EDITOR’S NOTE About this Edition > “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the intelligent. It is the one that is more adaptable to change.” - Charles Darwin. In the past few months, we saw how some of the superficial layers broke down and now when life is adjusting itself to the new normal, marketing took different perspectives. We bring you this edition of The Marksman to share ideas and stories from the realm of marketing which connects and brings us together in these tough times. Our cover story for the month is based on 'Personalized Marketing: The Next Chapter in Customer Engagement’. Marketing has the surreal ability to convey ideas in the most creative ways, designed to appeal to the masses. However, this surreal ability is now indulged in the business of gathering customers’ data using predictive algorithms and personalizing ads based on consumer behavior online. Our special story cut across the conventional boundaries of marketing and is meant to give insight on how luxury is now for the masses. This edition takes you through a journey of stories, empowerment, controversies and much more.
CFA Winners > A very hearty congratulations to the winner and the runner up of this month’s Call For Articles. 1. Deepesh Jain 2. Amit Pant You can read their brilliant pieces in the ”Featured Articles” section. We were overwhelmed by the responses that we received from all of you and encourage you to write to us with the same enthusiasm for all further editions as well.
EDITORS
THE TEAM
NANDANI
DESIGN
AJITH
DEEKSHA
SAMBARTA
KRITI
SHIVANI
SAMBARTA
SURATH
SUMIRAN
ARKO
SAMBHAV
MADHULIKA
SNEHA
WRITERS
MANALI
ATHARVA
SANCHITA
CONTENTS KICKSTART Empowering the women who empower us to succeed in life, is by far the truest form of empowerment, and with meesho #mystoremystory, this has been coming true.
MARKETING FAUX PAS Here we see a marketing campaign going wrong and within minutes the whole world knows the wrongdoing and the brand suffered immensely.
COVER STORY Are you bugged continuously by ads for a product you thought of buying? Find out in our cover story if it is a mere coincidence or more than that.
HALLMARK CAMPAIGN As user engagement and its vast possibilities are being explored, chilling can never be the same.
BRAND MARKIVE The story of a whizz-kid, turning a simple idea into a million-dollar business.
MORE THAN MARKETING Decades of rivalry or healthy competition we’ll never know! But clearly, there is something between these two.
PIONEER Know more about the person behind the success of Amazon India and his millionaire journey.
IT’S ALL ABOUT AD-ITUDE Celebrations are all about caring for our fellow humans and this emotional journey takes us through the lights, colors and joy that a young boy brings into an old woman’s life.
AD-TALES At times it is good to be reminded that youth is not about age but letting the child in you to flow freely.
MARK-5 Is fear a good motivator? We will see how brands are monetizing on the fears of people.
SPECIAL STORY A sneak peeks into few brands that are not ready to confine themselves into the socially confined age-old marketing agenda.
1
Meesho:
#MyStoreMyStory - KRITI AGRAWAL
Kickstart |
November Edition
We live in a world that has a plethora of opportunities for entrepreneurs. Many apps provide you with marketing tools and strategies that help to expand the business to social media and gain more customers. Meesho, an Indian-origin social commerce company, is one such platform that has been assisting small sellers across India since 2015. The name Meesho is short for ‘meri shop’ or ‘my shop’. IIT Delhi graduates Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal founded Meesho with an objective to empower homemakers in India. In the times of Amazon and Flipkart, Meesho offers an entirely new and engaging experience where it lets resellers shortlist
products and share the photographs of these with their network of consumers, be it their family or friends or people they barely know. In a very short span of time, it has managed to attract big investors like Prosus & Naspers, Sequoia Capital, RPS Ventures, Saif Partners and more. In June 2019, it became India’s first startup to receive investment from Facebook. The brand has now become India’s most trusted reseller platform, reaching 5.5 Million users from 3 Million users in the last six months. It already has 21 thousand suppliers and 2 Million resellers on its platform and targets to reach 20 Million resellers soon.
2 Meesho believes that everyone has a story worth telling - a story of struggle, a story of courage and a story of winning! Through the #MyStoreMyStory campaign, it calls out to all the first-generation women entrepreneurs to share their personal stories of triumph!
November Edition
It beautifully captures the unstated need of a woman, which is to claim what she rightfully deserves- her own identity. It celebrates the unstoppable spirit of women who will overcome all social and economic barriers with the line that captures the sentiment of 'Not just a homemaker, a Meesho Entrepreneur'.
Kickstart |
As a part of its marketing strategy, Meesho recently launched its first ever TVC in collaboration with DDB Mudra where it displays the entrepreneurial spirit of Indian women. The TVC is followed by the brand campaign #MyStoreMyStory, to highlight how Meesho has been instrumental in helping women attain financial independence. The film is based on strong cultural insights mined using DDB’s proprietary ‘emotional advantage’ thinking.
