A Super Bowl spot might be the Holy Grail for showcasing advertisements in the United States however, the ICC Cricket World Cup is as much of its Indian equivalent as any. In fact, it can very well be argued that the ICC Cricket World Cup is much closer to the hearts of Indian marketers than the Super Bowl is to their American counterparts as it comes once every 4 years. Therefore, everyone who is anyone in the Indian commercial marketing space has been gearing up for this cricketing extravaganza & with February finally arriving the results of their blood, toil, tears & sweat are finally available for all to see. Every major brand is vying for as many airings of their advertisements as possible while the match is ongoing so as to capture the eyeballs & attention of the masses that tune in to watch the men in blue go about their business. Prior to the start of the cricketing spectacle the entire nation was captivated by the Delhi elections where the Aam Aadmi Party steam-rolled its competitors & captured the lion’s share of the 70 seats that were up for grabs partly on the back of a strong & efficient marketing campaign. The Markathon for this month shall elaborate more on that in the AAP Marketing Analysis under the Perspectives section. Also featured in this month’s perspectives is the overhaul of the legendary motorcycle Bullet by Royal Enfield, a gargantuan task given that the company had to bring in over-riding changes in the bike while maintaining the legacy & the DNA of the company within the product. The Cover Story for this month is a brilliant take on taboo products & how marketers are doing an excellent job by finding new & innovative ways to promote them in markets that have reservations against them. In the Vartalaap section we have Mr. Rajesh Pandit, who has 17 years of
industry experience in multiple senior positions in the domains of consulting and service industry. Due to his passion for leadership development, he has got into academia and is currently an adjunct faculty at IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Rohtak, IIM Udaipur, IIM Shillong. For Eye2Eye we have a raging debate over Carl Jr’s sexually suggestive ad that was aired during the Super Bowl addressing all the key points about whether it a cheap trick to grab eyeballs or a smart marketing concept. In the Specials segment, we bring you Brand Story that traces the transition of Victoria’s Secret from a loss making company trying to sell lingerie to men to a luxury brand that stamped its authority in the fashion industry. Another marketing treat in this month’s edition is Radical Thoughts which captures the evolution of ad retargeting & explains how major e-commerce companies such as Flipkart & Snapdeal use cookie-based technology to zero in on their customers & provide them with ads suited to their preferences. Apart from these we have our regular monthlies Ad-dicted & Updates to keep you abreast of all the latest happenings in the world of marketing. So without any further delay dig in to another fun-filled edition of all things marketing. Do provide us with your valuable comments & feedback by writing to us at markathon.iims@gmail.com so that we can continue to evolve & improve. Happy Reading! Team Markathon!
The Markathon Team Editors
Cheena Pasrija | Gautam Gopal | Mohammad Fahd | Sumit Bedi | Vinay Jain
Creative Designers
Ansul Jindal | Kasturi Guha Thakurta | Sagar Riaz
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Contents Perspectives Made Like a Gun, Engages Like a Bullet Amruth Jayaram and Ramnath Prabhu | NMIMS, Mumbai
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AAP’s Marketing Analysis Shashwat Shekhar | IMT Ghaziabad
4 Specials
MARKETING OF TABOO PRODUCTS
Sumit Bedi| IIM Shillong
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AD-dicted Ansul Jindal & Kasturi Guha Thakurta | IIM Shillong
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Brand Story Sumit Bedi | IIM Shillong
Vartalaap
Mr. Rajesh Pandit Adjunct Faculty | IIM A, IIM Rohtak, IIM U, IIM S
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Eye 2 Eye
Carl ‘s Jr.’s Sexually Suggestive Super Bowl Ad for its all-natural burger - Cheap Sunt to Grab Eyeballs or witty concept? Pradyut V. hande | SIMS Pune & Mukti Maloo | NMIMS Mumbai
Silent Voice
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Radical Thoughts Mohammad Fahd | IIM Shillong Updates Cheena Pasrija | IIM Shillong
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Obama’s Visit to India Naaz Abdul Khadar | SCIT
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Made Like a Gun, Engages Like a Bullet The Story of Royal Enfield By Amrut Jayaram & Ramnath Prabhu SBM, NMIMS Mumbai
Ten months had passed and Rajesh was pacing across the corridor, he had been waiting for this day. He was not expecting a baby but something a bit more powerful, his Bullet. He was not buying a vehicle, but he was about to make a statement, a loud one- thanks to his Bullet. Royal Enfield has seen two World Wars, the Great Depression, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the birth of the 21st century, it still lives to tell its epic saga. How has the brand remained successful, not just relevant, for more than a century? Enfield Cycle Company began as a makers of bicycles, motorcycles, lawnmowers and engines in England. They sold their products under the brand name Royal Enfield, this brand name was licensed in 1890. The motto” Made like a Gun” was essentially coined to reflect on their legacy as manufacturers of weapons. This brand also faced a lot of flak towards the turn of the 21st century, the Indian market was flooded with lighter, more fuel efficient motorcycles which needed very little maintenance. Royal Enfield was still making motorcycles in the good old way. Their motorcycles were heavier, they had the gears on the wrong side and they had a fuel efficiency of a truck. Customers had frequent complaints about the performance and found it very difficult to get spares. Eicher Motors that owned the brand was footing losses and had come close to selling off Royal Enfield. Siddarth Lal, the young scion asked for two years to turn things around, he had to make history a lot more appealing. Royal Enfield has always had a unique positioning, they target auto enthusiasts and travellers not commuters. They know that their customer aspires to have the “Macho” image, Royal Enfield gives them a sense of control and authority. It was a license to the limelight. It had a legacy of exclusivity and one-upmanship. The brand faced a unique challenge. Ironically, it was posed by its greatest asset, its legacy. The loyalists did
