Cycling away to Cannes

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/06/26/stories/2008062650090200.htm

What is the first association that comes to your mind when I say ‘France’? A normal person might say ‘perfumes’ while an advertising person (not to suggest that he is abnormal) might well say ‘Cannes Lions’, so imp ortant is the winning of this international award to people in the business of creativity.

Coincidentally, it was a brand of agarbathi from the NR Group, a fragrance company headquartered in the quaint town of Mysore, which won a bronze lion at Cannes in the radio category in the first set of awards that were announced on June 18. An award at Cannes is still something that the Indian advertising industry yearns for and so rarely gets, and Mudra Communications, the agency that created the spot, has every reason to be proud of its achievement.

The power of the brand
There is a criticism levelled at agencies, not without justification, that most of their international award-winning work is for public service advertising or for marginal brands. The significant fact in this case is the fact that Cycle Brand is a dominant brand in the agarbathi category with over 30 per cent market share of the organised sector. The brand that has been in existence for 60 years, no mean achievement, has a few interesting reasons behind its success. Most successful brands have a simple, yet effective brand name.

The brand name ‘Cycle’ has a few striking advantages in the Indian context. A cycle is something that every Indian has seen, wanted to own, owned or ridden. It needs no translation, has a visual mnemonic that is recognised across the length and breadth of the country and most importantly represents ‘value for money’ which is really one of the key reasons for the brand’s popularity and dominance. Let’s move on to the award winning commercial.

Radio, the Cinderella medium
For quite some time, radio has been ignored by advertisers, media planners and creative directors. Thankfully the trend has been changing, courtesy the increasing importance of the youth market and the phenomenal rise in the incidence of traffic jams in every metro. FM radio is here to stay.

In the same breath, however, one needs to accept that India is primarily a television country if script writers are anything to go by. It is all fine to say that ‘radio is the theatre of the mind’ but if the scripts are anything to go by then the scripts for radio more often than not end up being mindless. Of course, I must mention that radio channels seem to do better scripts for themselves than for some of the clients who entrust their creative work to them.

In fact, the actual number of entries for Cannes in the radio category has come down from 46 last year to 36 this year. It is in this context that the award-winning Cycle brand commercial has to be viewed. Let me explain: The entire film is one long and shrill (as per a member of the jury that awarded it) rendition of the familiar Indian tune ‘Om Jai Jagadish …’ on the cycle bell. The commercial is dramatic and single-minded, even if my description is not! Yes, as someone said, “Great advertising is produced by a single-minded thought that comes alive in a compelling way.”

Throw in a tune and a chant that the whole of India can relate to and you have a winner. Once again, I must hasten to add that this is not dependent on turn of phrase, or ideas lost in translation in this vast and confusing land that is India, which even jurists who did not understand the language or the significance of the words could still award. It certainly has ‘legs’ as it could be extended to ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’ and a whole host of tunes pertaining to other religions that this not always secular country can recognise, if not relate to.

Awards and media
All of us are familiar with the ‘strategy’ of agencies releasing their award-winning entries in cheap media at their own cost. I am sure that this is not one such happening and this campaign will get extensive media as the idea surely has the capability not only to win an award as it has done, but will also deliver at the market place, addressing as it does, the Indian ethos and preferences for things that are religious, and stokes the Indian penchant for prayer, particularly in the face of problems! Speaking of media exposure and visibility, one must mention also the ‘Lead India’ campaign that had tremendous media weight behind it, not to forget celebrities such as Amitabh Bachchan, also winning an award as did other well known brands such as Luxor and Reynolds. Indian agencies too had sent 295 entries this year as against 252 the previous year. Yes, winning is important for Indian agencies as it represents global recognition for Indian talent.

Winning at the market place
It is generally accepted that the creative mind is very different from mine, dull and predictable as it is. Awards matter to the creative mind like nothing else and winning at Cannes must be the ultimate. At the risk of pouring some cold water on their enormous enthusiasm, I must say one thing. India is an enormously diverse, complex country ridden with differences of language, colour, caste and religion. To sell here is no mean achievement and many of our eminent brands and creative people do this with regular ease. Some of the work done for dominant brands in the Indian context continue to deliver outstanding creativity that makes customers notice it, on occasion smile and almost invariably buy. Let us put a premium on work like this and if it wins an award, then it is a bonus. Let us not get preoccupied with the approval of a few foreigners who have limited understanding of this country, its people and complexity.

Taking a leaf out of the BCCI
Let me digress to cricket, my obsession and I can almost hear you saying, ‘So, what is new?’ In the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties, India – even if it was a good team and the winner of the Cricket World Cup, was a nobody in the pecking order of the people who mattered, when it came to running the game. Our itinerary was at the mercy of the biggies like England and Australia who treated us as ‘illegal immigrants’ on their hallowed turf. Now all that has changed; India has the eyeballs, the spectators, the TV revenue, the marketing acumen and now wonder of all wonders – a good team.

The shoe is on the other foot. We call the shots and the erstwhile dominant countries are protesting and perhaps some of our actions are worth protesting about. But the balance of power has shifted, slowly, steadily and inexorably in India’s favour. The cricketing world had to sit up and take notice when we ran the IPL. Now others are trying to do their own versions and only time will tell how successful they will be.

Similarly at Cannes, one suspects that India and Indian advertising is not as well represented or as powerful as it ought to be. There are whispers of South American dominance in the jury for one. My submission is that our time will come and that day is not far off. Let us not do what we used to do in the world of cricket for so many decades, complain about being discriminated against and sidelined, but discover a way of getting the recognition that we rightly deserve. Recognition, not only for our work, but also for the industry. Let us learn from our clients who faced the same problems that we are facing globally and yet who have placed India on the global map through their achievements whether it is the Tatas through their acquisition or the technology companies who have put us on the global map of recognition. It did not happen by whining or ‘whingeing’ as the Aussies might say, but by the power of achievements, that just cannot be ignored.

Yes, we can!

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO brand-comm and the author of “One land, One billion minds”)

Does your personality fit your organisation’s culture?

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/manager/2008/06/09/stories/2008060951511000.htm

Sport can offer a lot of learning about life and managing businesses, but that’s only if we pay attention, assimilate the lessons and follow them consistently. My knowledge of sport, sadly though, is restricted to cricket for which I have an obsession, to put it mildly.

Thanks to the Indian Premier League, there was a lot happening on and off the field which could teach us some lessons. There has been a lot of controversy about the poor performance of the Royal Challengers team and the owner, Vijay Mallya’s obvious and publicly stated unhappiness with his team’s performance. The CEO of the team was “summarily dismissed” and if rumour was to be believed, a few other heads were on the block as well, Rahul Dravid’s included.

Let’s take a look at the two principal actors in the drama — Mallya, the owner of the Royal Challengers and Dravid, the former India captain (and the captain of the Royal Challengers team) — and analyse their respective personalities based on what we have seen, read and heard about these two personalities and see if there is a match of personalities at all between the two.

We should remember that the two were forced to come together in a commercial venture to create a winning team unlike what happens in the corporate world where people can choose the company they join, and owners too determine who works for them. When Mallya won the Bangalore bid he had to sign Dravid on as the captain and Dravid had no option but to represent Bangalore.

