Niche

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Not so long ago, a debate on protection, preservation and sustainability was started. On Earth Summits, Conferences and Meets where numerous measures and statistics were, and are continuing to be discussed. And while this discussion grows more intense by every passing hour, there’s not much that has been done.

But what if there was something you could do, right now? Right from the comforts of your blankets? All it would take, is a lifestyle change, change towards sustainability, change towards a better living. Minimo, is that step. Sustainability has been made an easy, basic reality by Mr. Mayank Jain.

An IBS Hyderabad alumnus, he has taken his first and huge step in the direction to make living, sustainable which not only drives him, but invites us as well, to a better future.

Minimo is a brand that promotes sustainable living with a refreshing range of products that aim to reduce carbon footprint and the plastic waste. that has become a bane to the planet.

Bamboo toothbrush that has charcoal infused bristles and the bamboo makes disposing the toothbrush hassle and guiltfree.

Bamboo toothbrush holder that makes sure your teeth and your brush are always away from bacteria and protects it from coming into contact with any contaminated surface.

A cutlery set that includes a spork (a spoon+ fork, how convenient!), a steel straw (no more turtles should get hurt) and a straw cleaner to ensure you’re not tasting juice from before in your coke.

5 TRENDS TO LOOK OUT FOR THIS

2020 The Marketing Funnel Shift: Companies have shifted their interests from targeting customers as "gatekeepers to wallets" to rather focusing on further segmentation through efficiently leveraging content to target niche audiences. It's important to be selfaware about the way your audience feels about your brand & what it stands for in comparison to the entire idea of a business glossing over its customers in hopes of monetizing their every move. A business needs to entice your audience, inspire them, provoke their thoughts, excite them or appeal to their emotions. The right content creation is the key to creating higher engagement levels across all social media platforms.

Chatbots aren't going anywhere: Company hotlines can get mundane soon. Not all companies have figured out the best way to outsource their helpline services, which often increase the lead time between understanding the problem and providing solutions for the same. In-fact recent studies have shown that 45% of end-users usually prefer turning to chatbots for customer service. As surprising as that may sound, people love chatbots. Grandview research reports that the worldwide chatbots market will reach the 1.25$ billion mark by 2025. With an estimated annual growth of 24.3% Chatbot: 1 | Your friendly neighbourhood hotline guy: 0

The Rise of Vertical Video: People spend an average of 6 hours every day watching videos on various platforms. As imperative as a concept, companies today strategies every minute details that need to be inculcated in the video to be able to communicate the right message. However, people do not always like turning their phone sideways. Yes, that's true. People don't like it. Instagram came in with the idea of IGTV where their entire focus was to promote watching videos in vertical mode. YouTube wasn't far behind either, it gave the audience the option to portray their vertical mode skill set. So, if you are a business functioning on Instagram and if you want to publish a video that's longer than a minute then it needs to be shot in the vertical mode keeping IGTV in mind. People have a thing. Accept it.

Social Media Advertising: Fact: 83% of companies are paying for Facebook ads. Twitter earned $665 million in revenue in 2018, $575 million of this comes from ads.

Advertise AdvertiseAdvertise: More than half of the millennials (57%) today believe that ads becoming important. Many social networks often leverage user information such as browsing habits so that they can provide relevant advertisements.

Besides, another reason why your business should start investing in social advertising is that social platforms are changing their algorithms. They now prioritize posts from family and friends rather than posts from brands. This has resulted in a decline in organic reach on social media for companies. Thus, one will have no choice but to pay for social ads if you want your brand to be noticed. Leveraging social media ads allows businesses to tap into more targeted customer pools. Generating higher quality leads.

It gives us the futuristic feels and the user base has just been drastically increasing giving companies a reason to invest and inculcate visual searches a part of their marketing campaigns.

Voice & Visual Searchers are getting louder: According to Search Engine Land, voice-based commerce sales in the United States reached $1.8 billion in 2017 and are projected to reach $40 billion by 2022. Yep, that’s 40 billion! You heard it right!

Voice searches are easy and absolutely fun, who doesn't like being able to simply say out loud what needs to be done and your personalized smart speaker takes care of it (at least most of the times) it eases information search and more importantly reduces screen time which seems to be the go-to factor for people to access the technology.

Google has long enabled reverse-image searches, Google lens makes it possible for people to take a picture of something in the real world and find information about it. Pinterest launched its Lens feature back in February, and the social media platform reported that its users conducted over 600 Million combined Monthly Searches with it (So many millions in the article)

Rithik Jain

Absolute vodka: A Powerful Campaign

In 1917 Swedish govt. took over the country’s alcohol industry. Absolut as a company was founded in 1879 by Lars Olsson Smith and is produced in Åhus, Sweden. He challenged and beat, the city of Stockholm's liquor marketing monopoly with his vodka. Vodka was then sold nationwide under the name "Absolut Rent Brännvin". The name changed with time-space, and in 1979, the old name Absolut was picked up when the upper-price range ABSOLUT VODKA was introduced. It was only sold in Sweden before it hit the global market in 1979, at this time, absolute entered the market, which was already filled with powerhouses like, Smirnoff. It was a bold move and for them to stand out, they needed to do something out of the box. Part of the difficulty was that they had very little or no branding and their bottle design were very simple and common.

The campaign debuted in 1981, which was an idea that took the shape of the campaign. The very first ad, ABSOLUT PERFECTION, established the meme of wrapping visual and verbal puns around simple, striking imagery.

This was just the starting of the campaign, they knew how the next 25 years would see 1500 variations of the ad created for the brand and how it would take the company globally. The company explored every opportunity to show the creativity of the campaign, which was linked with Christmas to build the customer-brand relationship.

