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Foreword Hrm practices play very important role in managing any type of business. Yes, practices do differ form sector to sector company to company but the basic idea of managing the staff , recruitment and selection procedures are mostly the same. In this project we have considered hrm practices in retail sector. Retail sector in India is now growing aggressively and want for professionals in this sector has also increased. Competition has made a lot of difference in this sector , To match with the competition Excel Hr practices are important.
Human resource management in retail sector its importance at present is what tempted us to select this topic from the wide range of topics provided to us by our Professor. We are very much thankful to our professor to include this topic in the topics given for the project.. In this project we have unleashed,H. r practices in Retail sector. With a view to its development in India. The process of gathering information and studying the topic was more than interesting. The project is undertaken by a group four students viz. Shoaib Salmani, Khan Waseem, Khan Zubair, Sarang Shaibaan, Sonu Virani and Koor Furkan belonging to T.
Y. B. M. S. /B. presented to our Esteemed Prof. Mr. Mehtab Ahmed. We put our best foot forward in-order to make this project a very interesting one. The systematic flow of information and the comprehensiveness of the topics are our selling points to demand maximum marks. We thank each other for pure team playing and perfect co-ordination and our Prof. for giving us such important topics to study which focus on the current issues. This helps us to be in touch with the actual world out of the Syllabus and text-books. Sr. No. | Chapter| Pg. no. | 1| Introduction| 3| 2| Advertising| 7| | History| 9| 4| Types of Advertising| 16| 5| Recent trends in Advertising| 25| 6| EmoteVertising| 29| 7| Case in Point| 34| 8| Conclusion| 54| | Bibliography| 56| INDEX I Introduction Across time, we have been witness to big changes in advertising, from merely communicating a product or service, to highly sophisticated multi-dimensional and multi-channel strategies, and always with the same goal. Across time, we have seen a huge evolution of techniques and trends, products, strategies, media… The authentic “next big thing” comes with the advent of the Internet.
Advertising is a very powerful business. All by itself, advertising powers large industries such as television or print media, huge empires with thousands of employees and billions of dollars in revenues which constantly feed their tummies with money coming from the advertisers. Across time, we have been witness to big changes in advertising, from merely communicating a product or service, to highly sophisticated multidimensional and multi-channel strategies, and always with the same goal: to induce someone to buy or use that product or service.
To achieve their goal, advertisers use different types of weapons with very different characteristics, ranging from pure carpet-bombing that guarantees the coverage of a large area, to highly precise snipers that allow them to hit a specific target right between the eyes and in the perfect moment to do so. Across time, we have seen a huge evolution of those weapons, new techniques and trends, new products, new strategies, new media… However, as in many other industries, the really big change, the authentic “next big thing” comes with the advent of the Internet.
And believe it or not, even though the Internet has been among us for quite a significant number of years, the change is yet to come. Let’s review some of the changes that will, in the coming years, turn the world of advertising completely upside down… The first and fundamental change is related to the so-called “interruption marketing”, and it could be well expressed as “don’t get between my content and me”. Think about it: for a number of years, the media industry has been able to run their business with a very clear and straightforward model – if you want to put your hands n my content, you will have to accept my conditions. And those conditions are: either you pay for it, or you will accept interruptions. Those interruptions will come any time, in any form or shape, and we will charge advertisers depending on the number of eyeballs that we are able to ??? theoretically ??? put in front of your ad. We ??? the media ??? can manage the time, the sequence, the primetime… anything. We have the control, and all you can do is to sit down and become “audience”, i. e. hut up and listen. Depending on which side you are at, the idea sounds reasonable; media companies learn how to influence us, how to shape our tastes and habits, and we accept the model because we basically don’t have any other model to compete with. But all of a sudden, Internet explodes, and offers infinite choice, for free and with a completely different interaction model: now, the user is in control, and things happen only when he or she decides to click. And it is not just the Internet…. e also get TiVO, we get Slingbox (make sure you google those products and stay tuned to the concept if you haven’t heard about them yet 🙂 and concepts like time-shifting or place-shifting become a true, painful reality. The conclusion is crystal-clear: forget about control. All the control lies now in the hands of the user. Another big change arises precisely from that locus of control: when the user controls what to do and where to go, the role of the content provider becomes pretty much like in that movie, Field of dreams (1989): if you build it, they’ll come.
Suddenly, creating content for a small audience becomes feasible and, more than that, it proves to be profitable. With infinite shelf space, proactive audiences, recommendation engines and other characteristics of the Internet, such as the potential for viral diffusion, many advertisers and content providers realize that the old rules of the Industrial Revolution are not only untrue, but also completely suboptimal. What’s the point in shooting the same ad to a large crowd when you can ask that crowd to self-segment themselves and you know that, by doing so, the ad will be more effective?
That’s clearly another conclusion, another take-home: forget about best-sellers, forget about blockbusters. The long tail of the distribution, made up of all the teeny tiny segments that were previously impossible to target, can be much larger and profitable than a couple of onehit wonders. The third interesting element emerges from another characteristic of the Internet as a medium: bi-directional interactions. As users get the control, they also get two more things: a voice, and a loudspeaker. And they demand to be heard.
They want to be able to interact, among them and with you; they actively search for information about other customers who experienced your products, they tell the world the whole thing when things go well, but especially when things go wrong. And we get prosumers, and we get crowdsourcing (again, make sure you search those terms in Wikipedia if you haven’t previously heard about them), and the competitors that rely on the users as a truly important information channel become well known and are able to build a successful reputation. Which leads us to the third conclusion, again, pretty clear: don’t consider your customers “an audience”.
Audience comes from audio, from listening, and your customers want to do much more than just listening. If you insist in considering them “just an audience”, they will sure get upset. The world of advertising, the world of communication has changed, and the change is not precisely small potatoes. As Bob Dylan says, “the times they are a-changin'”… make sure you bear that in mind when it comes to planning your next move. What are the current trends in advertising? How are you reaching your customers in a day and age where television and newspapers are no longer as effective?
What causes a product or service to sell in today’s world? Do you believe images and music cause a product or service to sell? When a product or service is advertised what causes it to stay in your mind and create a feeling of need for a product or service? With the facts of images and music being played what makes those factors have an effect on the way we think? If you do not like a current song and you see it advertising a product will you no longer buy the product? Children will see there favorite actor or actress in a commercial they want the product. For example an actor or actress in a nail polish advertisement.