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perspective not want the handcrafted motorcycle to undergo any change. They believed that it was these very aspects of the motorbike that made it the Bullet. In contrast, the younger generation wanted their piece of history with an overhaul. In addition to this Royal Enfield had to adhere to the more stringent environment norms. This Catch 22 situation would be a nightmare to any brand manager. Eicher Motors had to do identify the features they needed to pursue and the features they needed to overhaul. The most needed change was in the engine, but that was the heart of the bullet. Cast iron material of the engine was the source of the legendary “Bullet Sound”, but it was also the epicentre of many performance issues, especially the mileage. Eicher had to make an aluminium body engine with fewer movable parts, this made it lighter, more fuel efficient and brought it in tune with the emission norms, but took away its iconic sound. The company had to invest in unique technology to produce the sound organically and rhythmically as the bike rides. The gears had to be brought to the left side making it compliant with the conventional motorbike systems, this move again came despite a lot of resistance from the loyalists. They saw change as a dilution of the brand. They had to nullify the effects of these dramatic changes to ensure that the brand still retains its sheen. A great way to make a customer fall in love with a product is to make him use it more often and thus reinforce the value proposition it offers. They did this by pioneering the discipline of customer engagement in India. It is very interesting to observe that this historic brand has achieved such engagement by means of technology, the internet. Traditionally India has always had a clique of Enfield owners. The company brought these small unorganised groups on to the internet and provided them a forum to communicate. The “Riders”, as they call themselves, were given an organised forum to form groups and chart courses for drives. Bigger groups were formed thanks to this platform, and now there are
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groups that cover the entire country as North, South, East and West zones. The riders are encouraged to organise rides and promote them on the website. These rides are exclusive in nature and require prior registration and planning. In fact the website also has a “Rides Calendar” which features regular yearly rides so that the riders can plan well in advance. They also design concept rides to exotic destinations such as Ladakha and Vaishno Devi. “Rider Events” are essentially tours and reunions to engage riders. They typically involve touring a state or even a country like Tibet or Nepal. These trips can last as long as a fortnight. The riders post their experiences on Rider Logs and post pictures of their journey. These events essentially capture the spirit of freedom and a sense of independence that this brand stands for. Royal Enfield conducts Vagator, a periodic program, to indulge its younger customers. This is essentially a drive to a destination followed by concerts, stand-up shows and merry making. This again reinforces exclusivity, as only those who own Royal Enfield are invited. The company also encourages customers to play with the motorcycle’s engineering post purchase. The customers are given modification tips on the internet and
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are encouraged to share experiences of their modified rides. The handcrafted nature makes it relatively easy to modify these bikes. The customers are further aided by information on original parts dealers presented on the website. Unique activities make unique brands. The advantage of Royal Enfield is that it has a smaller customer base than many of the mainstream motorcycle brands and can thus engage them very intimately. Those brands that sell tens of thousands of motorcycles a year cannot hold events on such a scale. Thus the engagement model gives it an inimitable competitive advantage, in customer engagement. The company has come up with ways to involve customers even before they make the purchase. The prospective buyers are encouraged to visit the factory to see the artisans handcrafting a Royal Enfield. Since the purchase is high involvement in nature, the brand also offers jeans, sunglasses, jackets and other accessories to its riders, so that they can wear the brand. These accessories also give those with lesser means to associate with their aspirational brand. Some brands are aptly called “Magical” as they have retained the kinaesthetic connect with the masses over the years by just being exceptional. Conventionally, a two wheeler company would spend a considerable part of its bottom line on advertising, branding or hiring an ambassador to give it an image. Royal Enfield does none of these and yet has created tremendous goodwill and loyalty for the brand. It has remained exceptional without seeking much exposure. The brand has few but powerful print advertisements. These advertisements speak of the handcrafted nature of the motorcycle and also highlight how the Bullet differentiates the men from the boys. The company has also placed its product strategically in a few movies like Jab Tak Hai Jaan (opening scene). It gained a lot of attention for its placement in Bhaag Milkha Bhaag, with com-
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ments reading “Two legends one movie”. Royal Enfield stands testimony to the fact that the customer engagement is a great way to listen to the customer, feel the pulse. The mode of engagement may differ from brand to brand. In contrast to conventional brand building which is driven by the management, engagement builds brands driven by the customer. Traditional customer journey models end with purchase while Royal Enfield has managed to lengthen the journey by means of structured engagement post purchase. Royal Enfield lives to tell its story to the next generation as well.
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AAP’s Marketing Analysis How Aam Admi Party emerged as the Goliath in this David vs Goliath fight By Shashwat Shekhar IMT Ghaziabad
Women Safety, corruption, Village issues to high decibel issues of water, electricity, Swaraj and Janlokpal. What these series of dialogues did was to ensure that even the public is involved in decision making and took the message of participatory democracy which AAP believes in to every corner of Delhi. This also gave AAP a first mover’s advantage and set the agenda for Delhi elections.
Fund Raising Dinners
Politics – Sports –Bollywood. Three things which attract the most attention in India. With innovative ideas being brought into the field of marketing the face of politics is seeing a dramatic change.With the success of Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi in this David vs Goliath fight we look at some of the unconventional marketing techniques AAP used to reach out to the masses and develop their own brand. AAP lost a lot of sympathizers after resigning in 2013 hence what they needed was a public outreach campaign which showed that Mr.Kejriwal would be there to stay would not leave again. The root of the campaign was the tagline which now all of us have heard at least once ‘5 Saal Kejriwal’. It served multipurpose firstly it made people believe that Kejriwal can form a stable government and will be their for 5 years. Secondly the tagline capitalized on the popularity of Kejriwal which was more than that of the party. The song composed by lyricist and singer Vishal Dadlani had the same wordings and it was widely used in campaign by AAP to amplify the message many fold. The next step was to remove the perception of AAP as a ‘Dharna’ party and to make people believe that they too have a vision for Delhi and can govern. Thus was born a series of Delhi Dialogues. An extensive vision document created by AAP after discussion with members of the public in series of meetings. Different issues of Delhi like
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Crowd funding for political parties on the lines of USA was done. People were invited to have a dinner with Kejriwal if they donated a certain amount of money. Apart from educating people about their policies this campaign served as one of the bases of getting clean money and also garnering support from upper/middle class.