They also realized that they could be a part of current events and sporting events. All they needed to do was put it in the shape of the bottle and voila! Absolut was reaching another subsection of its consumers. This is what they did with their World Cup edition. Finally, their most successful and creative campaign came around a geographical location, this was a masterstroke from Absolut as it made it more personal to people and where they live. If a brand speaks to you personally then you are more likely to purchase from them. It has been proven time and again. And Absolut was very clever to use this tactic. The campaign ran non- stop for 25 years with 1500 variations. They were used globally and focused locally, which means, people feel connected and in turn, they happily purchase their product. In the US alone they saw a rise of 10,000 cases sold in 1980 to 4.5million cases in 2000. The company saw a rise in cities around the globe and they did that by making their bottle the star of the show.

Nilesh Rajput

CADBURY CHANGES ITS MARKETING CAMPAIGN Cadbury is known for setting strategy at the global level and executing it at the local level.

Cadbury has been following this business model ever since the British confectionery sent its first recipe to Australia in 1900. Cadbury sees its brand as the fabric of the nation. It is all about bringing people close, sense of belonging and connection.

Cadbury dairy milk celebrated its 70th anniversary by launching an integrated campaign to strengthen human relationships, by changing its brand proposition to “generosity”.

From “kuchmeetha ho jaye” to “kuchacha ho jaye” Cadbury dairy milk has come a long way. It is conceptualized by Ogilvy India, where the campaign promotes the generous spirit and relationships built by human beings on small abstracts of life. The brand went back to the roots of human relations. Cadbury, as a brand is always known for valuing relationships and helps in making people closer to each other.

The commercial features two brothers. The younger brother is shown, kneeling in front of the empty Cadbury dairy milk wrapper and praying for the chocolate bar to reappear. The elder brother is shown to be studying and observing his younger brother’s actions. Out of goodness and generosity, the younger brother sacrifices his chocolate and replaces the empty wrapper with his own.The mother, a silent spectator, figures out the elder kid’s generous act of giving up his chocolate for the younger ones. The creative add concludes with “kuchacha ho jaye”. This story depicts the simple human charm, straight from the heart. Cadbury attempts to bring forth the inherent goodness in people.The campaign depicted how small moments strengthen human relations and how generosity in every individual can be a source of celebration.

In today’s competition and fast-moving world, we tend to overlook the goodness in others and also the kindness inherent with all of us. Cadbury dairy milk wanted to depict such human relations and highlight these little acts.

Vedika Agarwal

Dove Breaking stereotypes of beauty From the basket of Unilever, Dove has constantly given some captivating campaigns that helped the brand not only in building the brand voice but also in influencing people to feel comfortable with their body types and skin colour.

They launched campaigns like “Real Beauty Sketches” and “Self-esteem project” through which the brand showed that it cares about the women of every age and engaging with these local issues proved to be a successful marketing strategy.

The Dove “real beauty” campaign has been impactful for many among the marketing circles around the world. After gaining establishment in the western market, Dove did a tremendous job of snatching its share of female beauty consumers in the Indian market.

The campaign was started in the UK in 2003 with these billboards having images of women and two tick-box with options like “grey or gorgeous?”, “withered or wonderful?”, and “fat or fit?”, this gained a lot of appreciation and the company won many accolades and raised its revenue from $2.5 billion to $5.8 billion. Other campaigns that added to the success of Dove, were “Real Beauty Sketches” and “Real beauty stories”. In real beauty sketches, women were asked to describe themselves while an artist would sketch them and then the same women were described by another person while the artist would sketch, and there was a huge difference seen in both the sketches. The first one was less flattering than the other and it was depicted that women cultivate a flawed and negative image of themselves.

“Real beauty stories” is a massive success on twitter, where people at random publish their views on beauty.

Dove’s real beauty initiative has made its way to India from its core strategy from the west, but the Indian campaigns have been upgraded per the Indian perspective. Popular Bollywood filmmaker Pan Nalin was invited to shoot a commercial spot calling out “let’s break the rule of beauty”.

The campaign portrays women of India with different skin colours, hairstyles, clothing and of different ages. The diversified country that India is with a racially mixed population, the dove has successfully managed to capture the broad essence of Indian women in one ad.

Dove is also witnessed for exploring the market, engaging customers and utilizing its marketing channels through social media. Along with the launch of “let’s break the rule of beauty” add, Dove created a Dove India account on twitter through which it engaged the users to express their views on the standards of beauty in India. This helped dove not only in promoting its products but also in getting feedback that their strategy was effective. Another successful social media initiative by Dove was #PledgeRealBeauty on twitter and “Dove Real Beauty Pledge” on Instagram. Women talk about the stereotypes persisting in India, they talk about how difficult it is to bear the pressure of matching with the standards set by the native people about the female body, such as skin color and body weight.

Engaging with social causes helps a brand to grow by boosting visibility, creates recognition and message about a company. Dove completely took advantage of this strategy and launched a local campaign with the concept of selfbeauty among young girls- “The Dove Self-Esteem project”.

Dove not only very beautifully portrayed the revolution of Indian women but also engaged with the young female generation to convey the importance of positive thinking and being confident. It is very important that young girls today have high Self-Esteem, that they feel good about themselves and are comfortable with their appearances. Only then will they grow into successful confident women. Dove hopes to reach 2.55 million young Indian girls by 2020.

This way it shows that Dove cares about the community of its consumers, which in turn will help them to create a new customer base for the years to come.

Anam Fatima

COCA - COLA In 2011, the beverage giant Coca-Cola started a marketing campaign in Australia and later, it was spread across the 80 countries including the US. The campaigns was to replace the Coca Cola’s logo from one side of a bottle with a phrase “share a coke with” followed by a person’s name, they used a list of containing 250 of the country’s most powerful names which aimed that people go out and find a bottle with their name on it then share it with their friends.