Does that have the effect on the nail polish itself? No, yet children will want it. Does having a big start make a product more effective when marking it? Does a new popular song really make a product better? Or is it the fact of it catching or grabbing your attention? When you hear a song on the radio that was in an advertisement does your brain automatically think of a product? If so, how would you go about finding which one would really help? With music and images constantly changing how do you keep up with advertising in today’s market? What key factors are necessary to market?
Before going deeper we will first understand what exactly we mean by Advertising the next chapter deals with the term Advertising. II Advertising Advertising is a form of communication used to help sell products and services. Typically it communicates a message including the name of the product or service and how that product or service could potentially benefit the consumer. However, Advertising does typically attempt to persuade potential customers to purchase or to consume more of a particular brand of product or service. Modern advertising developed with the rise of mass production in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Many advertisements are designed to generate increased consumption of those products and services through the creation and reinvention of the “brand image”. For these purposes, advertisements sometimes embed their persuasive message with factual information. There are many media used to deliver these messages, including traditional media such as television, radio, cinema, magazines, newspapers, video games, the carrier bags, billboards, mail or post and Internet. Today, new media such as digital signage is growing as a major new mass media. Advertising is often placed by an advertising agency on behalf of a company or other organization.
Organizations that frequently spend large sums of money on advertising that sells what is not, strictly speaking, a product or service include political parties, interest groups, religious organizations, and military recruiters. Non-profit organizations are not typical advertising clients, and may rely on free modes of persuasion, such as public service announcements. Money spent on advertising has increased dramatically in recent years. In 2007, spending on advertising has been estimated at over $385 billion worldwide, which will exceed $450 billion by 2010.
While advertising can be seen as necessary for economic growth, it is not without social costs. Unsolicited Commercial Email and other forms of spam have become so prevalent as to have become a major nuisance to users of these services, as well as being a financial burden on internet service providers. Advertising is increasingly invading public spaces, such as schools, which some critics argue is a form of child exploitation. In addition, advertising frequently utilizes psychological pressure (for example, appealing to feelings of inadequacy) on the intended consumer, which may be harmful. III History of Advertising
Edo period advertising flyer from 1806 for a traditional medicine called Kinseitan Egyptians used papyrus to make sales messages and wall posters. Commercial messages and political campaign displays have been found in the ruins of Pompeii and ancient Arabia. Lost and found advertising on papyrus was common in Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. Wall or rock painting for commercial advertising is another manifestation of an ancient advertising form, which is present to this day in many parts of Asia, Africa, and South America. The tradition of wall painting can be traced back to Indian rock art paintings that date back to 4000 BCE.
As the towns and cities of the Middle Ages began to grow, and the general populace was unable to read, signs that today would say cobbler, miller, tailor or blacksmith would use an image associated with their trade such as a boot, a suit, a hat, a clock, a diamond, a horse shoe, a candle or even a bag of flour. Fruits and vegetables were sold in the city square from the backs of carts and wagons and their proprietors used street callers or town criers to announce their whereabouts for the convenience of the customers. As education became an apparent need and reading, as well printing developed, advertising expanded to include handbills.
In the 17th century advertisements started to appear in weekly newspapers in England. These early print advertisements were used mainly to promote books and newspapers, which became increasingly affordable with advances in the printing press; and medicines, which were increasingly sought after as disease ravaged Europe. However, false advertising and so-called “quack” advertisements became a problem, which ushered in the regulation of advertising content. As the economy expanded during the 19th century, advertising grew alongside.
In the United States, the success of this advertising format eventually led to the growth of mail-order advertising. In June 1836, French newspaper La Presse is the first to include paid advertising in its pages, allowing it to lower its price, extend its readership and increase its profitability and the formula was soon copied by all titles. Around 1840, Volney Palmer established a predecessor to advertising agencies in Boston. Around the same time, in France, Charles-Louis Havas extended the services of his news agency, Havas to include advertisement brokerage, making it the first French group to organize.
At first, agencies were brokers for advertisement space in newspapers. N. W. Ayer & Son was the first full-service agency to assume responsibility for advertising content. N. W. Ayer opened in 1869, and was located in Philadelphia. An 1895 advertisement for a weight gain product. At the turn of the century, there were few career choices for women in business; however, advertising was one of the few. Since women were responsible for most of the purchasing done in their household, advertisers and agencies recognized the value of women’s insight during the creative process.
In fact, the first American advertising to use a sexual sell was created by a woman ??? for a soap product. Although tame by today’s standards, the advertisement featured a couple with the message “The skin you love to touch”. In the early 1920s, the first radio stations were established by radio equipment manufacturers and retailers who offered programs in order to sell more radios to consumers. As time passed, many non-profit organizations followed suit in setting up their own radio stations, and included: schools, clubs and civic groups. 9] When the practice of sponsoring programs was popularised, each individual radio program was usually sponsored by a single business in exchange for a brief mention of the business’ name at the beginning and end of the sponsored shows. However, radio station owners soon realised they could earn more money by selling sponsorship rights in small time allocations to multiple businesses throughout their radio station’s broadcasts, rather than selling the sponsorship rights to single businesses per show. A print advertisement for the 1913 issue of the Encyclop? ia Britannica This practice was carried over to television in the late 1940s and early 1950s. A fierce battle was fought between those seeking to commercialize the radio and people who argued that the radio spectrum should be considered a part of the commons ??? to be used only non-commercially and for the public good. The United Kingdom pursued a public funding model for the BBC, originally a private company, the British Broadcasting Company, but incorporated as a public body by Royal Charter in 1927.
In Canada, advocates like Graham Spry were likewise able to persuade the federal government to adopt a public funding model, creating the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. However, in the United States, the capitalist model prevailed with the passage of the Communications Act of 1934 which created the Federal Communications Commission. To placate the socialists, the U. S. Congress did require commercial broadcasters to operate in the “public interest, convenience, and necessity”. 10] Public broadcasting now exists in the United States due to the 1967 Public Broadcasting Act which led to the Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio. In the early 1950s, the DuMont Television Network began the modern trend of selling advertisement time to multiple sponsors. Previously, DuMont had trouble finding sponsors for many of their programs and compensated by selling smaller blocks of advertising time to several businesses. This eventually became the standard for the commercial television industry in the United States.