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Oh SNAP: The Impossible Choices - SHIVANI JOSHI
Marketing Faux Pas |
November Edition
We all have had our share of fun, drama, and excitement when we played games like "would you rather" at get-togethers and parties with our friends. Trickier the choices, the more fun the game would get. However, who would have thought that this fun game of giving impossible choices would cause the social media app Snapchat around a billion dollars. Yes, a billion dollars.
Back in March of 2018, Snapchat hosted an advertisement on its platform for a game called 'would you rather'. The advertisement gave its viewers the impossible choice of either slapping Rihanna or punching Chris Brown. Just a few hours after the advertisement was posted, it received a lot of criticism from its users across various social media platforms.
The reason Snapchat faced criticism for this particular advertisement was because of Rihanna's and Chris Brown's history. Back in 2009, Brown was sentenced to serve ďŹ ve years probation and 1,400 hours of community service for violently assaulting Rihanna, his then-girlfriend.
4 After her post on the rival platform, Snapchat’s shares dropped almost 5% overnight. The company immediately took down the advert, apologized stating that the advert slipped through its review process and violated guidelines.
November Edition
“Now SNAPCHAT I know you already know you ain’t my fav app out there! But I’m just trying to figure out what the point was with this mess! I’d love to call it ignorance, but I know you ain’t that dumb! You spent money to animate something that would intentionally bring shame to DV (domestic violence) victims and made a joke of it!!! This isn’t about my personal feelings, cause I don’t have much of them...but all the women, children and men that have been victims of DV in the past and especially the ones who haven’t made it out yet...you let us down! Shame on you. Throw the whole app-oligy away.” -Rihanna (Instagram)
However, the apology did not pacify the users and the audiences. Snapchat continued to face criticism for its inefficient reviewing standards and paid a price for its mistake by losing around 1 billion dollars of its market value.
This incident involving Snapchat should be a lesson for marketers to draw the much-required line between viral (click-bait) marketing and conscious marketing. They need to understand that today the target audience is much more mature and aware and would not take everything that is presented to them for its face value. The choice is up to the marketers, would they rather tread this fine line or pay the price.
Marketing Faux Pas |
Rihanna criticized the social media app for hosting an advert that appeared to make light of domestic violence and urged her Instagram followers to leave the app.
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Personalized Marketing: The next chapter in customer engagement - SAMBARTA DUTTA
Cover Story |
November Edition
Okay, let’s face it! We have all had that fleeting moment of desire to smash our devices when we opened our mailbox after getting back home and finding it filled with junk mails and promotions. But ever wondered what it would be if those ads and promos were curated just for you; to give you that warm fuzzy feeling of getting noticed. That’s where the door to personalized marketing opens. Marketing concepts have seen a major overhaul after the advent of the digital age. From simple print ads to digital ads, today’s marketer depends heavily on analytics and consumer profiling to give out a personalised experience. Curating the content for a target segment depends on demographics, psychographics, and buying pattern The ultimate goal is to lure and engage the customers
by communicating with each of them on an individual level. A January 2019 Gartner study found that 55% of surveyed marketing leaders have increased resources allocated to personalization since 2017. This indicates a gradual yet steady shift to targeting customers on an individual level to ensure maximum engagement and future retention. Any personalized marketing strategy begins with the collection and analysis of data. But dear readers, as spoken wisely by Uncle Ben, With Great Powers, comes Great Responsibilities. A large section of consumers is still uncomfortable about divulging their personal information. Nowadays predictive algorithms are smart enough to pick up any upcoming changes in consumer behaviour.
6 Internet Marketing is perhaps the most common channel to pursue when one wants to target customers on a personal level. Amazon is perhaps the go-to name that performs stellar in this domain. Dear readers, think about the “frequently bought together” and “customers who bought this item also bought” prompts in the Amazon website/app. These nuggets of suggestions don’t appear out of thin air, there’s an immense wealth of data behind them to influence the user’s mind.
November Edition
Tools of Personalized Marketing
Another form of addressing customer demands directly is via direct mails and texts. Customised e-mails also give a chance to businesses to leverage impromptu situations which may enforce customer decisions. One of the best examples of such is practised by Grubhub, a US-based food delivery app. Every time there’s a rain/blizzard forecast for a given location, it sends out a personalised automated email/notification to the customers in that area asking them to order from the comforts of their home.
Cover Story |
One weird incident on focus would be when the manager of a Target store in Minneapolis was confronted by an enraged dad who demanded why they were sending mailer containing advertisements for maternity clothing, nursery furniture, and pictures of smiling infant to her teenage daughter who was in high school. It turned out that the predictive model of Target had picked up that the man’s daughter was pregnant unbeknownst to him or his family. This fallout made sure that Target put checks and measures on the actions it takes at the business end based on such data.
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Cover Story |
November Edition
OTT platforms like Netflix and Spotify leverage the use of algorithms to showcase customised offerings to the user based on their usage history. Alex Underwood, VP and head of global strategic partnerships & verticals at Spotify, states that “Data should serve your audience, not yourself”.
