How the brand tasted success with witty and controversial ads
At a time when venture capitalists are looking at start-ups with the
same trepidation that Australian batsmen look at sub-continental
wickets, one particular brand has broken the trend of pessimism and
scepticism, and that is Quikr — a brand I have been following closely
for some time now.
Its history
Quikr was launched in July 2008 as an Indian online classified
advertising platform, where users can buy or sell goods and services,
from one another.
Let’s take a quick look at the launch commercials released in July 2011.
In the ads, people wanted to sell their bikes or mobiles at the click
of a finger using the mnemonic “Quikrrrrrrr.”
While the commercials were quite striking, I had my reservations. “Was
the brand getting into too tight a boundary with a brand-name like
Quikr? Was the consumer interested in speed of sale or a better price?”
asked the older, more rational consumer in me. But I soon came to a
realisation — that I was not the target audience.
The impatient Indian
The target audience was the impatient Indian, the two-minute noodle
generation who, if given a choice, would have been born in six months!
They want everything the day before yesterday and find T20s too long.
They are great fans of the digital medium, which is in keeping with
their impatient state of mind.
The brand continued to “celebrate impatience”, which was an essential
trait of youth, with such catch-lines as “the quick India movement” or
“slow things I hate”. The brand smartly used less expensive, yet
visible, media, whether it was the slow moving queue in the supermarket
or a vehicle stuck in traffic.
Bob returns with the missed call
Quikr realised (when they launched) that a large number of consumers
were not online just then. While they would access the internet in the
near future, they had to be addressed now.
And so, it became the first brand with whom consumers could interact via
a “missed call”. They cashed in on the character Bob Biswas, essayed by
Saswata Chatterjee in the film Kahaani — and the humour worked. Here is a quick recap of this popular commercial, released in November 2012.
The missed call created a new set of consumers, as non-internet users
too got into the act. This had its own impact on social media.
From mundane to ridiculous
Here was a guy who wanted to sell his cow and, as though this was not
enough, someone wanted to sell cow dung! Imagine the potential of
something like this on social media. That’s exactly what Quikr did. Here
are the visuals, in case you missed them.
If you carefully analyse whatever Quikr has been doing, you will realise
that it has fundamentally changed the rules of the game by consistently
coming up with great ads.
The excitement continued with IPL, one of India’s biggest sports events .
People even watch the auctions with great fascination and get vicarious
pleasure when cricketers make pots of money, even as they comment on
the good horoscopes of some of these cricketers, who earn in crores and
often score runs in single digits!
But one season, a few cricketers didn’t get picked; this made news —
that included a Pakistani player as well. The commercials Quikr came up
with got a lot of visibility and some flak, particularly from Pakistani
audiences. Here’s what they created.
But then, Quikr didn’t really care about the backlash, since as a brand,
it was talking to the youngsters who, thankfully, have a greater sense
of humour than the people of my generation!
Most importantly, the brand kept making news and, if one may add, waves.
As luck would have it, there was a match fixing scandal as well, and
Quikr responded with a campaign in three days! The underlying concept of
the ad was “Why sell yourself for money? If you want, sell something
old from your house on Quikr.com.”
Obviously, match fixing was news and bad news at that, which left a
nation fretting and fuming and venting. Quikr was there to take
advantage of the conversations, adding to interest in the topic and
riding the wave. The ability to realise which communication makes waves
is something Quikr has been extremely savvy about.
The brand has also actively sought opportunities from the environment
and here is an example. When Sachin Tendulkar retired, what would happen
to his biggest fan?
Quikr got into the act and, even if the ad created a controversy, that
was not new to Quikr. It was there in the midst of it all, secure in the
knowledge that its consumer is young, impatient, and with a sense of
humour. He/she would understand that this was the essence of the brand
and wouldn’t care if it was controversial. The consumer was using the
brand and would recommend it to her/his friends actively, which explains
the brand’s success.
I wish I had the ability to document the brand’s success in one column, but so what if we can’t? Hang in there till next week…