MufflerMan takes Delhi by storm
This is one of the most successful campaigns run by AAP this season. Like Modi turned the ‘chaiwala’ comment on its head by organizing ‘chai pe charcha’ . AAP came out with its very own MufflerMan. Posters/Banners of MufflerMan were seen on the ground. On social media MufflerMan was trending for 19 days. There were one liners like ‘Sardi aa rahi hai aur Muffler wala bhi’ (Winter is coming and also a person with a muffler, which added punch in the campaign). In fact people made videos carrying this message which AAP used effectively to increase its visibility among tech savvy people. Posters stuck behind autos carrying the message of the Aam Aadmi Party was one the unique ways of campaigning. It had a dual impact, firstly Delhi ‘autowalas’ felt empowered for the first time, secondly visibility of AAP increased manifold. People now saw AAP posters wherever the autos travelled. It was one of the most economical way of marketing, high on visibility and high on impact.
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of the cities. This allowed them to go into areas where a cavalcade of cars and bikes cannot enter and reach out to the masses.
Taking Kiran Bedi head on
BJP propped up KB considering her experience, clean image and to tap potential female voters. AAP decided to counter it by taking the fight in the bastion of KB. They held a ‘Mahila Shakti’ road show led by the female wing of Aam Aadmi Party. Gul Panag on a Royal Enfield and various other female leaders of the party were seen in this road show. The message was clear from the party, women of Delhi still support AAP.
Delhi Call Campaign
Social Media
A common number was circulated where people from around the globe used to call and then that number connected the call to various Delhi numbers where the caller used to educate the other person about AAP and its policies and asked him to vote. Thousands of calls were made from across the globe. Pamphlets and poster hanging is banned from metros so how to tap the untapped market of metros for campaigning. Visiting cards? Yes, visiting cards carrying short messages of the party, their social media handles and a contact number was distributed to people inside the metros. Another low cost-high impact way to reach the masses. We all have seen billboards of political parties and large hoardings on the road. But what about human banners? Volunteers holding banners of AAP during peak hours and standing on strategic locations to catch maximum eyeballs usually over flyovers and crossings.
One area where AAP gave BJP a run for their money even during the Lok Sabha elections. Innovative hashtags like #Vote4MufflerMan #PressJhaduButton were among the top trends even on Election Day. Innovative social media campaigns like #Donate4AAP where people used to donate and then nominate others to do the same or where people used to donate some amount for each ‘Retweet’ or ‘Favourite’ was so successful that it hit even the FB page where people started donating for each ‘like’ ‘comment’ and ‘share’ as well. Velfie campaign – Video selfies, a novel idea where people shared a video of them giving reasons as to why they support Kejriwal. Just like a selfie one use to make a video from the mobile and AAP official handles use to tweet/ post them.
Selfie With MufflerMan
AAP’s Bangalore unit started this innovative campaign of crowd funding. People were asked to donate Rs. 500 or more and out of which 25 of them had a chance to meet Arvind Kejriwal when he visited Bengaluru. This campaign was open to people across nation and attracted quite a few tech savvy youth and also devising a creative marketing campaign besides getting AAP some funds as well. Just a couple of days before elections on a weekend, the center of Delhi Cannought place was covered with AAP volunteers. They were singing, dancing on the tunes of ‘5 Saal Kejriwal’ . There were posters banners and helium balloons were flown in the air carrying Kejriwal’s pic . Indian politics is changing and so are the ways of political marketing. Political parties are adopting new, innovative ideas which are more economical to connect with the masses and spread their messages. Political ideas aside, AAP has shown the way to marketers across India. By using an Omni channel marketing approach, they have reached out to all the potential voters with a simple and unified image. This is in essence the heart and soul of a good marketing campaign.
Guerilla marketing using flash mobs and nukkad nataks
Aam Aadmi Party use to arrange nukkad nataks and flash mobs where people use to appear out of the blue and carry the message of the party. They also established a team of dedicated volunteers named “Dance 4 Democracy” for the same purpose. Radio campaign run by Aam Aadmi Party is considered to be one of the most thought out political marketing campaigns. The approach adopted was vox-pop where it seemed real people were interviewed. People heard Arvind Kejriwal and his vision and also saw him apologizing for leaving them stranded. BJP released an ad where an older women seemed unhappy with AK resigning when she voted him to power. In reply to this AAP launched an ad where in Kejriwal says he has not gone anywhere and is still here and will come this time in full majority to fulfill his promises. ‘Cycle Cum Cycle Rickshaw campaign’ – AAP supporters hired cycles and rickshaws at meagre prices of 150200(Not confirmed) and took out rallies in different parts
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Cover Story “Marketing Of Taboo Products”
By
Sumit Bedi
IIM Shillong
Anyway, we cannot make or break societal rules but we defiantly can make our way through them. Our job is to make the customer aware of his need and satisfy that need with a great product. The different taboo products all across the world include condoms, sanitary pads, lingerie, performance enhancing drugs, sex-toys, contraceptive pills and of course the new technology edition Durex Fundawear
Durex fundawear Condom Sanitary Napkins Lice Lingerie MARKETING Pfizer Viagra BUDGET Vibrator (Sex toys) i-pill contraceptive pill Kimberly Clarke underwear (different underwear) Leaky bladder There are two types of people in the world. One, the mango people and other are the marketers. For mango people, taboo means the stuff that you are not allowed to speak out in open because of mor-
(Touch over the Internet). All these products have a sense of shame attached to them. The specific human need that they fulfill is not openly talked about in society. Even people from the most advanced and educated economies have some initial hiccups before accepting these products. Newton’s law of motion states that all objects stay in a state of rest or motion till the time an external force is applied on them. This happens because of inertia. This same inertia is also prevalent in the hual, ethical or societal principles. Well for marketers, man psychology. The old stereotypes that have been most of the times, they are not governed by any developed over the years will remain as it is till the such inhibition. We got our sales target to meet, you time some real external push is not given. know! Some stupid, societal principal cannot bog us Who will provide this push? Of course it’s us. The down.