Spotify uses machine learning to drive personalisation to help its audiences navigate more than 40 million songs. Apart from that, in 2017, Spotify launched Spotify Wrapped which is an advertising feature that displays a summary of what the user had listened throughout the year based on his/her usage. Spotify expanded the feature in 2019, showing users their streaming preference for an entire decade.
Social Media Marketing To Deliver Personalised Content: Personalization goes hand in hand with social media. The little details like optimizing the images and videos that go out on social media handles are just the stepping stones.
One of the most notable examples of personalization in social media campaigns comes from Cadbury. Cadbury launched two campaigns in two different countries to raise brand awareness, increase market penetration, and connect emotionally with consumers. For one campaign in Australia, they created a flavour matcher app that matched customers to 12 different flavours using their Facebook data.
In India, Cadbury launched a unique integrated social video marketing campaign to promote its luxury product Cadbury Glow, where users could interact and personalize a video by incorporating their names and pictures from their Facebook profiles and providing the phone numbers of the gift recipient. Both the campaigns were a smashing success. Product driven personalization: Even with all the digital strategies and technologies, sometimes what we crave is to feel and express our emotions to our loved ones with a tangible gift. This is where the good old fashioned marketing initiatives come into play with a twist of their own.
8 As customer expectations soar and the current technology evolves, personalized marketing is all set to take the centre stage in the field of consumer engagement for brands and companies. At the end of the day, the ball is in the customer’s court as they will be the ones driving the evolution of the marketing strategies of the future. The products from the brands will be judged under the lens of the originality of experience. When that happens will the companies be ready to match the demand? Only time will tell.
November Edition
Consumers were encouraged to find bottles with names that had personal meaning to them and tweet about their experience using #ShareaCoke. The same campaign was launched in India in 2018 with names of some common relationships to give it the desi flavour. The success story was repeated. The addition of 12 local languages also opened up a whole new dimension to catch the attention span of young consumers. It was a pure call-to-action advertisement which paid off handsomely for Coca-Cola.
Dear readers, by now you must have a fair idea of the power of personalized marketing. However, it is not always an easy task to determine what the customers are seeking at the moment. To deploy a personalized marketing strategy one must follow a basic set framework, namely – Identification of the customer segment, differentiating the customers based on demographics, psychographic, economic, and behavioural factors.
Cover Story |
The most classical example of this is the ‘Share a Coke’ campaign by Coca-Cola. In 2012, Coca-Cola launched this campaign in Australia where its iconic brand name on the bottle was replaced with some popular names.
9
Bingo:
#ChillWithBingo - SURATH BANERJEE
Hallmark Campaign |
November Edition
Bingo is known for its funny, creative, and youth-centered ads. Similar is the case with Bingo’s campaigns. Famous for their previous campaigns like #StartWithStarters and “Come on India”, Bingo decided to use the lockdown snacking enjoyment to engage with customers and encourage them to share their happiness and emotions related to Bingo. The latest ad about their campaign features the famous “Jeetu Bhaiya” from the web series “Kota Factory” who plays the role of the son and the role of the father is played by Manurishi Chadhha. It also features a cool dog. The scene starts with the chilled out dog sleeping on the pillow and the dad making himself as comfortable as possible in a Bingo bean bag.
The son arrives and demands that the dad vacate it immediately as the bag is a prize he won for chilling with Bingo. The dad gets irritated at the moment and a voice hovers over saying “Uncle! you can even win a recliner if you take part in this campaign!”. The campaign Bingo started this time is a contest where fans can click their selfie with a Bingo product and post it on Instagram with the hashtag #ChillWithBingo. The best clicks would be featured and the winners will get a chance to win a bean bag or a recliner as a prize. The campaign puts emphasis on keywords like ‘chill’ and prizes like recliners and bean bags resonates best with the word. With people being bored during the lockdown, the chance to win a recliner, does wonders for the brand.
10 Secondly, with the onset of highquality camera phones, people who love taking selfies and food selfies win a special place in this category. Bingo’s campaign would encourage people to do the same and hence latency will be avoided.
The campaign attracted and generated lots of offline and online engagement in unique ways. People also shared the gifts they received and overall it was a great success in terms of engagement and brand positioning.
November Edition
Firstly, this year people have mostly been at home and snacking has become their favorite pastime. This campaign uses the aspect creatively and efficiently.
Thirdly, the aspect of competition involved in the campaign would encourage people to spend more time with Bingo and this would add to their brand image and position.
Hallmark Campaign |
From a marketing perspective, many factors in this ad add to engagement and sales.
11
Dunzo:
Revolutionizing Deliveries in India - SUMIRAN NARAYAN We’re loving how Dunzo, a hyper-local on-demand delivery service is making India Lazy!
