on to explain how the company uses these young minds to solve tomorrow’s biggest challenges. Look, even scientists are getting younger. Mover over, old, wild Einstein, the image of a new scientist is a smart, cool, kid! These are the “Millennial”. Just a few years ago, you watched them zip by in cars driven by their parents with the ‘Baby on board’ stickers on them. You fought with them across the dining table to fi nish the vegetables on their plates. Today, you are meeting them in the boardrooms, and in the market place, and you cannot ignore them, for according to a survey done by Pews Research, this is America’s most educated generation, and the one with a large spending power. This is the first generation that grew up with computers, mobile phones, and got iPods & Nintendos as Christmas gifts. They are multi-taskers, they live on the Internet. They don’t go to the stores to buy things – they first check the website. This is also a generation that grew up in stable homes, is closer to their parents, who are more like friends (remember it was Justin Biebers’s mother who posted his first video on YouTube & is the one who travels with him and he is proud about it). This generation likes large families and is more tolerant. Most importantly, it’s very hard working, talented, confident, connected and open to change. It even voted for “change”. Don’t forget this is the generation that made the impossible happen and voted Barack Obama to power. And yes, he may not be Elton John, at least not yet, but 16 years old Justin Bieber got to perform at the White House.

With billions of dollars in collective purchasing power, this generation will affect business and market in a big way. But they are different and need to be handled differently. As the research done by The Economist magazine states, no generation in history has been so prepared at so young an age to use technology as an agent for change… business need to adapt to be able to connect with them, to personalise the customer experience, or else it would be WOMBAT (a waste of money, brains and time)

Get to market them better
It’s the Baby Boomer generation (1946- 64) that has been calling the shots from the 1960s till now. The Boomers lived by: Just Do it, the Gen Xers (1965-80) lived by: Why Do it, and the new Millennial (1980-date) live by: Just Did it. They need to be marketed differently and the one lady everyone is looking up to is Lady Gaga. In an era where no one buys CDs anymore, the woman sold 8 million copies of her album and 20 million of her singles, all thanks to her army of 2.8 million Twitter followers and more than 5.2 million Facebook fans. Mac Cosmetics went to her to help launch their new lipstick. The launch day alone generated 20 million unique views in traditional media. The launch outsold any launch in Viva Glam’s 16 year history. Mac Cosmetics and Estee Lauder must be mighty pleased. So much so, that now Polaroid is trying to revive its dead market with the help of the Lady and her accurate understanding of the Millennials!

It’s simple – if you know what drives their purchasing behaviour, you could plan a successful marketing campaign. A wine company realised quickly that this generation drank for fun not abuse; they liked wine more, for it could be shared with family and friends. A quick research and they knew what to put in their marketing campaign – colorful labels, smaller sized bottles, mid-priced, with the ads focusing on family & friends, and yes, people of diversity of race & age. If you could throw in something that was ‘environment friendly’, your campaign was bound to be a big hit.

This new generation is not just your new consumer, but also your new employee. It’s a breed that was brought up by doting parents, who taught their children to not just be successful, but also be fulfilled – to be what they, want to be (now wonder 3 Idiots set the box-office on fire, for it struck the right chord with both parents & children!). This generation never learnt to lose, for modern schooling says ‘everyone is a winner’. Dealing with such employees could get unnerving. How do you handle them, reprimand them, and most importantly retain them for they are bundles of talent? Companies like Ernst & Young were actually hiring consultants to teach them how to deal with this generation which did not learn to take ‘No’ for an answer.

C. H. Robinson Worldwide, allows these new employees to choose their own titles. Another company gives more personalized rewards to them, for that works better. For a generation that’s extremely tech-savvy, doesn’t care much about ethics, but how much difference they are making in the world, for a generation that’s expert in multi-tasking, prefers to climb Mount Everest than do summer jobs, one needs to think differently and plan differently.

When you start work on your marketing campaign, ask yourself how millennial ready are you, for that’s the future. If aliens may not be as sweet as ‘E.T.’ or ‘Jaadoo’ according to Stephen Hawkins, for they may rip our earth for their own good, neither would these millennials be good for your company and the market, if you don’t handle them well. It’s the new force. You better be prepared or they are coming to get you.

WHAT TRANSLATES TO BIGGER PROFITS?

2010-05-06T10:17:00.005+05:30

American Airlines spent tons of money reupholstering seats in their entire fleet and then of course spent more publicising this fact. They ran ads in all leading newspapers and magazines with the headline “Fly in leather”, for now they knew they had an edge over their competitors. Excited by their terrific ad campaign they decided to take it across borders and share it with their potential Spanish speaking customers. Of course, this time they translated it in Spanish, so that it would have a wider appeal. However what they got was rather unexpected. A lot of Spanish speaking people complained about these advertisements. Much to the horror of the airline, when they looked at the Spanish advertisement & translated them back again in English they realized, their snappy headline “Fly in leather” had changed to “Fly Naked”!

Don’t Translate
Just because you have a great ad-campaign, does not guarantee success in all markets. Since business today is done in multiple markets, each different from the other in terms of culture, language, religion et al, it makes sense to be ‘culturally sensitive’ while doing business.

As a starter – don’t translate – if you want to avoid global mishaps and embarrassments. The Dairy Milk Association learnt it the hard way. After its hugely successful campaign “Got Milk” popularized the benefits of milk in US, the company decided to continue its victory march to Mexico with the same campaign. However it had to beat a hasty retreat after it realised that the Spanish translation actually read – “Are you lactating”. Wrong translations landed Parker Pens in trouble when the ads which were supposed to say “It won’t leak in your pocket and embarrass you” turned into “It won’t leak in your pocket and make you pregnant”. Coors beer wanted to show you how you could let your hair down and have fun with Coors, when it made its tagline “Turn it loose”. The Spaniards were not pleased when they saw a beer that helped you “Get loose bowels”. The Chinese too got really suspicious of this drink which promised to “Bring your ancestors back from the dead”. The various Chinese characters had distorted the phrase “Come alive with the Pepsi Generation!”. Unfortunately, no one in China (which is already heavily populated) wanted to bring their ancestors back!