However, it was still a common practice to have single sponsor shows, such as The United States Steel Hour. In some instances the sponsors exercised great control over the content of the show – up to and including having one’s advertising agency actually writing the show. The single sponsor model is much less prevalent now, a notable exception being the Hallmark Hall of Fame. The 1960s saw advertising transform into a modern approach in which creativity was allowed to shine, producing unexpected messages that made advertisements more tempting to consumers’ eyes.
The Volkswagen ad campaign???featuring such headlines as “Think Small” and “Lemon” (which were used to describe the appearance of the car)???ushered in the era of modern advertising by promoting a “position” or “unique selling proposition” designed to associate each brand with a specific idea in the reader or viewer’s mind. This period of American advertising is called the Creative Revolution and its archetype was William Bernbach who helped create the revolutionary Volkswagen ads among others. Some of the most creative and long-standing American advertising dates to this period.
The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the introduction of cable television and particularly MTV. Pioneering the concept of the music video, MTV ushered in a new type of advertising: the consumer tunes in for the advertising message, rather than it being a by-product or afterthought. As cable and satellite television became increasingly prevalent, specialty channels emerged, including channels entirely devoted to advertising, such as QVC, Home Shopping Network, and ShopTV Canada. Marketing through the Internet opened new frontiers for advertisers and contributed to the “dot-com” boom of the 1990s.
Entire corporations operated solely on advertising revenue, offering everything from coupons to free Internet access. At the turn of the 21st century, a number of websites including the search engine Google, started a change in online advertising by emphasizing contextually relevant, unobtrusive ads intended to help, rather than inundate, users. This has led to a plethora of similar efforts and an increasing trend of interactive advertising. The share of advertising spending relative to GDP has changed little across large changes in media. For example, in the U. S. n 1925, the main advertising media were newspapers, magazines, signs on streetcars, and outdoor posters. Advertising spending as a share of GDP was about 2. 9 percent. By 1998, television and radio had become major advertising media. Nonetheless, advertising spending as a share of GDP was slightly lower???about 2. 4 percent. A recent advertising innovation is “guerrilla marketing”, which involve unusual approaches such as staged encounters in public places, giveaways of products such as cars that are covered with brand messages, and interactive advertising where the viewer can respond to become part of the advertising message.
This reflects an increasing trend of interactive and “embedded” ads, such as via product placement, having consumers vote through text messages, and various innovations utilizing social network services such as MySpace. IV Types of Advertising Media Paying people to hold signs is one of the oldest forms of advertising, as with this Human directional pictured above A bus with an advertisement for GAP in Singapore. Buses and other vehicles are popular mediums for advertisers A DBAG Class 101 with UNICEF ads at Ingolstadt main railway station
Commercial advertising media can include wall paintings, billboards, street furniture components, printed flyers and rack cards, radio, cinema and television adverts, web banners, mobile telephone screens, shopping carts, web popups, skywriting, bus stop benches, human billboards, magazines, newspapers, town criers, sides of buses, banners attached to or sides of airplanes (“logojets”), in-flight advertisements on seatback tray tables or overhead storage bins, taxicab doors, roof mounts and passenger screens, musical stage shows, subway platforms and trains, elastic bands on disposable diapers, stickers on apples in supermarkets, shopping cart handles (grabertising), the opening section of streaming audio and video, posters, and the backs of event tickets and supermarket receipts. Any place an “identified” sponsor pays to deliver their message through a medium is advertising. One way to measure advertising effectiveness is known as Ad Tracking. This advertising research methodology measures shifts in target market perceptions about the brand and product or service.
These shifts in perception are plotted against the consumers’ levels of exposure to the company’s advertisements and promotions. The purpose of Ad Tracking is generally to provide a measure of the combined effect of the media weight or spending level, the effectiveness of the media buy or targeting, and the quality of the advertising executions or creative. Covert advertising Covert advertising is when a product or brand is embedded in entertainment and media. For example, in a film, the main character can use an item or other of a definite brand, as in the movie Minority Report, where Tom Cruise’s character John Anderton owns a phone with the Nokia logo clearly written in the top corner, or his watch engraved with the Bulgari logo.
Another example of advertising in film is in I, Robot, where main character played by Will Smith mentions his Converse shoes several times, calling them “classics,” because the film is set far in the future. I, Robot and Spaceballs also showcase futuristic cars with the Audi and Mercedes-Benz logos clearly displayed on the front of the vehicles. Cadillac chose to advertise in the movie The Matrix Reloaded, which as a result contained many scenes in which Cadillac cars were used. Similarly, product placement for Omega Watches, Ford, VAIO, BMW and Aston Martin cars are featured in recent James Bond films, most notably Casino Royale. Blade Runner includes some of the most obvious product placement; the whole film stops to show a Coca-Cola billboard. Television commercials
The TV commercial is generally considered the most effective mass-market advertising format, as is reflected by the high prices TV networks charge for commercial airtime during popular TV events. The annual Super Bowl football game in the United States is known as the most prominent advertising event on television. The average cost of a single thirty-second TV spot during this game has reached $3 million (as of 2009). The majority of television commercials feature a song or jingle that listeners soon relate to the product. Virtual advertisements may be inserted into regular television programming through computer graphics. It is typically inserted into otherwise blank backdrops[13] or used to replace local billboards that are not relevant to the remote broadcast audience.
More controversially, virtual billboards may be inserted into the background where none exist in real-life. Virtual product placement is also possible. Infomercials There are two types of infomercials, described as long form and short form. Long form infomercials have a time length of 30 minutes. Short form infomercials are 30 seconds to 2 minutes long. Infomercials are also known as direct response television (DRTV) commercials or direct response marketing. The main objective in an infomercial is to create an impulse purchase, so that the consumer sees the presentation and then immediately buys the product through the advertised toll-free telephone number or website.