Brand Markive |
November Edition
Online delivery services have brought about more leisure in our lives. We no longer have the trouble of leaving our homes to buy something or have our favorite food. Thanks to technology, it all comes straight to us at the comfort of our homes. And with this “New normal” it is the need of the hour, isn’t it? It is amazing how a Bangalorebased start-up Dunzo, founded in 2014 is the talk of the Nation. Dunzo is an all-in-one, prompt 24*7 delivery channel focusing on getting things done as quickly as possible and that is its tagline- “Save the excuses and time. The better way to get things done, just Dunzo it!” says. So, how did Dunzo Start? The founder of Dunzo, Kabeer Biswas, is an alumnus of the University of Mumbai.
He completed his management studies at the Narsee Monjee Institute of management. The co-founders of Dunzo are Ankur Agarwal, Dalvir Suri, and Mulund Jha. Kabeer is also the founder of Hoppr, a company which he later sold to Hike Messenger. After Hoppr was acquired by Hike, Kabeer came to Bangalore, and since he had a lot of time to spend so he wandered around the city for several months, looking for something interesting to do. He started ideating a service that would work as a to-do list, which would complete tasks on its own. This is when Dunzo was born, it was started as a mere WhatsApp group where delivery services could be addressed and carried out. Initially, Biswas would complete these tasks on his own. People were satisfied with this assistance and started talking to their friends and family about it.
12 Like every other startup, Dunzo also faced many challenges since its inception. Dunzo later stopped a few of their services such as home duties, secretarial chores, and tasks that involved the government. They started focusing on the food and delivery sector which had more competitors, but Dunzo was ready to take it all! Major competitors of Dunzo are Swiggy Go, Jhutpat ,and Meratask in Delhi, and Jugnoo in Chandigarh. Dunzo has won massive fan bases in the cities it presently operates in. The company has literally made the lives of people easy and convenient. So, India stay Lazy, Just Dunzo it!
November Edition
In 2015, within a year of the commencement of business, Dunzo had been working on more than 70 orders per day. Now, it is a full-time online app-based service that aims at fulfilling services asked for in under shortest time possible. In the tech-savvy world, Dunzo connects us with riders who are nearest to us, thus saving our time and effort of stepping out in search of things and visiting multiple stores. Dunzo is almost like our Siri or Alexa who runs errands for us. A crucial problem for Dunzo at that time was to find funds for carrying on with the business. They approached many firms in the country but were unable to raise capital from most of them. In March 2016 Dunzo raised 650,000 dollars. They conducted another funding round in December 2017 in which Google directly 12 million dollars invested in the company along with the existing investors
It was the first time that an Indian business received funding from Google. After Google invested in the company, they were able to tap a broader market population, and it paved the way to generate more revenue. The latest funding for Dunzo was in August 2019, 34.56 crore rupees from Alteria Capital.
Brand Markive|
The orders he catered to, included something as simple as getting a cold drink from a nearby shop or getting a home appliance repaired. His friends helped him to spread the word so that more people were attracted to this program. Soon more orders started coming in, and Kabeer could not finish them off all by himself. He started hiring part-time employees and volunteers to carry out the tasks. Later Kabeer and his friends enhanced the idea into an app-based business that focused on locals.
13 7
King to the Rescue of the Clown - ARKO GHOSH
More than Marketing |
November Edition
The current market scenario makes one think of the famous quote from the TV series Game of Thrones – “When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground." The competition is so cutthroat that it is a struggle for companies to constantly perform well in the market.
With all the uncertainty and unpredictability this year has brought with it, there is no room for complacency or any slip-ups that might have been deemed "normal" in any other scenario. Having said that, Burger King did something unusual yet special that took everyone by surprise. Let us give you a small backstory. It is no surprise that every company is struggling to survive, let alone churn out profits in the midst of a pandemic. Be it a start-up or a huge corporation, no one is spared from the brunt of the Coronavirus.
McDonald's was one such company facing a difficult time with very low sales leading to a situation where they were considering shutting down their services. They had exhausted all their options and it was just a company running into loss with every passing day. Then the unimaginable happened. Burger King - arguably the biggest competitor McDonald's has had over recent years, came out with a post asking people to buy from McDonald's.
14 November Edition
From saying something as savage as - "Why eat with a clown, when you can dine with the king" to say something as endearing as "Buy from McDonald's", brands have come a long way and we're seeing more sides in this ďŹ eld than we had ever imagined. At the end of the day, isn't it more than just marketing.
More than Marketing |
Despite all the rivalry and below the belt shots they've ďŹ red at each other, this stood out as one of the most wholesome instance ever witnessed between brands. It is hard to fathom that these are the brands who literally give each other no room for error, pushing each other to be on the top of their game all the time.
