Category: Brand

  • Ad Mad World…

    Advertisements, that which are used to market things we may or may not want… but now, television commercials have become a source of entertainment all by themselves, irrespective of whether theproduct/service is interesting to us at all.. and so, that got me thinking, do we relate to ads in the same way that we relate to fellow humans also…
    We have the ads that are about the things we have to live with the mobiles and service providers,which are essential for us on a routine basis… kinda like relatives.. dont necessarily have to like them, but not exactly disposable either.. of course, among these we might find some ads that we love, just like some cousins/aunts/uncles etc who are special to us and nice people who happen to be relatives…
    and then there are ads, which may not have any relation to what we want, but we still like them and may even adopt the product/service because of this liking.. like friends… of course, the friends hopefully last longer than the particular ad campaign…in general, we most usually like the ads that have a bit of humour in them, or the ones that give an emotional tug, or the ones that remind us of us… i guess we relate to people in a similar kind of way…
    yes, i am into marketing and am working a lot these days, work which includes ads… and yes, it would have been still okay if it reflected only in the posts i write, but when, during introductions, when i respond to ‘Hi, i am Xyzee’, with a ‘Hi, I am stressed’, i guess there is a problem somewhere 😉
    until next time, does it all add up??

  • The fifth p

    As the title implies, this post is going to have a lil bit of marketing in it. I read an article in the Economic Times, so i thought i’ll riff on it here – The four P’s in marketing by kotler are famous enough, and there have been several wannabes trying for the fifth position, like ‘people’, ‘packaging’ etc, but this one takes the cake. It is very Indian, thats why i loved it – it is the ‘paanwala’.

    Brands are now competing with each other to make their presence felt in the small paan dukan -from fmcg co:s like HLL and Nestle to telecom players like Hutch, everyone wants to be in a paan shop, and in the process, the old paanwala is slowly being phased out and he is being replaced by the new paanwala dude who himself is a walking promotion, sporting Reebok, Levis, RayBan etc…..read more

    I was slightly skeptical about putting the bihar stuff yesterday, but it got a good response..and yahoooooo, it’s the weekend, two days of solid nothingness, only a lil shopping. Meanwhile, guys in Bangalore and Mumbai, tomorrow, watch out for WorldSpace’s ad in TOI and Bombay Times respectively and give me your feedback. So happy weekend people, enjoy yourself, take care and be back on monday for the latest edition of manuscrypts…what’s left is

    manuscrypts trivia

    just a lil dig at management… 😉

    Put eight monkeys in a room. In the middle of the room is a ladder, leading to a bunch of bananas hanging from a hook on the ceiling. Each time a monkey tries to climb the ladder, all the monkeys are sprayed with ice water, which makes them miserable. Sooner enough, whenever a monkey attempts to climb the ladder, all of the other monkeys, not wanting to be sprayed, set upon him and beat him up. Soon, none of the eight monkeys ever attempts to climb the ladder. One of the original monkeys is then removed, and a new monkey is put in the room. Seeing the bananas and the ladder, he wonders why none of the other monkeys are doing the obvious, but, undaunted, he immediately begins to climb the ladder. All the other monkeys fall upon him and beat him silly. He has no idea why. However, he no longer attempts to climb the ladder. A second original monkey is removed and replaced. The newcomer again attempts to climb the ladder, but all the other monkeys hammer the crap out of him. This includes the previous new monkey, who, grateful that he’s not on the receiving end this time, participates in the beating because all the other monkeys are doing it. However, he has no idea why he’s attacking the new monkey. One by one, all the original monkeys are replaced. Eight new monkeys are now in the room. None of them have ever been sprayed by ice water. None of them attempt to climb the ladder. All of them will enthusiastically beat up any new monkey who tries, without having any idea why. And that’s how any company’s policies get established.