Infomercials describe, display, and often demonstrate products and their features, and commonly have testimonials from consumers and industry professionals. Celebrities This type of advertising focuses upon using celebrity power, fame, money, popularity to gain recognition for their products and promote specific stores or products. Advertisers often advertise their products, for example, when celebrities share their favourite products or wear clothes by specific brands or designers. Celebrities are often involved in advertising campaigns such as television or print adverts to advertise specific or general products. Media and advertising approaches
Increasingly, other media are overtaking many of the “traditional” media such as television, radio and newspaper because of a shift toward consumer’s usage of the Internet for news and music as well as devices like digital video recorders (DVR’s) such as TiVo. Advertising on the World Wide Web is a recent phenomenon. Prices of Web-based advertising space are dependent on the “relevance” of the surrounding web content and the traffic that the website receives. Digital signage is poised to become a major mass media because of its ability to reach larger audiences for less money. Digital signage also offer the unique ability to see the target audience where they are reached by the medium.
Technology advances has also made it possible to control the message on digital signage with much precision, enabling the messages to be relevant to the target audience at any given time and location which in turn, gets more response from the advertising. Digital signage is being successfully employed in supermarkets. Another successful use of digital signage is in hospitality locations such as restaurants. and malls. E-mail advertising is another recent phenomenon. Unsolicited bulk E-mail advertising is known as “spam”. Spam has been a problem for email users for many years. But more efficient filters are now available making it relatively easy to control what email you get.
Email is however, becoming a major force in advertising when bulk mailed correctly, not as unsolicited Spam, but as e-blasts. The difference between spam and e-blasts is spam is unsolicited email advertisements that continue to be mailed against the recipients wishes while e-blasts can be “opted out” so the recipient will not receive it again. More and more people are choosing a select number of email solicitations they wish to receive, making e-blasts a viable method of advertising. In addition to the fact e-blasts are relatively inexpensive to use, you can track the recipients viewing of your advertising with great precision depending on the program you use.
There are a number of companies that offer on-line systems to distribute e-mail blasts. You can also buy software capable of sending and monitoring e-blasts. In both cases, these programs are designed to allow the recipient to opt out if they do not wish to receive your ads. Some companies have proposed placing messages or corporate logos on the side of booster rockets and the International Space Station. Controversy exists on the effectiveness of subliminal advertising (see mind control), and the pervasiveness of mass messages (see propaganda). Unpaid advertising (also called publicity advertising), can provide good exposure at minimal cost.
Personal recommendations (“bring a friend”, “sell it”), spreading buzz, or achieving the feat of equating a brand with a common noun (in the United States, “Xerox” = “photocopier”, “Kleenex” = tissue, “Vaseline” = petroleum jelly, “Hoover” = vacuum cleaner, “Nintendo” (often used by those exposed to many video games) = video games, and “Band-Aid” = adhesive bandage) ??? these can be seen as the pinnacle of any advertising campaign. However, some companies oppose the use of their brand name to label an object. Equating a brand with a common noun also risks turning that brand into a genericized trademark – turning it into a generic term which means that its legal protection as a trademark is lost. As the mobile phone became a new mass media in 1998 when the first paid downloadable content appeared on mobile phones in Finland, it was only a matter of time until mobile advertising followed, also first launched in Finland in 2000. By 2007 the value of mobile advertising had reached $2. 2 billion and providers such as Admob delivered billions of mobile ads.
More advanced mobile ads include banner ads, coupons, Multimedia Messaging Service picture and video messages, advergames and various engagement marketing campaigns. A particular feature driving mobile ads is the 2D Barcode, which replaces the need to do any typing of web addresses, and uses the camera feature of modern phones to gain immediate access to web content. 83 percent of Japanese mobile phone users already are active users of 2D barcodes. A new form of advertising that is growing rapidly is social network advertising. It is online advertising with a focus on social networking sites. This is a relatively immature market, but it has shown a lot of promise as advertisers are able to take advantage of the demographic information the user has provided to the social networking site.
Friendertising is a more precise advertising term in which people are able to direct advertisements toward others directly using social network service. From time to time, The CW Television Network airs short programming breaks called “Content Wraps,” to advertise one company’s product during an entire commercial break. The CW pioneered “content wraps” and some products featured were Herbal Essences, Crest, Guitar Hero II, CoverGirl, and recently Toyota. Recently, there appeared a new promotion concept, “ARvertising”; its supported on Augmented Reality technology. Global advertising Advertising has gone through five major stages of development: domestic, export, international, multi-national, and global.
For global advertisers, there are four, potentially competing, business objectives that must be balanced when developing worldwide advertising: building a brand while speaking with one voice, developing economies of scale in the creative process, maximising local effectiveness of ads, and increasing the company’s speed of implementation. Born from the evolutionary stages of global marketing are the three primary and fundamentally different approaches to the development of global advertising executions: exporting executions, producing local executions, and importing ideas that travel. [107] Advertising research is key to determining the success of an ad in any country or region.
The ability to identify which elements and/or moments of an ad that contributes to its success is how economies of scale are maximised. Once one knows what works in an ad, that idea or ideas can be imported by any other market. Market research measures, such as Flow of Attention, Flow of Emotion and branding moments provide insight into what is working in an ad in any country or region because the measures are based on the visual, not verbal, elements of the ad. Advertising research Advertising research is a specialized form of research that works to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of advertising. It entails numerous forms of research which employ different methodologies.
Advertising research includes pre-testing (also known as copy testing) and post-testing of ads and/or campaigns???pre-testing is done before an ad airs to gauge how well it will perform and post-testing is done after an ad airs to determine the in-market impact of the ad or campaign on the consumer. Continuous ad tracking and the Communicus System are competing examples of post-testing advertising research types. V Recent Trends in Advertising Across time, we have been witness to big changes in advertising, from merely communicating a product or service, to highly sophisticated multi-dimensional and multi-channel strategies, and always with the same goal. Across time, we have seen a huge evolution of techniques and trends, products, strategies, media. The authentic “next big thing” comes with the advent of the Internet. Advertising is a very powerful business.
All by itself, advertising powers large industries such as television or print media, huge empires with thousands of employees and billions of dollars in revenues which constantly feed their tummies with money coming from the advertisers. Across time, we have been witness to big changes in advertising, from merely communicating a product or service, to highly sophisticated multidimensional and multi-channel strategies, and always with the same goal: to induce someone to buy or use that product or service. To achieve their goal, advertisers use different types of weapons with very different characteristics, ranging from pure carpet-bombing that guarantees the coverage of a large area, to highly precise snipers that allow them to hit a specific target right between the eyes and in the perfect moment to do so.