The campaign helped Coca-Cola to increase its share by category 4% and increased consumption by young adults to 7%, the campaign was started to bring awareness among young adults and quickly it grew to become one of the most recognizable campaign drives of the year, since then the US followed the suit, printing first names across the front of its bottles and cans in Coke's branded font. People could even order custom bottles on Coke's website to request things like nicknames and college logos.

Big brands are often not flexible to do something ground-breaking when they're already giant and they have a threat of their image to be tainted. What did Coca-Cola do to appeal to the masses of people? They appealed to individuals by putting their names on each bottle of coke. It was no doubt a ground breaking story across the marketing and advertising industry.

Many consumers were delighted by this, while others were left confused - why make a temporary item so personal? The competitor Pepsi even released counter-ads shortly after the campaign launched. Coca-Cola knows it very well that coke fans are regular buyers and the company molds it into the sense of individual ownership with full dedication. Speculating what name, you'll get out of the vending machine was a fun thrill in and of itself, even if it isn't yours, it encourages you to "share a Coke" with whosoever’s name is on the front.

In the United States the campaign credited by increasing sales by 2% and also help in reviving the consumption which is 10 years now, in 2015 company extended the campaigns by increasing the number of names to 1000. Nicknames such as “bro”, “better half” were also added to the inventory of names, in 2016 company replaced the names with lyrics from 70 popular songs including 'lean on me' and 'we are the champions'. In 2017 the company came with new variants; holiday destinations.

Bottles are labeled with favorite summer holiday spots such as Hawaii, Barbados, etc. The campaign kicked off by placing the most popular Australian names on coke bottles to drive sales and lead to a social conversation around the soft drink market, the campaign proved to be a success and soon spread to the whole world.

Nilesh Rajput

Marketing reforms in

FMCG sector

The FMCG sector is a major contributor to India’s GDP with a whopping size of around 500 billion. The revenue growth contributes around 40-45 percent of the total income of FMCG companies resulting in the revival of rural demand along with new product launches. The after-effects of demonetization and GST have lead to low consumer demand. However, the effects of GST are now over and have given a major high in the form of an input tax credit on capital goods and input services. To support this reform govt. has made the necessary changes in the policies and development in infrastructure.

The growing share of organized retail in India has been one of the major drivers of India’s FMCG market. After India allowed 100% FDI in the retail sector, many global retailers started investing in Indian companies as they saw huge opportunities.

Another factor is digital media which is changing the landscape of marketers everywhere. The rapid growth of the internet and digital media significantly altered the buying decision of Indian consumers. Selling products online will help the companies to reach more consumers beyond the geographical limit.

Innovative packaging, rebranding of products are some of the innovation strategies that FMCG companies are adopting to make their products more appealing to consumers.

For many years, FMCG companies have been looking to tap the rural market. Companies like HUL, ITC are conducting e-chaupals, project shakti to increase the awareness regarding the quality of the product and also improve the family income. With a rise in income levels and increased demand for branded products, the rural market is still an untapped reality.

Undoubtedly, growing awareness, easier access, and changing lifestyles are key growth drivers of this consumer market. The bottom line is that with increased industrialization and government initiatives to improve the rural belt, this sector will keep on growing which will further improve the valuation and stock prices of FMCG firms.

Nilesh Rajput

Gillette: The best a woman could get!

"The best a man can get" has been Gillette's tagline for decades and has remarkably positioned itself as a brand, consumed heavily by men. Their recent advertising campaign did portray that all men are not the best that they can be. The most often justified characteristics associated with men have been rudeness, bullying, and harassment. The advertisement tried to change the definition of masculinity altogether.

The ad caused a serious backlash, as no target audience would like to be told that they are not good enough. The advertisement aimed at various social media platforms received plenty of negative feedback from existing customers on Twitter. Videos of men throwing their Gillette razors in the bin became viral too. It seemed to be a major setback for Gillette as their core audience had started disliking the brand at a considerable speed. The advertisement video became the 20th most disliked video on YouTube. Men felt accused, outraged and offended.

This entire campaign seemed like a disaster, where Gillette offended most of their primary users, but for what exactly? To align with the thoughts of the millennial, who strive for zero gender discrimination and harassment?

Being a huge brand with the backup of a very reliable Research and Development department, the backlash from men was predicted. No customer base would like to be told that they are just not good enough. But, guess who liked the ad campaign the most? Women!

Women came all out on social media in support of the advertising campaign as it showcased men not being perfect and highlighting their insecurities. They loved the fact that the video also portrayed the fact that men should also educate other men and children to help change the characteristics attached to men. Now guess who is talking about shaving more and more on social media? Who buys more expensive razors? Who shaves more and more each year? Women!

In their recent history, Gillette was slowly but surely losing its place in the market and had a dip of over 20% over the past decade. The organization was on the verge of losing a master's brand status. They had to think something different and change the way they approached their audience.

Most of the time, big MNC's and marketers get fixed upon trying to please their existing target audience. In such situations, it is useful to research the market regularly with a short time frame and see if the products offered, can benefit a different target audience. For such steps to be taken by a firm, the risks and benefits involved are needed to be calculated.

The only question which arises is, did Gillette really predict the backlash and really wanted to change their target audience with one of the most disliked videos on YouTube, or were they genuinely trying to make society a better place by educating men about the importance of changing their attitudes and the characteristics attached?

Sanchit Sharma

Googles In-house Marketing Campaign:

Google Maps People turn to Google Maps in their moments of needs, whether you are stuck in traffic, want to explore a new city or to make sure that you reach your favorite restaurant in time by choosing the best shortcuts.

Google Maps has changed the way we travel. Access the maps of the world at a single click. Although Google’s next big challenge is to tap into the unchartered territory by acquiring and sustaining new users on their platforms. Real-time traffic updates and alternate route suggestions can save commuters precious hours that would otherwise be spent in gridlock. Unfortunately, research showed that many users weren’t aware of the real-time traffic feature.

