BEST KEPT SECRETS!

takes a ‘brief’ look at what’s causing the thunder, down under!

BANNED! Screamed headlines across media a while ago forcefully blanking out two male undergarment ads. The august body of I&B believed that the term thunder down under really took on scary dimensions and instructed them to stop the plunder (of innocent and bewildered minds) and immediately surrender! The two TV ads in question – Lux Cosy & Amul Macho – were seen as playing havoc with the joyous ‘family viewing time’ and pre-empting stunned, embarrassed silence and uncomfortable questions.

Okay, so what did these ads portray, anyway? The Amul Macho ad shows a newly-wed woman, moseying over to the village ghat and washing her husband’s undies. She begins in a coy, sensuous fashion and soon appears quite charged up while turning on the heat! Her energetic body language astounds her staid companions who look at this overt, exhibitionistic performance with shock and horror. ‘Crafted for fantasies’ says the slogan! In the Lux Cosy ad, a washerwoman calls at an apartment to pick up the laundry. A man wearing a towel answers the door. And accidentally his towel drops. Before he can register shock or embarrassment, the washerwoman’s eyes dart towards the undies, registering uncensored delight & approval in a flirtatious manner. The Moral Police, however, didn’t share in any way the washerwoman’s joy, were not remotely amused at this ‘slip-up’ and refused to dismiss the affair as ‘andar ki baat hai’.

They termed these ads “vulgar, indecent & suggestive” and sent out strong messages to the ad fraternity & channels to be careful and exercise restraint in the stuff beamed out, or else…

This isn’t the first time. Over a decade and a half ago, the Marc Robinson-Pooja Bedi Kamasutra ad with the tagline ‘For the Pleasure of Making Love’ had the powers-that-were in a tizzy. Subsequently the Arbaaz-Malaika coffee ads as well as the Milind Soman-Madhu Sapre TUFF ads created a crazy furore – as did the recent XXX flavoured condom ads. Neo Sports ads (tongue-in-cheek turned foot-in-mouth?) covering the recent ODI series in Feb’07 also came under fire and was termed ‘racist’ by the high priests.

Fact is obscenity, vulgarity, suggestiveness, insinuation, et al represent tricky areas for the simple reason that they are all relative, subjective and contextual. Fumes ad practitioner Atul Malhotra, “the problem with these guys is that they consider themselves self-appointed guardians of public morality without even trying to understand the reference to the context angle. Don’t these people see FTV, MTV, Hollywood or Bollywood movies?”

“Which planet do they inhabit, yaar? Is our tradition, culture and sabhyata so fragile that a couple of ads can threaten it? C’mon guys, wake up and taste the… lassi!” He says that you wanna ban stuff – ban gender bias & religious intolerance because they influence and poison the mind of people – not some corny undergarments ads, for chrissake! Preeti Paul, a media executive agrees with the basic premise of Malhotra’s argument but concedes that the Amul Macho ad did exceed the limit. “It’s definitely cheap & titillating and appears to have been created to shock & stimulate viewers.” Housewife Seema Suri agrees. “Which sicko pervert directed the actress and dreamed up the concept? I mean that suggestive look and body language, that glazed expression, it was so embarrassing! My mom-in-law just couldn’t figure out what that lady in the ad was doing and frequently asked me to explain… I am delighted ban ho gaya. Advertising should have some moral limits.”

Not everyone agrees with this take. Mitali Gupta, a journalist, believes too much is being made about “this silly ad! Hey, c’mon guys, its only a dumb TVC, okay? The ad guys took the titillation & naughty route to grab eyeballs and public attention, which I think was cool b’coz what the hell do you say about a jock, anyway? Chill, man!”

Creators of the ad believe that the uproar is happening only because it is truly a clutter-busting ad, standing out and making waves (in a dramatic and meaningful way) in a category that is truly tough to penetrate… Ooops, was it a faux pas? Didn’t mean it. We are outta here, guys. Its getting too hot!

BEST KEPT SECRETS!

Myth-exploding time, guys!

4Ps B&M's Monojit Lahiri takes you down an explosive track where revered, sacrosanct and holiest-of-the-holies laws, rules and practices go for a sublime toss!

Rules and laws. Commandments and diktats. Rails and fences… these continue to govern our lives, right? Ditto in Adville. “Problem with rules” rues the local wit “is their seemingly invincible rigidity. What must however always be kept in mind and acted upon is the simple fact that the moment these great laws lose their effectiveness, validity and winning streak and become a deterrent to creative development, they should be relegated to the trash bin! Shocked? Don’t be – because with this single move you liberate yourself from restrictions and boundaries and allow yourself to… fly! This is not to categorically debunk the entire concept of rules; they were created for certain reasons and surely had their uses…Today however, sane communication practitioners must be viewed in perspective and not something that is gospel truth and carved in stone!