15
Amit Agarwal:
The Man Behind Amazon India -SAMBHAV MEHTA
Pioneer |
November Edition
Amit Agarwal, currently serving as the Senior Vice President and Country Manager of Amazon India, recently completed 21 years with Amazon. Being a graduate from IIT Kanpur and Stanford, he joined Amazon as a software developer in 1999. Now, why did Amit Agarwal become a very important pioneer for Amazon? One of the main reasons can be that not only did he contributed towards the vision and goal of Amazon but also, he is considered the man behind Amazon’s success as an e-commerce giant in India. In 1999, when Amit Agarwal joined Amazon, it was only publishing books. He also became the youngest member in the senior leadership team of chief executive officer and president Jeff Bezos. In 2007, Amit Agarwal also served as Jeff Bezos’ technical advisor which was a very enriching experience for him.
In 2004, Amit Agarwal moved to India to look over the expansion of Amazon in India. Amit has a crystal-clear vision, strong determination, and drive which helps him in his passion for improving customer lives and contributing towards the economic wheel of the country. He still feels as this is his day one of joining as he mentioned in his recent tweet overwhelmed by the story box given to him by Amazon on his completion of twenty-one years in the company. In his interview with YourStory, Amit mentioned that his focus will be to increase consumer satisfaction, lower the prices, and ensure reliability with fast delivery. Amit is of the view that though there will always be some disruptions by technology and there will always be some sector which will not embrace the introduction of technology in their business, India has a very large
16 • • •
Consumers all over the world are the same in some aspects. Amazon has helped to build brands for local manufacturers and sellers. How greatly aligned is customer experience with the economic growth of the country.
It comes as a surprise when one gets to know that Amit Agarwal aspired to become a primary school teacher and start his own school.
Apart from his dedication to work, Mr. Agarwal also loves to play electric guitar and listening to music. He was a vocalist in a rock band known as Also-Rhythms during his post-graduation days at Stanford. He is also a die-hard fan of Kishore Kumar and Jerry Seinfeld. He also entertains friends and family with his amazing talent of imitating Amitabh Bachchan at parties. Under Agarwal, Amazon launched initiatives such as Chai Cart, deploying three-wheeled mobile carts to navigate a city, serve tea, water, and lemon juice while teaching them about selling online thereby, beginning project Udaan.
November Edition
During his tenure in Amazon, his three learnings are:
However, Mr. Agarwal accidentally landed up in the internet business. Amit has always been an integral part of almost every single bet made by the retailer that spans Amazon’s core marketplace business, Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Pioneer |
entrepreneurial base that is willing to adapt to such changes in technology and supply their products digitally by becoming digital entrepreneurs. Amit Agarwal inspires the youth of the country and especially the students from IIT as he is from there and has attained such success in his life.
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HP India’s Diwali Ad resurfaces as #GoLocal - MADHULIKA PATOLE
It’s All About Ad-itude|
November Edition
As soon as Diwali is around the corner, the internet gets flooded with all the brands releasing their amazing Diwali themed campaigns, trying their best to grab the audience’s attention.
narrates a heartfelt story about a woman who is selling diyas by the roadside and the genuine efforts of a small boy who helps her to sell off all her diyas by advertising her products.
However, this time around along with all the new campaigns there was this one Ad that was published in the near past, resurfaced online, and went viral. Yes, it was HP India’s #TuJashnBan Kisi ki Zindagi ka rebranded as #GoLocal. The ad resurfaced online as it fits perfectly with the “Vocal for Local” and hence has been titled as #GoLocal. The idea behind this ad was to encourage people to buy local products from local vendors instead of buying branded goods. Kudos to HP India for coming up with this campaign way ahead of the Vocal for Local movement. The ad is a definite tear-jerker as it
It starts with a scene where a young boy along with his mother is passing by a woman selling diyas by the roadside. The mother refuses to buy the diyas but the boy returns and buys a few diyas from her. When he wishes her Happy Diwali, the woman replies that it would be Happy Diwali for her only if all her diyas are sold off.
18 The boy then uses his HP printer to print posters with the woman’s photo with a message stating ‘Amma ki Diwali happy banao’, encouraging people to buy diyas from her and pastes them in the neighborhood. People notice these posters and start buying diyas from her stall and eventually, all her diyas get sold, brightening up her Diwali.
Recently we also saw the support that Baba ka Dhaba received as a part of vocal for local movement. Both, the Ad and the Baba ka Dhaba examples have shown us the value of choosing local. By showing small acts of kindness can go a long way in creating a positive impact on someone’s life. By #goinglocal we can spark happiness in the lives of our local vendors. So next time you go shopping for diyas, lanterns or decor, do buy from the street vendors and make a difference. Brand:Hewlett-Packard(HP)
India
Campaign:#TuJashnBan
#GoLocal Agency: Autumn Worldwide
November Edition
“Iss chaka chaund, iss dhakka mukki mein shayad tum lena bhul gaye Yeh kacchi miiti ke pakke diye tum sath le jana bhul gae”
The brand does a wonderful job of striking a chord with the customers by building an emotional connection.