Across time, we have seen a huge evolution of those wea pons, new techniques and trends, new products, new strategies, new media. However, as in many other industries, the really big change, the authentic “next big thing” comes with the advent of the Internet. And believe it or not, even though the Internet has been among us for quite a significant number of years, the change is yet to come. Let’s review some of the changes that will, in the coming years, turn the world of advertising completely upside down…?? The first and fundamental change is related to the so called “interruption marketing”, and it could be well expressed as “don’t get between my content and me”.
Think about it: for a number of years, the media industry has been able to run their business with a very clear and straightforward model – if you want to put your hands in my content, you will have to accept my conditions. And those conditions are: either you pay for it, or you will accept interruptions. Those interruptions will come any time, in any form or shape, and we will charge advertisers depending on the number of eyeballs that we are able to ??? theoretically ??? put in front of your ad. We ??? the media ??? can manage the time, the sequence, the primetime… anything. We have the control, and all you can do is to sit down and become “audience”, i. e. shut up and listen.
Depending on which side you are at, the idea sounds reasonable; media companies learn how to influence us, how to shape our tastes and habits, and we accept the model because we basically don’t have any other model to compete with. But all of a sudden, Internet explodes, and offers infinite choice, for free and with a completely different interaction model: now, the user is in control, and things happen only when he or she decides to click. And it is not just the Internet…. we also get TiVO, we get Slingbox (make sure you google ??those products and stay tuned to the concept if you haven’t heard about them yet 🙂 and concepts like time-shifting or place-shifting become a true, painful reality. The conclusion is crystal-clear: forget about control. All the control lies now in the hands of the user.
Another big change arises precisely from that locus of control: when the user controls what to do and where to go, the role of the content provider becomes pretty much like in that movie, Field of dreams (1989): if you build it, they’ll come. Suddenly, creating content for a small audience becomes feasible and, more than that, it proves to be profitable. With infinite shelf space, proactive audiences, recommendation engines and other characteristics of the Internet, such as the potential for viral diffusion, many advertisers and content providers realize that the old rules of the Industrial Revolution are not only untrue, but also completely suboptimal.
What’s the point in shooting the same ad to a large crowd when you can ask that crowd to self-segment themselves and you know that, by doing so, the ad will be more effective? That’s clearly another conclusion, another take-home: forget about best-sellers, forget about blockbusters. The long tail of the distribution, made up of all the teeny tiny segments that were previously impossible to target, can be much larger and profitable than a couple of onehit wonders. The third interesting element emerges from another characteristic of the Internet as a medium: bi-directional interactions. As users get the control, they also get two more things: a voice, and a loudspeaker. And they demand to be heard.
They want to be able to interact, among them and with you; they actively search for information about other customers who experienced your products, they tell the world the whole thing when things go well, but especially when things go wrong. And we get prosumers, and we get crowdsourcing (again, make sure you search those terms in Wikipedia if you haven’t previously heard about them), and the competitorss that rely on the users as a truly important information channel become well known and are able to build a successful reputation. Which leads us to the third conclusion, again, pretty clear: don’t consider your customers “an audience”. Audience comes from audio, from listening, and your customers want to do much more than just listening.
If you insist in considering them “just an audience”, they will sure get upset. The world of advertising, the world of communication has changed, and the change is not precisely small potatoes. As Bob Dylan says, “the times they are a-changin'”… make sure you bear that in mind when it comes to planning your next move. http://www. enriquedans. com (blog in Spanish). Indians might as well be very emotional. The ever so marketable histrionics in bollywood movies only prove this point. There may also be a lot of demand for the “K serials”. But do we need a forced dosage of emotions in the ads too? On TV the viewers (much to the advantage of the advertisers) do not have much choice.
One might just not be in the same mood, as being expressed by the advertisement, worse still, nowhere close. Imagine if you are watching Monday night laughs ; then I see the Airtel ad. Your brain might just urge you to make the same reaction as a boy enjoying his birthday party until he comes to know that the biggest gift given to him by his worst enemy has broken. The tear would be sitting right on the edge of your eyes, wondering if it is worth taking the plunge! VI EmoteVertising The New Mantra of Advertising in India EmoteVertising is The New Mantra of Advertising in India. Indians might as well be very emotional. The ever so marketable histrionics in bollywood movies only prove this point.
There may also be a lot of demand for the “K serials”. But do we need a forced dosage of emotions in the ads too? On TV the viewers (much to the advantage of the advertisers) do not have much choice. One might just not be in the same mood, as being expressed by the advertisement, worse still, nowhere close. Imagine if you are watching Monday night laughs ; then I see the Airtel ad. Your brain might just urge you to make the same reaction as a boy enjoying his birthday party until he comes to know that the biggest gift given to him by his worst enemy has broken. The tear would be sitting right on the edge of your eyes, wondering if it is worth taking the plunge!
The advertising campaigns of things like life insurance, beauty products, baby products, retirement solutions, healthcare products, tour operators ; social messages can never separate themselves from the emotional content. A viewer even expects an emotional connect. What, however, is not easily conceivable is why some companies practice emotional advertising even though there is no need for it. In particular, advertisements of products like electrical switches, salt, telecom companies, hawai chappals, newspaper ; paint to name a few. Let me start not by decimating the whole concept of emotional advertising, but cite examples which I appreciate. Those which I think are path breaking, surpassing the barriers of the kind of product, or the target audience. The latest frooti advertisement is the first which comes to my mind.
The VO plays, “ladke se ladki tak,” and we see a guy with Frooti resting his head on a girl’s shoulder. Hanging out with her friends in the college canteen, a girl whistles on seeing a guy. VO: “Canteen se seeti tak. ” A teacher enters his class to find one of his students gulping down a Frooti. Approaching him he grabs it for a sip. VO: “Student se teacher tak. ” Clad in a spacesuit, a little girl descends from a spaceship sipping a Frooti. VO: “Fancy dress mein chhipe armaanon tak. ” A guy notices a crumpled piece of paper thrown on the road by somebody. He picks it up to throw it in the bin. VO: “India badal gaya hai… …lekin India ka favourite froot drink wahi. Super: Frooti. India’s most trusted fruit beverage brand. Striking a balance amongst creating melodrama ; sending the message across is what the ad has brilliantly achieved. It is neither too moving nor does it rubbish the idea of an emotional connect. It is also not a product with whom one would appreciate an emotional connect. Hats off to the creative team, of Creative land Asia for making the ad flawlessly. One cannot forget surf’s “daag ache hain” campaign. It not only connected to the mother’s desires ; their plight of keeping the clothes white, but also with those of the kids, who despite all efforts not to dirty their clothes, just do it!