Let’s do a quick ‘dekho’ of some popular, time-tested numbers that need to be handed the pink slip!

USP

The great Rosser Reeves founded and authored this much revered UNIQUE SELLING PROPOSITION in an era when products “genuinely” had definite, tangible differences. Today (apart from the term being systematically raped due to abuse, misuse and over-use) it has lost much of its sting. Why? Because times have dramatically changed. Electronic firms share research. Large FMCG brands often come together to manufacture, in order to cut costs. Levels of excellence are cutting across the entire spectrum of products and services, almost eliminating the “difference” factor. Ad Guru John Hegarty believes that there has been a paradigm shift in that we are living in a whole new age – the age of the ESP, Emotional Selling Proposition!
 
“Here the perceived difference is all. Why do I wear a purple shirt instead of a white shirt? Sure, it’s only about colour, but hey, it makes me feel different!” Hagarty, extending this line of thinking, invites agencies to re-invent their focus in terms of profile and persona. “I believe they need to see themselves as a manufacturing company because they are really and truly a part of the manufacturing process – manufacturing ideas that make a difference between brands.” The result is empowerment. Customers actually feel more certain, assured, passionate and in love with the product. The “emotional difference” is indeed the real difference!

RATIONAL BENEFIT

There was a time – far away and long ago – when rationality was equated with substance and a logical proposition invariably earned respect, credibility and positive customer response. Hate to rain on your parade, guys, but that’s all sepia-tinted history residing in an ocean of mothballs! Look around the ad-space and you’ll see tonnes of stuff that are totally irrational — and rocking! The Cola ads are excellent examples, as are Happy Dent, Alpenliebe, Mentos, Surf, Airtel, Hutch, Naukri.com, Pond’s, Cadbury, Fevicol…. Remember the iconic series on PORCHE? The ads were classic examples of zero-logic communication with send-up lines like ‘Too Fast. Doesn’t Blend.’ ‘People will talk... old cars go to yards, old Porche’s go to museums.’

Who can forget the other classic, VW, with the amazing line ‘It’s ugly but it works’. My personal favourite remains the stunningly evocative series for Norwegian cruise line, which seemed to amplify inaudible whispers of the soul with lines like…. ‘I will be naked more, I will memorise clouds. There is no law that says you cannot study a sunset… or make love at 4 pm on a Tuesday.’ To the purist (and kill joys) it may not be logical and rational but it remains intensely human. If we eavesdrop on peoples imagination and dreams and respond, chances are when they morph into customers they will return the compliment…

Slogans/Strap-lines

A globally respected ad guru dismisses this aspect with “It’s a lie that you must have a strap-line/slogan in your ad. These are mostly pathetic exercises in shallow wordplay or meaningless phrase.”

He goes on to cite popular examples – progress is our most important product. Tomorrow’s technology, today… and the most chilling cliché of them all, committed to the relentless pursuit of excellence!

Fact is these corny, pontifical, posturing, benign gyaan- driven lines necessary? The consumers don’t give a damn and even within the ad-frat few pay attention. Then why on Earth do they still exist? “Because” says Shantiniketan trained, New York based art director Piya Sen, “Some dumb luck boss-man decades ago got hysterically attached to the letter, not the spirit of how ads should be written and insisted that no ad go without it. The die was cast. The seed was sown.”

At the end of the day, with exceptions (Just Do It, Nike) slogan strap-lines are there to please clients or politically correct bosses. Nothing more. If an ad does what its meant to do — entertain, engage, enthral, enlighten, empower — it doesn’t need a strap-line. If it doesn’t, the greatest slogan can’t viagrise it.

Just Do it is breakthrough stuff only because it epitomises the attitude of people reading it, not the company. It’s not about making shoes for people who do it. See the difference? So next time you see an ad, don’t forget to zero-in on the strap-line… it’s likely to keep you in splits all day!

Myth-exploding time, guys!

HAS Entertaining EDGED OUT “SELLING” IN AD-LAND ?

Snowed under with ads hysterically sold on entertaining, 4Ps B&M's Monojit Lahiri wonders whether there’s been a slight confusion in priorities!

Man, its one hulluva time in ad-land!

Today’s ads (especially TVCs) are mind-blowing… Splendid examples of riveting audience engagement, carefully crafted and designed to woo and impact a promiscuous (and forever) distracted viewer-base with the (ominious) ‘remote’ always at their fingertips. “Our job in these scary competitive times is simple: delight and surprise,” explains a Mumbai based hot-spot maverick (with his drooling, devoted acolytes, nodding energetic approval). “Not bore the pants off them with grim and boring product facts or figures. That will only inspire. zzzzzzz!” Adds another pony-tailed member of the ad-frat, “Times have changed. The world is on a perpetual and frenetic fast-forward. To catch the flirtatious eye of the prospective customer, one has to be unique, special and different. In this backdrop, ‘entertainment’ is the acknowledged hot-line, the great leveller… Films, songs, books, events, happenings, news – we borrow and spin-off from any and everything that promises visibility, noticability and stopper-value. At the end of the day, in this crazy clutter, grabbing and freezing eyeballs is the name of the game, baby-cake!”