The king of good times
Mallya is a successful businessman with a flamboyant lifestyle. His brands are famous, some of them leaders and a few global. His diversification into airlines, if not commercially profitable yet, has demonstrated his understanding of diverse businesses and delivery of quality service to the most demanding if not the most discerning customers. He is in-your-face in the media.

Contrast this with Dravid, an educated middle-class professional whose cricketing ability has given him international recognition. Even in the cut-throat world of modern cricket he has been a gentleman. He seems to be a knowledgeable, intense, introvert who loves to spend time with his family when he is not touring and who is more comfortable with a book in his hand than with a glass. Now tell me where is the fit between the two?

Companies have cultures
It is important to remember that companies have cultures, some strong, some not so well defined or tangible. I have spent a fair amount of time in advertising agencies and I can say with a fair amount of certainty that the culture of advertising agencies is very different from your normal, staid company.

I remember an induction statement often made at ad agencies “Welcome to the zoo!” While that could be argued about, what is certain is that only a certain type of individual would be comfortable in the advertising agency, where creative types come to work in torn jeans, pony tails and earrings.

In fact, I frequently tell my students who wish to enter advertising to do an internship in an agency to help them decide whether they would fit in or end up being fish out of water in the chaotic environment typical of an agency. I am told the BPO industry could give the agency business a run for its money in being an industry for mavericks.

While we are talking extremes in these examples, it is still important for people who wish to join companies to understand what they are getting into in terms of management style and working environment. So, do your homework, talk to your seniors, acquaintances and just about anyone who can give you information about the industry, the company and the working environment.

So where is the fit?
So let’s get back to our cricketing example. Mallya has publicly gone on record saying that he would have picked a different team. The common complaint is that Dravid picked a test team. Whether he has or not, he has certainly chosen people he is comfortable with. People like Anil Kumble, Sunil Joshi, Wasim Jaffer and Jacques Kallis who are culturally and emotionally suited, perhaps, to his own disposition. People who are understated, but performers in their own right.

I for one have no idea what is on Mallya’s mind. But if one were to do an academic exercise, I am sure Mallya would have chosen people who would entertain. A few who would have interested the business tycoon — Shane Warne the king of spin, with a cigarette in one hand and a can of beer in the other and with a track record of amazing success and astounding controversies. M. S. Dhoni, the charismatic captain of the Indian team with his flamboyant batting style and matching hair style. Andrew Symonds, the dreadlocked hero, Harbhajan Singh and maybe even Sreesanth… I know all of this seems funny, but I do think that there is some, if not a lot of, truth in the statement that people work better for companies and people they like and are comfortable with. They flower in environments where they have “freedom from fear” and “the freedom to fail.”

Do you have the freedom?

(The writer is CEO Brand-Comm and also the author of One Land One Billion Minds.)

IPL’s drama and excitement leave people thirsty for more!

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/06/12/stories/2008061250040200.htm

Shane Warne is a fantastic cricketer.” I looked up in surprise. Not that the statement was surprising. It was the person who was making the statement about one of the game’s greatest characters that caused me to look up and stare. It was being made by a prosperous 50-year-old lady in the huge queue at the new, glittering and yet completely characterless Bengaluru International Airport.
Would this lady have known that Shane Warne is the greatest leg spinner of all time, if not the most disciplined? Would she know that Shane Warne has over 700 test wickets? Would she know about Warne’s ball of the century to Mike Gatting? Would she have known about his ability to text messages at a furious pace even as he spun the ball with a gentle drift? What she certainly knew about was Warne’s tremendous contribution to the Rajasthan Royals team leading the underdogs to actually end up winning the IPL trophy in an amazing final at the brand new stadium at Vashi.
Yes, the single greatest achievement of the IPL has been its ability to woo housewives and socialites like the lady mentioned above from their traditional soaps to cricketainment as the advertising mentions. I need hardly mention that it had diehard cricket fans like me glued to the television set every evening with a steadfastness that has frustrated spouses and delighted Sony Entertainment whose television ratings for Max have gladdened marketers and advertisers no end. It has also left some of us with withdrawal symptoms as we have nothing to do every evening, not that our spouses want us back in any case! So, how have these 45 days been? Are there any learnings for franchisees, marketers and consumers?

Power of the team, not reputation of individuals
The franchisees that got their team composition right, without worrying unduly about the individual reputations of the players they bid for, were ahead. Rajasthan Royals paid a mere $10.3 million for its team as against $16.9 million paid for the team from Bangalore that was branded as the Royal Challengers. The Mumbai and Hyderabad teams were similarly high priced.
The learning is simple. Reputations or brands cost money but they have not delivered if this tournament is anything to go by. The most valuable player was Shaun Marsh, not Andrew Symonds! All the Indian iconic players delivered sporadically, if at all. The emerging (high price) champions such as Ishant Sharma and Robin Uthappa had very poor ROIs. It seems strange to talk about cricketers as though they were stocks, but many of the Indians flattered to deceive and some of the franchisees at least have regretted the non-performance of their stars quite vehemently and publicly to the embarrassment of the stocks in question!
No other team demonstrated the lack of balance than Hyderabad, which, despite the presence of charismatic players, finished at the bottom of the table, aided and abetted by the likes of Shahid Afridi. So, the big task for the teams next time around is to scout far and wide for talent from the world even as they develop their own young talent within their regions. Also, some of the teams might have to trade their players and hope that this will not add to their losses. Managing teams and managing companies is simple, provided you keep your costs low.

Where is the money?
The main source of revenue for the franchisee is the media rights and the teams in the last four got a bigger share of the media pie – which is a great relief. The phenomenal viewer interest within the country and in cases outside India are a testimony to the tremendous popularity of the T20 format and the closeness of many of the games including the final, which was undecided till the very last ball. The franchisees who are here for the long haul will benefit, although some of them might have been disheartened at the manner in which most of the companies which are publicly listed like Reliance Industries have been hammered in the stock market after they have won the bids.
Clearly, while Dalal Street watches cricket, it does not favour companies investing heavily in it. If you look westwards at similar clubs such as Arsenal, one of the most successful football clubs which has revenues of £177 million, and baseball teams such as the Los Angeles Dodgers, they have a cumulative annual growth rate of 21 per cent.
A significant portion of the gate revenues goes to the franchisees and the sight of full stadiums almost everywhere including Hyderabad, where the Deccan Chargers lost all their seven local games, some of them narrowly, was a feature. The entertainment in the grounds with world-class performers (if not the cheerleaders) must have helped. But one wonders if the same enthusiasm will continue if the cricket fails to deliver. I repeat myself when I say that IPL’s long-term success will have to depend on the quality of success and the closeness of the teams that are competing.

Who is supporting whom?
I started supporting the Royal Challengers and then quickly changed camps. I followed the Punjab Kings (not because of Preity Zinta) for some time and kept reminding myself that I was born in Madras, the home of the Chennai Super Kings, but found myself supporting the winners ultimately.
Speaking of local connect and the ability to garner the locals to back teams, I thought that the Kolkata Knight Riders had done a good job as had, perhaps, the Chennai Super Kings. Of course, these are not based on hard facts, though I did read somewhere that the Kolkata franchise had sold T-shirts to the value of Rs 5 crore.
I feel that while there has been a lot of interest, hype and media around the event, the franchisees, perhaps given the paucity of time, have done very little to promote following for their teams in their cities. People (and here both Kolkata and Chennai are perhaps exceptions) are following the game for their individual favourites, like the lady of the piece following Shane Warne. This will be the big challenge if our cricket teams have to have the following of Manchester United and Chelsea – a lot of ground level activities must happen, not only on our TV screens.
The next big challenge for the franchisees has to be connecting with the local city population. That has to be a continuous, ongoing activity, hopefully resulting in unearthing of local talent making its debut in IPL and eventually hitting the international scene. I know that for all the franchisees, this is a commercial venture. India Cements has already broken even in the first year, but in the long haul, the profitability of this whole venture will have to depend on it being a mass movement that people will feel passionately about, not just a mere mix of cricket and entertainment. Our getting there will depend entirely on the long-term commitment, vision and passion of the franchisees, even if some of them are already frothing at the mouth over the non-performance of their teams and the consequent losses that they have suffered.

Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!
If you had to pick one player who has dominated the media and attention of the nation including the lady in the queue, it has been Shane Warne. One admiring English cricketer who has been tormented enough by him once asked him, “Who writes your scripts?” In the 2005 Ashes series, it was Shane Warne who single-handedly kept England at bay and almost helped Australia retain the Ashes. England loved, admired and yet dreaded Warne and headlines like ‘It ain’t over till the fat laddie spins’ were common and the IPL was over only after the fat laddie won the trophy! Not only him, but a host of players such as Shaun Marsh, Shane Watson, Mathew Hayden and a host of coaches such as John Buchanan and Tom Moody have all left their mark on the tournament. The IPL calendar for the next few years at least must accommodate the full Australian contingent to ensure even greater interest.
So, here is a quick summary of what I am saying. The IPL has been an unqualified success for viewers, spectators and advertisers if not for Vijay Mallya. Prudence in team acquisition and balance in its composition are key. I read somewhere that Kevin Pietersen is being contemplated for a huge fee. My quick response is: Perish the thought; it will be one more costly failure.
Get the players to do grassroots promotions, not TV appearances, as that will help the locals to bond with the teams. Shane Warne has a lot of following in Hampshire as I am sure in Rajasthan. While it is a business, it is still a game for most of us. Let not the sordid things that happen in board rooms be aired on our screens. Manage quietly if you cannot manage efficiently. While Mukesh Ambani has been very much in evidence in the Mumbai stadium, he has, to me at least, been the most admirable owner.
The greatest thing for our cricket has been the emergence of so many fine youngsters such as Manpreet Goni, Yusuf Pathan and Swapnil Asnodkar who have taken to this format as a duck would take to water. May their tribe increase! There has been no innovation in the game itself and the game suffers from its old ailments such as very poor umpiring despite the availability of technology. The umpiring was pathetic. What was even worse was the commentary. We had some of the worst commentators on air while some of the best cricket was on view.
Let me end with a tongue-in-cheek comment even as I accept that some of my initial predictions about IPL have not been bang on. Teams must have both a long-term and a short-term strategy. The short-term strategy would be to get some ageing Australians in, such as Justin Langer, Andy Bichel and Brad Hogg, for a song. The long-term strategy is to use some of the greatest players in the world to influence, motivate and develop local talent that will eventually build a team of world beaters.

Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO of brand-comm and the author of “One land, one billion minds”

Royal challenge – a diluted brew

In my early twenties I used to be a lot dumber than I am now. My father had a bottle of Glen Livet whiskey in his cupboard and on a couple of occasions I had swigs from it. For fear of getting caught, I would slip in some water into the bottle lest my father discover the shortage. I am sure he could recognize the diluted taste of that excellent malt, but being the gentleman he was and still is at 92, he never raised the issue. Now several years later I can see another brand of whiskey being diluted through the impetuosity of its owner. I speak of Royal Challenge or RC as it is fondly referred to by its drinkers. Although I do not have the market share figures to back it, I do believe that Royal Challenge is a dominant brand of whiskey. In fact when I used to be a Rotarian a few years ago, the fellowship used to be the high point of the meetings, particularly those involving multiple clubs, and if RC was not being served, the event would receive a “thumbs down”, so powerful was the brand’s influence on Rotarians from Bangalore at least. Given the threat to surrogate advertising for his brands, Vijay Mallya branded his cricket team as ‘Royal Challengers’ and in five weeks time the team has become history.

The impact on the brand
Surrogate advertising is something that we all see. Mineral water, cocktail snacks, casual wear are all brands of liquor or cigarettes that are not allowed to advertise in mass media and use this devious route. In this scenario Mallya arrived at what might have been a marketing coup in calling his team the ‘Royal Challengers’. Commercials were made - which also featured Mallya - merchandise was created, mass media was bought….A blitzkrieg of advertising was launched. The team started playing matches and losing them with monotonous regularity. The players did their best, but still lost, at times narrowly and at other times embarrassingly. Mallya lost his cool and sacked the CEO who went to town about being ‘summarily dismissed’. Nor was Mallya satisfied with that. He went to the media to complain bitterly about the team composition. The brand has got amazingly bad press and Mallya, in no small measure is responsible for the mess that the brand and the team is in. The only difference between this team and others is that this team is an existing, popular brand, not a new creation like the Kolkatta Knight Riders.

Building a brand’s equity
A brand’s equity is something that is carefully and assiduously built over a period of time. Your actions can add to the brand’s equity or dilute its equity. The poor performance of the team and the controversy surrounding it must certainly have affected the brand. Instead of strengthening a dominant brand, the owner of the brand has substantially diluted the brand’s equity. Imagine a guy walking into the Bangalore Club bar and asking for ‘Royal Challenge’ even as the match is being shown on TV! It is important that Mallya remembers the impact of his sometimes hasty actions on a large, well established, popular brand. After all it is easier to destroy than to build, whether it is a brand or a team.

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO of brand-comm and the author of “One land, one billion minds”)

Cricket break in between commercials

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/05/15/stories/2008051550020200.htm

Brands need to continually reinvent themselves as they grow older but it does not stop with merely changing the identity and creating new commercials to announce it. Does it demonstrate a new focus to the customer, better customer service or more contemporary products?

Cricket has audiences who are glued onto the TV set for hours on end, starting with the pre-match build-up, the toss, the pitch report, the highlights at the end of each innings, the presentation ceremony, the concluding remarks and whatever else follows it. On one single match day, a consumer could end up seeing the same commercial 10 times.

It is 8:45 pm on Tuesday –May 6 – and yet another IPL match is being telecast. I watch religiously despite the mediocre fare being provided by the depleted Chennai kings who clearly miss the likes of Mathew Hayden (who has recently been a t his diplomatic best) and Mike Hussey (who continues to be Mr Cricket).

One more wicket falls as the home team struggles. As I wait for the replay, a commercial comes on air for the nth time.

The IPL has been a succession of TV commercials, several of ordinary quality, like some of the players on display, interspersed with some cricket, some of it lacklustre.

Even as I contemplate switching the channel, the phone rings. It is my friend who calls to tell me that a wicket has fallen in the Royal Challengers camp too as the CEO has just quit. The CEO later reiterates that he has been “summarily dismissed”!

What with the cheerleaders having to tone down their act and actually being made to wear some clothes, Harbhajan’s hand straying onto his India team mate’s cheek, the ‘excellent’ relations between Warne and Ganguly… the IPL has had its fair share of excitement. My regret, though, is that the advertising that has been the foundation for the entire economics of funding the IPL – barring a few exceptions – has been quite boring, at least for diehard viewers like me.