Today, every brand is on the lookout for broader markets – mostly international. Many times, it is the language barrier that can harm a campaign & even the overall brand. To reach new markets, mere “translations” never work. From the obvious, hilarious faux pas, to the serious marketing blunders, everything can be avoided if we look beyond translation.

We need to look beyond the language and into the cultural differences in languages. We need to “transcreate”. Quickly defined, it would mean “not just translating content, but ensuring it is culturally relevant as well”. Such a measure will take care of the cultural differences & language nuances.

One size fits all?
‘Think global, act local’ is an oft quoted statement. Transcreation helps you to localize your content. After all, it’s true that each country is different and within each country, different ethnicities give different regions unique flavours. Transcreation helps you and your brand become a part of the local culture. Just see how “Spider-Man” was localised to suit the Indian comic buffs. Peter Parker became Pavitr Prabhakar, Mary Jane, became Meera Jain, Aunt May was Auntie Maya and uncle Ben, became uncle Bhim. Your brand, your advertising campaign, should metamorphise in much the same way, if they want to win market share. You need to learn from the videogame developers who were the first to realise the benefits of adapting to local cultures. They had to vary the amount of violence and explicit language to comply with the cultural and legal requirements of different regions of the world.

One product will not work everywhere as Pepsodent discovered with its teeth whitening toothpaste, which didn’t fare well in South Asia where many cultures value chewing betel nuts which darkens teeth. In Japan, during the 12th century, blackening was associated with coming of age. Later on, in the 18th century, it was associated with nobility & the Samurai.

Just creating good ads & good products will not guarantee success. Today, one needs to ‘Transcreate’. A transcreator has the ability to connect with the audience and its feelings. It must have been the work of a transcreator who changed the dull, dowdy American campaign of Coca- Cola from “The Real Thing” to “Thanda Matlab Coca-Cola!” to make the product rock in India.

Adapt to survive!
Last month a massive survey was done in US by the market research firm CSA (Common Sense Advisory), which confirmed that reaching new markets through transcreation was the most demanded service, with the highest growth potential.

Be it healthcare, or mobile phones, cars or cameras, the benefits of each need to be communicated effectively, so that it is both culturally & linguistically appropriate. However famous your brand name, however successful, if it’s not adapted to suit the local culture, it has very high chances of failing.

No wonder big brands are employing firms to specifically examine their product names in multiple tongues. After all it’s very expensive to create a brand identity and you don’t want to be stuck with a brand name that won’t work in other cultures or languages.

Volkswagen realised ‘Jetta’ in Italian was pronounced as ‘letta’ which meant ‘misfortune’. The ‘Matador’ didn’t do well in Puerto Rico for it translated to ‘killer’. ‘Trafi cante’ an Italian brand of mineral water could not sell in Spain for the word meant ‘drug dealer’ there. Toyota realised that its MR2, which in France is pronounced as “merde”, meant ‘crappy’. Rolls Royce decided to change the name of its car, the ‘Silver Mist’ to the ‘Silver Shadow’ before launching it in Germany for ‘mist’, means ‘manure’. The Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer tried to sell its goods in the American market with the slogan “Nothing sucks like an Electrolux” – just imagine how much good a little better knowledge of English could have done to it!!!

‘Transcreation’ is the new buzz word for doing business, for it’s not just about making your advertising messages, or brand communications better understood, but it is also about producing the same ‘reactions’ from the audiences anywhere in the world.

Culture Concerns
To prevent your bottomlines from getting a ‘culture shock’, it is absolutely important for you to become culturally sensitive. The world is changing. There are now ‘global’ markets, and ‘global brands’, and sometimes even ‘global marketing campaigns’, but however much we are influenced by other cultures, American or European or whatever, we still retain our local identities. So, there never will be ‘global consumers’. For we may go to Mc- Donald’s, but we eat the Aloo Tikki burger there. This is the only land where you will find tandoori pizza, and it is here that I ask for ‘Thanda’ and get Coca-Cola. It is here that Ford had to be the ‘josh’ machine to appeal to the crowds.

Every country has its unique identity। So nothing can work ‘across’ all borders. To succeed, one needs to adapt. No wonder, the first step that marketers are taking, is checking how their campaigns, brand names, marketing communications will work in other cultures. They are investing in ‘transcreating’ – for that’s what translates to bigger profits.

TEN SUPER STARS OR ONE SUPER TEAM? DECIDE!

2010-04-22T11:49:00.001+05:30

There is more IPL action happening on the front pages of newspapers than the sports pages. The controversies, the money spent on buying “super players”, $2.75 million on Kieron Pollard, $1.3 million on Shane Bond, got me intrigued. Does stacking your team with the best players guarantee success?

The myth of the Lone ranger
Personal leadership is the most studied, researched topic in American life. However romantic the idea of a larger than life individual working alone and accomplishing great things may sound, the fact remains – seldom can success be attributed to one individual. Most of the times, it’s not great men or great women, but great groups that have been responsible for
success.

Great groups are formed not by putting extremely talented people together. In fact, talent alone can never result in success. The fact is that even Michelangelo worked with a group of 16 artists to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel – one of his most famous works. The lone ranger can only achieve as much, while a great team can break all boundaries and even do the impossible. What makes a team truly great is the fact that they are bound to each other with a “Great Dream”. Henry Ford once said, “Coming together is a beginning, working together is progress, achieving together is success.” The feeling of togetherness comes when you have a shared goal.

Last month, an interesting documentary hit the theaters. It was titled “Waking Sleeping Beauty”, by director Don Hahn. He explains the second coming of Disney studios, which had been left far behind after Pixar entered the business. Hahn, a Disney producer himself shows how the Magic Kingdom was staffed with the best talent in 1984 with young, very energetic & extremely creative people, yet, every production bombed. It took two great team players – Michael Eisner, and Jeffrey Katzenberg to turn this creative chaos into a movie-making powerhouse. Then in the 90s, due to ego clashes and various other reasons, they stopped playing as a team and the downward spiral started again. As Hahn himself says, “I can’t look at animation as anything other than a team sport”. This is true for most business – and good leaders know that.

A lot of us may feel we are good team players, for we are helpful, friendly and are actively involved in the happenings of the company. This is passive leadership. The real “team players” are those who not just bring out best in themselves, but have the knack to identify the true potential of their team members and charge them up and stimulate them so much that they go ahead and do the impossible.