The “chintamani” campaign for ICICI bank was a good break from the boring ads of the banks. It was an innovative way to convey the emotional connect ; with “short term chintamani” coming in the second leg of the ad, they assured a special mention for their efforts. Going into the recent past, I seem to recollect a few advertisements from the automobile sector. The “Make your own road” campaign with the racy music, the rustic ; adventurous imagery captures the inherent desire for an SUV amongst men. “The josh machine” campaign did very well to sell the ford ikon. With the sport variant coming into the market the tag line fit perfectly with the youth connect.
Last, but surely not the least is the enfield ad. A train is running on the tracks, the next scene shows an enfield approaching the tracks ; the legendry thud of the engine, train is given a red signal ; it stops, the enfield on the other hand is shown a green flag by a buy ; it passes the track while the train remains at a halt, the VO says-“make way for the bullet electra”. I might be biased here, being a die hard enfield enthusiast, but the sound of the engine brought out all the emotions it was meant to. Not to mention I could clearly see the jump in sales, looking at the number of enfields on road. This wasn’t the first time that enfield had used an emotional brand connect.
Watching an old enfield ad, it became perfectly clear. A rider on an enfield is going through the streets of a city, the very recognizable bullet engine & then a jingle starts playing-“yeh bullet meri jaan, manzilon ka nishan” the 20 odd second ad finishes with some more imagery of meeting fellow bullet riders. It is the kind of camaraderie amongst the bullet owners, the ad exploited. In another category, thinking about ads for milk products like chocolates, butter, condensed milk, two brands occupy most mind space-Amul & Cadbury’s. Both “shamelessly” attempt to make us indulge in “sinful pleasures”. (I speak strictly from the weight conscious’ point of view, excluding myself. The splashing milk, melting butter on parathas, condensed milk on sweets, I am already drooling. The low cholesterol oils survive on an emotional connect. Unarguably condom ads also feature in the “acceptable” category of ads with an emotional connect; after all, it is all about the feeling, pun intended. There are however, a few categories, where an emotional connect is unnecessary. For instance in the Legrand advertisement, there is no apparent need for an emotional connect. In the advert, what appear to be the young girls’ parent’s hands make the Legrand logo. The young girl is now reading to her younger sister, when her sister falls asleep.
The light turns off automatically, because of the “clock in the switches” whatever happened to the good night story, tucking the children to bed & then not forgetting to turn off the light? In order to make the emotional connect work, the creative team has created a world distant from reality. Worse still is an ad for the infrared motion detectors electrical switches, again from the Legrand stable. The ad begins with a similar show of parent’s hands. A restless baby in a cot, which is closed from three sides only, gets off the cot ; starts walking. As he is walking the legrand lights installed along the floor sense the movement ; start turning on in a series.
Why would a parent get a cot with protective bars on three sides only? The next in the line of fire, if I may, is the ads of Airtel. The ad starts with a young girl calling up her father who is out on duty. Apparently an engineer, he helps his daughter who is awake well beyond her bed time ; bored, to draw a whale by joining the stars in the night sky. What benefit can an emotional connect have for a telecom company? What first needs to be answered is why, rather how can a father leave his young daughter alone in a huge house? Advertisers should not distort reality only to accommodate the emotional context of the story. It is not only misleading, but never lets the viewer understand the message.
I still wonder why airtel had created the previous ad with a football being kicked across what seemed to be a border protected by barbed wires. The emotional content was still unwanted. The saving grace was however that the ad makers didn’t contort reality to fit in the approved story line. For ads of newspapers like Times of India, only one question-why? For salt advertisers-why only focus on children & their health? I thought goitre can happen even to adults. Why only focus on children’s health issues after consuming non-iodised salt? After all, both President H. W. Bush ; his wife Barbara Bush had hypothyroidism within two years of each other ; that too as adults.
They seem to have been kept in the dark of the health effects of a deficiency of iodine. I cannot seem to figure out ; am reaching out for help here, as to why have Chevrolet, Skoda ; Honda tried to exploit the emotional brand connect in their respective advertisements. I think they wrongly interpreted the results of their surveys, saying “Indians are emotional” what they missed out was “but they don’t need so much of it on TV”. Further a question rises, why do the advertisers not capture any other emotions? Why not use the emotions of disapproval ; disgust? The new beauty product campaigners are increasingly using this very trick.
Trying to project an image that the brand actually sympathises with their target audience, they are increasingly rubbishing promotion of all so perfect models on screen. More “realistic” beauties are being used at an increasing level. Maybe use an emotion of betrayal, or anguish, or ecstasy, or fear? Is it too much of a gamble then, with an increasing number of companies unable to get their message across, I think they have nothing to lose to go ahead ; try this. VII Case in Point As we have went through the various information on Advertising. Now we have complete knowledge of what advertising actually is. We’ve seen most recent trends and ideas in advertising.
As in the earlier chapter we explored the Indian funda of advertising i. e. EmoteVertising (Emotional Advertising). Now let us study some of the live advertisings currently doing the rounds. Here are some interesting cases of Advertising. 1) This Holi – DRY Holi March 20, 2008 save water, Holi, Initiative, ads by Adidiot, New trends in advertising, Idea Here is an Ad that we did to promote dry holi this year. Please save water by celebrating dry holi. We request you all to please use dry colors like regular Gulal or natural dry colors made of fruits and flowers. Probably – the amount of water that we all are going to waste in just one day across India, would suffice for crop irrigation for one year in Rajasthan!
Please feel free to add your comments on this initiative, idea and suggestion made by us. 2) Bajaj Pulsar – Pulsarmania March 18, 2008 Bikes, Pulsarmania, Kawasaki, Bajaj, New trends in advertising Quite often I think to myself that ad making is like cooking ??? a dash of this and a dash of that a little magic of the chef’s hands and lo behold the perfect dish is there to be dunked down your belly, but whenever you try to copy the Chef’s original recipe you discover that in fact it was not that original and the end product is different from what you anticipated. Similarly in ad making the ad gurus copy the perfect formula complete with a celebrity roped in despite this the commercial falls flat (read the last post).