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marketers! The only way to break this taboo is to get the things out in open and let people talk about it. Breaking the taboo is an end and there are many means to that end. One of the ways to get people to accept the taboo is to make them sing. I came across a blog when I was researching for this article. The author of the blog was surprised to find two young girls sing “Viva Viagra”. (Viva Viagra was the song Pfizer used to advertise Viagra across America). Now, he went and asked them that what they were singing and they actually didn’t know the meaning of the words. They were just enjoying the tune they had heard on television. Of course the marketers of Pfizer have done a fine job in making people aware of a human condition and providing a brilliant solution to it. After reading this blog I was reminded of a story from my own childhood. I was not able to blow a whistle when I was young. My father and my cousin used to blow whistles constantly to make me realize that I could not. And guess what, a television commercial came to my rescue. Those days there was an advertisement by Stayfree where a girl used to jump and blow whistles. She was in a great mood, and her friend used to ask her that how she had so much confidence in days of periods as well. This was followed by the tune of Stayfree. (That time, I did not care about the product, I cared about the whistle.) I learned to blow a whistle from a sanitary napkin ad. There is no way in life sanitary napkins will be a taboo for me. The point is that Enegizer and Pfizer understand that if you take the product off the center stage and you make fun of the centerpiece, you are good to go. There is nothing derogatory or vulgar about it.
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There is just a message at the end of a fun advertisement. The recent Durex advertisement featuring Ranveer Singh does the same thing. The advertisement is super fun. The advertisement is of a condom but nowhere does Reckitt Benckiser use any term related to sex or to a condom. They say do the rex. They use the word “chattri”. They use the number 69 in their commercial and they play with the lyrics of the song in the background beautifully. In the end, they send the message of using a condom when having sex. Another innovative way that marketers employ to inform the people is by being completely open and shameless (not in the wrong way) about the particular product and make it cool. The recent “Drop Your Pants” for Depend Underwear campaign uses this technique. Depend Underwear is not actually an underwear but an adult diaper. Approximately 65 million adults in America have a blad-
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february 2015 the product. The same concept was applied by a couple of teenagers in Canada when they started the Slut walks. There has been a long standing stereotype that says that rapes occur because girls dress provocatively. A few girls in Canada decided to change this belief and came up with the concept of Slut Walks. They just broke the stereotype and brought the whole concept of rape and a girl’s appearance out in the open. This led people to accept the fact that girls can dress in any way they want and it’s time for men to check themselves. Another approach that marketers use for these tabooed products is by actually making people awkward. Talk to them when they really don’t want to and this approach will take away the taboo completely. RB used this approach to promote Durex. A flight was scheduled from Moscow to someplace. The airhostess came in front of everyone to tell about the standard safety procedures. Well, here is the catch. She started to describe the process of using a condom and told people to look into the pockets of the seat in front of them to get the real protection. There was a free Durex condom for everyone. Initially, the people felt a bit startled and awkward but then they started laughing. I am reminded of a great story that reverberates in the management text. The story is from “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” by Mark Twain. Once, Tom was asked by his grandmother to paint a wall. Tom kept
der condition where they need a diaper all the time. So, Depend comes out with the marketing gimmick that says “It’s time to drop your pants for ‘underwearness’”. The advertisement shows people walking on street with Depend Underwears and being proud about it. The advertisement tells people not only about the great new product but also about the fact that there are other people on the planet with the same condition and it is perfectly normal to use
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tached to it. They can walk into stores and buy lingerie like any other product of daily use. Victoria’s Secret did this with great marketing techniques and gradually pushed the lingerie into the lives of American people. We have seen really great marketing techniques over various taboo products in the past. Some people might think that this is the end of the road and there will not be any more taboo products. They are definitely wrong. Technology won’t give a chance to marketers to rest in peace. The new sex toys like the vibrator and Durex fundawear are going to test the creativity of the marketers even further. So, we as marketing enthusiasts should sit tight and enjoy the ride while the big companies come up with great new marketing campaigns.
seeing the wall for some time. He did not actually MARKETING want to paint the wall so he was thinking of an alBUDGET ternative. He came up with a brilliant idea. He called
upon his friends and before they came he started paitning the wall. He was happy when he did that. When his friends arrived they asked him that what he was doing. Instead of cribbing about the task that he was assigned, he cheerfully told them that he was painting the wall. He also added that it was great fun and it was actually a privilege for him to be able to do the task. Though, he was just painting the wall, his friends were curious as to what was making Tom so happy. So, they told Tom to take a break and let them paint the wall instead. Tom obliged & instead Tom’s friends painted the wall while actually enjoying the process. They were really happy and Tom did not even have to pick up the paintbrush after that. Moral of the story: Tom turned a mundane, uncool task of painting a wall into a privilege that his friends wanted to enjoy. How did he do that? The answer is the choice of words. He turned a negative emotion into a positive emotion by choosing his words wisely. Marketers also have to do the same thing when it comes to marketing taboo products. We do not have to break the Chinese wall that protects the stereotypes of the society. We just have to paint it with a different color, a color that people are comfortable talking about. Victoria’s Secret, one of the top lingerie brands in the world, has been doing a great job at marketing another taboo product. It has taken the taboo and shame out of lingerie. Today, both men and women are open about it and they find no shame at-
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VARTALAAP An Interview with Mr. Rajesh Pandit
Mr. Rajesh Pandit has 17 years of industry experience in multiple senior positions in the domains of consulting and service industry. Because of his passion for leadership development he has got into academia and is currently an adjunct faculty at IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Rohtak, IIM Udaipur, IIM Shillong. “It’s all about reformulating the market offering which is done by adding new services, economic benefits and relational benefits”
IIM A, IIM Rohtak, IIM U, IIM S
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Adjunct Faculty
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Markathon: You have worked for more than 17 tion. years in the industry at various positions of responsibilities. How relevant do you think is the theoretical knowledge of marketing in the real world? Markathon: Can you think of one of the frameworks? Academia has two or three different objectives, research, curiosity and the third is industry. The third Yeah, one of the frameworks that I am really fond of part is the biggest contribution from a management is a framework by professor Parasuraman, he is an institute to the industry. So what I find in the curricu- authority in B2B marketing and has written tons of lum in general is that it tries to cover all three and literature and citations, he is a real guru in B2B marhence some of the stuff we teach may not look rel- keting. I draw a lot of inspiration from him, lot of conevant but it will help you develop some other traits in ceptual frameworks and cases from him. One such students, things like coming up with disruptive ideas, framework is where he maps how a particular sellso you don’t have a specific framework for disrup- ing should take place in B2B. How do you go about tive ideas. You need curiosity, research will give you selling there are different techniques of selling right!, some insights and you would identify something. So and the framework is very simple where you match I wouldn’t say academia is something far away from customer involvement on the X axis and the supplier what industry needs, the only issue is the contextu- involvement on the Y- axis. The B2B transactions inalization of that to corporates, that’s where I think volve give and take even though sometimes the powsome professors are distinguished from others. So er games work on either sides. A good relationship when you have a theoretical framework how do you would only work if both the sides are engaged. In contextualize and what are the ramifications of it that the three grades of selling come out very clearly. and what are the implementation challenges. If we The first one is transaction selling wherein it Is inplug those areas then you will find there are lot of trinsic to the product meaning whatever is there in rich concepts which are extremely relevant to the in- the product is what you sell in which case there is no dustry and industry is not really taking advantage of additional value add so it’s a very transaction based it. I mean sometimes when I look back while teach- approach to selling. And then you elevate to the coning I think why the heck didn’t I use this framework, sultative selling also known as extrinsic selling where life would have been so much easier. But it is not a you unravel beyond what the product has to offer. sweeping statement what I mean is that not all 20 Which means I need to customize it for you, identify sessions will give you 20 frameworks which you can your problems, articulate it and then fit in the solugo and apply. It could be 5 frameworks which you tion. So it is more consultative in nature. Then he also could apply but what is important is contextualiza- talks about Strategic or enterprise selling which is the