Often, superstars come with ‘super egos’, but ‘super team leaders’ are ‘super ego mangers’ – and that’s what success is all about.

Cisco is one company that has learnt this lesson well and has changed its organizational culture. From days when ‘rock star’ leaders were compensated primarily on how much money their individual business units made, today the focus of Cisco is on a new programme where executives are judged on the basic of how to collectively reach group achievement and “shine everyone’s star”. The company is learning to work as one, and in the process has generated millions of dollars in savings and billions of dollars in new business. Of course, some ‘super stars’ left the company, but instead of losses, the company made profits. Just as a lot of superstars packed in a fi lm does not guarantee its success at the box-office, similarly, a company of individual super achievers is not always successful. Think about it – the 2004 US Olympic basketball team consisted entirely of NBA stars. It finished third and lost to Lithuania! When coach Herb Brooks was choosing his hockey team, he left out some of the country’s greatest college players and shocked a lot of Americans. On being asked why the best players were left out, he said, “I’m not looking for the best players, I’m looking for the right players.”

When we recruit, that’s exactly what we should look for, since that’s the first step to building a great team and a great company. As Jim Collins says very lucidly in his book “Good to Great” – first, get the right people on the bus, wrong people off the bus and the right people in the right seat; then figure out where to drive. Before you decide the vision, mission, strategy, tactics and structure, decide on the people. Your company needs strong players and strong teams, not “one genius with a thousand helpers!” A great leader is one who has the guts to recruit people better than him & the capability to manage these people & keep them motivated. As Michael Jordan once said “Talent wins games, but team work and intelligence wins championships.”

The one place where the impact of a great team is felt and understood immediately is football. In three hours, you see the outcome of team work. Its not the teams with superstars like Beckham or Ronaldo that make you win, rather, it’s the players with a high sense of a camaraderie who make their teams win, Lionel Messi, the reigning World Player of the Year, scored a hat trick in 22 minutes and another one in the last 4 minutes, leading Barcelona into the European Champions league & defeating Arsenal. While many felt he was single hardly responsible for the 4-1 win, the man himself said and has always said this year after year: “This is a matter of all of us,… we all fought, …and luckily I scored the goals.” FIFA, one of the biggest events in the sporting calendar is happening this year – it would be interesting to once again witness how super teams and not super stars steal the show!

Everybody loves a good team
Great teams are based on similarity of spirit and diversity of strengths. It required the magnetic attraction of Thomas Edison to bring together a machinist, a Swiss clockmaker, a German glassblower and a trained mathematician to bring about a breakthrough. On October 22, 1879, the first bulb completed its first trial run of 14 hours. Yes a genius, but Edison never was the “lone inventor”, much like this young man & his team of four. They were called dropouts, artists, iconoclasts, even best friends. But this young man had the ability to unleash their limitless individual creativity, make them work 90 hours a week, for weeks at stunningly low pay and no one seemed to be bothered. They just wanted to make a gadget that would change the world. Steve Jobs and his team did so when they invented Mac – the first personal computer, much the same as Edison, who changed the world with his bulb. There’s an old African saying that goes – “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together”. Winning teams in business or sports have proven this time and again.

A team of three best players at McCann Erickson debated & discussed a creative idea for days. Then, while taking a shower, one of them thought about a punch line that went like this – “Some things money can’t buy.” He rushed to his team & they debated over it that morning. By Sunday, they had chanced upon something “priceless”. Yes it was a team of three that made the most beautiful ad for Master Card. It’s the “priceless campaign” that helped Master Card defeat Visa – something it was unable to do for a long time. Great teams are priceless and everyone loves them. Remember the delightful team of Sherlock & Watson that we grew up reading about. The evergreen story of a team of five brothers - the Pandavas & how they defeated the mighty Kaurawas, or the adorable 3 idiots who not just set the box-office on fire, but set an example of how great teams can work in unison, both in-front & behind the cameras. No one was a ‘super star’ – each had a role clearly crafted which suited him, just the way one should build corporate or football teams!

In fact the “Green Bay Packers”, the American football team which was coached by the famous Vince Lombardi is so loved that today, if you want to buy tickets, you need to wait for over 30 years! Many in Green Bay put the names of their baby on the list as soon as the birth certificate comes. After all – everybody wants to be a part of a winning team – even if its just as a spectator.

So as we plan for the future, this new financial year, let’s look beyond profits, beyond targets, beyond superstars and hunt for super team players.

MARKETING BY THE MOB - THE POWER OF “YOU”!

2010-03-25T10:14:00.002+05:30

“Team sunegi, duniya dekhegi;” it’s your chance to tell Mumbai Indians how to play. And if that’s not enough, then for a cricket crazy nation there is more. You can help Kolkata Knight Riders by actually coaching them, for this time, Shahrukh is asking for your suggestions & making you a coach of his team. “Main bhi coach,” sums up the Indian mentality where everybody sitting in front of their TV sets knows the exact “winning mantra” for each match. This time, a lot of IPL teams are asking you, and rewarding you too for your suggestions. Why?

“You” – the new advertising guru

The chocolate bar ‘Picnic’ seemed to have run-out of an ad agency, when in February this year, it invited consumers to create their own advertisements, where they had to film themselves attempting to eat a Picnic in 30 seconds flat. The best films would be the new commercials for the brand and would be aired on TV. Seeing the super success of involving the crowds, Australia’s bankrupt radio station FBi 94.5FM asked its listeners to come out with innovative ways of asking music-loving billionaire Richard Branson to save the radio. People came up with the most creative ideas… from baking 5000 cupcakes with Branson’s face, to one enthusiast even swimming up to Branson’s private island to ask for his help. Branson finally called up the radio station & gave a donation last month. A great campaign more-so, considering the client was already bankrupt!

The mob can do magic if you hit the right spot. In 2006, Doritos asked people to make their own ads of the chips, upload it on the Doritos website and the most voted ad would be aired during the Super bowl, with the winner taking away $10,000. Last year (2009), the prize money went up to $1 million, but that’s not the point; for the first time in 10 years the king of beers, Anheuser-Busch was dethroned as the king of “Super Bowl Commercials” by the Doritos ad, made by an amateur on a measly $2000 budget. Not only did this show that just because you are a big ad agency, you have the best ideas, but that a great idea can come from anywhere, so just don’t forget the mob.