Opportunity to see. But what is there to see?
Media planners swear by OTS or ‘Opportunity to see’. They want consumers like you and me to see the commercials a few times at least, during the purchase cycle. But how many times can one see the same boring commercial which precedes, interrupts and follows a game, which also happens to be dull and one-sided on occasion?

So, here is my question to agency creative and strategic types: What is your view on ‘wear-out’ of TV commercials?

Cricket has audiences who are glued onto the TV set for hours on end, starting with the pre-match build-up, the toss, the pitch report, the highlights at the end of each innings, the presentation ceremony, the concluding remarks and whatever else follows it. On one single match day, a consumer could end up seeing the same commercial 10 times.

Clearly, some of us do not learn or are gluttons for punishment. I read somewhere that the IPL could well be the ‘Superbowl’ of India. Superbowl is a big event in the US, as most of us know, where several brands launch new, edgy commercials at a phenomenal cost. One recalls the impact made by the ‘1984’ commercial previewed by Apple when I was young and actually had hair on my head!

This tradition of launching commercials in the event continues. While the IPL may present a great opportunity for Indian advertisers to showcase their creative talent, one wonders if they have risen to the challenge or even understood the mindset of the viewer of 20-20 cricket.

My submission to advertisers, agencies and marketers is to watch both games on the weekend at 4 p.m. and 8 p.m., particularly the commercials, without switching the channel once and see their own commercials several times over to empathise with the viewer. They will quickly realise that their execution does not measure up to the challenges of repeated opportunities to see on the same day on the same channel.

Having said that, let’s take a look at some of the commercials that have been on air, not necessarily in any order.

Change for the sake of change
It is that time of year when companies seem to be dissatisfied with the way their brands look. Everybody wants to look younger, more with it, and in tune with what a younger audience wants. After all, we are a young country and even if we forget it for a moment, the agencies who have been behind these identity changes will quickly remind us! Ceat, one of the well-known if not iconic brands of my time, has suddenly woken up to the fact that younger customers do not even know it exists.

Marketing as we all know seems to be full of companies who ignore the importance of investing in their brands in a sustained manner! So, out goes the rhino, out goes the ‘born tough’ (a clear position if there was one) and in comes a new colourful logo which is announced with a lot of fanfare.

A lot of the communication on TV is about change itself and how it is inevitable and necessary. There was a level of intrigue in the first commercial where a middle-aged man tries to take a picture of a young girl in a bikini (when will middle-aged men improve!) while a young man wearing a t-shirt with the caption ‘change’ is blocking the view. The other commercials, in my opinion, lack the same level of interest and intrigue.

Godrej, another ‘old’ brand, has reinvented itself in design and Shoppers Stop too has a new identity.

All these campaigns feature heavily on the IPL, some as ‘creepy crawlers’ below and on the side of the screen, which, instead of reminding, actually end up repelling me.

Rejuvenation is an important part of branding and brands need to constantly monitor themselves, keep measuring how consumers feel about them and look for ways to engage the customer.

But identity, however visible, is just one aspect of the brand. Brands need to continually reinvent themselves as they grow older but that does not stop with merely changing the identity and creating new commercials to announce it. Does it demonstrate a new focus to the customer, better customer service or more contemporary products?

My concern about all these identity changes is that there is a predictable pattern to it. The logo is changed, often without continuing any aspect of its past; it becomes a lot more vibrant and colourful; there is a high-profile ad campaign that touts the change and then life goes on. What has changed for the brand or the consumer?

Hawaai at your feet
When we were kids (there I go again!) we used to wear a brand of rubber chappals called Hawaii made by Bata. Every second person used to wear it. In fact, I later discovered that Hawaii had become a generic name and several other manufacturers sold their brands as Hawaii to unsuspecting and uniformed customers.

Paragon, a company that makes rubber chappals has a new commercial featuring actor Shriya (Rajnikant’s lady love in the film Shivaji) who is dancing in the streets with a group of people, one of whom is a lady with a broom! Another celebrity commercial without a script or an idea … quite like a formula film that cannot find the right formula.

In defence of the commercial, I must tell you that my 17-year-old nephew, who is visiting from Malaysia, wanted to buy the chappals because he likes Shriya … So there you go.

The agency might well say “you are not the target audience!” But I am the target audience for the commercials done by Citibank. Clearly, the bank seems to be stressed out because of all this sub-prime crisis and I do recall one commercial with a girl jogging, talking to the camera and I could not for the life of me figure out what she was saying. Citibank has a series of commercials which are not too different.

From banks, we move on to insurance and another commercial for Max NewYork Life which has a harried housewife whom we later discover is paranoid.

But I am getting ahead of myself. A lady enters an empty house and searches high and low for her husband. He is not answering his phone, his shoes are strewn carelessly on the floor and he is nowhere to be found. The tension increases for the lady as she rushes from pillar to post calling out to her husband and her panic increases. She finally finds him slumped in his chair and rushes to him, only to wake up the poor sleeping man who probably was having one of his few moments of peace undisturbed by his wife…

Yes, insurance is a difficult subject and fear is not an easy emotion to handle, but after all this build-up, staccato images, black and white treatment, all adding the tension, it’s a letdown as the film ends almost comically. As my nephew says, “God! She almost gave him a stroke waking him up like that!” Yes, advertising works differently for different folks I guess.

Love me, love my dog
Advertising uses the unnatural liking we have for children and dogs. I love dogs and children (especially when they are not my own) and I just love the Vodafone commercial which has a cute girl with curls and our pug which has now acquired celebrity status. The brand which used to talk about coverage is now talking about service and helping consumers.

The commercials are charming, to put it mildly, and restore my faith in the power of advertising to charm and sell. Being an Airtel consumer, I am unable to talk about their service. But being an avid television watcher, I can tell you that I do not mind ‘opportunities to see’ commercials like these.

Another interesting commercial is for the Moto Yuva where a middle-aged father apes his teenage son while his family watches in amusement. While I have discussed a few commercials that were sad, weird even, there is nothing to beat the Animal Welfare Board which claims that the dog has been mistreated and the ad should be pulled off air!

So, here’s hoping that we get better cricket breaks!

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO,brand-comm, and the author of One Land, One Billion Minds.)

Would Richard Branson have done the same thing?

Sir Richard Branson is a one man PR army. He has built images, brands and businesses in a manner that few, if any, have done using public relations as a strategic differentiator. He has been lowered via a crane in his birthday suit for the launch of his mobile services in New York, dressed himself as a bride to promote bridal wear, danced the bhangra at Heathrow airport when Virgin launched its flight into India, went around Connaught place on top of an auto and went in a second class compartment with the dabba wallahs of Mumbai. The list of photo opportunities that he found with such regular ease goes on. Sir Richard Branson, although frequently found in the company of models and long legged beauties, knew the difference between being on Page3 and Page1 of the newspapers. He had amazing self assurance and could think on his feet. When once asked at a press conference on how one could be a millionaire, he said, “You start out as a billionaire and then run an airline!” to howls of laughter from the media. Vijay Mallya has lots of similarities with Sir Richard Branson. He could have even modeled himself on the maverick business man for all we know. But that is pure conjecture. What is not conjecture however is the fact that he is in your face in the media and is a successful businessman recognized globally with a range of diverse brands that he markets internationally. His latest venture is as the franchisee owner of the Royal Challengers team in IPL and sadly for him this venture has caused him a lot of embarrassment and heartburn, in that order of importance.

