Category: Marketing

MUMBAI: In a bid to consolidate its focus on strategic thinking, Lintas Media Group (LMG) has rolled out ‘The Collaborative‘, a central team that will focus on development and application of knowledge and systems for next generation media planning.
 
The new division to be headed by LMG president Premjeet Sodhi will cater to business units including LMG, Karishma Initiative and Aaren Initiative.

“The media agencies are undergoing a re-engineering as the media consumer evolves due to fragmentation of current media in content and form and emergence of new media. The media practices can no longer be skewed towards traditional forms of communication and we are defining newer ways of approaching the subject of communication design,” said Sodhi.
 
‘The Collaborative‘ will bring together domains of planning sciences, buying analytics, consumer and category landscape which were earlier operating as independent teams.
 
Averred LMG chairman & CEO Lynn de Souza, “Today, each of the teams has developed an enviable body of knowledge in their respective areas. The formation of a common team under the banner of ‘The Collaborative‘ will build synergies in their growth and enable efficient harvesting of the knowledge for application to the whole business.”

MUMBAI: FMCG major CavinKare has announced the launch of Hi 5, a new deodorant body spray for men, as the official deodorant of Kings XI Punjab team.

Designed by fragrance experts, Hi 5 is inspired by the West Indies cricket team’s victory sign – the High Five – which they liberally flashed and popularised on the cricket field. 
 
With cricket as its inspiration, CavinKare has build on the association with the IPL (Indian Premier League) franchise and will be launching a TVC starring Yuvraj Singh, Irfan Pathan and S Sreeshant.

CavinKare VP (marketing), Personal Care Vineet Trakroo says, “The Hi 5 brand reflects a sense of adventure which is synonymous with today’s youth. With cricket a religion and cricketers being larger than life icons, we tied-up with Kings XI Punjab. The brand is inspired by High Fives on the cricket field, which is a sign of success and teamwork used by youth all over the world.”
 
The company has also created an online contest to give an opportunity to consumers to interact with a select few players of the Kings XI Punjab team.

Kings XI Punjab CEO Anil Srivatsa adds, “We are excited to partner with CavinKare this season. Our team has the right blend of young energetic bunch of players which is in sync with their brand values. We hope the association a well deserved success in the months to come.”

The Hi 5 deo launch will be backed by online presence including winners being selected at the end of a month for a dinner date with the Kings XI Punjab IPL cricket team.
 
Hi-5 deodorants have long-lasting masculine fragrances designed to boost confidence to maximize thrills and action in life. Conceptualised as an adrenaline booster for young, active, trendy and adventurous men who are ready for thrills and adventure, it is edgy and power packed. The deo is available in three variants – Rush, Dive and Blaze.

From April, Hi-5 will be launched in all metros and major cities targeting SEC A, A+, B, 15-28 year old males. The body spray comes for Rs 150 for 150 ml bottle.
 

MUMBAI: Synergy Media Entertainment Ltd (SMEL) is setting up a specialized division that will focus on on-ground consumer activations.
 
The new division will be headquartered at the company corporate office in Noida and will have specialized teams at each of the 17 stations of the brand.

In addition to identifying existing employees to staff the new division, the company is also looking at undertaking specialized hiring. 
 
This division will assist My FM in its branding, marketing and advertising activities.

The new activations division will focus on creating specialized as well as ancillary on-ground activations to add value to MY FM‘s offering of advertising and consumer marketing opportunities that it provides to its advertisers.
 
My FM COO Harrish M.Bhatia said, ” We have already established My FM as a strong radio brand in our markets and looking forward we believe this specialised division for consumer activations will add to our repertoire of services offered to our clients. We have an excellent talent pool and we have already been creating on-ground activations but the new divison will work in a more focused and specialized manner to add value to our offerings.”

MUMBAI: Percept Out-of-Home, a 360 degree Out-of-Home communication solution and a division of Percept, has rolled out the outdoor campaign for ‘Go‘ cheese brand across Delhi and Mumbai.
 
