While watching a reality show / sporting event / award function or any other media event, ever wondered who is actually entertaining you with those freely aired programs without being charged a penny?
No, not the small-screen Producers; it’s the corporate world out there, hungry to promote their offerings to their target customers, involved in sponsoring various events and funding every hour’s entertainment menu through their advertising revenue stream.
You can say the whole lot of media industry is thriving on this very concept – be it a print, broadcasting any other media form. What’s more? If a tournament of World Cup’s stature is being organized in the cricket-crazy country like India, the advertisers are expected to make a beeline to promote their products extensively on the global platform.
Needless to say, with India reclaiming the world champion’s title, the positive vibes and the incremental ad revenue flow has spilled over onto IPL’s swashbuckling T20 tournament as well. With recent launch of 3G services by the telcos, now-a-days we are frequently bombarded with 3G ads.
Contents
Idea – Not so good though!
The latest 3G ad features two of the Abhishek Bachchan avatars – 1G and 2G – waiting for the bus to watch an IPL match, but in vain. Immediately, the model’s 3G avatar arrives with the next generation technology and shows them the match on mobile internet.
I am left wondering whether this is the best of the ideas! Gone are the days when Idea ads used to be creative. Some of the Idea’s good marketing taglines and brand communication strategies created sensations like,
“An Idea can change your life”, “Walk when you talk” and “No Idea? Get idea”.
ZooZoos – Aliens living past expiry date!
Regarding popularity of Vodafone’s ZooZoo ads – What should I say: ‘Good’ about it or ‘Truth’ about it? Well, good things first – these aliens are quite popular amongst viewers of almost all age-groups for their cuteness. But, a fact remains that they’re an out-dated concept now.
Not even Big B’s Kaun Banega Crorepati notch favorable ratings after two edition stints. This was evident from limited episodes in subsequent editions of the quiz show hosted by a national icon. Similarly, Vodafone also need to call quits from its ZooZoo strategy; just like they did away with their Vodafone pug’s following.
Now, coming to Vodafone’s ZooZoo, rather JoJo, advertisements; JoJo – the cartoon creature mimicking Rajnikanth, tries to spread the message that once you access Vodafone 3G, you’re nothing short of a Superman, oops! Rajnikanth, and the ads are too predictable.
Already they’re resembling most of the Rajni jokes in their concept, like running faster than a bullet, splitting a ball and hitting two targets with a single ball, making the earth to spin, etc. All these ideas are already available online on searching for ‘Rajnikanth jokes’.
Dairy Milk – Something meetha about it!
Even Cadbury’s Dairy Milk has run through various TV ad campaigns from time to time. However, its latest commercial which depicts Dairy Milk chocolates as compensating for all those dicey vegetables (such as bottle gourd and bitter gourd) which invariably show up at dinner, is aimed to positioning the brand as a wonderful dessert in households that are too health conscious in terms of nutritional value of the food.
Havells – Fanning simple thoughts!
Ever watched Sprite or Mentos Ads – Aren’t they like dimaag ki batti gul ads? They’re a bit too complicated for everybody to understand at the very first screening of the ad itself. In fact, here we’ve a simple and single-minded commercial which connects with the consumers with its straightforward communication to use Havell’s fans.
In a series of commercials, Havell’s have portrayed different situations where the protagonist uses whatever they find to fan themselves out of the hot weather conditions. This act is immediately followed by protests saying a lot of efforts have gone in creating the object that is being used as a make-shift fan by the protagonist.
The Ad campaign ends with a tag-line: “Hawa Chahiye? Havells fan Lagaiye!”
So, what do you think which is the most creative advertisement recently released in India ?