A team in disarray
20-20 cricket is perhaps a lot more unpredictable than regular cricket which already has a reputation for unpredictability. However there has been nothing unpredictable about the performance of the Royal Challengers’ team that has lost 7 out of the 9 games that it has played so far and is predictably at the bottom of the table if not at the bottom of the popularity charts. Gifted as we are with enormous hindsight, it is obvious to see that the team management, whoever it may be, has done many things wrong or could have done things differently. It is perhaps a problem with Bangalore in that it has two senior players Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble who have never played this format before, and in fact are not even regulars in the one day version of the game. Rahul Dravid, instead of finding people with diverse skills who would complement his own solidity has found players with similar styles like Wasim Jaffer and Jacques Kallis. Yes, the critics have labeled it as a test team in surrogate uniform. The successful teams have entertaining and match-winning Australians like the Hussey brothers, Gilchrist, Symonds, Hayden, Watson, Warne, McGrath, and Shaun Marsh… the list goes on. The Bangalore team has only Cameron White who is not even a regular in Australian one day team and yet he commanded a price higher than all of them (with the exception of Symonds) and not surprisingly is not a regular in the Royal Challengers team. I suppose the management of the team does not have the same respect for Australian cricketers as the rest of the cricketing world. As a person who lives in Bangalore I am terribly disappointed with the team’s performance, but have not watched it live as the team does not have a single cricketer who can set the stadium alight, with perhaps the exception of Dale Steyn who is constrained by his being a bowler who can only bowl four overs in a match.

Vijay Mallya loses it
As defeats happened with depressing regularity Vijay Mallya lost his cool. His ego was hurt, which was understandable. But his reaction was irrational and poorly handled and difficult to understand from a public relations point of view. His sacking of the CEO was poorly done and created bad press, and Charu Sharma continues to talk to the media. Instead of talking to Rahul Dravid about the team’s performance he continues to talk to the media about how he was unhappy with the team selection and how he had a different list of players whom he wished to select. Is this his way of getting the people he does not like out of the team, Rahul Dravid included? But surely there has to be a better, calmer way of handling this crisis. If only Vijay Mallya looked at this as a business loss he would have taken in its stride. But his ego has been hurt and he has reacted poorly, irrationally even, and shown himself in an unfavourable light to some of his admirers.I for one am a great admirer of his airline and am a frequent flier on it. Mr. Mallya is a successful businessman with a track record that many lesser lights would envy. But his childish handling of this situation is something that we expect from the BCCI, not from a corporate leader with a reputation. As we all know the Chairman of Selectors, also has this distressing habit of talking to the media about his displeasure with individual players! If one of the CEOs of Mr.Mallya’s businesses had not delivered, how would Mallya have handled it. Quite differently I am sure. Why does managing cricket cause people to lose their heads?

Mr. Mallya I am no expert in public relations, but something tells me that Sir Richard Branson would have handled the situation differently. As a cricket lover I can only say that “its just not cricket”. But as an observer of public relations I can tell you that good businessmen “praise in Public and criticize in private”. And to criticize to the media, that is just not the done thing. The Royal Challengers team has its fair share of problems, some of which can be fixed. But the largest problem seems to be a jittery owner.

Now who will fix that problem?

Midsummer night’s excitement

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/05/01/stories/2008050150100200.htm

It is just a week (at the time of writing) since the IPL had a spectacular opening night at the M. A. Chinnaswamy stadium at Bengaluru on April 18. Opening night hardly seems the way to describe a new cricketing format and tournament, but that is pre cisely what it was.
It had glamour, excitement, extravaganza, music, performances, laser shows and, to top it all, a fantastic display of fireworks that had live and television audiences oohing and aahing. The show was something that any Indian would have been proud of and I am no exception. Sadly, the match that followed was a damp squib, or at least the Royal Challengers’ innings, if you could call it that, was a demonstration on how not to play the 20-20 format.
The last week has been a kaleidoscope of action on the field, some truly exciting games that have gone to the wire, some typically one-sided games, a few goof-ups in the organisation of the game, ratings on the rise, a lot of advertising on the screen – a lot of it, as it happens in India, intruding into the game, controversies regarding the cheerleaders, some of it probably justified and perhaps a taste of the overkill on cricket that one is sure to be exposed to before the finals on June 1.

BCCI or IPL? Who runs the game on the ground?

In my view, and that is not an isolated view, the IPL as a concept in cricket has been a marketing coup. It has been a well orchestrated sales pitch culminating in the finalising of the cash-rich franchisees, a players’ auction where players were bid for and bought - making Adam Gilchrist feel a bit like a cow (albeit a well paid one!), the enormous build-up and hype preceding the event with every newspaper and television channel in the country (the numbers of which seem beyond my comprehension, at least) devoting entire sections to it and the television commercials promoting the event before the tournament …

Thankfully, the IPL at least seems to have got its advertising act right for the later commercials are far better than the karmayudh ones that launched the event. Of course, there is learning for us as well. Just check which team your dentist supports lest you end up in the dentist’s chair – naïve and as a supporter of the opposing side as the IPL commercial depicts! Beware too of thin ladies with keychains who get into the same lift as you, they just might be supporting some other team!

But advertising is the easy part; the more difficult part is the organisation and here the IPL or BCCI has miles to go before it sleeps. Take the match played at the Eden Garden before a capacity crowd of over a 100,000 people and television audiences of a few millions. The pitch that was dished out for such a crucial game was a landmine and the batsmen were expecting the ball to explode in their faces and they played tentatively. Of course, an enquiry has been ordered into the affair and we all know what happens to enquiries in our country! However, let me quickly mention that a sporting pitch is not such a bad idea. People do not want to see only sixes and fours, but tense, tight games.

As though we had not had enough excitement for one evening, the lights failed at a crucial stage of the Eden Gardens game and we almost had a record in the possible intervention of Msrs Duckworth and Lewis in deciding the outcome of the match! Thankfully, there was light at the end of the tunnel literally and the match was resumed after a delay of half-an-hour which seemed like two hours, late as it was in the night.

The matches too for some strange reason start at 8 p.m. and given the lethargic manner in which some teams bowl and the dew which makes them rub the ball after every delivery ensures that most matches end only at 11.30 pm. Why are matches starting so late? Is it to woo the soap audiences who can join the second innings after seeing Kolangal? Incidentally, Tamil Nadu seems to have pretty low viewership still. I suppose it is difficult to beat the lure of the soaps and the tearjerkers!

More confusion followed in Mumbai where a fantastic show of fireworks was followed by a shower of debris on the playing area and one saw a bemused Jacques Kallis, who was perhaps more used to repairing the damage in the South African innings, actually repairing the playing surface and cleaning it up! And finally, the cheerleaders! I read the interesting comment by someone saying that the gyrations of the cheerleaders were not much different from what one saw from the Mumbai bar girls. Having never had the good fortune of visiting these heritage spots of that great city, I cannot comment. But what I can say is that US audiences have demonstrated time and again that cheerleaders do not make a difference to audiences or viewership and if what one is seeing on television is any indication, I am sure it is just a waste of time and money. I suppose too that our cameramen can find better angles than the ones they are using now to show the Redskins and the other cheerleaders at the various venues. What seems to be on offer most of the time is skin while reason suggests that people might be more interested in the sight of wood striking leather!