GOOGLE’S BIG IDEA: #LookBeforeYouLeave Campaign To solve this problem, the Google Maps team came out with the #LookBeforeYouLeave campaign to remind commuters to check Google Map real-time traffic updates on their phones before hitting the road.

The integrated media campaign ran on digital (online video and social) and traditional (radio, TV, and OOH) channels in eight key Indian cities (Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad, and Kolkata). A crucial channel for the target audience was YouTube, they used real-time data signals to develop dynamic and contextual digital ads that were served across the platform.

Google’s marketing team created ads that addressed India-specific traffic conditions. These included common events like cricket and weddings, showing how they can be sources of sporadic traffic jams and how the real-time traffic feature can help alleviate the problem.

Another brilliant campaign by Google was brought into action during the monsoon season. As poor weather conditions often add to traffic problems in the major cities, Google used the Google Ads and weather API— a set of programs that fetched weather information and created a set of YouTube bumper (small advertisements & notifications) that were triggered only when it rained. The dynamic, real-time ads encouraged users to check Google Maps before hitting the roads, especially during inclement weather.

Users were drawn to the witty, contextually creative idea, which boosted awareness.

Google, then, wanted to test its brand value across cities so they experimented with brand placement: Quick advertisements were shot to test whether the ad should start by introducing Google Maps with a slate-static one-second image or whether they should wait until the end of the advertisement. After testing two versions of the video ad and measuring audience response using surveys, they found that featuring a slate at the beginning of the ad drove a strong increase in feature awareness, with an average lift of more than 10% in Kolkata, Bengaluru, and Mumbai. The feedback made it clear that brands need to set the stage early on and communicate who they are and why audiences should care about their products Simply creating relevant ads isn’t enough. In today’s advertising world, brands must stay top of mind with consumers. Google was aware that their ads had to be served several times to leave a lasting impression among commuters in busy Indian cities, but viewing the same ad over and over again isn’t the best user experience. So they set the stage big by utilizing OOH channels to run ads. They took over billboard space in two high-traffic locations in Mumbai and built a dynamic feature, displaying real-time traffic updates throughout the day for 15 days. Commuters were able to use the real-time information to plan their routes right there and then, making the OOH effort a highly relevant and memorable interaction.

With YouTube at its core, the #LookBeforeYouLeave campaign achieved the overall goal of driving feature awareness across top cities in India. Business goals were met as the daily active usage among consumers who had downloaded the Google Maps app on their smartphones, had substantially increased. By carefully crafting and reinforcing their message with locally relevant campaigns, they were able to tap the market for new end users by increasing engagement levels, increasing brand awareness by almost 10%.

Rithik Jain

Content Creators: Are they promoting brands or branding themselves. #CreateDon’tHate.

This hashtag might seem familiar to the eye, especially to those who are habituated of scrolling down Instagram, getting fixated on the aesthetics, placement and appeal of products. This appeal is heightened and is at its prime, all thanks to Content Creators.

Content Creators are people who carry out information relating to a product by collaborating with the companies producing them, ensuring the best product placement, promotion techniques but the way of engaging audience. Audience engagement is often invited through contests, giveaways (sponsored by the brand), or just by merely replying to the comments made on the posts by the audience. All these strategies make the potential customer feel validated and emotionally attached and attracted to eventually buy the product.

But, how is coming of content creators different from any other marketing tool or strategy?

Every marketing tool is essentially bought into play to boost the product, push it through the market without any separate existence of the tool itself. Now, content creators are not just another tool but also humans with a personality that they attach to the brand when they market them.

Personalised content pushed through by these creators often put equal limelight and attention towards the product as well as the person. Now, every like every product is unique, so is every person, be it a marketer or not.

This uniqueness brought to focus through storytelling, posts, stories, blogposts is what eventually leads to the branding of the person in turn. Brands, after all, are anything that stand apart and have the ability to be recognised through emotion, familiarity and distinction from something that’s been seen before. And that is what every content creator is putting out on every social media handle they are available on.

However, like any other strategy, content creation does not always hit home and is misunderstood quite often, this is where the hashtag mentioned above, comes into play.

The audience, as volatile as it is, takes little time in believing in the brand via content creators and far less when it comes to distinguishing between them and actually understanding that the brand and the person are, in fact, two separate entities; that their values as an object and as a human differ.

After all, they are a part of a marketing strategy not beyond or apart from it.

Tamanna Gogia

IKEA #MakeEverydayBrighter IKEA is a Swedish based company that was founded in 1943 by Ingvar Kamprad. It designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture, kitchen appliances, and home accessories, among other useful goods and occasionally home services. It has been the world's largest furniture retailer since at least 2008.

The company is known for its modernist designs for various types of appliances and furniture, and its interior design work is often associated with an eco-friendly simplicity. Besides, the firm is known for its attention to cost control, operational details, and continuous product development, corporate attributes that allowed IKEA to lower its prices by an average of two to three percent over the decade to 2010 during a period of global expansion.

Now coming to the marketing part, IKEA publishes an annual catalog, first published in Swedish in 1951. IKEA published 197 million catalogs in 2010, in twenty languages and sixty-one editions. It is considered to be the main marketing tool of the retail giant, consuming 70% of the company's annual marketing budget. Since 2007 every year IKEA has launched a new advertising campaign giving tough competition to its competitors.

Recently, ahead of its first store launch in India, IKEA launched a new ad campaign which was #MakeEverydayBrighter. The campaign is based on the core thought of how our life at home can become brighter when we look at our homes differently. It`s not just the big things, but even the everyday ones can be brightened up by IKEA. While the company and its campaigns have managed to strike the right chord with consumers globally, it left no stone unturned in creating a buzz about its debut in India three months before the launch. IKEA collaborated with Dentsu Impact agency for its Indian ad campaign. . In August 2018, IKEA saw a huge opening of its first-ever store in India. The iconic launch took place in the City of Pearls – Hyderabad with thousands of people trooping into the store. So what makes the IKEA advertisement different from others? Well, the advertisement was a nice mix of what IKEA stands for as a brand and what is the uniqueness they are offering to Indians.