It’s All About Ad-itude |
As the story unfolds there is a beautiful narrative that goes on in the background…
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Cadbury:
Khaas campaign of a Khaas brand - SNEHA PATEL
Ad-Tales|
November Edition
The iconic Kuch Khaas hai ad by Cadbury from the 90’s always features in the top ten ads of that era in the list of any marketing enthusiast The’ Asli Swaad Zindagi ka’ campaign was a game-changer for Cadbury and helped the brand change its perception in the minds of the consumers. The ad showcases a girl eating Cadbury Dairy Milk and simultaneously praying that her cricketer boyfriend scores a century. When the moment arrives, with sheer abandon, she does the wonderfully awkward dance while barging into the cricket field to celebrate the joyous moment with her boyfriend. The visuals of the ad are so enthralling, the lyrics so soothing and the tune so melodious
that they formed the perfect trio and resulted in an advertisement which saw the pinnacle of success. This advertisement, brainchild of the legendary adman Mr. Piyush Pandey, and conceptualised by Ogilvy and Mather, was released during a time when India was witnessing a lot of changes like liberalization, communal tensions, and the rising popularity of cable TV. This ad or rather the entire ‘Asli Swaad Zindagi ka’ campaign broke the notion that chocolates are for children. Chocolate was thought of as a treat that only the kids consumed and was not an item that the adults would enjoy. Cadbury realized that the target market was limited and was getting stagnant day by day.
20 Cadbury targeted the child which is hidden inside every adult. The series of ad campaigns showcased people being carefree and childlike. They were getting excited over small, seemingly routine things. These a minute long ads showed adults of different age groups just being goofy and joyous. The campaign introduced the idea of eating a Cadbury Dairy Milk to celebrate the joyous moments of life, thus began the long association of connecting the brand with happiness. The ad also played a crucial role in changing the language narrative in Indian advertising. The ads of the 1980s and 1990s had an ‘anglicised’
Ad-Tales|
It wanted to shed that image and expand its target base and did a wonderful job in doing so.
The ad campaign has a timeless element to it and has been evidently popular. The success of the campaign can be measured from the fact that the core theme of finding happiness in small things is still used in the marketing campaigns by the company. It is said that chocolate is a mood enhancer and Cadbury evidently emphasizes this. The ad is nostalgic and has tugged the hearts of millions of Indians and inspires us to strive for the ‘khaas’ moments of life.
November Edition
tone to it, however, the Cadbury ad was in Hindi. Chocolate was considered a western product during those times in India, with this ad, Cadbury broke that barrier as well by conceptualizing their entire campaign in Hindi so that it could resonate with the masses.
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The Fear Factor in Advertising -ATHARVA SINDEKAR
Mark-5 |
November Edition
Fear is a survival instinct! According to a study conducted by Anjala Selena Krishen and My Bui, who work in the department of marketing at Loyola Marymount University in California, fear-based advertising can affect consumer buying behavior positively. But what is fear-based advertising? It is a communication strategy that companies have been adopting by using a persuasive message that emphasizes the potential dangers and harm that will befall individuals (in this case, the audience) if they do not adopt the messages' [or adverts] or recommendations. Here are a few TVCs that are feeding on consumers’ COVID-19 fear!
1. Nerolac Excel Virus Guard Nerolac Paints, the upbeat jingle that everyone remembers fondly of, released this TVC last month to make the most of the current COVID-19 scenario. Claiming to be India’s First Antiviral Interior Paint with Japanese Shiquy Technology, it reduces germs, viruses & bacteria by 99.9%.
In the TVC, we can see how Angira Dhar (the smarter one) warns Ranveer Singh (as naïve as an Indian consumer) about how walls are vulnerable to viruses and germs.
2. CenturyPly ViroKill Hygiene is the numero uno priority these days. Be it your office desks or your home furniture. This TVC comes with a generic tagline: ‘Raho Befikar’. A soon-to-be concerned mother is shown worrying about her unborn child when her husband consoles her with this new plywood! Claiming that the new ply comes with a revolutionary treatment and it contains highly activated nanoparticles to rupture and kill 99.99% of germs and viruses. Isn’t this too deep of research for a ply company? Anything for the business they say!
22 3. Colgate Vedshakti 'Mouth Protect Spray’
This product is manufactured in tandem with CenturyPly ViroKill laminates and ply.
Colgate has been a market leader for a very long time in oral care and hygiene. This October, it has come up with a mouth protection spray to reduce the germ build-up in the mouth. In my opinion, any product that has the word ‘Ayurvedic’ associated with it, sells well in the Indian market. The Father-Daughter duo reflects the genuine care that we all feel about our loved ones when they step outdoors.
5. Philips System
UV-C
Disinfection
We all are tempted to sanitize our daily objects like phones, wallets using hand sanitizer. Using sanitizer for cleaning your hands is reasonable but sanitizing your daily objects with it seems risky.