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pinnacle of relationship where both where both the management teams are on the same page, both are making investments and where the boundaries are blurred between a customer and a supplier. If I work in a B2b company and deal with customers, all three shades of opportunities that will come in hence my pitching should be different for all the three opportunities. Typically we don’t categorize them into these three, we just go and sell whichever way we want, wasting our energy or underperform on certain areas. Markathon: With changing times have the marketing strategies of organizations like TATA Steel which come under B2B marketing changed? What do such organizations do in order to woo their customer? See one fundamental difference between B2B and B2C is that in B2B there is more focus on rationality of your product offering. It’s not so much about emotions, you buy from a supplier because there is functional value and benefit, without which you would never buy, there could be aberrations of nepotism, leaving aside those based on pure marketing concepts you would never buy from a supplier if the functional benefits aren’t better than the competitors so the nuances of selling in B2B and of B2C are different. In B2C emotions play are huge part, you might buy a soap because of the model shown in the advertisement. I don’t really want to talk about any one company in particular but TATA Steel clearly developed a roadmap and ran two major initiatives when their product was getting commoditized, this was sometime early 2000 or mid-2000. The initiatives were 1) Customer Value Management and 2) Retail Value Management. You may think that a large company may create a pull in the market place, so once they dump it on the channel, their journey almost ends they don’t even look at the consumers per se. while they are focused on it there is not so much of rigor on it and TATA Steel realized that it is causing a massive problem for them. So they tried to change the retail value, what is the value for the channel. They focused on that layer to differentiate from the competitors. So they are various schemes that can be offer, it’s not just monetary approach, it has portfolio approach where every channel participant. Dealer, distributor have their own aspirations. This way you will map out with each person and they went about doing that layer. The second thing they
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did was Customer Value Management where they tried to come up with new ways to create value for the customers be it say example JIT. One of the example is there was this intermediate activity that the customer had to do in a particular segment and its all about segmentation in B2B. a particular segment was having additional activity what it could offer and they say that particular activity can be done in house at a much cheaper cost because of economies of scale and also because you are in that particular field. So with little bit of refinement in their plant, machinery they could offer it at a significantly lower cost, which was an additional value they could offer. So those nuances how you create the Customer value and you keep differentiating. The third thing they did was Branding. Typically branding in B2B is different as compared to the branding in B2C. Again in B2B you accentuate the functional benefits you offer rather than emotional pitches. So that’s another thing they did in steel which completely a commoditized place. They were pioneers in branding the commodity so those are nuances how you create a differentiation in the marketing space. You may feel that this is a very basic thing to do but this doesn’t happen very easily. Most companies in B2B except the ones that are setting up a shop now have been around for a long time. With that comes a lot of baggage and their ability to change their mindset, ability to get closer to the customer requirement. It’s all about reformulating the market offering which is done by adding new services, economic benefits and relational benefits, perceptual benefits in his mind that he is being taken care of, his need are being met etc. so a whole lot of other things you wrap around to get out of commoditization. B2B is very simple the whole aspect gets commoditized very quickly. It’s because the ferocity of competition is much higher today. The only way to come out of commoditization is by rejigging your market offering. There is no other way. This requires deeper understanding of the customer business far more than anything else. Markathon: The importance of maintaining a good relationship with the customer is always emphasized and rightly too but why is intra-organizational relationship management important for an organization? Does it have any direct impact on the organization’s performance? Yes, it goes back to definition of marketing which is
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vartalaap
february 2015
satisfying the needs of the customers. Which means all the different functions/ departments of the company needs to work in harmony to provide that to the customer. In past, the customer driven department of the organization was sales, may be marketing but today all the departments of the organizations are in touch with the customer in one way or the other. For eg- A production or an operations head would always be in touch with the customer, especially in B2B, because it is all directly linked to the inventory management, just in time strategy. The customer at times might need the guarantee or the assurance that proper value is created for him or proper quality standards are maintained. This assurance could be given by the production head not the marketing head. It is extremely important for finance too, because the CFO needs to raise funds and there might be 100 competitors and investors might have a lot of choice other than you. So the CFO’S marketing proposition is not to the consumers but to the investors. So marketing is not any department these days, it is a glue between all the other departments. So usually, there is one person from every department which is in touch with the marketing department to present uniform company image to the customer. Markathon: Real time marketing is getting increasingly popular especially on the social media, what do you think about it from marketer’s perspective? Firstly- It is 24X7, the companies are in touch with the customers always through social media. Secondly very important is you take action based on it. For egthe first time you approach the customer, you take information, the second time you take more informa-
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tion, third time you take even more information but the fourth time the kind of information you take is action based, it is the kind of information will result in immediate sale. Markathon: What would you like to say to all those students who want to make a career in the marketing field? Any particular area of marketing they should focus in today’s era, such as digital marketing or social marketing? When we talk about digital marketing, personal marketing or social marketing these are all just a method to reach the customer. So today it’s digital, tomorrow it might be 3D but they will always be way to reach the customer. What my real advice to anybody who is getting into marketing would be to get into the skin of the customer and understand customer’s business better than the customers. If you can understand that, the mode and medium to reach the customer would be figured out by you really well. If you see digital marketing, the most of it is technology, which a programmer could do really easily but what really matters is the customer insight. You need to understand who is the customer, what does he want, when is he up. Especially from a B2B perspective there’s nothing more imp than to understand the customer. The issue many times is the many marketing folks are not interested in understanding customer’s business. They go with the dynamics of the organization to get financial gains and try to sell what they have instead of understanding how to increase customer value. If any one true understand how to increase the customer value, money will come in tons on its own.
