Social Marketers - Brands which believe in People and Planet

Going beyond the mere goal of ‘Profit-Making’, organizations that have an objective vision with a social cause in place, are the ones that are the real growth drivers for the economy, is what Ramanujam Sridhar, Founder and CEO, Integrated Brand-comm has to say about ‘Social Marketers’, one of the ten categories of the Pitch Brands 50 –Awards For Excellence in Marketing, presented by ABP News, in partnership with Percept to be held on June 12 at Leela Kempinski in Gurgaon.

Sridhar further says, “When organizations have a clear strategy in mind that reaches to the grass root level in terms of business and social good, then we have a winning organization in shape.”

While more than 30 brands made it to the shortlist after going through investigative – scrutiny of the Pitch’s editorial team, 13 were selected to go to the next level. While the jury has locked five winners, let’s take a quick-peek look at the 13 names that went to the jury.

One of the brands that made it to the shortlisted list was ‘Punar Vivah’, a daily soap on Zee TV, which is based on the trials and tribunes of remarriage in India. The show wanted to reach out to viewer’s battling the same taboo. So the question was how to communicate with the audience on this sensitive issue? Mobilox and Zee TV partnered in conceptualizing a mobile solution that would provide a platform for all viewers access to live counselling where they can seek professional help on issues enveloping around remarriage right from their mobile phone.

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Ageless Brands: Date the beginning of an everlasting legend!

Ageless Brands are like mighty rivers, which have been flowing throughout the year for centuries as their market remains unchanged and power unchallenged, is what Sharad Sarin, Senior Marketing Professor from XLRI has to say about ‘Ageless Brands’, one of the ten categories of the Pitch Brands 50 –Awards For Excellence in Marketing, presented by ABP News, in partnership with Percept.

While more than 20 brands made it to the shortlist after going through investigative –scrutiny of the Pitch’s editorial team, 10 were selected to go to the next level. While the jury has locked five winners, let’s take a quick-peek look at the 12 names that went to the jury.

Lux is one such brand from the list which has come a long way from early days of Leela Chitnis, Prema Narayan, Rekha, Zeenat Aman, Hema Malini to Sridevi to Shah Rukh Khan to Katrina kaif and still remains one of the leaders in the beauty soaps category.

According to Pitch Brands 50 jury member Sunil Gupta, Marketing Partner, South Asia, Results International Group, all brands want to remain relevant to the changing consumer as well with the changing time. “Ageless brands should not be considered as ‘Old’, and this perception needs to be changed as they evolve with time. “Sticking to their core promise, ageless or everlasting brands have evolved to ensure that they are relevant to the changing consumer,” says Gupta.

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Building the perfect property

When competition overwhelms the market and brands find it difficult to differentiate on unique attributes or price, it might be a good idea to invest in building a property?

When one thinks of Coke three things come immediately to mind: the Coke brand mark, the iconic bottle and the colour red. These are powerful attributes and provide instant customer recognition when used in combination or even individually. While Coca-Cola has spent hundreds of millions of dollars over decades to build these attributes, their success is not purely a result of time and money. It is thanks largely to the company’s understanding of one of the basic principles of branding — building strong product attributes that work as powerful differentiators.

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