Under #MakeEverydayBrighter, the main challenge was to familiarize IKEA with consumers and make them think it`s a brand for them. The ad captures playful moments between family members and shows just how amazing our lives at home can be. Each situation brings to life a new perspective on everyday life at home and how IKEA’s home furnishing solutions help make each day brighter and happier.

The main essence of the advertisement was that it showcased from furniture and household products to soft toys at very reasonable rates. Also, it targeted every age group making it a typical family store.

The result of this campaign was flabbergasting. IKEA witnessed a horde of about 40000 people on its opening day. They earned a staggering amount of revenue on day 1 which was nearly about Rs 1.5cr. The main reason behind these numbers was that Indians recognized IKEA as a brand which provides worldclass furnishing solution at affordable prices. India is a highly sensitive market when it comes to pricing, where pricing writes the future of any product or service in the market. Thus, IKEA had the biggest advantage. After the success of its Hyderabad store, IKEA now plans to open 25 more outlets by 2025 across India with Mumbai, Bangalore, and Delhi in the next two years.

Priyanka

Kellogg’s:

Nourishing dreams and Lives

The Kellogg Company, doing business as Kellogg's, is an American multinational foodmanufacturing company. Kellogg's products are manufactured in 18 countries and marketed in over 180 countries. Kellogg's mission statement is "Nourishing families so they can flourish and thrive."

Various methods have been used in the company's history to promote the company and its brands, ad campaigns being one of its favorites. Cultural Machine's digital channel blush, along with Kellogg's India collaborated with tennis pioneer Sania Mirza. Sania, an expectant mother now sends out a message about liberating children from social and cultural norms and setting them free to be the individuals of their own choice. For the first time, we see Sania, not as a tennis star or a cricketer's wife but just as another mother who would want to wing her child's dreams in every way possible.

The believability of the campaign is high because of the presence of Sania, as she has herself lived all these values. This makes her the perfect role model, whom this generation’s mothers could relate to.

The choice of Sania Mirza as the face of the campaign plays an integral role in the campaign. The fact that Mirza’s parents nourished her dreams, enabling her to become the Tennis legend that she is today, makes this sports star the aptest choice for the campaign. Further, Sania, sharing a message with her a child makes for a heebiie-jeebiies moment, doubling the impact of the campaign.

In the honest and heartfelt narrative, Sania Mirza advises her soon-to-be-born baby. She discards all the stereotypical expectations, gender, and societal structures, brushing off the pressure that the child might face due to his/her famed parentage. In the video, Sania Mirza speaks collectively on behalf of modern mothers like her, who support their children and set them free to choose their path in life.

Kellogg's India directing marketing CMO Sumit Mathur says, “Today’s generation is living in a disruptive entrepreneurial age. The barometer that defined the norms and success and achievement in the society has moved away from conventional careers to people following their passions. Kellogg's, as a brand, truly celebrates this rejuvenated mind-set of people who strive towards a better day and a better quality of life. I feel our brand partners in their daily triumph of eating better by providing them with the right nourishment for their day.

Therefore, when I came across this opportunity, I thought it was a great way to celebrate #NourishYourDreams where a mother reassures her future child that she will continue to nourish his/her dream despite pressure from peers and society.”

Breaking free of the clutches of norms and rules, the campaign is a celebration of freedom that parents now wish for their kids. Reaching out to progressive parents who believe in their child’s dreams and nurture them to pursue the highest star, #NourishYourDreams is all about hope and aspirations.

Mansi Beniwal

Ten years ago, amid an economic recession, Boston’s Yav Le Appliance Plus Lightning was losing money, "I’d read somewhere that people will buy some things anyway during the recession and one of the most considerable things was refrigerators,” recalls CEO Steve Sheinkopf. So they pumped more money into Television and newspaper advertising, thinking it would help but, it didn’t and they got hurt. And here is the big move towards digital marketing.

This is the world of digital marketing where people are more influenced by social media and mostly, the young generation, who are also the target customers for big brands. Digital marketing is the strategy that included social media, blogging, reputation management, email components, etc.

The marketing campaign is organized, strategized efforts to promote a specific company goal, such as raising awareness of a new product or capturing customer feedback. They typically aim to reach consumers in a variety of ways and involve a combination of media, including but not limited to email, print, advertising, pay-per-click, and social media which is the most engaging tactic nowadays.

So, let’s look at some steps which will help you to design the most attractive digital campaign for a brand.

-The very first step is to know how your marketing campaign fits into your marketing plan. Great marketing campaigns follow a consistent theme and promote a single or focused idea or goal. You have to do marketplace analysis for your product or service which include an overview of your market, realistic assessment of your performance and competitive analysis.

-Second is articulation of clear Business Objectives of your digital marketing program such as whether you have to increase brand awareness or you are focusing on sales or you want customer retention or you want to reduce cost per acquisition of customer, these are all standard business objectives but they do not give you pathway that how can you do it? That’s why you have to dig down and go beyond these in the digital sense.

-After designing the desired goal for your campaign you should be able to measure the outcomes of your campaign. So, how will you measure it? Does it depend on what’s your goal was? If it was for increasing brand awareness then with the help of social mention, press mention and popularity we can reach towards the defined goal. If it was for gathering most of the revenue then we can measure it by leads, sales and upsells. If it is for boosting user engagement then we can survey for how many blog shares, social shares and email interaction you got and so on.

