Tag: Big

  • Remote Control

    It would’ve been a big shock to Airtel, having their entire teaser campaign hijacked by BIG. Painstakingly created, their four ads conveyed four different aspects of the service and had the ‘See you at home’ and the red couch in common. Though I missed the ads, I read this report about Airtel’s launch of their DTH service on a particular day, told my wife that it was Airtel’s DTH service, only to be given a look of scorn when BIG ‘revealed’ the couch and the service’s key features. From my reaction, I can imagine the sheer rage and frustration that JWT and Airtel must’ve felt after spending time, money and energy on the teasers. I can also imagine the Mudra guy devilishly grinning with a ‘Yeah, see you at home’ mutter when the guerilla idea struck him. I wonder of this will be a strong case against teasers and will go down in history as the most quoted example against brands which want to do a bit of teasing.

    Airtel can take solace in the fact that at least Reliance sees them as a threat. This should prepare them for the long battle ahead. Of course, sometimes I think nothing is preparation enough for Reliance (check out my ‘vision‘ of BIG). Sadly, the final Airtel launch ad, though interesting for a couple of watches, is not exactly engrossing after that. 

    But Reliance has also to be complimented on the extremely devious but smart thinking, that just took the steam out of Airtel’s campaign. It was quite refreshing to see someone other than the colas going for a head to head battle. Meanwhile, I simply loved their latest TVC for showcasing their 32 movie halls. Amitabh’s ‘Mere paas maa hain’ dialogue from Deewar has been mothered by brands across categories. Its plain irritating usually and forget me, I bet even Big B would be cursing them with a different ‘maa’ reference!! So this one was a welcome change with a new twist. What i liked best was the way this single dialogue was used to showcase the offering, almost like “with 32 movie halls, you can get more movie dialogues” 

    Meanwhile, I expect some star wars to happen in the DTH space. Aamir endorses Tata Sky, i think it will be only a matter of time before the Big B steps in for Reliance (in spite of Big B fatigue, I think ‘Ho to big ho’ will sound perfect coming from him). Airtel already has a plethora of stars – Kareena, Madhavan, Vidya Balan, Saif Ali Khan, A R Rahman etc endorsing them. I like the little connections in this – Madhavan and Vidya were paired first in Guru, which was supposed to be a take on Dhirubhai, and Reliance owns Big TV. The ‘tragedy’, meanwhile, is that SRK, who is Airtel’s biggest brand ambassador, is ‘santusht’ with Dish TV. Well, maybe he is not, but i wonder if he has a choice. Is that a lesson for brands to have a bit more ‘vision’ while signing contracts? Anyway, we should see some interesting wars ahead for control of the remote. 

    until next time, the telecasting couch 🙂

  • Its just getting bigger…

    A big news earlier this week was the launch of Big TV, with 20 channels to be launched – music, movie, lifestyle, regional..according to this article from some time ago.  (via medianama) Right at the bottom of the article is a paragraph on their internet plans. I, for one, am always intrigued by the BIG plans, since Reliance has a way of upsetting the entire setup, irrespective of the category, and using it to their advantage – whether its through scale, pricing or whatever disruptive means they can think up. This article says that a budget of Rs.100 crore has been earmarked for the marketing and communication of this entity, and also gives the pricing. With that budget, they can afford the tagline “Ho to Big Ho” 🙂

    I remember writing a BIG post, quite a while back touching upon the synergy that could be derived out of all the BIG entities – FM, Adlabs, BigFlix, Mobile, Music, Adda, and I had mentioned DTH too. With existing providers scampering about to announce who got a matrimonial tie up faster, reliance, with their content and distribution options could really muscle their way in. Adlabs and Big Adda, for example, are working quite well together, by promoting new movies with a Big Adda site. But what I missed out in that post was the stuff I’m more interested in now – BIG’s IPTV venture, in partnership with Microsoft, about which I’ve been hearing about for quite sometime now. Coincidentally, I also read this article today, which talks about the government approval for IPTV being on the way. For those who are wobbly on IPTV (like me), I’d suggest reading up here and here, though the latter is a bit dated.

    As is always the case when I think BIG, my thoughts end up usually on the potential synergy. IPTV brings all the content that you’ve traditionally on TV, but with an interactive and customised aspect. And its not just TV, but also Video On Demand (Tata Sky Showcase). How well BigFlix and Adlabs could be made to work in tandem here. Move over, all those silly games that are showcased on DTH, how about playing some Zapak based cool MMORPG s. Maybe they can even use Big Adda to create a social networking generation of Indian housewives, who’d be gosipping online while watching their favourite saans and bahus. (Tell me when I go overboard) And if their websites have some online shopping options, with the improved targeting  and context that the Internet offers, they could make a killing. I just saw a Big Adda TVC promoting social networking on mobile, so even a ‘quadruple play’ mentioned in the IPTV wiki article might be possible. Also in context, Adlabs-> Reliance Big Pictures -> Big Cinemas.