In February last year, Bingo asked people to create games, quizzes et al, around the theme “Bingo har angle se mmmm...” It got the wackiest of responses from someone suggesting George Bush should say “M sending Bingo Chilli Dhamaka to Iraq”… and not bombs to a blind man seeing with his mind’s eye how “yumm” the chips were.

Lays went a step further. Forget an advertisement, now you could create your own flavour and win Rs.50 lakh + 1% of the product’s sales revenue. “Be a little dillogical”; well, nobody was complaining even though the award seemed “illogical” or rather too good to be true!

“You” – the new product developer

Lays did it in India, Kettle chips did it in USA, and it was all about asking you to become a flavor artist and create a chip & win prizes too.

Adidas asked users to express their individuality and design their own shoe with the help of an expert. Lego provided its users with a software to help people design the LEGO of their dreams. It proved the coolest way to capture complete attention & imagination of your target audience and involve them totally with your brand, at almost no extra cost.

P&G realised it, when its then CEO, A.G. Lafley, found that he was running out of ideas and it was getting impossible to keep up with the demands of consumers. P&G’s Connect + Develop was launched to ask customers to help. Its “Pringles Prints”, where interesting things were printed directly on the chips was launched at almost no cost & in no time. Through ‘Connect’, it found a small bakery in Italy which could do the job for them. This proved cheaper & faster than developing the process in-house.

Netflix, the on-line movie rental company, has a software that helps identify what kind of films its customers like & then recommends similar films to them. If the customers liked the recommendations, it would only mean more business for Netflix. It launched a contest where anyone who could increase the efficiency of its existing software by 10% would get $1 million. The plan worked & the winning team took away the moolah. The plan was so effective that they plan a repeat this year too, but again, for just a million dollars!

This seems to be the time for doing business “with” real people. Not just “with”, sometimes products are designed “of ” the people too. Burger King in Brazil took the tagline “Have it your way” to a whole new level, when they decided to install a secret camera, which took customers’ pictures and printed them on wrappers of their burgers! The crowd loved it completely!

“Me and Meri Maggi” – that’s how Nestlé decided to celebrate its 25 years of Maggi, with who else but “You”. Maggi is nothing without its consumers (as is true for every brand), and every body has a “Maggi story” to tell. So now, you could share your “Maggi moments” and your recipe with the world & get famous too. Your picture would be printed on the package. No celebrities, but the consumer is important, for it’s a loyal crowd that builds a big brand. Cleary, this brand is proof that today, business is being redefined as – “for” the people, “by” the People, “of ” the People.

“You”– the new company

Crowd souring seems to be a profitable model for businesses. “Innocentive” is a company that has made a whole new business out of this. It uses the global brainpower to develop new products, new commercials, new virals – whatever. A global brainstorming to solve your problems – can you beat that? Every solution has a reward and big corporation (P&G used Innocentive to launch Pringles print) is asking Innocentive for help. Rockefeller foundation wants a low-cost water treatment system & offers $15,000 to the winner. So if you have an idea, share it and earn too!

New products have a notoriously high rate of failure, for many times companies fail to understand customers. “Trend Hunters” is a new business that helps you spot “trends”, and the latest trend it has spotted is “Next Besting” – how people are choosing almost-as-good-budget friendly options over expensive ones. So, if you want to feel the pulse of the crowd you may want to visit “Trend Hunters”.

The most talked about thing on the Internet called “YouTube” is the best example of consumer generated content. Even IPL’s viewership is increasing, now that you can see the matches on YouTube. Soon, you would have set-top boxes, which would stream digital content on your big TV, Satellite TV! Beware, You- Tube could render you redundant soon!

“You”... all the way!

The common man is a bigger hit than a celebrity. Look at TV – the most popular shows are the “Reality Shows” with ‘real’ people & not ‘paid actors’. People believe movie reviews given by the commoner, more than those given by the critics. Magazines are asking readers to send-in their pictures & their stories, and these are more popular than those delivered by trained journalists

In May 2008, 50,000 citizens in Estonia, on a single day cleaned up the city. It was something that would have taken the government 3 years & 22 million euros! Some motivated individuals used the power of the mob & did it. This year the people of Portugal did the same. Forget business, how about doing it for our own country? After all we all know, whenever you’ve got a knotty problem that you can’t solve you know what to do – call the mob!

THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT 100

2010-03-11T10:09:00.000+05:30

It’s a special issue that we hold in our hands today and hence a time to celebrate, and celebrate we will. For as someone said, “Stop worrying about the potholes in the road and celebrate the journey.” It’s been an amazing journey for 4Ps B&M. It stared as a dream, an idea, and over the years was nurtured and made grandiose by A. Sandeep, the most witty, dynamic and intelligent Editor of the magazine. He was, is and will be the backbone of this magazine. It’s geniuses like him and Sutanu Guru, Steven and Aditi who have made this magazine so popular and revered! 100 is after all a very special number and our 100th issue very special too. It symbolises commitment, consistency and great quality and trust which our readers have put in the magazine.

“Trust” is the keyword and various instances in the recent past have once again proved that this is the most important factor. No one has realised this more than Toyota. In February 2010, Toyota recalled hundreds of thousands of its cars from America and Japan due to faulty brakes resulting in huge losses. According to a survey, Toyota previously had a flawless reputation, with nearly 92% respondents trusting the brand almost blindly. Post the recall issue, only 66% consumers consider it reliable. In fact, in USA, about 26% judged Toyota to be of a lower quality than domestic brands. In this world of cut-throat competition, this is not good as competitors don’t miss a chance to beat you down... which is exactly what Ford did. It’s the only American car company to have survived the steepest sales downturn in decades – that too without a government bailout. When it comes to winning new customers and their trust and admiration, Ford has taken the lead and its showing in their balance sheets too. In 2009, Ford actually made profits – for the first time after fi ve years and thanks to the once-in-a-lifetime “golden” opportunity provided by Toyota. Ford now says there’ll be no “brakes” on its profitability even in 2010.