4. Greenlam Antivirus Surfaces There are multiple TVCs made for this product but what caught my eye was the ‘Greenlam Hostel’ Ad. With the tagline, ‘Har surface safe‘ it promises to kill viruses and bacteria.
This new disinfection system uses UV lights to deep clean and sanitizes everything from food to handbags, currency notes, mobile phones, etc.
Mark-5 |
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An Amalgamation of Mass & Prestige: Masstige Marketing
- SANCHITA KHATTAR Did you know there’s a thin line between brands for the masses & brands for the classes? This sweet spot has been covered by Masstige brands.
Special Story |
November Edition
Niche marketing which focuses on the classes targets a very narrow segment of the audience & aims at super luxurious brands such as Gucci, Hermes, Ferrari, etc. Mass marketing focuses on selling products to the masses & targets conventional products such as Coca-Cola, big bazaar, Nivea, etc. But the line where scale meets profitability is labeled as Masstige. Targeting the masses & also creating a sense of prestige in their minds is what successful Masstige marketing is all about. Brands that have adopted the Masstige marketing model include Forest Essentials, Victoria’s Secret, Zara, etc.
Mass
The Masstige marketing theory is based on the idea that other elements of the marketing mix, i.e. product, promotion & place if are appropriately set, a premium price can be charged for your brand. Masstige brands concentrate on innovation & promotional strategies adopted by premium brands & create symbolic benefits. One major breakthrough in this marketing theory was brand equity. It is the value of the product that has been derived from the consumer’s perception of that brand rather than the product itself. Masstige brands are able to charge premium prices because of their strong & positive brand equity. The factor that differentiates these brands from the other two extremes of the spectrum is that they offer luxury & prestige at reasonably premium pricing.
Prestige
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With the aim to ďŹ ll the gap between mid-market & super-luxury, masstige brands command a price above conventional goods but way below super luxury goods. This is what makes them premium, attainable & accessible by the masses. With the rising per capita income of the working class, increasing standards of living & growing brand awareness the world is now ready to wake up to a new market- Masstige.
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A similar promotional strategy is followed by Forest Essentials. A great store ambiance combined with high quality, ayurvedic elements & premium pricing has helped the brand establish itself in the masstige category. These brands follow a zero advertising policy as they believe in using those revenues in opening up new stores.
The Masstige strategy is also followed by luxury brands. One of the ways of entering the Masstige market for them is to trade-down their prices. The challenge here is to maintain brand exclusivity. To solve this, brands can introduce various product lines that do not interfere with the brand’s core products. This balance between exclusivity & Masstige has been successfully struck by Ferrari. While Ferrari cars remain very expensive, exclusive & maintain its niche image, the brand has extended its product line into various categories such as apparel, toys, caps, etc.
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Zara, for instance, focuses on the idea of selling sophisticated tastes & styles to the masses by imitating the designs of luxury brands & designer houses.
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Content Marketing:
Good content matters but now with Context -DEEPESH JAIN Let us understand content marketing with the help of a common example:
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Flyer 1
Flyer 2
Suppose you are handed out these two posters on any random day, which one is more likely to attract you to buy the shoes? Almost everyone will have the same answer: “Flyer 1”. This is exactly what Content Marketing is. The end goal of Content marketing is to generate profits either directly or indirectly. It can be either in the form of direct sales, increased footfall, or in the form of increased customer base, word publicity etc. Why Content Marketing? Any marketing campaign is irrelevant to the audience if there is an overflow of information. Here, content marketing plays a crucial role which helps in retaining the customer’s interest & curiosity to influence buying decisions.
As it is rightly said, “Every kingdom needs its king and in the kingdom of Content, Context is the king.”
According to a report by SDL, Context is said to be an untapped portal of opportunities to learn an understanding of consumer’s behavior need and anticipate the expectations of the market which helps to strengthen future strategies. In any marketing campaign, content and its context has been the most important factor for its success as the content makes the customer interested and curious about the campaign. On the other hand, context plays the role of connecting people emotionally and also to the aspects of reality. Why Context in Content? The importance of context could be understood by the blunder made by Levi’s even after having great content they couldn’t get the context quite right.
26 On the other hand, another company i.e. Samsung India completely nailed the marketing strategy just with the help of great content with greater context which resulted in both direct and indirect profits to Samsung. Samsung Television had run a campaign in 2017 with a music backgrounēṅd of ‘Beh Chala’. In this campaign, a blind girl calls up a serviceman to repair the tv and requests him to come a bit earlier than the scheduled time and the service person makes sure that it is followed no matter how difficult it was.
Even though the service aspect was not shown in the ad, yet people could connect with it. This is the power of the right content and right context which combined and became the exact information people needed about the services provided by Samsung. Both campaigns had amazing content along with social messages, yet Levi’s Campaign failed and on the other hand, Samsung’s Campaign skyrocketed its sale, reputation, etc. in that year solely because of one reason i.e. “The Context” In the world of marketing, it can be said that Content is the most powerful kingdom today with context on the throne. And to rule the real world, a company must rule the world of marketing which can only be done by controlling the most powerful kingdom and king that are Content & Context.