-The next is who are you targeting? Yes, you are a target audience because your audience can make or break the success of anything especially a campaign. For this first, we have to figure out what stage of the buyer’s journey your campaign is targeting. It depends on whether your campaign audience is in the awareness, consideration or decision stage. Audience analytics will also help you, it is the platform which helps the business to determine the kind of content to serve up in the future based on the data we can get from the social media and with this we can uncover several valuable data sets which can further improve the profile of your audience persona.

-And the last is most important when you will publish for your target audience. This is all about timing. Starting it on an attractive point and then giving a deadline for your campaign gives you a much better idea of when, how and how often you can promote it.

Sharvari Bojhe

SwiggyLicious Operating in more than 25 cities across India, Swiggy is an online food delivery service with its headquarters located in Bangalore. Under demographic segmentation, Swiggy targets the younger generation which includes teenagers, who find it very convenient to get food from their favorite restaurants at their doorstep. It also targets college-going students and the ones who work at offices who generally find it difficult to commute to their favorite restaurants.

Under the behavioral segment, Swiggy targets the customers who are looking for maximum convenience when it comes to food and getting it delivered at their doorstep to avoid all the traffic chaos to get to their favorite restaurants. For psychographic segmentation, Swiggy targets customers who believe that it is better to have food delivered at home. The Swiggy campaigns on all occasions have created an image to provide maximum convenience for both the customer and the restaurants they have partnered with. Swiggy now aims to set kitchens jointly with restaurants for higher revenues. It also aims to extend its services to Swiggy stores and expand its delivery business into other products.

Swiggy stands out in terms of logistics when compared to other major players in the market. The organization figured out a way to excel in online delivering food service is to have an extensive network of logistics due to which Swiggy has built a sound and sustainable business model. Swiggy has recently launched the Swiggy Access kitchen, which is a ready-tooccupy kitchen that offers rent-free access to restaurant partners with all required amenities. Swiggy aims to assist the restaurant owners to optimize their kitchen in terms of demand forecasting, stock planning, and order edits, etc.

Swiggy has an immense reputation amongst its target audience not just because of its excellent services, but also its interesting social media strategies. Each social media campaign of Swiggy has been remarkable and has been following the trend of moment marketing, keeping them ahead in the market. The posts are light, appealing, have good quality and are humor based. Campaigns like #EatYourVeggies, #SuperSwiggy, #EarnYourCheatMeal conveyed the notion of eating healthy by using witty one-liners and puns. Swiggy has also used influencers to market its services.

Sanchit Sharma

The Glory of

OnePlus

When we talk about smartphones, there are a few brands that come to our minds, OnePlus being one of them. The success of this brand has left the market stunned, as it has surpassed our expectations in more ways than one. In spite of being a six-yearold start-up, it has found its place in the smartphone market along with big players like Apple, Samsung, etc.

The company’s main goal is to produce premium quality phones, within the reach of the common man, believing that the customers would "Never Settle" for the lowerquality devices produced by other companies. The mind-blowing specs and low cost make it one of the most talked-about and preferred brands by the users.

What is the mystery behind OnePlus’s phenomenal victory and its unparalleled shift from a mere start-up to being a “flagship killer”? Well, there are no easy answers.

Campaigns and Marketing Strategies The motto of the company is to restrict the expenditure on advertising and promotion and to discard the traditional ways of it. One of the highlights of this brand is its unique promotional campaigns or activities. One Plus uses the Lean Start-up Methodology (Build > Measure > Learn), which helps the campaigns to adapt to the ever-changing market.

Rather than spending millions on media, OnePlus opted for some unconventional ways to promote the brand and muster the curiosity of the users, around the world.

Let us have a look at some of the remarkably impactful campaigns of the company, which contributes to 40% of revenue.

Invite-only WOM (Word Of Mouth) •

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desire things that are out of reach of others. OnePlus considered this philosophy and came up with a unique way of promoting their brand by creating a wave of anticipation among the mass. Besides, this system allowed the company to gain knowledge of the smartphone market and the expected demand for their product. Furthermore, it allowed the company to meet the demand of the customers at a steady pace, without any hassle. a person got an invite, he received other invites to share with his network.

Thus, through this referral type invite system, the OnePlus One allowed its consumers to share their experiences and views with the members of their respective networks. This way, OnePlus One gained free advertising of their product by their customers, and thus achieved higher sales.

# NeverSettle •

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aimed to make their customers experience the ‘Never Settle’ way of life. This campaign tried to prove that you don’t necessarily have to spend huge amounts of money to get the kind of smartphone you want and make an impact.

Sarin, head of marketing -India, OnePlus, states “Our guiding philosophy ‘never settle’ is all about pushing boundaries and with this campaign we want to build that philosophical connect, with our community and future users, and get them to be part of this way of life.”

Invite Link-up with Amazon, Ola, and Air Asia •

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Tie-up with Amazon helped OnePlus to reach a maximum number of customers, as Amazon India had, by then, gained a solid hold on the Indian online shopping market. The decision to take Amazon’s help proved to be quite fruitful as the figures showed sales of over 20000 phones in no time.

Of their strategies was to allow Ola and Air Asia customers to request for the phone to have a hands-on experience of it. Plus, during the launch of the OnePlus X, they came up with a campaign where the consumers could order the phone through the Ola app and have it delivered within 15 minutes.

From the aforementioned ones, there a few more campaigns, which provided a significant impact on the sales and promotion of the OnePlus brand.

Cannot be an Indian and not adore Amitabh Bachchan. Though it was not their plan to go the traditional way, it was quite difficult to get a hold of the Indian market without the influence of a well-known celebrity. As a result, they joined hands with the veteran actor. Actor, Sushant Singh Rajput, comedian, Vir Das and many more were on the list as well. The strategy to tap different entertainment sectors was commendable, indeed.

Built an online forum wherein, the tech-enthusiasts could discuss various Android app development related issues and ideas. These techies turned out to become the initial adopters of the brand.