“The Outdoor campaign in select focus cities was done with the aim of creating a noise level for the brand thus resulting in demand generation and increased penetration which has been achieved well through the select media mix and careful planning by the Outdoor Agency Percept”, says Go Cheese VP marketing Rahul Akkara.
 
In Delhi, the ‘Go‘ cheese campaign has been positioned at Delhi metro Stations – metro branding, inside metro branding, wall wraps & unipole resulting in high visibility and recall value.

The Mumbai campaign is positioned on select bus queue shelters.
 

MUMBAI: In a bid to beat the summer heat, Lux has relaunched its four body wash variants under the new Lux Body Wash range. The range is available in 125 ml and 250 ml packs and is priced at Rs 45 and Rs 80 respectively.
 
The 4 variants are White Glamour, Silk Nourishment, Soft Luxury and Uplifting Firm.
 
Said Lux Ambassador Priyanka Chopra, “I am very glad to take my association with Lux a step further with the launch of these four luxurious Lux Body Wash variants for the summer season. I am honored to be appointed as the face for this new range and I would really urge all you women out there to experience this new variant and feel your skin become soft and supple.”

MUMBAI: In a bid to expand its digital business division, brand activation agency Candid Marketing has appointed Arunabh Biswas as associate creative director for its Mumbai office.
 
“Biswas‘s experience proves his ability to provide the right direction to our expansion. Over the next year, Candid will be at the forefront of digital activations,”says Candid Marketing VP content & planning Amrita Kumar,

Says Biswas, “Today‘s age of communication is getting increasingly concentrated around the digital world. It is a constant ground of innovation and apt use of knowledge. Candid has been regularly creating campaigns which re-define innovations in the activation space. With its entry into the digital space it has a new aim, the agency bring forth the values that have led it thus far.”
 
Prior to this, Biswas was Web Chutney creative consultant. He handled brands like Airtel, Metlife, Maruti Wagon R, KFC and Makemytrip.com.

Over the last year Candid has grown by over 40 per cent, providing on ground activation strategies to clients like HUL, Nokia, ESPN Star Sports, Cadbury, Pepsi, Star TV and Mars Foods.
 

MUMBAI: HDFC Standard Life, associate sponsor of Rajasthan Royals in the third season of Indian Premier League (IPL 2010), has unveiled a new campaign.

While Leo Burnett has conceptualised and scripted the campaign, it has been directed by Sanjay Shetty from Opticus.

The new campaign, airing across TV channels from 22 March, features Rajasthan Royal players – Shane Warne, Yusuf Pathan, Munaf Patel, Kamran Khan, and Swapnil Asnodkar.
 
HDFC Standard Life EVP and head marketing Sanjay Tripathi said, “Our association with Rajasthan Royals is aimed at bringing to the fore our common values – self respect or living life with head held high. And the campaign is a natural outcome of our effort in propagating the values of self pride, confidence, and self belief.”
 
Additionally, HDFC Standard Life has several activities including financial planning sessions for the young players in the Rajasthan Royals team and on-ground initiatives in the coming months.

MUMBAI: Triton Communications has bagged the creative duties of The Vini Group, a venture promoted by Darshan Patel.
 
Says Patel, “For Vini Group we undertook a qualitative and quantitative research for five to six months to understand consumer needs because I firmly believe that insights are critical for product development.”
 
“I have worked with Triton for many years and know their capabilities, their ability to create communications that work with our target audience. My comfort level with the Triton team is an added bonus,” adds Patel.
 
Triton Communications director Munawar Syed said, “Patel is clear of his objectives and understands the role of advertising in creating and building brands that have a rational and emotional connect. We are delighted to be back with him.”

MUMBAI: The Indian advertising industry is set to grow at a CAGR of 14.1 per cent to touch Rs 426.9 billion in 2014, says a recently released Ficci-KPMG report.