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This ad campaign was so successful in India only because of its content and the context in it. It not only showed the commitment of Samsung towards its customers but also depicted the respect it has for them.
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Levi's created a campaign to sell its jeans under the tagline, “Hotness comes in all shapes and sizes”, this content indeed was an amazing idea but it didn’t go well with the model representing three jeans that all were alike with a skinny physique which completely altered the meaning of the message.
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Risky Marketing Campaigns That Paid Off
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- AMIT PANT If someone introduced something to you saying it smells like a primary sexual organ, for many of us it would be an instant turn off. Yet in the mind of Hollywood star and entrepreneur, Gwyneth Paltrow, she had just scratched the surface of this gold mine. In January 2020, her company ‘Goop’, introduced a candle called ‘This smells like my vagina’. This as expected, got a lot of mockeries. Yet this isn't the first time that she introduced something controversial. Her company has often dabbled in pseudoscience to develop its products. From ‘Vaginal Jade Eggs’ to ‘Vaginal Steaming’, this candle is in the range of sexually themed products. Shock & Awe: The vaginal candle that smells like MONEY
‘This smells like my vagina’ candle – Goop
Doctors have repeatedly criticized the company in the past for making false health claims about its products and spreading general medical misinformation. In 2018, Goop was fined US$ 145,000 under California’s civil penalties laws for making “unsubstantiated” marketing claims about the aforementioned jade egg. Moreover, the candle is steeply-priced at $75 for 300 grams.
When all of this information is present to the general public, this seems like a steep mountain of information for a consumer to ignore and buy the product. Yet the candle was a super hit, instantly sold out on the website. For days it wasn’t available and whenever it was, the candle was sold out within minutes. It was resold on eBay for around $250. It was officially viral. What retained the users was the insights she provided on her life. Goop was incorporated in 2011. The products that the brand sold were and still are expensive. But the products no longer were just products, they were a lifestyle choice and an entry into the life of a Hollywood star. Goop is based on the breaking of taboos. On their website, it says “We go in first,
28 With all of this work in the background, the product was named “This smells like my vagina”. When a product is named like that, it is bound to turn many necks on impulse. Every news outlet in the west covered the story, expressing a serious doubt in the product. Numerous reaction videos on YouTube picked up a similar tone. This was pretty infamous in the ‘meme world’ too. The market was skeptical. But even bad publicity is publicity. This name was so different that one could not ignore it. The online reach was organic and self-propelled. The outer packaging is flowery and feminine. The actual product is very nonchalant and the font is straight to the point. The vibe of the product feels like it is made for the person who embraces their body and doesn't care about others. To be honest, if the sticker is removed, it is indistinguishable from the other candles in the market.
If you look at the trends, they created a candle market of their own. While many people have said ill about Goop, it did not matter as it has been building a community of like-minded individuals since 2008. The controversy brought more people to the website and they just bought the candle to see what it is about. Even if people did not buy it, it had brought them to the landing page where there are numerous other products inspired by the lifestyle of Gwyneth Paltrow.
Americans searching about candles; Goop candle in Jan 2020
And if you are wondering about the smell of this candle. Well, it does not smell like a vagina. This candle is made with geranium, citrus bergamot, and cedar absolutes juxtaposed with Damask rose and ambrette seed. Next in line is the candle “This just smells like my prenup” among the host of other products. Goop is worth a quarter of a billion dollars now. So, the next time if the customers don’t listen to you; shock and awe them.
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Americans interested in the Goop’s Candle
That hype around the sticker is doing wonders.
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This makes the brand seem like an organization that is trying new and innovative experiments that could take society forward. All of this resonated well with the progressive, feminine, millennial, and western crowd. Goop consumers are also forgiving if the product doesn't work out since all of its products are organic and fair-trade themed.
CALL FOR ARTICLES DECEMBER 2020 EDITION The Marksman provides one and all the opportunity to discover their hidden talents in the literary field through our “Call for Articles”. For the upcoming month, the articles can be sent on any of the following topics: ● ● ●
Conversational Marketing: Changing the Way Customers Buy Voice Marketing: Cashing Voice Searches of People Lessons From the Pandemic: Innovative Ways of Livelihood
Please ensure that there is no plagiarism and all the references are clearly mentioned. Kindly follow the guidelines given below: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
One article can have only one author. Your article should be approximately 800 – 850 (strictly adhere to the word limit). The article must have relevant pictures that can be used to enhance the article. Send in your articles in .doc/.docx format to marksman.simsr@somaiya.edu Subject Line: Your Name_Institute Name_Course Year. Kindly name your file as: Your Name_ Topic.
The best adjudged article will be given a Winner’s certificate. The First Prize Winners will be awarded Rs. 500 Cash Prize. Deadline For Submission Of Article: 22nd December 2020
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