Confessions of an Ad Man - David Ogilvy

David Ogilvy, the father of Advertising and the most sought after in today's advertising Industry, wrote this book. This book depicts ogilvy's previous jobs experience and how he learned to lead from them. He worked as a chef, a door to door salesman, a social worker, a farmer, an associate in research for motion picture.

His learnings from his past experiences and applying them are simply astonishing. The way he learned from Dr.Gallup(research for motion picture) about the habits and mentality of Americans. Also from his head chef, who was a great lesson of leadership in ogilvy's life.

Ogilvy continues talking about how to get good clients, keep clients, great campaign efficiently in ad industry, but it has great leadership lessons which can be applied anywhere. He also gives lots of tips on categorical approach to different industries to build downright unique campaigns.

All in all the way he learns from all his ex-employer leaders and applies to build his own brand & leadership qualities is truly impeccable, so the book has soak up lessons for wanna be leaders and for those who are leaders.

Brand Failures by Matt haig

Fascinating is the word for this book. 100 Spectacular Brand disasters from most of the global giants, who set on sail with multi million dollar campaign, only to sink without a trace.

The book is one of the best from the learning perspective as it extensively takes the before launch scenarios, during launch hurdles and the aftermath. It also gives the checklist of lessons learnt hence providing ' how not to' advice.

Book starts with few classic failure examples (New Coke, McDonald's, Ford Edsel). It further takes us to 'Idea Failures' in which it takes few examples as how Pepsi AM(for those who don't want caffeine through coffee) didn't work or Rasna's Orangejolt(launched just because of competition) and many other idea failures.

Book continues with examples of 'Extension Failures' in which it suitably explains Bic, a pen brand, if extended to underwear can be a disaster or Harley Davidson, extended to perfumes yet another disaster or even colgate, toothpaste extended to kitchen entree followed the same league. Pond's Toothpaste was yet another one. People like Ponds for fragrance, there was no link for fragrance here and hence the failure.

Next comes 'PR Failures' which has examples of McDonald's McLibel, Exxon etc. 'People failures' has example like Fashion cafe, which had no connection between model and food.

'Culture Failures' has hilarious and amazing examples like Pepsi's slogan in Taiwan was 'Come alive with the Pepsi generation' which translated to 'Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead', then there were translation problems for cars like General Motor's Chevy Nova (in Spanish it meant 'it doesn't go') in Latin America, Mitsubishi Pajero(in Spanish it meant 'Masturbator') and lot many.

Re-branding Failure has examples of Tommy Hilfiger for its logo. 'Tired Brand Failures' which has one of the most oldest and famous brands like Yardley, Kodak, Levis etc. The reason for failure was very much simple people just wanted to move on with the world and evolving technology in case of Kodak and for Yardley & Levis, it had many new competitors focusing the youths and next gen.

Brand Failure is not just the lessons of failure, what to do or what not to for only Marketing enthusiasts it typically projects learning values for how to maintain the brand 'ONESELF'. So it is not a book just for folks involved in branding but for everyone.

Dairy Milk: From Taste to Dessert

Like any of us, a product's life history undergoes many phases.Cadbury's one of the most popular product - Dairy Milk wasn't an exception.Looking through the history, the way Cadbury marketed Dairy Milk with different campaigns, focusing & projecting it in various ways & alluring people to indulge in their sweet tooth in some way or the other.

Way back in 1994, Cadbury's market was stagnating so it launched Real taste of life (kya swaad hai zindagi mein) which managed to get young adults.

In 1998, Cadbury saw many young adults still need rational justification for having chocolate, it launched ' Khane waloon ko khane ka bahana chaihiye.

Also, not much back in the past, Shubharambh and kuch meetha ho jaye displayed cadbury as a special occasion 'meetha' category. Like the one displayed by Thanda Matlab... (Coca Cola).

Meethe pe kuch meetha ho jaye: Dairy Milk's ongoing attempt to move away from special occasion product to one that is consumed daily.

Cadbury now wants chocolate to be in household's daily consumption habit may be in dessert or in snacks. It has stepped into the market with long haul strategy to attract all age groups which is a very strong move. It looks Indian sweets as its competitor and not Nestle(what a way to make your competitor feel low). Keeping that in mind it also wants to compete and push dairy milk in Indian Sweet style.

Post inspired from here

Charlie Chaplin, The legend forever

The most creative and influential artist of the silent film era. A war torn world needed a gift of comedy and he was there. Finest Artist and Mesmerizing Work.

Hats off - Sir Charlie

ZooZoo saga continues after 3G to Super Weeks Teaser

I wonder what the creative guys at vodafone must have briefed to their heads for approval of 3G ad campaign, especially when all other competitors were talking about how 3G helps see live content, faster internet speed and low pricing, and these guys were showing rajnikant and superman. Credit should be given to the brand manager too, who took the risk and approved the creative rendition.