Taking the audience for a ride!

IPL has delivered ratings to the franchisees and advertisers as the games have overtaken ongoing reality shows and family soaps. Clearly, IPL is the season’s biggest blockbuster; whether it is because of the cricket or entertainment is still a toss-up.

What is not in doubt is that the games have got a much higher percentage of women viewers as 8.2 million women in six metros watched the initial matches and the average viewership was as high as 23 minutes. Yes, the initial excitement, interest and viewership are all heady, and yet a word of caution is relevant here. As an avid watcher of the cricket, I repeat, and not the cheerleaders, I am appalled at the high percentage of television commercials. I am sure the network was happiest when the lights went out at the Eden Garden as commercial after commercial kept getting repeated, many of them boring. The sad part is that while advertisers and agencies are going gaga about 20-20 as a great opportunity, the sad reality is that none of them has done anything specific for the event or the format, except the IPL itself and the teams. They keep showing the same commercials, many of these commercials are too long for a shortened version of the game.

Also, there is a distressing reappearance of the creepy-crawlies that used to bother us in the old video cassettes that we saw a few years ago. Remember those obnoxious ad messages that used to be below the visual, often encroaching into the visual area? Well, they seem to be back with a bang. I remember a few commercials – maybe they were from Hyundai or Godrej. I think channels have a duty too to the viewer. I am sure they will find enough ways of making money, but remember you are killing the golden goose and are putting off the genuine viewers who make this whole economy sustainable.

So, whom should I support?

I have spent the last 28 years of my life in Bangalore, a city I love, traffic jams, airport controversies et al. Yet, I cannot imagine supporting this team though I personally admire Rahul Dravid. Should I support the Chennai team because I was born there and spent the first 27 years of my life? Should it matter to me that the highly paid captain of the Chennai team, the charismatic M.S. Dhoni, cannot speak a word of Tamil? Maybe I should support the Rajasthan team as perhaps I could take a holiday there or because Shane Warne has given me more pleasure as a viewer than any other cricketer?

Ultimately, it will just boil down to the cricket, which is probably why that all this new viewership caused by stars like Shah Rukh Khan and Preity Zinta and the entertainment such as fireworks and concerts by Hariharan may dwindle, and women will go back to the familiarity of the soaps and leave only the diehards like me to watch the cricket.

This is the biggest challenge. Rahul Dravid, before the first match, said he wanted to see a sea of red in the stadium as red was the team’s colour. But were the T-shirts available before the match? I am not sure, as the launch seemed to happen much later. To me, the defining moment of the week’s cricket so far was in the match between the Mumbai Indians and the Royal Challengers. Mukesh Ambani, the owner of the Mumbai team, was in the crowd wearing his team’s colours. Rahul Dravid, the captain of the opposing team, played a wonderful on drive (he does that when he gets rid of the shackles in his mind) and Ambani stood up and cheered. Yes, thank you, Sir, for reminding us it is about the game and its quality and not the narrow confines that have been artificially created by marketers. It is only the quality of the cricket and the talent of the cricketers that will sustain the IPL, aided as it will be by the very natural excitement that the 20-20 format inherently provides.

Here is hoping that there is more excitement in the game. Therein lies the real entertainment.

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO, brand-comm, and the author of One Land, One Billion Minds.)

How agile is your company?

We live in times that simultaneously present great opportunities and tremendous challenges as well. Companies need to do multiple things and follow different strategies to stay ahead in this complex environment. Today, one particular strategy that is gaining increasing credence in the corporate world is that of “agility”.

A study conducted by Booz Allen Hamilton amongst CEOs threw up an interesting fact: CEOs had identified “improving corporate agility” as their most important goal, next to topline revenue growth. This made me wonder. Yes, it does seem important and even allows companies who claim competence in this discipline to actually stand out from their competition.

But are companies actually practising what they preach? I know for a fact that my company is not as agile as some of our competitors or even half as agile as it ought to be. That leads me to a question that seems easier to ask than to actually answer. “How agile is your company?” More critically, “Is agility up there on your agenda so that it gets the sort of senior management attention and energy that it so patently deserves.”

What makes for agility?
“It is no longer enough to respond to change; today, organisations must lead change or be left behind,” says leadership expert Pollyanna Pixton. Today, there is growing interest in change and change becomes extremely relevant in the context of agility because being agile means being proficient at change. Agility allows an organisation to do anything it wants to or has to do to remain agile.

An agile enterprise is basically a change proficient organisation. So here is another thought that crosses my mind. Does your organisation talk more about change or is it at the forefront of creating change? Or is it, like most corporations, merely responding to change? Sometimes questions can be uncomfortable, but the smarter organisations address them sooner rather than later.

Innovation at the heart of agility
Innovation is another attribute that companies seem to aspire for. Though innovation seems to be part of the mission statement of most companies, it seems to be revered more in rhetoric than in actual practice. While a few companies like Apple seem to have innovation in their DNA, many others still seem to be coming to terms with the concept or the process to make it an integral part of their thinking and functioning.

Let’s study innovation in a little more detail. Where is it generally found? Innovation is most often found in product design and an innovative product that readily comes to mind is the iPod.

In the Indian context one remembers the Titan Edge, which was the slimmest watch in the world, truly elegant and breakthrough. India too can claim credit for the “single serve” packaging revolution that the sachet brought to Indian consumers and the contribution of brands like Chik to bringing this product to what C. K. Prahalad, the eminent management professor, called the “bottom of the pyramid”.

Innovations could also be in the strategy that companies devise and Titan’s revolutionising of the concept of gifting watches was an innovative strategy that made and continues to make a difference to the brand’s fortunes. Other smart companies innovate in their processes and that helps them gain leadership. Infosys has made the global delivery system a differentiator, while other companies and brands have innovatively positioned themselves to stand out from their competitors. Often , agile companies can discover and lead a paradigm shift and move to a different level of opportunity as the early movers in the Internet space demonstrated. So what is innovative about your company?

How can your organisation be agile?
Let’s take a look at some agile organisations and see what makes them tick or what other aspiring corporations can do to climb onto the agility bandwagon. While enterprises have executives and managers at varying levels, who contribute to the company’s progress, the agile ones have a tremendous amount of healthy debate on critical issues that impact the company and its business.

In case you want your company to be agile, it might not be a bad idea to heighten the quantity and quality of debates within the company. But before that, run a quick reality check on the company culture. Is it conducive to debate? Do people have the freedom to disagree with ideas? Is there a culture of disagreeing without being disagreeable?

It is critical that organisations provide their employees time for learning and self-development. Often enough, many companies have a board of directors who take their functional responsibility more seriously than their role as part of a senior management team that guides and directs the destiny of the company. It is important for directors to play a larger role that cuts across functional specialisations.

Smarter companies also back multiple ideas, much the way a punter would go to a strange race course and back a few horses as he might not know which one will get him the jackpot. Agile companies make more decisions and quickly move from an authoritarian to a collaborative style of management that serves today’s needs better. Technology companies, given the nature of their business and environment, seem to have applied more thought to agility and use methods like extreme programming and Scrum which seem to work for them. It is, perhaps, worthwhile to remember that agility need not be the domain of technology companies only and every company must consider it as a strategic differentiator.