But at times you see something which is as close to being perfect as you thought it could be. It’s very rare that you see a commercial that makes you crave for some action without even asking you to do so, and that’s precisely what the new Pulsar commercial titled Pulsar Mania does to you. It makes you want to jump out of the bed, don your helmet pick up the keys and listen to the rumble of your bike’s engine before you hit the road. 6 guys burning rubber in such a well choreographed manner that it would make John Woo sit up and take notice, the guys go through formations that are amazing and the effect is heightened by some excellent cinematography.
The ad is perhaps the best bike commercial ever to have hit the TV screens in India ??? The commercial is one of the most captivating commercials I have seen in the recent times, it’s visually breathtaking and the effect is tremendous. I bet even the ad makers hadn’t thought that the final product would be so good. The USP of the ad is that it focuses on the product through out without ever losing focus or stressing too much, it’s un-conventional to say the least ??? No voiceover, No tagline. Yes they could have done with some good music since it would have increased the overall effect manifolds and moreover it would have given Pulsar its own tune which is still missing.
The last time I saw a good Bike commercial in India was years ago (Incidentally both this one and the last happen to come out of the Bajaj stable) ??? it was the Kawasaki Bajaj Eliminator commercial which had the famous jingle rendered soulfully by Shankar Mahadevan (Ae chalne waale raah par rukna na haar ke). Feels good to see such amazing work ??? it’s a spark which has come out after a long time. 3) Kids for the Future of India February 26, 2008 ads by Adidiot, New trends in advertising Here is the second ad done by Adidiot in support of Education for Kids and nurseryadmissionsdelhi. blogspot. com. 4) Pepsi’s New Season Opener -Featuring Shahrukh Khan, Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone.
February 19, 2008 Shahrukh, Ranbeer Kapoor, Pepsi New ad, Youngistan, Hrithik, Cola Wars, Fixes, Coca Cola coke, Pepsi, New trends in advertising Summer’s are around the corner and the soft drink giants are vying for your attention, Pepsi has already??launched its latest commercial featuring Shahrukh Khan, Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone. It’s an explosive combination sure to make viewers sit up and take notice of the unveiling of the new Pepsi Slogan for 2008. The ad has Shahrukh as Deepika’s geeky elder brother and Ranbir as the guy after Deepika. The season opener from Pepsi has Ranbir trying to woo Deepika while donning a biking jacket and hanging from her balcony, suddenly he falls down and in the process he pulls down a dish antenna with him.
Hearing this sound Shahrukh opens the door with a book in his hand (titled antariksha??yatri – comeon guys??you could have done better than that)??to check and finds Ranbir dressed like a superhero with a dish antenna in one hand. Shahrukh asks him who is he and where does he come from. Flabbergasted Ranbir looks at Shahrukh and points upwards towards the balcony, Shahrukh thinks he is from another planet and asks him where is he coming from? , Ranbir meanwhile has turned around facing two hoardings with neon signs (one is Hindustan??something and the other is Young India Underwears) and he blurts out in an alien like tone “Youngistan se aya hoon – i have come from Youngistan” to which Shahrukh replies – Why have you come here? and pat gets the answer from Ranbir in the same alien tone – “To be your sister’s bodyguard (tumhari behan ka body guard banane)”.
Shahrukh takes him to meet Deepika and tells her that he has come from Youngistan and would stay with them from now on and leaves the love birds alone(while Ranbir and Deepika give each other the know it all smile),?? Deepika asks Ranbir “How did you do this? ” and Ranbir replies holding a bottle of Pepsi “Chaho to sab possible hai – Everything is possible if you want it” at this moment the new slogan for 2008 is unveiled “Yeh hai Youngistan meri jaan – Pepsi”. The ad has tremendous entertainment value which fizzles out in the end when Shahrukh leaves the two alone and one more critical thing – SRK has been wasted in this ad, the ad holds good promise as it begins but loses steam as it progresses.
The ad is in line with Pepsi’s efforts to establsih itself as a youth brand and the only thing that comes to my mind is David Ogilvy’s famous quote “Every advertisement should be thought of as a contribution to the complex symbol which is the brand image”. Full marks to the ad on supporting the overall brand image but otherwise a poorly executed ad which lacks the punch and banks only on the celebrity’s appeal, lets hope Pepsi does better sequels to this one. The ad has just been splashed on all the major channels but how all these pieces fit in in the mind of the consumer is yet to be seen, however since Pepsi has decided not to renew the contracts of Saurav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid we?? believe that Pepsi would be pushing this campaign quite aggressively. 5) Axis bank “the brand” connecting on a personal note February 6, 2008 Axis Bank, New trends in advertising Axis Bank has some serious catch up to do with its competitors and what better way to do so than to connect with the consumer through good services wonderfully conveyed through a brilliant ad campaign. It all started with the re-branding of UTI bank when they came out with commercials featuring twins and connected instantly with the consumer, there was a media frenzy which was created when UTI turned into Axis bank. The bank managed to capture attention and post the launch went into a lull which was broken recently with the new campaign which started with the Personal loans advertisement.
In the ad is a middle class Indian family trying to??look fashionable while getting dressed up against the chill (goes well with the mercury dipping so cruelly this year) as they happen to be in the land of the Swiss ??? Switzerland. But in reality the family happens to be in a photo studio trying to look as if in Switzerland (complete with a backdrop of the Swiss Alps), the punch in the ad came when the photographer says “bhaisaab behenji ke thoda kareeb jaiye ??? aise ??? thoda romatic (pronounced-romaanteek)” at this point the actors in the commercial give amazing expressions and make it look so wonderfully middle class. At this moment the voice over began “If you have a desire to travel, we have personals loans to help you fulfill it” followed by the tagline “Axis Bank ??? Personal Loan Solutions”.