With the plethora of TVCs on air during the ICC tournament, zoozoos kept their charm. After the success of Vodafone-3G teaser Campaign followed by an awesome ad campaign in the ICC world cup 2011. Vodafone has launched 'super weeks' teaser campaign for IPL-4. Zoozoo doing push-ups, getting body massage.

Not sure where vodafone is going to us with this, but zoozoos will keep their style, kudos to their creative team. Waiting for Pandora to open in entertainment and services from vodafone.

IPL-4 or Brand War??

The fourth season of Indian Premier league has kicked off. It's not just the public that is excited about the cricketing action, Sponsors and advertisers have have queued up for their brand war. Mumbai Indians top the table for brand value with owner Reliance Industries(big shot). Moreover, sachin's consistent performance has attracted lot more sponsors.

Debutant Bridgestone, wants to increase its awareness through brand Sachin and Harbajan. Orbit, a chewing gum, is associated with all the 10 teams. Coca Cola has increased its spendings by 30%, wants more impact for its brand. CSK is suddenly a hot property, despite a four-fold increase in its entry price for sponsors, new sponsors are lining up. For instance Aircel has extended its contract for another 3 years, Reebok for another 2 years. India cement is thankful to CSK for growing its popularity in northern markets.

Team owners are all smiles. 20 more sponsors and 2 new teams have joined the IPL-4 bandwagon to bring in more fun and fight, which will go for next 50 days.

Mood-Based Marketing

First it was Google which started showing up ads based on your search, although a person does not always search based on mood. Then retail stores came up with an idea that music helps consumers feel cheerful and upbeat and hence making them spend more.

Mood decides the type of music one wants to play, based on the music you play on your PC or phone, relevant ads will pop up. It scores tracks in a user's music library based on attributes such as: anger, tender, sensual, pleasant and tempo.

So next time if you are listening to 'Pyar humein kis mode pe le aya' don't be surprised if you see a matrimonial ad(to end the wait for 'batiyaan bhujane wali').

Mobile Marketing, a good bet

Moblie marketing is more than just sending SMS or MMS to consumer. It is a marketing platform where an idea can be reached personally unlike the mass media marketing. It is very efficient if a product has personal appeal or customized as per the consumer i.e. In this kind of marketing different segments can be attracted with customized interest as required in particular segment. It started with the concept that whenever a person receives a message, he/she thinks that it must be friend's message and is very enthusiastic about reading or replying to the person.

From the consumers perspective this marketing is good to an extant but the bulk one is really not tolerable, also the bulk one creates a notion that every marketing ad is crap. So it is ignored and is frustrating when it comes often, which kind of deviates from the whole purpose of marketing.

After all the talks about Mobile wallet & Mobile PCs, this is going to be a good bet for a long time from now. Although this type of brand building is very expensive for new start-ups in terms of technology but with time it will come down to expendable levels and will be enjoyed by a lot more chunk of marketing players.

Pepsi obsessed with Social Media Marketing!! - got hit hard

Pepsi for the first time instead of investing in Super Bowl,US's biggest game, diverted its campaign towards dialogue marketing with consumers to suggest best choice for social cause. It used facebook, twitter, iphone applications etc to get response for what will 'refresh the world', consumers can than vote for their favorite causes and pepsi would give millions to these and social media to promote the impact that its generosity had on causes.

There was a spectacular response with lots of votes, likes and followers but there was only one snag, despite all these big talks and social media response numbers, Pepsi's sales started to slide. For the first time in living memory it lost its number two spot and Diet coke overtook it.

Pepsi admitted its fault and said it needs more of product oriented marketing and advertising. After looking at its arch-rival's (coke) marketing campaign which was equally focused on Super Bowl, Social media and few other events, Pepsi had no choice but to see the axe which they hit themselves(lost its Market share by whooping 5%).

And then we grow up...

...at an eye's blink

Deals!! A good way of Marketing ?

Snapdeal, Delivore, Dealsandyou ... etc are few websites which in the recent past have capitalized internet shoppers with their amazing deals and hence growing their business. They are also a very good platform for marketing any product which has not got public attention. They not only target deal-hungry consumers(most of us are) but also grab attention of those who don't have the need to buy and make them feel the urge to buy (just because something is cheaper and good, people are ready to spend and give a try).

Groupon(another deals website) has different model than the above mentioned ones. It has given a step ahead thought on that. Its discount increases as the number of buyers cross a certain limit. However the story doesn't ends here. Gap has come up with yet another idea ' Lets make a Deal', in this Gap offers a deal on apparels and if buyer don't like it, he/she can make a counter-offer before making its final offer. It clearly overruns the offers which the above deal sites has to offer.

Deals business seems to be stable as it gives platform for marketing of the product and also gives consumers to save extra bucks. Its beneficial at both ends. It gives consumers the reviews of what they are getting and also to marketers the review of the product and what their product can do in the market if discounted or priced in certain range limit.