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eye2eye
february 2015
Carl’s Jr.’s sexually suggestive super bowl ad for its all-natural burger. Cheap stint to grab eyeballs or witty concept? Pradyut V. Hande SIMS, Pune
Mukti Maloo NMIMS
The Super Bowl advertisement spots have gradually become synonymous with racy, brazen, overtly emotional or plain bizarre (read Kim Kardashian’s 2015 T-Mobile commercial) content that continues to delight, annoy or confound an American Football loving republic. Carl Jr’s. sexually suggestive advertisement featuring Model Charlotte McKinney; promoting their new “au naturel” burger is yet another addition to that notorious list. In an attempt to grab the attention of their target 18-35 “hungry” male consumer base in a run up to one of the most widely viewed sporting spectacles of the year, what Carl Jr. appears to have overlooked is the fact that almost 50% of the televised viewership is comprised of females. By grossly objectifying women under a sexual connotation, the company doesn’t really endear itself to the public. Moreover, it is the women who assume greater decision-making responsibility when it comes to daily household purchases. The commercial only reinforces the company’s existing positioning as a sexist, upward aspiring brand that resorts to cheap marketing gimmicks in an attempt to eat into the market share of more established players. Incorporating sexually suggestive content in one’s marketing campaigns is a tightrope walk. On the one hand, it must straddle aestheticism while on the other; it ought to leave jaws dropping and hearts racing through subliminal messaging. Carl Jr’s. latest commercial may have raked over 3 million views and counting; but the benefits of such a campaign are often transient. Instead of sexually objectifying women as “meat” to sell “meat”, they would be better served building long term brand equity as a competitive differentiator. Would sexual arousal sell you more burgers? I’m not quite sure! This one merely leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Pun intended.
As a representative of the parent company of Carl Jr. said, “We don’t show anything you won’t see at the beach and we don’t cross the line but we like to get right up to it. Besides 46% of the brand’s core audience is the 18 to 34 year old hungry guy. ” Carl Jr.’s commercials usually have more buns than burgers, and this one wasn’t any different. Despite the hue and cry over feminism and women empowerment, Carl Jr. persist in this form of advertising. Reason: it sells. The advertisement, titled ‘Au naturel’, has been watched over 9.4 million times on YouTube and has sparked over 4,5oo tweets, and led up to 2.5 billion media impressions in the first two weeks post launch. Sales beat forecasts per week as well during the super bowl. Clearly, the young male audience is not objecting to this approach. There is no denying that this form of advertising is a cheap stint for grabbing eyeballs. But hey! It works. Carl Jr. doesn’t appear to be changing tactics anytime soon and with good reason. The advertisements go down well with the target audience, they do not offend anybody and they not only create impressions but convert into sales. In an overcrowded market, with cutthroat competition, the situation is always do or die. In such a scenario, it takes immense creativity to differentiate the product and pull in customers consistently. While raunchy is easy to imitate, and several food chains have tried, it takes a great deal of ingenuity to blend the message with the concept seamlessly and still create a lasting impression. Carl Jr. accomplishes just that with the imagery of natural body and beauty compared to no added hormones or steroids.
Topic for the next issue: “Flash Sale marketing strategy of the smartphone makers a good or bad strategy?” Your opinion (view/counterview) is invited. Word limit is 250-300. Last date of sending entries is 8th March 2015. Include your picture (JPEG format) with the entry. Winners will receive a prize money of Rs. 500 each!
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silent voice
december february 2015 2013
Last month’s results WINNER Naaz Abdul Khadar || SCIT
honorary mention Hari Prasad C K || PSGIM
Theme: Obama’s Visit to India
Congratulations!!! Vivek receives a cash prize of Rs 1000!
THEME FOR NEXT SILENT VOICE: India vs Pakistan, World Cup 2015 LAST DATE OF SENDING THE PRINT AD: 8th March, 2015 EMAIL ID: markathon.iims@gmail.com Send your entry in JPEG format named as SilentVoice_<Your Name>_<Institute>only.
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AD-dicted AD-dicted
PRODUCT: TATA Docomo
POSITIONING: Bhalai ki supply CREATIVE AGECY: Contract Advertising
december february 2013 2015 By Ansul Jindal IIM Shillong
POSITIONING: Yeh nahi badlega par doraemon flipcard ka photo badlega
CATCH
CREATIVE AGENCY: McCann, Delhi
R
YouTube Link: https://www.youtub.com/watch?v=vnIsz2_vQ2I
YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bFixS__OUs CONCEPT: The most recent advertisment titled ‘Selfiesh’, begins with a young girl clicking a selfie, just to keep it to herself. A solemn voice-from-above immediately intercedes and censures her for this almost criminal demonstration of ‘selfieshness’. The advertisement then cuts into a scene where her love partner is being subjected to a blast of insults put down by his father. The narrating voice then highlights how sharing the life-changing selfie with the protagonist’s boyfriend could inject a surge of gladness into his life. At that point the advertisement goes ahead to urge prepaid clients to do their bit and initiate the ‘Bhalai Ki Supply’, by availing more information through dialing *123# for tailored-to-fit arrangements. VERDICT: Catch As the saying goes ‘JO BIKTA HAI, WOHI CHALTA HAI’ and undoubtedly selfie is the most garnered and popular concept trending worldwide. Thus, Tata DoCoMo has hit the right chords of the worldwide audience primarily targeting Gen-y with their latest selfie possessing flick. The use of a selfie cannot be understood better than via this less-thanone minute composition. The humour in the commercial has worked like a cherry on the top of the cake. Docomo surely has come a long way in a short span of time and this advertisement not only ensures its place among the top brands but also earns the brand some brownie points.