    So, in essence, all the current developments are just about to make BIG bigger.

    Meanwhile, a tangential big news is Yahoo’s tie up with Intel to launch an interactive TV channel. Read a good post on it here. And if you thought all of that was big, spend the weekend contemplating these futuristic interfaces.

    until next time, just the biginning 😉

    BIG update: The TVC is out, and check out the synergy in ‘Rock On’ – Big Pictures, FM, Music, Adda. Now we’re talking!!

  • Marching to different beats

    I read an article today on LiveMint, which deals with creating UGC for TV and Radio. Well, for starters, I think its already being done. The polls, the debates etc on news channels, and more importantly, the reality shows, are all user generated content. Of course, the packaging differs because unlike the net, time is also a factor on these platforms. 24 hours vs what content to put there.

    It also took me back this post, where I’d talked about the relevance of mass media to pure play internet entities. In a warped sense, I’d agree with the article that in a true convergence era, a medium like the internet, which has already absorbed user participation as one of its tenets, would play a larger role in shaping media consumption. So much so, that going forward, I’d bet heavily on an entity like Instablogs, which would find it easier to adopt to platforms like the television or radio. Yes, they got funded too, isn’t that just awesome?

    Which also brings me to another layer of thought, something I’ve touched upon earlier, if mass media entities want to test out the wild wild web and the currently hot social media scene, and what it could do for them, what is the better way of doing it – creating their own scene or leveraging existing popular platforms. I came across examples of both kinds today.

    While NYT is perhaps the best newspaper website in the world, it also plays a bit on social media (check out this facebook app). And today I read about the partnership it had entered into with LinkedIn. LinkedIn users will now get their industry related news from the relevant sections of the NYT site, and these news will have a share option. I think that’s an absolutely great way for LinkedIn to give a good value add to its users, and also stimulate conversations and for NYT, it creates a lot of relevance to the user, and will increase the website’s pull. That’s NYT’s way of leveraging a relevant social business network.

    The other thing that I came across is Radio City’s new website. (thanks to @thej) I haven’t done a complete tour yet, but it seems like they are primarily aiming at build communities there – a section called ‘Friends of Music’ has blogging, groups, finding colleagues(?!) and catching up with others attending gigs. In fact, the profile is also very orkut/facebook, and shows options for picking friends based on geography/music taste/school/workplace. Yes, i cringed at the last two too! It also has a calendar with some events already updated, and even has a karaoke section.  There is also an option to upload videos (upto 20MB) In addition, it attempts a Yahoo Launch by allowing you to create your own station by adding tracks. But I think it is also a way to take ownership of the music space – there is a musicopedia, a lyrics finder, a music news reporter and so on, which aims at making this the one stop resource for music in India. Yes, you can also listen to popular tracks, and stations created by users/ pre packaged ones (eg. KK, Alka Yagnik, though the content in this is limted, as of now). In essence, a decent effort, for trying the music ownership strategy, though from a new media perspective, I’d have liked more focus and efforts on podcasts (like Big FM), a talk show platform, better forums etc, instead of all that work on the orkut style social networking.(classmates and colleagues)

    While I’d usually go with leveraging existing social media, i think  a part of Radio City’s route does have its benefits, given the popularity of music and Bollywood in India, and its potential for creating communities especially with the context that Radio City offers. What they do beyond this would be the really interesting part.

    until next time, tuned in

  • The Next Big Thing

    No, this is not the major announcement about an awesome new service I’ve developed, thats later..sigh

    This is about the Ambani kind of Big, and its amazing to see what i consider a perfect duplication of the strategy that made an oil, petrochemical conglomerate. Backward integration. Only ADAG is not stopping at that. Its going horizontal too. Its putting its fingers in every pie that has some stake in the entire big pie of communication and entertainment – be it content or distribution.
    Lets talk about distribution first. They have a nationwide CDMA serivce provider, hell, even a GSM provider in a few markets. Smart!! They will roll out a DTH operation very soon, and they already have the retail version of broadband up and running. Its only a matter of time before they make a big impact in the consumer broadband space, and I’m not even taking the ubiquitous datacard into consideration. Which basically means they have 3 platforms – mobile, internet and television neatly tied up. A small bylane in distribution – Big FM, Big Flicks. FM is not that small, and Flicks is a good start to a click and mortar way of functioning. In fact so is FM, because a friend who works there recently sent me a link to their podcast!!
    Now the meat – content. You want movies, they got Adlabs. You want music, they got Big Music. Oh, you’re that new gen animal that thinks UGC and social networking is cool, welcome to Big Adda.
    I’d like to think that somewhere i have seen a fragment of the big picture that the younger Ambani has in his head. The more i see it, the more i admire it, coz he really thinks big.
    Meanwhile, if/when they integrate from a brand communication perspective, they have a perfect family friend who can be ambassador. Yup, you guessed it, Big B 😉
    and i bid adieu thinking zapak is a whole new ballgame 😀