London, they created a campaign called, ‘Delivery in 60 Minutes or Less’. Through this campaign, the company promised to deliver a phone within 60 minutes of placing an order, else it would be free!

The Road Ahead According to a recent survey, OnePlus 7T, the latest product by the company, has been voted as the best value-for-money Android flagship phone of 2019.

If the company manages to keep on producing such high-quality products, without letting the buyers make a hole in their pockets, it seems, the company would be able to keep a hold on the premium phones market.

Of course, the company is currently facing stiff completion by brands like Apple, Samsung and a few reviving companies like Nokia and Motorola.

However, with its amazing product quality, great specs, unique marketing strategies, and well-strategized tie-ups, it does have the potential to remain the market leader for a long period.

Ipsa Basu

‘Do What You Can’t’ Product innovation synthesized with technology can effectively solve human predicament. Brands, with the help of product development and marketing agencies are providing solutions which make our lives much easier and one such brand is Samsung. Samsung, one of the biggest and most reliable electronics and smartphones brands, has come up with two exclusive solutions: GOOD VIBES and RELUMINO. These two unique offerings from Samsung will establish the missing link in the communication module between the deaf-blind and the caregiver. This one of a kind Application uses ‘Morse-Code’ to convert vibrations into voice or texts and vice versa. It has been built as two different User Interfaces (UI), where one interface offers an invisible UI for the deaf-blind, using gestures, taps and vibrations, while the other one uses a visible UI with a standard chatting interface specially for the caregivers.

A deaf-blind person uses various combinations of dots and dashes by tapping anywhere on the screen in order to send their desired messages. Short tap is for dot, long press for dash, two-finger tap is space, long pass deletes letter and flipping the phone sends the message. The standard interface, on the other hand, enables users to use voice and texts to send messages to the deaf and blind. These messages are received as vibrations in the Morse code which they can easily interpret. As part of its citizenship Initiative Samsung has tied up with NAB- National Association for the Blind. It will distribute Samsung smartphones and VR devices to NAB Delhi and it will also provide tutorials. NAB has agreed to use Relumino in classrooms, helping the students with low vision to enhance their learning abilities by using these products.

Samsung has also partnered with Sense India, a non-profit organisation for Good Vibes, to improve the lives of the deaf and blind. Samsung has conducted training and workshops in Delhi and Bengaluru for the educators and the deaf-blind individuals along with their guardians. They have planned to hold comprehensive training workshops to expand their footprint in other Indian cities such as Kolkata, Raipur, Goa, Nashik, Ujjain, etc. and to fine-tune the app through constructive feedback. Samsung’s advertising agency- Cheil WW India, has beautifully conceptualised and executed a campaign to spread awareness about this life changing product innovation. A recently launched emotional video on the Good Vibes app features a deafblind girl who shares a special bond with her mother. When distance sets them apart, her anxious mother seeks a unique medium to communicate with her daughter with the help of the Good Vibe app on a Samsung handset

This digital video showcases the impact that this app can create on the lives of deaf and blind individuals. At present, these apps are only available on the Samsung Play store but Samsung will soon launch these apps on the Android for everyone using smartphones. The app has won four Abby Awards at the Goa International Fest, 2018; Silver at the New York Advertising Festival Awards in the TechnologyInnovation category; Gold at Mobile Grand Prix for exceptional work in CommunicationDesign category. Peter Rhee, Corporate Vice President of Samsung India said- “To win awards for campaigns is every person’s wish but we have achieved something better. We are very happy to be able to develop technologies that will help improve quality of life people with low or no vision, enabling them to be more aware of the world around them and be integrated with our society. A winwin on bringing smiles to those faces who never expected such communication way for themselves.”

There have been plenty of product and technology innovations happening around the world which we have always admired but such great innovations coming from our mother land is a matter of enormous pride.

Pritam Bannerjee

In China, The Power of Niche The rise of niche brands in China showcases the strength of information exchange across social media platforms. Fashion trends can easily spread from country to country but for China, however, it’s more complex. Instagram, like major Western social media platforms, is blocked by a firewall in China. Thus, the crossover of information like fashion trends is hugely driven by netizens who are not so fond of sharing. Chinese Influencers help in spreading of fashion trends by sharing their unsponsored fashion recommendations on Chinese social media. Their fashion recommendations about their style and unique taste, which in turn helps them to gain followers’ loyalty, traffic, and potential brand sponsorships. However, there is another group of sophisticated Chinese consumers, most of whom have extensive overseas travel experiences, and have access to first-hand fashion information. They are well-informed about the Western media and thrive on being fashion-forward. They are well-connected and active on Chinese social media channels at the same time and enjoy sharing their lives, their fashion styles, and their way of living via Chinese social media without really expecting anything in return. A Chinese Gen-Z consumer who follows Instagram trends closely commented: “I want more people to know about these niche brands and sharing them helps the recognition of these brands in China.” According to the McKinsey China Luxury Report 2019, “The concept of a niche brand has multiple meanings across luxury segments, from one that exhibits unique design to those that are a niche in the sense of being rarely seen on the street, or simply not available in mainland China.” While the definition of a niche brand as per Chinese consumers is quite subjective and depends on the consumer’s level of sophistication, the general sentiment is that labelling something as “niche” makes the brand, or product, feel more premier, which is the new equivalent of “premium” and “bespoke.” “I think that niche brands are very premier.