The campaign connects to the consumer making him feel a part of this family, because all of us at some stage or the other have sacrificed our personal desires like an annual vacation for want of funds. As a result of the wonderful execution and emotional connect through the middle class storyline the ad manages to negate the negative image that the consumer has about loans. Let’s just hope Axis bank backs it??up with good services and doesn’t end up sending goons for loan recoveries as has become common these days for all banks to do so. And the commercial is wonderfully short setting up the platform for a series of commercials to follow. A wonderful campaign to begin the year ??? Full points to O&M. 6) Vodafone rolls out latest ‘Happy to Help’ campaign Mukta Lad, 14 July, 2009 Mumbai
Post the spate of Vodafone commercials featuring the popular ZooZoo characters aired during the IPL, the telecom brand has come up with a new ‘Happy to Help’ campaign. Created by O&M, the new campaign features Vodafone’s trademark character – the young girl and the pug. Speaking to Campaign India about the latest campaign, Rajiv Rao, executive creative director, O;M said, “This time, we started off wanting to refresh Vodafone’s customer service promise. The promise itself wasn’t new; it’s been a brand philosophy since its launch and the first time we stated this overtly was with the Happy to Help campaign during the IPL in 2008. Rao adds, “The task for this campaign was to breathe new life into the promise. Moreover, the customer service promise wasn’t just a statement.
It was backed up with tangible service substantiators – like the over 4000 Vodafone Stores and mini stores which brought the service around the corner, the self service kiosks which made it easy for a customer to help themselves anytime, anywhere; the 24-hour service and Vodafone mobile vans which actually made the service accessible at your doorstep. So we actually wanted to bring the customer service alive using these solid offerings. “Rao says the ZooZoos will be back sometime. “Of course there will be Zoozoo ads in the future. The overwhelming response from all sections of people has ensured the Zoozoos will be back some time,” he says. Vodafone Happy to Help ‘Dorm’ from Campaign India on Vimeo. The first TVC titled ‘Dorm’ begins with the young girl tucked up in bed in her dormitory, when she hears a squeak. Soon after, she sits up and begins reading.
Cut to the scene where the Vodafone pug is seen keeping a watch near the door. As soon as it hears footsteps, it steps onto a squeaky toy. Instantly the girl shuts her book and feigns sleep. When the footsteps are out of earshot, the pug makes the toy squeak again and the girl then begins reading her book. This spot speaks about Vodafone’s self service kiosks that are ‘Happy to help night and day’. Vodafone ‘Baking’ from Campaign India on Vimeo. In the second TVC titled ‘Baking’, the girl is baking something, but is unable to read the recipe book because its pages keep flying. Moreover, her hands are full of dough. Right on cue enters her pug, which helps keep her pages from flying.
When asked whether it was challenging to create a new campaign post an extremely successful series like the ZooZoos, Rao says, “Vodafone has always created properties which have served the brand well. The pug has been one, Zoozoos are another. Each of these exist to make the brand promise come alive. And they all have different roles to play in the overall brand story. ” This new campaign is supported by outdoor, online, retail and radio. The creative team includes Piyush Pandey, Rajiv Rao, Elizabeth Dias, Aarati Kakkd, Bhavna Kher, Virendra Shinde and Akshay Seth. The campaign has been shot by Prakash Varma of Nirvana Films. 7) AirTel comes of age – joins Idea, Reliance and Vodafone
December 16, 2007 New trends in advertising, Tata Indicom, Reliance, Idea, Airtel Finally Airtel comes of age ??? in line with the new trend. Well what to say, I seem to have developed a fixation for Airtel?? though not an Airtel user I have been quite impressed with the way Airtel always manages to waste money in some ad or the other. I mean they have a knack for it off late they have been pouring money in like anything into their ads but “uffff ads” is all that they have managed. But finally someone seems to have woken up at Airtel and they seem to be coming of age. The kids are amazing, the setting is great and the result is a well executed ad with a message in it.
By picking up soccer instead of cricket and not showing the Indo Pak border the ad company certainly seems to be trying to give it an international feel, or may be they thought cricket in no man’s land would not have been a very good idea (We at Adidiot are big cricket fans so we are being biased). The Airtel “No man’s land soccer ad” scores heavily in terms of being in line with the current trend in Indian Advertising “Social Messages or just messages”. Vodafone did it with “ek pal main kitna kuch campaign” and Idea had their very own idea in “What an idea sirji campaign”. Even Reliance kicked in with an ad which was not exactly a social message we are talking about the “Yeh India ka Cricket hai Bedu ad”.
In my opinion the winner??is Idea because they were the first ones to come out with the brilliant campaign starring Abhishek Bachhan. It’s a very good ad with a very human message but I have only one question “Is Abhishek Bachhan required in this ad”, he doesn’t add anything to the otherwise brilliant ad. I am sure Abhishek would have charged a bomb to endorse Idea; well it’s a different debate altogether “Do we need celeb endorsements? ” Finally here are the ratings: No1. Idea”What an idea sirji” No2. Airtel”No man’s land soccer” No3. Reliance”Yeh India ka cricket hai bedu” No4. Vodafone”Ek pal main kitna kuch” The only missing company is Tata Indicom but I think pretty soon they would also out with a similar looking and very well made ad with a social message in it.
If it goes this way than it would reflect heavily on the lack of ideas amongst the Indian Ad companies. No doubt they are being creative in the ad but are following somebody else’s league all the time. For the companies: please wake up and don’t throw away money just like that, instead do some real social work. Anyway we are here to help save there money and honestly if Airtel comes to us we wont even charge a penny from them for our idea. Advertising Trends in Indian Telecom The way telecom firms advertise, gives an approximate idea about the telecom trends. I would try to uncover some of them, which come to my mind. At the initial launch of the mobile services, they were advertised as lifestyle products.
The message that sought to be conveyed was that if you have a mobile phone, you have arrived in life. A few well-healed people could afford the high call rates at that time. It was in no way for the masses. I am sure that the mobile companies made a large profit out of it. Perhaps for the first time, Indians were exposed to concepts alien to them: Customer Care Support. It saw a booming of the ancillary services and fresh graduates, stunted in mental development though, came out in droves for the well-paid jobs. Airtel then sought the services of Sachin Tendulkar. He was the brand ambassador and saw his earnings sharply increasing. I saw his picture everywhere exhorting me buy the mobile prepaid card.
After the initial publicity passed away, A. R. Rahman gave his now famous tune. All the other companies have variously tried other gimmicks to sell their connections. However, the landscape changed after Reliance came in the mobile services. Mukesh Ambani was seen telling people about his fathers dream. The initial launch was lackluster. With the launch of the prepaid services, the punch line was “mujhme hai who baat” or “I have that thing! ” I wonder how many people act