Clap-Clap. Wonderful. Fabulous et al… but excuse me, isn’t advertising a means to an end… an end called ‘selling’? Are prizes, wah-wahs, medals and gongs more crucial than ‘sales’? Has advertising in the recent times, become too self-absorbed, drawing too much attention to itself and too little in closing the deal related to the purchase intent? Has advertising become a ‘high-wire’ act with the creative guys freaking out to impress other creative guys with the ‘Big O’ coming from ‘their’ recognition, applause and appreciation, ‘not’ of clients? Is the ‘S’ word, unfashionable, dumb and corny in a time where no one does anything as crass as selling; they do the sophisticated thing. Build brands! No one looks at the sales figures. They track scores! Has advertising become ‘the’ product itself with ABBYs, CAG, Goafest, Cannes, et al as the prime target of one and all?

Kolkata-based, veteran adman (and sometimes actor, he was Satyajit Ray’s hero in the second of the maestro’s city triology Seema Baddha?), Barun Chanda believes that this phenomenon in some fashion has always existed. “There have always been the arty or smart-arse types who make it their business to blow away their clients with showy and spectacular, but irrelevant concepts. They’ve, on cue, garnered the appropriate gasps and wows but hardly ever touched the crucial areas of selling! It’s not a crime but a ‘sin’! The agency should be sacked immediately,” Chanda says. However, Chanda believes that often the clients are to blame too, “Because the promise of glitzy awards amidst glamorous settings at home and abroad works as a seductive carrot for them.” To director sahiba Leena (Shabd) Yadav, “The entertainment quotient works as a super-seller. Used in appropriate manner – Happydent, Cadbury, Fevicol, Naukri.com, Airtel - they rock! They go beyond the cut and dry product features to create an emotional synergy and connect that ensures top-of-the-mind awareness.” However, she is quick to add that flippant and casual endeavours, hoping for short-cuts to accelerate consumer preference is doomed “because it neither entertains nor sells!”

Lowe’s Executive Creative Director, Preeti Nair Chax advances the case further. “We live in a deadly crowded ad-space with products and ads coming out of our ears! In this scenario, entertainment can offer a fabulous solution as a clutter-buster but ‘only’ if crafted with care and never losing sight of the product-is-the-hero angle,” she said. She cites the example of Fevicol, Miss Palampur, Surf, Greenply, Naukri.com, ICICI Prudential (among others) as interesting examples of leveraging the entertainment quotient in a positive manner. “However celebs (especially Bollywood) should be handled with great responsibility and special care because their red-hot personas as entertainers can easily demolish the very reason for them being present in the ad – to sell the product!”

To Parveen Chawla, a smart, young and sensitive Delhi-based ad person, it appears tragic that “entertainment suddenly is on a flier!” She believes it has something to do with the popular bimari of manoranjan inspiring Bollywood honchos like Sunjay Dutt and Sunny Deol growl lines like ‘Apun ke style ka mamla hain’, or ‘Ye andar ki baat hain’, lending to a whole new dimension to the term, ‘thunder down under’!

So, whats the take-out? While it is indeed a given that in today’s stress-ridden life, entertainment is increasingly perceived as a welcome therapy and our movie-making technology is world-class, the problem is (ironically) that this lethal mixture of cool creative focus and stunning new age technology provides for a riveting ad capsule that undoubtedly engages, entertains, (even enthrals) in fine style ‘but’ frequently at expense of the selling proposition. Result? We see scores of brilliantly crafted TVCs that delight and surprise – as the high priest’s decree – but do they really turn you on to buy? Do they, in any fashion, impact your mind-set, alter belief or inspire change in perception towards the product or service advertised? The honest answer (most of the time) has to be ‘no’. With exceptions, form and style (entertainment quotient) seem to enjoy a winning run over content and substance (selling proposition) leading to terrifying audience take-out: Remembering the ‘Ad’ or the ‘celebrity’ in it but forgetting the ‘product’! 

HAS Entertaining EDGED OUT “SELLING” IN AD-LAND ?

IS MUMBAI REALLY AD-LA ND’S CREATIVE CAPITAL?

Of Course-Yes-Definitely!