It is trust that has made Apple top the charts, third year in a row as “the world’s most admired company.” Apple generates a hysteria around its products. This year, its sales are generating the same hysteria. Just three years old, in the smart phone category and the iPhone has already become the world’s third largest smart phone maker. Apple doubled its iPhone sales last year to 25 million. It is trust built over the years by Disney due to its obsessive focus on product quality that has seen it get ranked No.1 in world class quality by consumers.

Trust is that intangible factor that keeps companies afloat & enables them to beat competition; trust is something we value most. It’s the trust that our readers have put in us that we have been able to reach the “100th issue” milestone. “100” after all is an interesting number. There seems to be a magical ring to it. Ask any cricket lover and he will be able to recount the magical and fastest 100 scored by Shahid Afridi against Srilanka in Nairobi. A 102 runs out of just 37 balls. If one 100 can get people so excited, then think of two 100s and you could even get a Bharat Ratna, if not deliriously happy to say the least! Sachin Tendulkar became the first cricketer in the history of one-day cricket to score a double hundred in Gwalior. Every Indian’s heart swelled with pride.

It’s interesting to note that the most powerful man on Earth is judged by the work he does in the first 100 days of taking oath. An odd custom, some may say, but that’s how it’s been since the days of Franklin D Roosevelt, who also took office at a time of dire economic crisis. Roosevelt used the first 100 days to jumpstart the economy and put people back to work. FDR’s first 100 days were the greatest, and no President has been able to equal that time when Democrats & Republicans worked as one! Barack Obama too had the boldest 100 days and more or less everyone felt his first 100 days were impressive as a leader! Yes, 100 seems to influence a lot of things as Albert Einstein once said, “I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right”. Be it 100 runs, 100 days, or 100 conclusions, it’s one number that seems to be an important milestone to judge many things.

100!

‘Google’ was actually meant to be named “Googol” but due to a misspelling landed up as “Google”. ‘Googol’ means, one allowed by a 100 zeros. Dr. Kasner a prominent mathematician wanted a name for a very large number and Milton, his 9 year old nephew, came up with ‘Googol’!

Fascinating but true, sometimes what you think to be a hundred is not so. The famous “100 year war”, the longest war in history fought between England and France, actually went on for 116 years. The dictionary meaning of “centurion” would read as 100 soldiers, but typically a Roman centurion commands 80 soldiers. In Dhaka, a 100 mangoes equals 112 in the metric system, while in Dinjpur a 100 betel leaves is 64.

While on the number 100, here are some interesting quirky facts. Your daily cup of coffee contains more than 100 chemicals. When you sneeze, the sneeze it travels out of your mouth at over 100 miles per hour, and your heart beats over 100 thousand times a day. A “jiffy” is actually a unit of time for 1/100th of a second. The cat can produce over 100 vocal sounds and a shark can detect one part of blood in 100 million parts of water. Come to think of it, the Earth gets 100 tons heavier everyday due to falling space dust. The book by Gabriel Marquez listed as one of the best books of the twentieth century is called “100 years of solitude”.

If that’s not enough, then for all you people below 100 years of age, try this (13837) x (your age) x 73= a very interesting number. Check it out.

And as you mull over the impact of 100 in our lives, we hope you enjoy this 100th issue a hundred times more than any other. A 100 cheers to all as we celebrate this important milestone, for you all will surely agree there’s something special about 100.

THE NEW WORLD OF ADAMS AND IPADS

2010-02-25T10:18:00.001+05:30

As the world became sure of the rumours that Apple would launch its “much talked- about-tablet” the iPad by January end, NASDAQ went into a tizzy. Apple’s share prices soared. The world was bursting with excitement of what would Steve Jobs do this time! Gawker Media even went to the extent of publicly offering up to $1,00,000 in cash for photos of the Apple tablet a week before the actual launch. Yes, Jobs knows his job very well. He knows how to excite the world and how to very intelligently market his inventions. Moses knew the power of the “tablet” when years ago he descended on Earth with the 10 commandments engraved on it. Steve Jobs did much the same when he demonstrated how the world would change its ways after the iPad!

IPAD GIVES COMPETITION A RUN FOR ITS MONEY
Amazon’s e-reader ‘Kindle’ is definitely going to feel the heat for the iPad. Apart from being a beautiful device, the iPad is much cooler and more fun. It’s colorful, sleek and will come with zillions of applications for the user to download. Priced almost at par with the Kindle, the iPad would definitely be giving sleepless nights to Jeff Bezos (founder of Amazon.com & Kindle). The tablet is going to be the new form of browsing the web.

The iPad, with its new technology, makes browsing super fast, easy and most importantly an absolute delight. We might soon be saying goodbye to our laptops and desktops! The iPad brings along with it the “Tablet Age” and soon we could see a lot of people reaching out for a ‘Tablet’ to do a lot of things!

ADAM GIVES IPAD A RUN FOR ITS MONEY.
Yes, the iPad is changing the rules of the game yet again. However, there is someone who might give it sleepless nights too. It’s none other than our very own ex-student from IIPM, Sachin Ralhan, and his friends who have designed the Indian tablet PC, ‘ADAM’! It would be released in July in America and many feel it’s better than the iPad. It has everything that the iPad doesn’t have. It is slimmer than the iPad, it’s cheaper, it’s got a longer battery life, can run a 1080p HD video (which the iPad cannot), and uses NVIDIA’s new Tegra2 chipset (making its hardware sturdier than iPad’s), has USB ports and runs Flash, both of which the iPad cannot! Three cheers to Sachin, to IIPM and India! I’m surely waiting for the ‘Adam’! All the eves, the envious, the curious and various others, let’s together root for Adam!

TABLETS GIVE BUSINESSES A CHANCE TO RUN FOR THEIR MONE
Tablets are a new way of sharing content with the consumers. And you might have heard how they are going to save the newspaper business, the music companies, magazines and movie studios, television producers and just about everybody! I wonder how much they will save, but they sure will change the rules of many businesses and give them a new dimension to explore. Of course, the possibilities are endless. The iPad and its rich interface will make gaming more thrilling. A magazine will be brought to life with moving pictures, videos, graphics being embedded along with the text!

