The Hindu Business Line : The marketing journey

Swapnil, Marketing in India sure has come a long way. I see it going places. We are yet to arrive. In fact, the journey is more pleasurable than actually arriving.

That is a short and quick answer to your question. Here is a longer version.

I do believe marketing society in India has passed through several ages.

Age 1 is the age we saw soon after Independence in 1947 when demand was just about picking up for functional products and services. There was plenty of demand but not enough supply. This is the era of shortage.

In this era, advertising would talk of savings. Hard work. Frugal consumption. Products had to be very hard-working, long lasting, functionally strong and even cosmetically hard-looking. This era saw the Lifebuoy soap ad as the hallmark.

Focus was on ‘Tandurusti’ and the hero was the carbolic red soap Lifebuoy. Sweaty men were shown in ads. Hard work meant good and heroic deeds. The real man of the era was either a ‘jawan’ (soldier) or a ‘Kissan’ (farmer). Everyone else was between these two heroic personas. One protected the nation from enemies and the other fed a hungry nation, which was not self-sufficient.

Advertising imagery was all about tilling the soil, hand tillers, ploughs, tanks, rifles in hands of soldiers and the like

Age 2: This is the pre-Asiad era. Television was in black-and-white. The imagery now is about getting on to the growth path. Consumption was accepted. Movies were in. Men were shown working in groups. Products still ruled. The big P was Product.

This is the age when the defining advertising was the Godrej Storwel ad. The Godrej almirah was a perennial favourite in homes. It defined security, wealth storage and such.

Age 3: The post Asiad era. Colour TV was in. Ms Indira Gandhi had set up the LPTs and HPTs (low- and high-power transmitters) all around. Television was supplanting cinema reels in theatres as the visual advertising and entertainment medium.

In this era, men were shown solo. The hero of the era was Amitabh Bachchan.

This was also the ‘Hamara Bajaj’ era. Pride in the nation’s defining product owned by millions. The Bajaj scooter.

Age 4: The current era of overt consumption and more consumption. Eat more brands. Drink more brands. Wear more brands.

In this age, the defining ad is that of the promiscuous man, even. The defining image is that of the man in the TV commercials for Axe. The journey, you will agree, is more interesting than actually arriving. I do believe we have several hundred more ages to traverse. Enjoy the journey, Swapnil! Till you and I last.

These are times of recession. How does one cope? What does one do? My company’s volume is down by 42 per cent over the last quarter and our bottom line is affected badly as we have continued to advertise and volumes have fallen dramatically. The money is spent and the sales has not been achieved.

- Hari Venkataraman, Hyderabad

Hari, the one sound I can think of as an answer is a simple one: Ouch!

What can one do? Hari, I do believe an economic slowdown and a point of recession is a great time for the marketer to sit back and take stock. Normally, a marketer who lives a tight life that is high-strung has little or no time to really ideate. He is moving from one point of crisis to another. A slowdown is an excellent time to sit back and ideate and reinvent.

Most businesses can do with a dose of reinvention every three years. This is an excellent time to attempt it. Never mind whether you are in the business of telecom of toys. This is a great time to advertise as well. Advertising in these tough times need to be different. This is the time to move away from gung-ho creatives. Time to strategise and use advertising as a balm to soothe ruffled consumer nerves. Time to invest in market research as well. Time to invest in educating your team as well.

Lifebuoy’s new avatar and the Louis Vuitton boutique in Mumbai)
Out of home (OOH) advertising seems a great thing to be with during tough marketing times such as these. What is your view?

- Rohini Menon, Mumbai

Rohini, very right. OOH is the cusp medium that straddles a potential consumer’s life. It is that one medium that comes between in-home media such as television and radio and point of purchase media such as posters and LCDs and danglers. Outdoor offers visibility, immediacy and throw that no other medium can. A great medium to use. A medium no consumer can ignore as he hurries to work and returns home late, putting in more hours than before due to the job insecurity syndrome at hand.

In most developed marketing economies one witnesses spends on outdoor to be at least 21-23 per cent of the total advertising expenditure. In India it remains a mere 7 per cent of the total Rs 18,500 crore we spend on advertising.

This medium offers throw. It’s intrusive. It happens on the way to purchase. Offers immediacy. Is great on recall. Also offers possibilities of ‘In-the-face’ advertising which few other media offer.

Great locations for outdoor today are at traffic signals, on really long stretches of roads that people take to work or back from work, and certainly near shopping hubs. Serial hoardings work best. These are hoardings that can be placed on long stretches of single-use roads. Street-furniture is another excellent form of outdoor, just as aero-bridges and in-airport advertising and in-railway station advertising is.

By the way, during a recession, the first advertising medium that is hit is the outdoor medium. The moment you see the hoardings in a city going empty with the hoarding-owner’s telephone number on it, you know recession is here. Look around.
Brands today are taking on more than one celebrity to endorse their product. Why this trend?

- H. L. Jairaj, Bangalore

Jai, brands are taking on more endorsers of the celebrity kind all of a sudden. I do believe they are doing this as a hedge. As a hedge against the fact that celebrity appeal comes and goes. Further, celebrity appeal of the universal kind is largely missing in one single star today. In the old days that was a possibility.

Celebrities in the old days used to endorse just one brand. Zakir Husain is an example. In later days, stars such as Amitabh Bachchan started endorsing as many as 17 different brands.

The current trend is an archetypal revenge of the marketer. If the brand endorser can advertise for more than one brand, why should not a brand take on more than one endorser?

This is a kind of brand celebrity-insurance as well. If one does not click, another does. If one gets into trouble and faces the consequences, never mind, there is another to bail the brand out, without having to invest anew in a celebrity from scratch.

askharishbijoor@thehindu.co.in

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