By now, many must have read the tweet on Zomato India’s official handle which said, “Guys, kabhi kabhi ghar ka khana bhi kha lena chahiye .” (Guys, once in a while, you should eat home-cooked food too.)

The tweet spread like wildfire and left people in splits. It’s a classic instance of counter-intuitive marketing — asking people to do the exact opposite of what their service stands for. In this case, food delivery.

Humour is an effective content strategy, especially on social media. When people laugh, they connect. It can go miserably wrong but, when it’s right, you’ve won the game. The post was liked by over 20,000 people and was re-tweeted over 3,000 times.

Just the idea of writing it in such an informal way was the winner. The more casual you are, the more people connect and, in this case, it managed to hit the target audience. In fact Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal, who seemed clearly impressed, replied to the tweet, “Who did this? Good tweet”.

Within no time, several other brands followed suit. YouTube recommended, “Guys, kabhi kabhi raatke 3 baje, phone side pe rakh ke so jana chahiye ” (Once in a while, you should keep your phone aside and sleep), while Amazon suggested, “Guys, kabhi kabhi cable pe bhi kuch dekh lena chahiye ” (Occasionally, watch something on cable for a change), and MobiKwik advised, “Guys, kabhi kabhi queue main lag ke bhi electricity bill pay kar dena chahiye ” (Sometimes, you should stand in queue to pay the electricity bill).

Ixigo tweeted, “Guys, kabhi kabhi ghar par bhi baithna chahiye ” (Once in a way, people should just stay at home), while Faasos said, “Guys, kabhi kabhi khud bhi khana bana lena chahiye ” (Sometimes, people should cook at home).

Karthik Srinivasan, independent communications consultant, said, “This is anti-marketing. Companies have done it in the past. For instance, outdoor clothing maker Patagonia’s ‘Don’t buy this jacket’ advertising campaign is my favourite. With this, Patagonia’s focus was to raise environmental concerns. However, Zomato’s case is quite unique, though it did trigger speculation that it may start a service where people can order home-cooked food.”

Rajeshwari Krishnamurthy, Professor of Marketing, Great Lakes Institute of Management, said, “It is topical, and a very cheeky thing to do. It doesn’t have serious implications for the brand and helps it stay in the news, which is crucial.”

Finally, Zomato had the last laugh. It clubbed the tweets of all the other companies and wrote, “Guys, kabhi kabhi khud ke acche tweet bhi soch lene chahiye ” (Guys, once in a while, think of original tweets on your own).

As they say, to make things memorable, make people laugh!

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