Condé Nast started working on its digital version for tablets of Wired magazine even before the iPad was launched. It’s a new format and publishers who will reinvent will stay in business. Dwindling advertising revenues could rise again with a whole world of possibilities emerging thanks to ‘tablets’. Digital magazines can have digital ads, which are more interactive than plain print ads.

The iPad, the Adam, are “media viewing machines” and very powerful ones too! Check out the Sports Illustrated – Tablet Demo 1.5 on YouTube to see how reading will never be the same again. An art book now could have videos of the museum; a cookery book on the tablet could show the chef giving his tips. The creative possibilities for publishers are endless.

Travis Boatman of the gaming company EA says that playing games like Scrabble and other board games on the iPad would be a delight. Disney’s CEO, Bob Iger says Digi-books for children would come to life on the iPad. The Guardian, which can be downloaded on your iPhone for £2.39, claims it was downloaded 70,000 times in a month. The iPad, like the iPhone, too could open interesting revenue streams for newspapers and advertisers. The tablet gives advertisers a scope to be more creative. When people thought Billboards were dead, David Ogilvy proved the world wrong. He put up a billboard with a girl in a bikini and a tag line, “She takes off her top next week.” She did and people gawked. “She takes off her bottom next,” he wrote in the second week. The world waited and yes, she kept her promise and people agreed – creativity and not billboards were dead. Ogilvy showed how a creative idea always works. Kenzo pinned poppies on its billboards, which you could simply unpin and take home – a unique way of giving samples. Internet advertising has not been so effective; the iPad and a large dose of creativity could change this. Not surprising, many are calling it a “1.5 pound sack of potential.” One needs to ‘reinvent’ and ‘reimagine’ constantly; and for many businesses, iPad provides that rich canvas to showcase all their creativity.

It’s the game of ‘applications’. In spite of free content being made available, nearly 75 million iPhone and iTouch users download a paid application every month. The Apple store boasts of two billion applications. Even though most are free, the remainder generated sales of $200 million in a month. Not bad for a side business. Adam realizes this is going to be a war of applications – so it’s planning to announce a prize of $1m for developers of applications.

Go Adam...go and make us proud! Be it the Adam, iPad or any other tablet, this is for sure, every developer is now thinking of tablets, just the way the iPhone changed the business of mobiles. Would it be smarter than the smartphones? Would it be lapped up faster than laptops by the market? For those answers, we need to wait till March. However one thing’s sure – the tablet’s sure made technology more interesting and fun!

The future is going to be all about iPads and Adams!

IT’S GOING TO BE A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2010-01-29T10:33:00.000+05:30

‘When times are good, you should advertise. When times are bad, you must advertise.’ Though some marketers were not swayed by the logic then, they have now realised that the fastest way to set things right is with a powerful dose of a great advertisement

An interesting billboard went up in Manhattan in New York a few days back. The advertisement showed Oracle President Charles Phillips posing with a lady named YaVaughnie Wilkins with a quote below the picture that read, “You are my soul mate forever.” The only problem was, Charles was the only person who knew not that he would be featuring in this ad; for it was Ms. Wilkins – with whom he had had an eight-year long affair – who had decided to make things public after he dumped her! She even put a website address on the billboard: charlesphillipsandyavaughniewilkins.com where, if you wanted, you could check out the couple’s snaps, letters and cards sent to each other! Be it an interesting advertisement, adultery or advertisement of adultery, if done well, they never ever fail to capture the attention of the world. Last year, a lot of companies lost faith in the power of a good advertisement; and due to very bad times, a lot were forced to cut down their advertising budgets. But the fact remains, even though advertising is the tip of the whole marketing iceberg, it’s a very important tip nevertheless. And everywhere, companies are once again putting back their faith in this medium of marketing. For like Ms. Wilkins, they realise – the fastest way to set things right is with a powerful dose of a great advertisement.

ADVERTISING – A MARKETER’S BEST FRIEND
Recession or no recession, all gurus preach that marketing budgets should not be cut. They could be channelised from one stream to the other. Sure, tough times demand decrease in advertisement frequency and increase in use of other marketing efforts like direct marketing, which give more immediate sales impact.

However, nothing builds brands stronger and faster than ‘correctly themed’ advertisements; and this year, a lot of companies are doing just that. Not surprising then, that most researches this year are suggesting an increase in the advertising expenditure by 15-20% in India.

One of the first to join the bandwagon is Naukri.com. Remember its Hari Sadu advertisement. He is back and Naukri says it’s OK to call your irritating bosses names, for jobs are back and you can now switch once again. So fear not and express yourself! The underlying message being bidding goodbye to recession. The ‘bad boss’ brings ‘good news’ this time.

‘Hope’ is the new mantra for attracting consumers this year. Federal Express has launched a new ad campaign this year for India, Brazil, Mexico, Japan and UK, showing the world the power of hope. Its new tagline for ads this year is ‘FedEx delivers to a changing world’. It shows how the economy is witnessing an upturn and FedEx, as always, is one they can depend on to stay in business and survive.

The world is a different place today. A whole lot has changed. New rules have been written, old ones rewritten, and to survive you need to change. After 125 years, Oscar Mayer (a division of Kraft Foods) has decided to come out with a new ad campaign, even if it meant pushing aside its most famous and till date highly popular ad jingles. It knows that what worked till last year probably won’t this year. The campaign this year has a new tagline, ‘It doesn’t get better than this’. The ads show cheerful scenes from suburban life… very warm, very comforting, suggesting that good times are just around the corner. This time around, the world needs a heavy dose of ‘hope’ and advertisers are working overtime to infuse some through their ‘happy, homely ads’.

‘Homely’, because when times are rough, you look back to your home and family for support. You need to be reassured that all are together. Each one counts. Not just at home, but in business too, and the one who understood it best was Microsoft. Business is personal is the theme of its new ads. The print ads looked like ‘fake memos’ complete with words crossed, insertions made with a pen, et al; and as you read through, you realise that it was an announcement of the launch of Microsoft’s new software, which “understood how people really worked.” Read the memo, “…now more than ever, it’s everybody’s business… to come together and form a great company even in a tough economy”. Microsoft seems to have got it absolutely right this year. Its earlier ads never really managed to strike a chord with the audience. And Apple always had had the last laugh – as it scored higher with its comparative ads – making fun of Microsoft’s fuddy-duddy image.