Customer focus the key
Business usually revolves around the customer. Companies need to constantly scan the environment to sense and define meaningful changes in the environment and gear themselves up to respond to these changes so that they can serve their customer needs better. It seems obvious that customer needs are changing frequently and on occasion dramatically, if not unreasonably. It seems obvious that the smart companies will deliver to their customers whilst the more agile companies will deliver it quicker, better and perhaps more cost-effectively. So how well are you monitoring customer needs? And how geared is your organisation to meet their changed needs? Introspection seems to be the need of the hour.The way forward
Running companies is not easy. Often enough, the urgent seems to take precedence over the important. Agility is something that has to be urgently put on the agenda of companies if they have to stay ahead. As the adage goes, “In the future, there will be only two types of companies; those that are quick and those that are dead.”

I am sure we would all much rather live and thrive than be dead. While it is all very nice to want to be agile, it is more critical for companies to have a process in place to improve their agility. Intent is only half the battle, the other half is the discipline of a process that will get you there.

Get there first or be left behind forever.

(The writer is CEO, brand-comm and the author of ‘One land, one billion minds’.)

Is innovation the name of the game?

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/04/17/stories/2008041750050200.htm

Where’s the beef?” asked Clara Peller, former manicurist turned TV celebrity in her campaign for Wendy’s, which was one of the most recalled advertising campaigns of all time so much so that it made it into the editorial, the langua ge of the street, jokes and even underwear. Closer home Minute Maid has launched a similar campaign with perhaps far less impact with the line “Where’s the pulp?” Inspired by these thoughts and all the developments in the world of cricket and the competition between ICL and IPL and the weakness that exists genetically in ICC led me to this important question “Where’s the innovation in cricket?”

It seems obvious to me that the BCCI has demonstrated tremendous innovativeness (borrowed as it is from other sports such as basketball and football) in the conceptualisation and marketing of the IPL to various cash-rich franchisees. But for IPL to hold its own and thrive, or for ICL to survive even, one or both of them need to come up with innovations that extend to the game, its audiences and viewers, not only to the advertisers and marketers whose importance cannot be ignored.

Space-seller’s delight
Cricket is not only the number one passion in this country but the one which has witnessed very creative selling. When I was in South Africa in 2003 to watch the World Cup, I was talking to one of the TV technicians covering the event and he said, “You Indians are amazing! Imagine having sponsors for the weather report and the toss!” Yes, those certainly and many more, like the fours and the sixes package and the hunk of the day show, multi-tasking suggestions, SMS contests like naming your favourite player … clearly the demand for advertising time so far has been much more than the supply and the marketers have excelled themselves in innovation.

Of course, there is a quick downside to this. The current test series between South Africa and India has been a revelation in the sense that one actually got to see the batsmen talking to each other in the middle between overs. What? No commercials! You must be joking! Yet, the ICC, greedy as it is, aided and abetted by other boards, is running the risk of killing the real McCoy, which is test cricket. The West Indies has finished playing Sri Lanka at home and New Zealand have just finished a home series against England while the ICL matches were on every day, not to forget the Deodhar trophy and the Challenger series even if we are allowed to forget the Pura Cup, the finals of which were shown here too in India. Was anyone watching? This will be the ultimate challenge and soon there will be less and less test and one-day cricket and more of 20:20 cricket.

The innovation of television
Television coverage of test cricket started (hold your breath) in 1938 when England played Australia at Lord’s. But it has come quite far since then, though one must remember that till 1989 coverage was only from one side of the wicket, the logic being that when you watched a match live, you watched it from the same seat in the stadium.

Innovations have multiplied since the days of Kerry Packer and Channel 9 has led the way. StumpVision’s value was demonstrated by Shane Warne’s ball of the century. Throw in the snickometer, stump microphones (even if they throw up bilge on reproduction), slow motion replays to fractions of frames … all these and more have made it an absolute delight to watch cricket even if in India one’s viewing of the cricket has usually been interrupted by avaricious television channels. I am sure we will continue to watch even more technological innovations, all of which will make us better umpires than Simon Tauffel, the world’s best umpire, even if we give our decision seven replays later!

Necessity the mother of innovation

When Kerry Packer threatened to divide the cricketing world in two he came up with some outstanding innovations not only in the marketing of the game but in its running. Coloured clothing still rules the roost, though teams such as ICL’s Chennai Superstars hurt your eyes with the colour of their uniforms. Today most of the cricket is played under lights especially the shorter version of the game. Replays on the big screen that had the audience sweating…all these and more have been there for ages. The wonders that we experienced twenty years ago when we first watched World Series cricket are there, perhaps not too much new has been added. The ICL is doing many things that have been done before even if getting item number starlets to perform in between innings might be termed as an innovation by them, even if it seems pretty boring stuff to me, more so since my wife always seems to be around when that particular item comes on!

Where’s the innovation?

Let’s take two of the most hyped cricketing formats that are currently on view for us in India - ICL and IPL.
ICL already has eight teams and IPL will have a further eight. Let us look at some of the names as the name is perhaps the most visible part of a brand, even a sports brand. If you ignore the prefixes of the places, which are inevitable, you will find lions, superstars, heroes, champs, rockets, kings, challengers, chargers and royals. All the franchisees want to build brands around their respective franchisees but they seemed to have missed the first chance to be different or innovative.

All the franchisees have announced their teams with tremendous fanfare though some clearly have been lukewarm both in the composition of the teams and the way they have gone about announcing them to the media. Of the lot, I must mention that the King Khan’s launch of his team Knight Riders probably stole the thunder. We had him exposing his teams, his mascot the golden helmet, his commercials (ad infinitum on the channel as publicity) and even the team’s anthem.

While an anthem per se is an interesting idea, at the risk of sounding cynical, I must tell you that the Aussie chant “C’mon Aussie C’mon” is at least 20 years old as an idea. Having said that I am not even sure how ready the other teams are with their merchandise and promotions given the fact that the tournament starts on April 18.

The challenge of the future

Twenty-twenty is a phenomenal concept and our winning of the world 20:20 competition in South Africa will not be forgotten by us in a hurry. In fact, the ICL, which has much older players who retired some time ago like Ian Harvey and Stuart Law, to name just two, has had its fair share of exciting games and I just got a mailer from ICL saying that one particular game had a TVR of 2.6. When I used to live in Chennai, I used to find people stopping to watch a fourth division league match being played at the Madras Medical College grounds. So people will watch ICL, IPL, just about any L provided the cricketers perform.

Unfortunately, the BCCI and the franchisees have built too much hype around the generic interest of the 20:20 format. The recent ad for IPL saying it is more than a dharmayudh, it is a karmayudh. Wow! Adam Gilchrist slogging it out with Shane Warne promises to be certainly a war of karma! Speak about “mere puffery” that advertising specialises in! We do know that whenever any brand over promises and does not deliver on expectation it falls flat on its face. The IPL has to deliver on the consumer experience both in the stadium and in front of the TV screens. Getting skimpily dressed foreign models as cheerleaders is hardly the most innovative thing that one can think of. When Australia played England in a 20:20 game last year at the SCG I think it was, the commentator spoke to Gilchrist even as he was belting sixes and when the commentator asked Michael Vaughan what his strategy was, he very candidly said that he was only thinking of getting out of the hard hit ball’s way! Those to my mind were innovations as they gave the viewer something he had not been getting earlier and they had nothing to do with another meaningless contest or another opportunity to sell space.

