Category: Marketing

MUMBAI: Crayon Advertising has bagged the creative and media duties of the Indian counterpart of the Harvard Business School.
 
This is the first time the Indian counterpart of the B-School has taken on board an agency.
 
Crayons will be looking at creating buzz about the various education programmes offered by the Harvard Business School in India. The agency will be using print largely to create the buzz.
 
Harvard Business School started its India Research Center (IRC) in Mumbai in 2006.
 

MUMBAI: Lintas Media Group has won the media duties for Religare Enterprises. The pitch involved seven media agencies.

According to industry sources, the account size is pegged close to Rs 800 million.
 
Confirming the win, Lintas Media Group president Sudha Natrajan says, “This is a prestigious win and this was one of the most competitive pitches that have happened in the past several months.”

The account will be handled out of the Lintas Delhi office and will be headed by Lintas Media Group SVP and GM VS Mani.
 
According to a source, the closest competitor to Lintas Media Group was Madison India.

NAC advertising is the incumbent agency on the account. The agency will continue to be advising the client on the media side.

MUMBAI: Marketing & brand management heads Hari C and Ravi Luthria have put in their papers at Star Plus and Star One respectively.
 
While Hari joined Star India in November last, Luthria has been with the Star Network since 2006.

The duo were given the marketing & brand management roles when the network decided to integrate and structure its marketing functions in order to drive channel-specific marketing and communication needs while maintaining focus on network synergies.
 
While neither Hari nor Luthria were available for comment, sources confirm that both are currently serving their notice periods at the network.
 

MUMBAI: It is a win that came after a six-month evaluation process. Mindshare has retained its Unilever account for South Asia, including India, the US, Canada, Western Europe and South and Central Europe.

The FMCG giant will, thus, split its $5 billion global media business between Mindshare, Interpublic Group (IPG) and Omnicom Media Group (OMG).

It could not be independently verified how much was the size of the India account. Hindustan Unilever Ltd, however, spent Rs 17.65 billion on advertising and promotion for the first three quarters of this fiscal in India, up from Rs 12.41 billion a year ago.

Mindshare gets to handle the India account once again at a time when the margins of HUL are squeezed and its market supremacy in many products are threatened. The FMCG major has been fighting back and has increased its ad spend while it is eyeing the premium brands to widen its margins.

HUL is the top advertiser under FMCG sector on television during the calendar year 2009. It accounted for 19 per cent of FMCG sector‘s TV ad pie in terms of volumes, while Reckitt Benckiser (India) Ltd grabs the second spot with a share of 7 per cent.

Ponds White Beauty, Clinic All Clear Tech Soft and Dove Hair Fall Therapy System, all from the HUL stable, are the top three new brands of FMCG sector advertised on TV during 2009 in terms of secondage consumption, according to Tam data.
 
Before finalising on Mindshare, Unilever had initiated its global media agency review in July 2009 across 53 countries, in line with the company policy to evaluate media agency arrangements periodically.

Subsequently, in October, the FMCG major had shortlisted the battle to Aegis Mediabrands, Mindshare and OMG.

Says Unilever VP global media Laura Klauberg, “As we increasingly make use of digital and social media, we are confident that we have the best agency partners to help us engage in new ways with the 2 billion consumers whose lives we touch. In addition, greater alignment within our key country clusters will contribute to achieving exceptional results for our business in an increasingly complex and fragmented media environment.”
 
 
The outcome for Unilever‘s lead countries is as follows:
 

MUMBAI: Telecom company Idea Cellular has announced a multi-year sponsorship agreement with the current Indian Premier League (IPL) Champions, The Deccan Chargers of Hyderabad.

Idea Cellular, the pan-India mobile operator, will be the Principal Partner of Deccan Chargers, starting with the third edition of Indian Premier League (IPL) T20 Cricket Tournament, scheduled to start from March 2010.

Idea claims to have over six million subscribers in the state of Andhra Pradesh. During the upcoming IPL 3 T-20 Tournament, all 27 players of team Deccan Chargers, along with the coach and support staff, will be seen sporting the Idea logo on the front of their jersey and trousers.

Team captain Adam Gilchrist, ace batsmen Andrew Symonds and Rohit Sharma, pace bowler Chaminda Vaas, and several other leading international players such as Ryan Harris, Dwyane Smith, Scott Styris, Kemar Roach and Fidel Edwards will wear Brand IDEA during all their sporting action during the forthcoming T20 championship.
 
Idea Cellular CMO Pradeep Shrivastava said, “The Cricket fever is rising and IPL 3 will only add more excitement to it, further electrifying the cricket frenzy nation. Going with our essential brand promise of bringing champion ideas through the power of mobility, we have partnered with the Champions of IPL, to offer cricket entertainment by the Deccan Chargers to our 60 million subscribers across the country.”
 
Idea will launch a range of value added services on Voice, SMS and WAP portal, for 60 million subscribers, across the country to bring them closer to the Deccan Chargers. Idea subscribers will get a chance to win tickets for the matches, autographed merchandise, participate in Meet & Greet with the players, download special player messages and many more interactions with Team Deccan Chargers.
 