Chrysler too is hoping on ‘hope’ as it begins the New Year. It wanted its consumers to realise that it had emerged from bankruptcy and was a stronger, healthier company. As families came together for the New Year, Chrysler did not lose the opportunity to remind them that this was the very company and the very car that had been bringing home their loved ones and hoped to do so for many years to come. A dash of good cheer and nostalgia is what the new campaign, ‘Coming home’, is filled with. It hopes to once again get the cash registers jingling.

NEW YEAR, NEW MAKEOVER
The spirit of survival is what the coming year will be about, and if it requires a new look, then nobody is asking why. Probably, recession needs to be thanked and not blamed, for it’s recession that forces one to think creatively, to think positively. One company that’s surely been thinking very differently is Idea Cellular. With every cellular company banking on celebrities, this one decided to introduce a new ‘idea’ too. Abhishek Bachchan not just charmed you with his wit, but also showed innovative ways of saving paper. It has truly created a huge improvement in brand recall Sir Ji!

Visualise this on your TV screens… teen girls dancing at a bus stop using an MP3 player – then comes a tag line, ‘Made in China with software from Silicon Valley.’ You got it right! Not just companies, countries too are working hard toward changing their images this time, for it makes good business sense. With ‘Made-in-China’ products taking a major image beating this year, be it toothpaste, toys or pet food, the China Advertising Association decided it was time for a makeover. ‘Made in China, made with the world’, is the theme of the new adcampaign to help overcome all negative prejudices of the western world.

If you thought this was all, think again, for there is somebody else who is out with a new advertising campaign to showcase the world its new image. Taliban is softening their stance in Afghanistan and are making full-on attempts to change their image. Believe it or not, but their new policy of cutting off ears, nose or tongues is finding its way in a new ad campaign. Do not try to access it on YouTube for this commercial is banned from being viewed in our country, but this is one smart organization that has learnt its marketing lessons well and understood the power of a good ad campaign.

This next one that I am going to talk about is still reeling under the hit it got last year – from a golf club I bet! Post Tiger Woods, Accenture is still struggling to get its act together. It’s also out with a new ad campaign. It would be spending between $40-50 million bucks on this one, which shows different animals doing things they normally wouldn’t do. An elephant surfing, a frog leapfrogging other frogs, et al, with the punch line ‘Who says you can’t be big and nimble?’ God knows how the ads would fare. But one thing is sure: this

one would have all animals except the tiger! Of course, the fastest way for Tiger Woods to rebuild his image would be to stay away from commercials this year. But for others, it’s time to put in a spring in your walk, a cherry smile and try to win back customers and lost market share with advertisements that sell ‘Hope’ and ‘Happiness.’

This time, creativity will count the most. Remember, you can’t out-spend the competitor every time, and more so not in today’s times with very tight budgets. However, you sure can outthink them.

Choose a theme that gels with the feelings of today’s consumer and you can bet that this time things will get better, and it’s sure going to be a Happy New Year!

AAMIR DOES IT BEST – EVEN AT 44

2010-01-14T10:16:00.001+05:30

A good product or even a good advertising strategy alone cannot successfully sell a brand. In today’s cutthroat competition, strategic public relations holds the answer!

Amystery cream was pitted against some well known branded antiaging creams for seven days in a “blind product-trial” campaign in China. One hundred and fifty beauty bloggers in Shanghai participated in this “blind-trial”. The results showed an overwhelming 9 out of 10 women (bloggers) said they would recommend this mystery cream to a friend and a same number said it was better than the well-known, prestige brands that they had used in the past. The surprise result created a tremendous buzz online. After seven days the name of the mystery cream was revealed – Unilever’s Pond’s Age Miracle.

When David Beckham travelled to Australia to play for LA Galaxy FC the world leading style icon was seen using the V8 Lux, the new mobile phone that Motorola was planning to launch in Australia. The world saw Beckham using the phone, what they did not see was the weeks of hard work the agency Ogilvy put into developing media partnership with some of Australia’s top radio, print & TV media to help promote the idea that Beckham too uses the V8 Lux. In a country where its people use their mobile phone as a style statement, for the brand to be perceived as stylish you needed a stylish launch. For a phone that had ensured it was designed most stylishly with its gold plated accents, smooth snakeskin-like textures and subtle details, all it needed was a stylish roll-out (who better than Beckham) and an intelligent public relations (PR) agency to help influence people’s perception!

Pond’s Age Miracle cream’s launch in China through the “blind-trial” using beauty bloggers was also another case of how intelligent public relations can launch a new brand. For a country like China, which is home to over 340 million net users who are online for an average of 16 hours per week, this strategy of using the digital medium to promote a new brand worked wonders for Ponds. The cyber-charm, charmed the Chinese definitely.

NEW YEAR, NEW RULES

Times are tough, and more so last year when everyone was worried about jobs, pay cuts and salaries. A survey done in America by Schneider Associates, IRI and Sentient Decision Science revealed an interesting result. Almost 93% of respondents – the highest level in eight years of the survey – could not name one new product launch from a list of 50 launches in 2009. Why these results were more shocking was because the number of people watching TV, surfing the web or doing both simultaneously had increased tremendously, yet brand recall had fallen. The brand that topped the list of most recalled launches was KFC’s grilled chicken, which proved to be Yum! Brand’s biggest launch ever. Surprisingly, it’s not advertising which was responsible for making it big and memorable but a small “PR gimmick”. Oprah was roped in to distribute free coupons to viewers of her show. Yes, agreed it was a great product (healthy + great taste) and a massive campaign using traditional and modern, digital media was planned meticulously, but it was Oprah who acted as a catalyst, which is what made the launch most memorable. KFC outlets were flooded with people wanting to taste the product and they could hardly keep up with the demand. Oprah made the product noticeable and the launch highly successful. From April to December some 65 million Americans had tried the product, raising KFC’s market share of “grilled chicken” category to 25%.