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By Kasturi Guha Thakurta IIM Shillong PRODUCT: Alpenliebe Creamfills- Doraemon Flip Card
CONCEPT:
MISS
The recent ad by Perfetti Van Melle for its Alpenliebe Ceamfills range starts with an invisible narrator describing the story of a vegetable vendor Bholu, who is shown working very hard in the day by selling vegetables in a peculiar and catchy shrill tone to attract customers. Bholu who is all sweat by the day works doubly hard in the night to pursue his dream of becoming a lawyer. Then Bholu is shown to enter the courtroom all dressed up as a determined lawyer and the narrator reveals that finally his dream has come true. Then comes the twist in the story. When Bholu opens his mouth to speak in the courtroom, he shouts with the same shrill and typical lilt of a vegetable vendor, thereby disappointing everybody in the courtroom. The invisible voice asserts that he is not going to change but the pictures in the Doraemon Flip Card, which you can get free with Alpenliebe Creamfills, can change whenever you flip it. VERDICT: Miss Markathon adjudges the ad as a flop as it fails to convey any message to the viewers. The ad which parodies a lawyer has already received a lot of flak amongst the public for belittling lawyers. But the reason Markathon pronounces it as a flop is because of its distasteful way of promoting a toffee. The portion which features Bholu and the abrupt Creamfills sequence which pops up at the end can be passed off as two different ads as the two sequences fail to sync together.
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brand story
february 2015
Brand Story Sumit Bedi | IIM Shillong
“Victoria’s Secret” Yes, exactly...that eyebrow raise that you just had makes this brand one of the top 10 brands in the world. The brand stands for great sex appeal, youthfulness and romance. Ray Raymond started Victoria’s Secret in the year 1977. His vision was to create retail stores for men where they were comfortable buying lingerie for their spouse. There was some initial success but the model could not be scaled up. In 1982, Limited Stores Inc. acquired Victoria’s Secret Inc. No one at this juncture could have imagined the future of the brand. In the turn of events, Leslie Wexner (the creator of Limited Stores Inc.) replaced the loss-making model of selling lingerie to men with one that focused on women. New colors, patterns and styles of underwear were rolled out that promised sexiness. They were packaged in a tasteful, glamorous way and with the snob appeal of European luxury. Leslie Wexner’s strategy clicked. The company grew from 4 stores in 1982 to a 100 stores in 1986 and even further to 400 stores in 1988. People loved the concept and there was no looking back. Today the brand has more than 1000 stores all across America. It has gone up from having a 14% market share in 1998 of the intimate product market to a 35% market share in 2010. The credit for the amazing success has to be given to the impeccable marketing and a straightforward approach that speaks: “sex sells”. Its product line is also named to refurbish the image of sexiness in the mind of the customer. “Very Sexy”, “Bombshell” and “Miracle Bra” are some of the most popular product lines of Victoria’s Secret. The biggest competitive strategy of Victoria’s Secret is its sub-brands. The sub-brands help Victoria’s Secret to not only launch new styles and range but also position itself. Some of the most popular sub-brands by Victoria’s Secret are Very Sexy, Body by Victoria, Angels by Victoria’s Secret, BioFit, Sexy Little Things, Pout, Second Skin Satin and Victoria’s Secret Pink. In 2004, Victoria’s Secret launched a sub brand PINK. PINK caters to the young teenage girls that are normally not targeted by Victoria’s Secret. The brand launched the miracle bra in the year 1998. It sold 2 million units of in the first year itself. In 2002, Victoria’s Secret introduced the swimwear. In 2012, the brand launched the Victoria’s Secret designer collection
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that is the first ever high-end lingerie line. Victoria’s Secret has gone from being a value-driven brand to a brand creating luxury-shopping experience. This has been made possible by smart marketing of the brand. Victoria’s Secret started the tradition of fantasy bra in the year 1996. It creates a very expensive bra every year and advertises it as the “ultimate holiday gift”. Every fantasy bra is available on sale for just one year from the date of its launch. The year 2000’s red-hot fantasy bra and panty holds the Guinness World Record of the most expensive lingerie product ever created. It is valued at $15 million. The brand gained notoriety when it started using supermodels in its fashion show and advertisements in the early 1990s. The brand started hosting a fashion show in the year 1995. The show has over 9 million viewers. It is consumed in over 200 countries in one way or another. Every year the fashion show is containing less of fashion and more of show. This fashion show is responsible for transforming the image of lingerie as an embarrassing taboo product to an acceptable routine accessory.
Victoria’s Secret Angels
Angels is one of the most popular lingerie lines of Victoria’s Secret. The brand hires the best supermodels for this product line ever since it was launched in 1997. These supermodels are also called the Angels of Victoria’s Secret. This marketing gimmick by Victoria’s Secret is so powerful that in the year 2004, during the Super Bowl controversy, the brand cancelled the fashion show and instead launched a nationwide campaign named Angels Across America. The campaign caught the eye of everyone and the brand further strengthened its image. Victoria’s Secret has been successful in constantly creating buzz around itself. Everyone loves the shopping experience and the customer service offered by the brand. Moving forward the brand can expand in the countries like China and India. The new upper middle class in these countries will be a great target market for the brand. We hope that Victoria’s Secret keeps coming up with great new marketing strategies and we constantly keep learning from it.