At a recent ad-show, my erudite friend was suddenly seized by the spirit of enquiry. With seriousness writ large on his face, he drew me aside, took a deep breath, cleared his throat and let fly…Why (he asked with scary passion) is creativity in the ad- business forever linked with the usual (Piyush, Prasoon, Balki, Chax, Pop, Angelo, Josy…) suspects? Don’t tell me (he continued incredulity colouring his tone), that nothing significant, interesting, engaging, creative, fresh or original has ever happened beyond their gaze… or no outstanding talent has ever emerged outside their mafia-dom? If it has (and surely it has!) - why has neither the work nor individuals ever been celebrated, written-up or publicized like the over-hyped Mumbai lot? Is it because of a lazy, un-interested, un-informed, star-struck and Mumbai –fixated media forever dazzled by the sizzle, not the steak? Is it because the truly creative minds-of the non-Mumbai kind–don’t really go grey pining for marquee-status, bright lights or frivolous Page 3 razzle dazzle, choosing instead to concentrate on their work, perfectly happy with the peer respect and recognition they receive? Is it because hype, hoopla and posturing is an intrinsic part and parcel of the glamorous Mumbai culture and the new age savvy, creative guys have learnt the art of leveraging it with consummate skills and panache?

Arindam Nandy, Senior Creative Director, Response (Kolkata) believes that the issue must not invite over-reaction and should be understood in the right context. “First things first. Anyone making a sweeping statement about Mumbai being the only hot-spot for advertising creativity needs to visit his friendly neighborhood shrink-fast! There definitely exsits loads of talent, unfortunately not matched with equal amount of opportunity to allow it to catch fire!” Nandy cites the example of his own city, a place (traditionally) bursting with creativity, ideas and imagination. Unfortunately, the business (mostly) are East-India-centric eliminating (immediately) any chance of national perspective or all-India footprint. This, despite the greatest innovative brilliance places the work in the “regional” category, diluting the “interest quotient” of the media. He rationalizes, “It’s pretty much like Bollywood and regional cinema. Until hot ‘n’ heavy national clients with big ad spends hit the scene, this marginalized and also-ran status will prevail. Sad but true.”
 
Delhi-based creative consultant Mayank Gaur however is in no mood to play footsie, be politically correct or play coy. He slams it with all cylinders firing! He begins his fusillade by quoting the legendary baseball’s stars deathless line “champions discuss baseball. Fools discuss statistics.” Warmed up, he lays it on the line, “This issue has to do with two major aspects. One Mumbai’s sickening self-congratulatory complacence leading to a kind of arrogance that makes them believe that the sun actually comes out of their a…e! Two, the pathetic dumbling down of a media completely sold out to the Page 3 culture.” Gaur wonders whether their so-called Mumbai stars have ever bothered to look beyond their water-tight, closely-guarded incestuous, in-ward looking and self absorbed universe to check out the kind of work in range and brilliance coming out of the other centres. He detests the fact that just because clients are small and regional as (opposed to national big-ticket) the advertising is dismissed as insignificant. But brilliant-work, he emphasizes, remains brilliant work, irrespective of national footprint or humongous ad spend. It’s the power of the idea and creative insight that matters or should matter, surely! “The litmus test is to achieve creative brilliance riding on modest resources. Live the ‘small is big’ idea. Anyone can score brownie points having stars and all the required infrastructure on your side. It’s the small, modest, unsung shops breaking through with great creativity that should be applauded.” Gaur concludes his little tsunami with “at a time when the best ideas often happens in the loo, this Mumbai-nonsense is truly idiotic and juvenile. Quickly pull the flush yaar!”

Swapan Seth, CEO of the Delhi-based Equus Red Cell brings his own spin to the debate. “I really don’t think the issue is whether Mumbai is the cathedral of creative or not. It is just that the industry is largely present there. As is the film industry.” He believes that media location also has a role to play and that Mumbai-based publications tend to talk more often to people in Mumbai, which he is quick to add is equally “understandable.” Seth also highlights that the personal aspect of people must also be borne in mind. “There are people like me who speak when spoken to and to the point. I think there is considerable talent here in Delhi. Even Kolkata. Or Bangalore. It’s just that Mumbai creative people are so in your face that you feel that they are all there is to creativity.”

To Anuja Chauhan it’s really a non-issue because she genuinely believes that “Mumbai IS where the action is and the Piyushes and Prasoons ARE THE KHANS of that universe!” The talented creative director of JWT Delhi – (responsible for most of those celebreated and higly visible PEPSI ads over the last decade) – agrees that there is good work happening in other centres “But Mumbai is like Hollywood or Bollywood, the real and perceived capital of glamour, mega stars, big bucks, big league players, hot n’ happening environment” and combined they produce a lethal and magical package that seduces both media and ever-curious public. Since that is the nature of the animal, is it any wonder that most creative guys of any worth gravitate towards that city? And the big boys of the Mumbai ad-world may rejoice. There may be many takers, but very few are plotting painstakingly to usurp their hot seats... oh but it will take a lot to battle the masala magic of Mumbai... 

IS MUMBAI REALLY AD-LA ND’S CREATIVE CAPITAL?