They are the opposite of mainstream, and I love the statement of freeing myself from the mainstream by wearing and supporting niche brands,” says a Chinese Gen-Z consumer, who gets most fashion ideas from Instagram and overseas fashion icons. The restricted nature of information on platforms like Instagram ultimately feeds into this newfound power of “niche.” Consequently, if a brand does not have a presence in China, it can become more appealing to consumers who want to access to what they think of as “new information.” And with a rapidly growing middle class in China, more and more of the population is looking to information to help them advance, which only increases the power of “discovered” brands like GANNI. “Everyone wants to be in a position to share new information,” Shirky says. This creates value for a person as they want to go up on the ladder. What’s unique to China’s case today is that information sharing is highly related to identity formation, unlike anywhere else in the world. For fashion in China, the ubiquity of well-known brands and the growing fatigue for mainstream aesthetic has opened the door for the transmitting this new type of fashion information, which speaks to a Chinese person’s psychological need for self-differentiation and individuality. For the lucky brands, niche or otherwise, it’s resulted in accidental attention from fashion’s most sought after market, the Chinese consumer.

Pritam Bannerjee

SAMSUNG AND ITS Quad CAMERA AD CAMPAIGN Samsung is the second market leader in terms of volume of market occupied in India.

According to the latest statistic of Q3(October 2019) Samsung has a market share of 22.65% in India. The condition of Samsung and the goodwill of the company has increased exponentially in the last decade due to the Galaxy series of the company.

Earlier Samsung was considered as a premium brand and many allegations were also there on the company of poor battery backups and safety issues. For making its image better in the market Samsung launched its J series in which they gave the customer a cheap and reliable mobile which helped Samsung a lot to have a strong base for their Galaxy series. After the launch of the Galaxy series, Samsung never looked back and it keeps on innovating and always redeemed itself as a market leader in India as well as the world. According to the latest data of Q3 2019 Samsung owns a 31.49% volume of the world market. The latest innovation that Samsung brought was its Wide range of pictures in their Galaxy A models by using quad-camera technology. The promotion campaign for it was also great, for the promotion of its campaign Samsung has multiple world heritage places and world monument wider pictures which gave the consumer a great new prospect about photography as well as Samsung. For the promotions, Samsung also released many digital ad campaigns in which they showed their new technology and its uses in a fun way so that it connects to the young audience more.

Samsung also hired well-known youth icon and actor Ayushman Khurana as brand ambassador for launching these features phones in India so that the consumer can relate with the energetic personality of Ayushman Khurana to the new mobile phone.

Samsung with the direct method of advertisements on Television, Facebook, YouTube also had an indirect method where they deployed their representatives in the market to handover the mobile phones in the hand of the customer to give them a real feel of the mobile and to mobilize the crowd and engage more interaction about the phone.

Samsung is a technological giant that aims to innovate for higher social benefits which also included the latest innovation of mobile phones for blind and also the recalling of Samsung's initial galaxy model due to their battery problem which showed the commitment of the company towards its customer base.

Samsung also included this feature in its premium model Galaxy S series and the hard work in the ad campaign paid off to Samsung as it was the market leader in the premium sector of mobile phones having the largest market share according to the latest quarterly report.

The segments targeted by the company are mostly an urban area for its latest mobile and new launch but it also has many models for rural area The targeted sector by Samsung are the students or the youth who loves to travel or have a soft corner for photography the middle-class as well as premium customer connects with the company.

The positioning of Samsung is also commendable as it has brought its image of only a premium product to the available to all image, the wider care network and the Samsung stores are the example of the positioning process by Samsung.

Rishi Kulshreshta

Brand Colour Coding: A Camouflaged Marketing Strategy Mobiles are the way in for a market to our personal space. At all times, we are carrying a multitude of brands, right in our pockets, just a scroll away. And that scrolling isn’t getting any shorter, and nor are the brands at their market research and strategies.

Marketing strategies, to a layman, can be put down as “the way a brand reaches you or plans to reach you.” Now, with a market of 2.2 billion mobile users, it becomes imperative that the brand colour so chosen depicts the essence, intent, prospective targets, etc through the gateway of an app. Let’s look at how app colours are the way to communicate their utility to us as consumers.

Blue might be the most dominant hue on our phone menus when we scroll through the apps and that is not some random majority the brands went with one after the other. Blue signifies traditionality, which gives a user a sense of trust knowing that the brand has existed a long while and is familiar and somehow trustworthy enough.

There is probably one app that, us as millennials, would identify yellow with, or maybe a couple more at best. Not a popular choice amongst brands, yellow, mascots the brand in a fun, carefree light, which is not something brands would strategize for on a large-scale, however apps like Snapchat that intend to send out the exact message of being fun, joyous and everchanging, made a good call.

Although fewer brands prefer orange for their logos, the brightness and the stark contrasts against our mobile screens is the psychology behind taking up orange to grab attention. As research goes, it suggests that orange is slowly catching up with the share that blue logos enjoy.

Not only is the colour eye-catching, but it also gives out an impression of different, experimentative to the consumer.

Love, caution, bright, furious. Red. It’s a colour that has multiple personalities and therefore, gives a brand a chance at capturing multiple markets through the versatile directive. Its most commonly used by informative brands with huge databases of information to offer in some form or the other. Striking to some, bold to some, love to all.

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Green is the environment colour. Its everywhere and its everything, a narrative that might integrate a brand closely to our daily lives. It is majorly recognized as an earthy, utilitarian, safe shade for brands that might be essential “regulars” on your phone.

Apart from the colours, more and more brands are shifting towards what is being called the minimal white. This shift to market brands while being minimal, and on a white background was kickstarted by Apple. And as a brand that sells on aesthetics and social status, brands hit this trend hard.

Now, white has both the advantage of communicating variety and the disadvantage of being called out as mediocre. While it gives the brand and the designers a chance to experiment with a palette of colours and send out a “multipurpose, all for one” statement it also sends out the message of being low on experimentation and being a part of the sheep’s herd.

Tamanna Gogia

Now all of these are just some colours that you scroll through your screen and might also announce something more than their generic decode, there’s no arguing that this is indeed a camouflaged marketing strategy.

CROSS WORD