My advice to both the franchisees and the IPL is to look for ways to engage the spectator in his team, the game and cricket, not at the meaningless things that go by the way of entertainment. The real entertainment for cricket has to happen within 22 yards and the game has enough entertainers and characters to hold the attention of a billion people even.

Yet, why should I, living in Bangalore, support Jacques Kallis or my cousin in Hyderabad chant slogans for Andrew Symonds? That is the challenge of the modern game and I guess traditionalists like me are going to watch less of their favourite sport test cricket. But we have an open mind to change; we still watch one-day cricket and 20:20 cricket. But please do something different around the game of cricket that will engage, enthrall and make me loyal.

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO, brand-comm, and the author of One Land, One Billion Minds.)

A time to reflect

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/catalyst/2008/04/03/stories/2008040350080200.htm

Conventions, fests and industry gatherings are not only a wonderful time to network and catch up on gossip as much as a time to consider larger issues like the state of the industry that has given us everything that we have. In my 25th year in thisindustry (God, has it been so long, it hardly seems like that though!) many things have changed, while many others have not. Clients continue to be what they are, creative and account management cannot see eye to eye and there is never enough money to give the campaign the money it so desperately needs, we are not paid half of what we deserve… Having cleared the air of all these obvious generalities let us spend a little time on the industry and the way forward.

The very essence of the agency business
Sometimes we tend to forget the basics or the obvious things in our quest for unreasonable goals. Brands need a raison d’etre, a basis for existence. Like Starbucks came into existence because the average American needed a “third place” in his life after his home and his place of work. In the same context, what does advertising bring to the table? Or if we were to borrow a concept from C. K. Prahalad, the renowned management guru, “What is the core competence of the advertising agency business?” It is creativity; pure and simple. We can talk of global networks, integration of allied services, media optimisation and indeed we must. But at the end of the day nothing much has changed since the days of Claude Hopkins. Clients still come to agencies because they have a need. They wish to sell their products and services and they expect outstanding creative that will make that happen.

Leaders or followers?
The agency business believes in understanding the consumer and pushing buttons to make her act in a particular way. In short, our understanding of insights that motivate the consumer to act in a particular way are reflected in our creative, whether it is for insurance or detergents or shampoos. Yet to me it seems passive and represents more of an efficient follower of trends. Films, for instance, however bad they may be on occasion, have tended to lead change while the advertising industry has been content to follow the trends that someone else seems to represent. Yes, it is true when we say that advertising reflects the times we live in. But does that mean we lose the capability to lead change? One of my clients had an interesting thought. He said, “You agency guys are pretty good at following clients. You do the things we want, open offices if we ask you to which is all fine. But I have a suggestion for you. Why don’t you follow the consumer and her trends rather than follow clients?” Interesting question! I wish I had the answer to that one.

East or West the Indian way is the best
The way I looked at the world when I was 21 is different from the way my children who are around that age look at it. I was diffident, looking to the rest of the world for guidance, inspiration and approval if not for recognition. Today my children and their peers are confident, sometimes, I feel, to the point of arrogance. They do not need the approval of the rest of the world and that, sadly, includes their parents.

The environment, mood and overall outlook has metamorphosed, to put it mildly. If I were to look at this change from the advertising industry’s perspective we were in awe of Madison Avenue and looked to them for inspiration. Today I guess we still look at Madison Avenue for the approval of our budgets but there is a definite reliance on Indian thoughts, insights and ideas even if that has meant that scripts are conceptualised with a turn of phrase that is essentially Hindi that challenges the likes of me.

But what I am proposing is perhaps slightly different. Let me borrow from two sports, hockey and cricket though I must confess that my knowledge of the former is sketchy at best. When I was young Indian hockey was supreme on the world stage and then we lost our way as we were unable to find a style that worked for us in the face of the strength and the different styles followed by teams from Europe and Australia and we were left behind. In cricket we have found a new dominance, which, one hopes, will last. The reason for our success is because our batsmen continue to be essentially wristy and stylish while our fast bowlers have suddenly discovered pace, bounce and swing that we were usually subjected to. In a sense this is the best of two worlds as we have built on something that we already have, and acquired something that was lacking. The Western advertising world has believed in the power of the single-minded idea which, to my mind, is still the most compelling way of producing advertising. Couple that with an ability to create for our consumers and you will have a winner. I think a lot of Indian advertising is good and what prevents it from becoming great is the preoccupation with a Hindi turn of phrase and not so much the power of the idea and its long-term value.

Integration! What it is?
Agencies have been talking about integration for almost two decades now and their understanding of it is becoming hazier by the moment. For too long agencies have said “One voice” when they actually meant “One invoice”. Integration is a powerful concept that has delivered wonderfully for brands. Take a brand like Britannia’s 50-50 which has used this concept wonderfully, even sponsoring the third umpire’s decision in cricket matches where the audience waited tensely for the decision. Was the batsman in the crease or outside? Fifty-fifty! 100 per cent for integration! One of the reasons for the poor execution of this concept of integration by others has been the limited understanding of some of the communication disciplines by the people concerned. Take public relations … for instance, the advertising agency thinks that PR is getting its commercial reviewed while the PR company is clueless about the power of advertising or the strategy behind its own client’s campaign. The onus on integration, therefore, is squarely with the client. How many hats will the poor client wear, however gifted?

Is positioning only for clients and her brands?
Agencies have been brilliant in differentiating their client’s products for over 150 years. Remember the “bottles washed in steam?” Agencies too have been responsible for brands owning words in the consumer’s mind. Volvo has owned the word ‘safety’, Volkswagen has stood for ‘reliability’ and Nike has stood for ‘attitude’. Let us not forget that agencies have created this differentiation and helped position these brands uniquely. Sadly the agencies have failed to position themselves clearly. They continue to be ‘full service’, ‘creative boutique’ or ‘ideas’. What word does the agency own in client’s minds? They need to think about this. Charity, after all, begins at home.

A few good men and women
The economy is booming, if what one reads and sees in the media is any indication, and advertising cannot be left behind in an economy like ours. Yet we are constrained by the lack of people. In the Eighties we had people from top flight management schools coming to advertising. Several of the MDs of India’s leading agencies are from one top flight management school or the other. Today advertising agencies are going to smaller, less reputed and inferior schools to recruit. Advertising has lost out and become a low-involvement career option if at all it is an option. Clients who complain about the size of the agency retainers are also critical about the sort of people who are handling their business. This is the biggest challenge for the advertising industry. How does it package itself better with clients so that they see the value they are providing and hence get paid better? How to position the agency business as a destination for young men and women?

Do better ads
In 1987 when I was being interviewed by Mr. A. G. Krishnamurthy, the then CMD of Mudra, he asked me the usual question, “Why do you want to join Mudra?” I looked at the pin-up board in his cabin and said “I want to be involved with work like your agency is doing”. The work for Vimal and Rasna in those days, to me, at least, was path-breaking. I think the long term solution for the agency business is to produce work that people notice, talk about and love. Young people will want to be a part of this fascinating process of creativity. The Benton and Bowles agency used to have this philosophy: “If it doesn’t sell it isn’t creative’.

My advice to the advertising industry is simple “If we don’t sell ourselves to young people, we will no longer be creative.”

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO, brand-comm, and the author of One Land, One Billion Minds)