The report notes that amidst an uncertain economic environment and low industry sentiment that prevailed in 2009, the Indian advertising industry managed to almost sustain its media spend levels of 2008, falling marginally by 0.4 per cent to stay at Rs 220.3 billion (Rs 221.2 billion in 2008) for the calendar year.
 
 
With the market picking up in the second half of 2009, the advertising industry is expected to grow by 12 per cent in 2010 to reach Rs 246.9 billion.

“While the worldwide advertising forecast for 2009 was estimated to fall by 5.5 per cent, Indian advertising revenues were not subjected to similar reductions. The marginal fall of 0.4 per cent was not pervasive across media platforms,” the report notes.
 
Television and Internet advertising managed a growth of 7 per cent and 25 per cent respectively, whereas other platforms registered a de-growth of over 5 per cent.

The year 2009 brought in focus on the bottom line margins and greater consciousness on discretionary spend amongst advertisers.

In segment wise distribution, television is expected to garner a greater percentage of the total advertising revenues and constitute the largest share of the overall media spend eventually.

While print continued to dominate advertising spend in 2009, it lost a fraction of its overall market share to other mediums. Despite a 4.6 per cent fall in advertising revenues, agencies continue to be bullish on print advertising in 2010 and 2011, the report states.

In 2009, with declining spot rates and an increased focus on market expansion, the total number of advertisers increased by 7 per cent on print and 11 per cent on television. Compared to 2008, both regional print and television gained a larger share of advertising volumes while national players marginally lost their hold.

Some interesting points in the report are that the advertising spends by Real Estate, InfoTech, Financial Services, Retail and Apparel sectors fell significantly in 2009 while that by FMCG, Telecom and Education are believed to have increased over 2008. However, the distribution of advertising spends across categories saw some shift. Several FMCG brands including Coke and Pepsi joined the online advertising platform.

Also, IT and Telecom players continued their digital spend while the share of BFSI sector in online advertising volumes declined. Education, which largely dominates advertising on print media, found coverage on national television and radio. The luxury segment which had until recently restricted advertisements to English newspapers and magazines, saw television and OOH campaigns for niche brands such as Mont Blanc.

For other Asian markets such as Singapore, Hong Kong, China, Japan and Philippines, advertising spend over the last few years has accounted for approximately 1.2 to 3.5 per cent of the GDP. However the share of advertising spends in India remained in the low range of 0.4 to 0.47 per cent. So, with India’s GDP expected to grow at nearly 7 to 8 per cent in 2010, the outlook for the year looks to be more promising with advertising growth returning to double-digit levels.
 

MUMBAI: The Indian Premier League (IPL) and Topps, which works in the area of sports and entertainment collectables worldwide, have announced a long term partnership to launch a range of new collectable products and trading cards for the IPL in 2011.

Topps has been the market leader for collectable trading cards since inventing the modern trading card in 1952.
 
As part of this association, Topps will introduce a range of IPL collectables that will include stickers, albums and trading cards, which will be sold both at the retail stores and digitally. Topps will support the partnership with a substantial marketing campaign, including TV and sampling initiatives as well as a nationwide ‘Game Play demonstration tour’, which will allow children to play and swap their IPL collectables.

IPL COO Sundar Raman said, “This alliance with Topps – the world leader in collectables, is part of our effort to actively engage IPL fans across multiple platforms. Collectable trading cards are an integral part of any fan experience globally and through this partnership we are happy to introduce Indian fans to this unique and exciting global concept. There have been numerous instances where collectable trading cards of famous players have become invaluable to their owners. I am certain that this association with Topps will set a trend in world cricket for others to follow.”
 
Topps chairman Michael Eisner says, “Topps trading cards and stickers are, around the globe, an integral part of the history and heritage of many sports. Our relationship with the IPL today marks the start of a new era for IPL cricket fans that will enable them to connect with their sport, their team and their heroes through the medium of Topps products. The IPL is the most successful and exciting sports league to have been launched in the last 20 years and I am thrilled that Topps will be part of it”.