Advertising Opinions

I occasionally contribute to this blog but have been absent for some time now. You see multi-tasking is the buzz word today but I am hopeless at multi-tasking; for me it has always been one job at a time. I sort of get stressed when I have to do too many things at a time. Recently therefore when my co-blogger  and brother Aroop Bose told me that it is time I made a contribution I thought, “Goodness me! I already have my own food blog -- It is tasty ma! and I am also working on a film blog which I plan to launch shortly and not to mention my household chores” …. Even as these thoughts crossed my mind my eyes fell on the Bournville press ad. Though the first Cadbury Bournville commercial attracted my attention I found it a bit bizarre. I however like the current one, a novel way of emphasizing on quality and the press ad is an excellent support for the TV commercial. Usually in any ad it is the tagline which attract...

The Tata Sky advertising campaign which is currently running is one of my favourites. It is a three ad campaign on TV supported by outdoor; these ads have the ability to grab attention, arouse curiosity, engage the viewer by entertaining and convey the advertising message very effectively. The target consumer is the one who has a limited household budget, is a simple person and slightly hesitant to go in for DTH because he perceives it to be unaffordable; this campaign tries to correct this perception. The ads are in two parts, in the first part the characters make strange requests in the most difficult situations and are able to get what they want; the moral of the story being-- Do not hesitate to ask because you never know that you could be in for a pleasant surprise. In the second part the actual advertising message that Tata Sky has affordable options is conveyed very effectively. The first part of the ads is quite dramatic and entertaining and also arouses ...

Online shopping in India is growing steadily after a slow start however there are many who are suspicious about buying anything online, some are not comfortable with concept.  The current three-ad campaign of Flipkart.com deals with three fears people have which makes them resistant to online shopping,  these being: (1)  What if I receive faulty products? (2) Will I get the original product with original warranty? (3) I am not comfortable using credit card for online shopping because of frauds? Flipkart.com tries to allay these fears through their current ad campaign on television. Online shopping is a fairly new concept however ordering things by mail has been around for decades long before the age of the internet; even then the same three fears existed in the minds of consumers which prevented them from ordering by mail. The fears are not baseless, after all people do get cheated when ordering online and same was the case in the past wh...

Wow! they really think up new ideas to get noticed. The latest Volkswagen ad which was a four-page special silvery insert or should I say a pull-out with The Times of India dated August 29, 2011 was to my mind an interesting and innovative advertisement. Some say it was gimmicky but nevertheless the ad got noticed, so it served its purpose. What do you do when there is no significant difference in brands, in this case cars? In such a case the ad agency thinks of some great creative idea which can get the ad noticed and remembered, or a celebrity is used, or expenditure on advertising is increased if the client can afford it. In the case this press ad innovation was made in the medium of advertising itself. The ad was for Volkswagen Jetta and the cover looked like a regular copy of The Times Of India except that it had a silvery metallic look. I guess it had three layers - paper, foil and plastic film; the printing I think was done in the reverse on the plastic film against the foil. Th...

While watching Ke Hobe Banglar Kotipoti or Kaun Banega Crorepati in Bengali hosted by Sourav Ganguly I came across an ad in Bengali for a biscuit brand called Googly. I do not wish to comment on this ad but I would like to share it. As it appears Googly is local brand in West Bengal or perhaps in Eastern India (I really don't know) which might not be known in other parts of India; I did not know about it until I saw the ad. There is nothing in the ad to make it memorable, yet I found it quite interesting. The ad uses 3-D animation and the main character is quite obviously a cartoon version of cricketer Sourav Ganguly. Whether Sourav Ganguly's consent was taken for this ad I do not know but the advertisers did a clever thing by showing the ad in the TV programme hosted by Sourav Ganguly himself. Watch the ad below:      

Barbie -- Receptionist to Katrina Kaif From an ordinary receptionist to film star Katrina Kaif, Barbie doll in India has come a long way. Receptionist to film star? That calls for some explanation. Way back in 1987 Leo Toys tied up with Mattel Inc. As result of this tie-up the company Leo Mattel introduced several popular international brands in India—the Barbie doll was one of them. Barbie doll's first ever commercial While Barbie doll was launched way back in 1959 in U.S.A., for Indian children of the early nineties Barbie was a fairly unknown brand. The company and its agency Advertising Avenues set about introducing the brand in India. After the usual set of ads the agency hit upon the idea of featuring a live Barbie along with the doll in a television commercial. The Creative Director, Advertising Avenues told me that after a fruitless search for a tall, slim girl their eyes fell on their receptionist who happened to be tall – if memory se...

Recent Times The name Frooti has become generic to the category of fruit drinks in Tetra Brik packs to some extent. A colleague of mine had once shared with me an interesting anecdote; for some reason he had happened to ask a friend of his whether he had ever heard of Jumpin, the reply he got was, “Oh Jumpin Mango Frooti, of course I have heard of it!” That was years ago, a few days ago someone visited this blog while searching for ‘Jumpin Frooti’. This shows how strong Frooti has become in the category of fruit drinks in Tetra Brik packs. Jumpin’s performance improved to a great extent in the late 1990s thanks to improved distribution on one hand and more focused advertising on the other, while Frooti was miles ahead Jumpin was slowly and steadily gaining ground. Unfortunately Godrej decided to make some changes in Jumpin’s distribution policy, as a result of which the brand lost most of its market share. Today Godrej Jumpin has only a token presence in the mar...