IIM Shillong
radical thoughts
february aug 2014 2015
Radical Thoughts Mohammad Fahd | IIM Shillong
The Evolution of Ad Retargeting Over the past couple of years a new digital marketing strategy has been emerging from amidst a Pandora’s Box of marketing strategies: Ad retargeting. This remarketing strategy is based on a cookie-based technology that uses
a simple Javascript code to “follow” the target customers all over the web. The process is a birth child of affiliate marketing wherein dubious sites used to employ a redirecting link to another website & would receive a commission every time the redirected site would convert a customer. However, in recent times the process has evolved & is now employed by major e-commerce websites such as Flipkart, Snapdeal & Jabong wherein these websites drop an anonymous browser cookie whenever a customer visits their website & examines a particular product thus helping the retargeting provider know what kind of ads to serve. The cookies are so designed that one or two visits do not activate a plethora of the website’s advertisements. Instead, a frequency cap limits the number of times a potential customer will see those ads thus preventing a potential customer from feeling overwhelmed. As a result, ad retargeting has been growing
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exponentially over the last few years & has been proven to be a powerful tool that improves brand recognition & recall. However, some brands have been overexploiting this technique bombarding their potential customers with their ads left, right & centre. The absence of a burn code in many of these cookies exacerbates their problem as the cookie doesn’t know when a customer has been converted & therefore even after the transaction has been concluded between the customer & the service provider, product advertisements keep popping up from time to time. For some companies it might make sense to re-serve the same product however even for such companies the banner creative needs to be altered else they run the risk of developing banner blindness within their potential cus-
tomers wherein the customers subconsciously ignore any banner like page or recommendations. Therefore, advertisement firms & departments need to be smart & ensure that the customer isn’t annoyed or overwhelmed. A frequent alteration of the ad impression as well as enlightening the customer as to why they are seeing those ads can prove to be an effective technique in achieving said needs as illustrated by the success of Criteo, while advertising products for Zappos. Criteo also adds an option for the customers to opt out of the process of receiving those ads however, few do once they discover why they have been receiving those ads. Thus, a blind pursuit of an ad retargeting strategy is bound to be fruitless however a smart marketer who takes into account their customers’ needs & acts accordingly can bear immense fruits by employing the process.
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updates Brand Launch
december february 2015 2013 By Cheena Pasrija IIM Shillong Honda Amaze CNG variant launched Honda Cars India Ltd. has come up with a CNG version of its sedan Honda Amaze priced at around 6 lakhs for 1.2 S MT Plus. The new variant will come with a 2 year warranty for all buyers. Commenting on the introduction of the new variant, Jnaneswar Sen, Senior Vice President, Marketing and Sales, Honda Cars India said, “At HCIL, we constantly work towards enhancing customer experience through our products and services. We are extremely happy to bring the Amaze with a CNG option for our customers, which will not only be cheaper to run and maintain but also eco-friendly.”
Lava Iris 465 launched at Rs 4,499 Indian handset maker Lava has launched Iris 465, its new budget smartphone at Rs 4,499. The phone will be available for sale across all national retail stores, multi-brand outlets from today and on all leading e-commerce portals next week onwards. It is amongst the lowest priced smartphones in the country and it will be quite intriguing to see how it performs in the competitive smart phone market of today.
Brand Watch Jetblue to be the first Airline to accept mobile payments Starting next week, JetBlue passengers can use Apple Pay on an iPhone 6 or iPhone6 plus to purchase food, drinks and other amenities (if not SkyMall purchases) on select flights. This marks the first mobile payment system to be used on an airline, but definitely not the last. Their flight attendants will accept both the six month old Apple Pay as well as credit cards with the help of specially equipped iPad minis. Hitachi rejigs top management of Indian operations Japanese industrial solutions major Hitachi today announced changes at top management with Deputy Managing Director Kojin Nakakita succeeding Ichiro Iino, who has been designated as Chief Executive for Asia Pacific. This is a part of Hitachi’s transition to an ‘autonomous decentralized global management structure’ in which each region is able to lead its business autonomously,” the company said in a statement. Twitter engagement for big brands increases tremendously during Q4 Big brands are getting much better with twitter these days. The total engagement for marketers jumped 105 percent year over year in the fourth quarter. After studying Interbrand’s list of the 100 best brands from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, it was also found that brands had 11 percent more tweets year over year in Q4. Even with the extra messages showing up in users’ Twitter feeds, brands grew their number of followers by around 40 percent during 2014 as a whole.
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updates
december 2013 february 2015
Media Premier League £5bn TV rights deal smashes all expectations Sky Sports and BT Sport got the Premier League TV broadcast rights for a record £5.136bn, beating all expectations for the live games during the 2016-19 seasons. Jeremy Darroch, chief executive of Sky Group, said: “This is a good result and confirms that Sky is the unrivalled choice for sports fans. We went into the Premier League auction with a clear objective and are pleased to have secured the rights that we wanted. Twitter to Buy Niche, a Talent Agency for Social Media Celebs Twitter announced its plans to acquire a New York based startup, Niche, which pairs content creators popular on services like Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr’s own Vine with brand advertisers. As per Recode the price tag may range from $30 million to $60 million
Ad Watch McDonald’s: Super Bowl XLIX ‘Pay by Love’ McDonald’s recent ad campaign ‘pay by love’ has brought a new revolution in the marketing industry. The campaign brilliantly works on creating a long term brand association with ‘love, care and warmth.’ McDonalds will now be selecting some lucky customers between 2nd FEB-14th FEB to pay with hugs and gestures of love. The advertisement shows people calling their mom to say ‘I Love you’, giving each other a family hug or doing happy dance as a mode of payment for their bill. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iq2Sm2XGv_s
Articles are invited
“Best Article”: Amruth Jayaram & Ramnath Prabhu | SBM, NMIMS Mumbai He receives a cash prize of Rs.1000 & a letter of appreciation We are inviting articles from all the B-schools of India. The articles can be absolutely anything related to the world of marketing but it should be an original work that is not published elsewhere. The articles can be specific to the regular sections of Markathon which includes: •Perspective: Articles related to development of latest trends in marketing arena. •Productolysis: Analysis of a product from the point of view of marketing. •Strategic Analysis: A complete analysis of marketing strategy of any company or an event. Apart from above, out of the box views related to marketing are also welcome. The best entry will receive a letter of appreciation and a cash prize of Rs 1000/-. The format of the file should be MS Word doc/docx. The last date of receiving all entries is 8th March, 2015. Please send your entries marked as <ARTICLE NAME>_<SENDERS’ NAME(S)>_<INSTITUTE> to markathon.iims@gmail.com.
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