Deloitte was looked upon as just an accounting firm. When it wanted to change the perception of the consumers, it turned to Hill & Knowlton to develop a unique campaign. Hill & Knowlton launched several surveys that highlighted various trends in healthcare. These surveys were published in the front pages of leading newspapers like The New York Times. In addition, people from Deloitte’s team were offered as sources who could comment on trends like Obama’s election, healthcare reforms etc. in main stream media like CNN, Fox Business etc. In no time, people started associating Deloitte with healthcare. To crown all its efforts, ‘Modern Healthcare’ ranked Deloitte as the number one healthcare consultancy in 2008. A little strategic PR, a $500,000 budget – and Deloitte was transformed at least in the eyes the people. Plain advertising could never have helped USAID increase the use of condoms in India (the sure-shot method to stop the spread of AIDS). Condoms are a taboo subject here – people get uncomfortable. All this had to be changed. “Condom bindass bol,” the TV ad campaign was backed by high voltage PR where contests were held; stories about the campaign were aired. The PR was so effective that it increased the sale of condoms. IPRA 2007 Golden World Awards for excellence in public relations was won by Corporate Voice ½ Weber Shandwick the only Indian entry to get a prize.

It was Hill & Knowlton that campaigned across 27 countries to persuade International Olympic Committee members to choose London for the 2012 games. As the markets mature, consumers become more and more critical. Some old tricks just won’t work anymore. Marketers need to rethink their strategies. It’s time to think beyond TV ads, beyond the 30-second TV spots. With people talking to each other before talking with brands, it’s important to find a way to influence their opinions & perceptions and PR seems to be the perfect choice.

IT’S SO POWERFUL – BUSH USED IT TOO

On August 2, 1990, when Iraqi troops led by dictator Saddam Hussain invaded the oil producing nation of Kuwait, Bush did not appreciate it – after all, “oil” was at stake. To push Iraqi’s invading army out of Kuwait would cost billions of dollars, and unprecedented US military mobilisation – and most importantly, the consent of American people. How would he justify what American soldiers were doing in the oil fiefdom of Kuwait, fighting against Saddam Hussain who was until recently an ally of the US. The answers to the public were supplied by none other than Hill & Knowlton, who masterminded the Kuwait campaign. A dummy group, ‘Citizens for a free Kuwait’, was set up by the Kuwaiti government; and as expected, this group employed Hill & Knowlton to give it consultancy. The Kuwait government gave funds to this group to the tune of $11.9 million – interestingly, $10.8 million of it went to Hill & Knowlton as consultancy fees :-). Amongst the various videos crafted under the expert guidance of Hill & Knowlton that were distributed to various TV stations & networks, one was an emotionally moving testimony of a 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl, Nayirah, who described how, when she was working as a volunteer in a hospital in Kuwait, she saw Iraqi soldiers take babies out of incubators and leaving them on the cold floor to die. It was the perfect PR peg – newsworthy, evoked a strong emotional response, stuck to the memory. It worked so well that everyone forget to verify one fact – Nayirah was a member of the Kuwaiti Royal family. After seeing the video, the world was furious and everyone hated the Iraqis and began to support the US military in helping Kuwait fight the Iraqi soldiers.

A great PR campaign had successfully managed to sell a war.

HANDLE WITH CARE

Public opinion is very important. Just as it requires tremendous skill to garner their support, it requires tremendous skill to handle public opinion when things go wrong. And if one doesn’t move fast, it could spell disaster.

When passengers of Jet Blue were trapped inside the aircraft for 11 hours due to a delay, each of the 1,000 passengers was extremely irritated. They were not allowed to de-plane and found it very difficult. A quick apology by Jet Blue and the matter would have been forgotten; but it turned out to be a PR disaster when Jet Blue argued that they did so keeping passengers safety in mind. People were furious and it sparked a government debate about passenger’s rights. Jet Blue was forced to announce a “Passenger’s Bill of Rights” which promised to de-plane passengers after five hours delay in future.

Talking of PR disasters, a bigger one could not be made when CEOs of GM, Chrysler and Ford headed to Washington to beg for a $25 billion bailout in – guess what – an expensive private jet!!! After being ridiculed, they chose hybrid cars for the next hearing.

When the Czech government accused the tobacco giant Philip Morris – stating financial costs of smoking outweighed its benefits (if any) – Philip Morris did a survey which proved that the number of people who died due to smoking actually helped the government save $24-30 billion in health care, pension and housing costs. The public was livid and what the company thought was a positive PR move, turned into a big PR disaster.

These big corporations might actually turn to Aamir Khan to learn a lesson or two in PR. For each of his films after Lagaan, the man has a flawless marketing and PR plan worked out in his mind. So much so that when it came to marketing of the blockbuster 3 Idiots, both the director & producer felt Aamir could do it best. The man knows how to influence masses – he made people change their hairstyles and bulk up after Ghajini, become more empathetic towards children with learning disorders after Taare Zameen Par, and even rethink the Indian education system – and its flaws – after 3 Idiots. He did it for he knew what to do, to how to make this happen. He knew how giving hair cuts outside movie theatres before Ghajini’s release would work, or drawing sessions with children before Taare Zameen Par released would interest people, or how even participating in the Narmada Bachaoo Andolan campaign would excite people (before Fanaa’s release obviously!).

He always has a new trick up his sleeve before his film releases. His disguise as a 60 year old man was a trick to promote 3 Idiots. Totally in sync with the story where his two friends go finding him. Everybody was finding Aamir, while the actor found his way to the bank. His last four releases had collective box office revenue of over Rs.590 crores (Rang De Basanti, Fanaa, Tare Zameen Par, Ghajini). 3 Idiots has broken all historic box office records (Rs.315 crore in 18 days).

One point the man has definitely proved – a good product or even a good advertising strategy alone cannot successfully sell a brand. It’s cut-throat competition and every single detail matters. As Raju Hirani confesses, he and Vidhu Vinod Chopra would have done the mundane job of putting ads and promos, but Aamir showed them the importance of a good PR Campaign.

So be it corporations or individuals, while you watch 3 Idiots, remember the one man who at 44 convincingly played a 25-year-old, aroused your curiosity and got you talking about the movie long before its release. Study his past moves and wait for his future acts, for when it comes to crafting a flawless PR strategy, no one does it better than Aamir Khan!