Deccan Chargers Sporting Ventures COO Dinesh Wadhwa said, “IPL is the most followed sporting event in the country. The success of Deccan Chargers in the last tournament has further increased the fan-following of the team. Our partnership with Idea Cellular will take the team to a higher plane of reach and visibility by connecting with millions of mobile consumers in the country. We hope to have a long-term, mutually beneficial association with Idea.”

Donning the Idea logo, Team Deccan Chargers will make its first outing at the opening match of IPL T20 tournament in Mumbai against Kolkata Knight Riders on 12 March at 8 pm.
 

MUMBAI: Vizeum India, part of the Aegis Media group, has won the media duties for Amrutanjan.
 
The size of the account is pegged at Rs 150 million. The account was previously handled by Media Direction, the social and rural communications group of RK Swamy BBDO.
 
Says Vizeum Media MD Indian subcontinent S Yesudas, “This is strategically a big win for us. We are committed to working with Amrutanjan as their extended brand management team and not just the media AOR. This business will be handled out of our Chennai office under the leadership of Vizeum South GM EM Sreeneelakandhan.”
 
Vizeum India handles brands such as ESSAR Group, Luxor/Parker, BSA Motors, Giovani and iPlayUp.
 

MUMBAI: Despite its poor on-field performance, the IndiaN Premier League (IPL) franchise Kolkata Knight Riders has signed up four more partners.

Kolkata Knight Riders CEO Joy Bhattacharya says that Videocon has come on board as the jersey sponsor. This is a corporate sponsorship and Videocon will have a presence on the leading arm and helmet. The energy drink Triple X has also come on board and has taken the back.
 
For merchandise, the franchise has tied up with Lux Cozy. The company will roll out co-branded T-shirts and the colour will change to purple from black and Gold. The franchise was looking at doing this last year but with the event shifting to South Africa, it did not become feasible.
 
The franchise has also done a promotional tie up with Fosters. Fosters does Art of Chilling parties and these will now be done in association with Shah Rukh Khan‘s team. This activity will start rolling out a few weeks before the event kicks off.
 
KKR, which has inked all fresh deals for a one-year period, is looking out for two more sponsors. Existing deals with the likes of Nokia (principal sponsor), Sprite (beverage partner), Tag Huer, Next and Reebok (kit) continue.
 

MUMBAI: Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are increasingly helping brands to create a viral impact on consumer purchase choices through word of mouth (WoM).

Citing an example while speaking at the The Mindshare Brand Equity Compass 2010 here today, Perfetti Van Melle India CEO Sameer Suneja said that a particular telecom company wasn‘t entertaining my friend‘s complaint. Irritated, he set his status message on Facebook against the telecom company. This was followed by some friends spreading similar status messages and the viral impact led the telecom firm to act in haste.

“In an hour‘s time, the telecom operator agreed to help and requested in changing the status message. Such is the power of social networking,” he said. 
 
According to marketers, WoM is fast catching up via the social networking sites with 70 per cent of Indians aged 15-34 age group. Also, about 60 per cent consumers trust and take purchasing decisions based on online discussions.

According to Suneja, WoM works for rational purchases, there are different categories of rational purchases including food. “Buying food products are high on impulse and in such cases WoM plays the catalyst,” he says.
 
Author Chetan Bhagat is also of the opinion that WoM does the trick when there aren‘t sufficient marketing budgets. “If one is to attract a crowd for an event in a short notice, WoM is a very effective medium. But, it‘s effective when the news is fresh and ‘awesome‘. A marketing budget of Rs 500,000-7, 00,000 can buy a lot of space on the internet which can be effectively used.”
 
So how does WoM work as a marketing tool? Says FritoLay India CEO foods division & Pepsico India region president Gautham Mukkavilli, “A stressed consumer looks in for simplified choices. Before zeroing in on what to buy, the consumer makes sure he accesses his personal space that can be anything from dance class to a blog.”
 

MUMBAI: The utility derived from time has changed significantly in the last decade and will change even more in the next decade as very young people become consumers and buyers of brands.

Thus, marketers believe that brands have to do the unexpected to create and spread awareness and stickiness in the shortest time span possible.
 
“Gone are the Ramayan days when media planners would capture the maximum pie on the show and thus, get 80 per cent exposure. These are the days of optimizers as everyone is fighting for their share wherein consumers are spoilt with choices.,” said Colors CEO Rajesh Kamat, while speaking at the The Mindshare Brand Equity Compass 2010 held here today.

Kamat noted that with one thousand messages reaching consumers daily in various formats, marketers can no longer cut paste the winning template. 
 
“If a brand wants to grab attention, it has to be a showstopper in the very first instance today as there is no second chance given in this competent market,” he said.

However, Radio Mirch CEO Prashant Pandey noted that unlike other media platforms, radio still remains to be built as a conventional brand as the fundamentals of radio marketing stays unchanged. 
 
Panday further explained that brand building has to talk about the style and persona of the product and that has to be supplemented with right delivery and consistency.

Thus, according to Pandey, brand building can never take place in compressed time “but sales surely can.”