Take Charge

O&M does it again. Creativity at its best. The latest from American Express basic charge card, after a hiatus of 7 years is captivating yet simple. The tagline "Don't Take Chances. Take Charge" urges customers to take responsibility for their spending with a lightness of spirit that is hard to ignore. Although the benefits mentioned in the commercial is a huge plus, the charge card in question requires the balance to be paid in full each month. Given the economic turmoil of the past year, am not surprised.

According to Forbes, "The number of credit cards issued this year has decreased 39%, causing further concern for card companies already dealing with financial setbacks. AmEx's second-quarter revenue, reported in late July, dropped 18% to $6.09 billion and profits plunged 48%."

Keeping the above in mind, this campaign is a hands-down winner. It not only encourages consumers to get credit cards and buy stuff (which by the way is great for the economy), but also manages to remind them to be sensible about it. Few campaigns can say it all...and still make us smile. This one sure does.

Coca Cola - From Santa Claus to Social Media

Advertising plays a larger role in our life than we can ever imagine. Did you know that the image of Santa most people have today is largely based on Coca-Cola advertising?

Before the profiling by Coca-Cola, Santa's appearances ranged from big, small, tall, fat, elf-like, bishop-like, gaunt, strict, spooky...and he wore everything from animal skin to a tan suit. Except for the color of his suit, the jolly old man owes much of his persona to the beverage giant.The traditional red coat has more to do with the imagination of Civil War cartoonist Thomas Nast than with any brand color.

Back in the 1920s many people thought of Coca-Cola as a drink meant for warm weather. With the 1922 slogan "Thirst Knows No Season," followed with a campaign connecting Santa Claus with the beverage, the company tried to remind people that Coca-Cola was a great choice in any season. Thus started the association of Claus and Coke.

An Excerpt From the Coca-Cola Website:

"Archie Lee, the D'Arcy Advertising Agency executive working with The Coca-Cola Company, wanted the next campaign to show a wholesome Santa as both realistic and symbolic. In 1931, The Coca-Cola Company commissioned Michigan-born illustrator Haddon Sundblom to develop advertising images using Santa Claus --- showing Santa himself, not a man dressed as Santa. For inspiration, Sundblom turned to Clement Clark Moore's 1822 poem "A Visit From St. Nicholas" (commonly called "'Twas the Night Before Christmas"). Moore's description of St. Nick led to an image of Santa that was warm, friendly, pleasantly plump and human. For the next 33 years, Sundblom painted portraits of Santa that helped to create the modern image of Santa ---an interpretation that today lives on in the minds of people of all ages, all over the world."

More recently, as part of the "Open Happiness" campaign Coca-Cola Company is sending three bloggers to 206 countries on Jan 1, 2010 to find out what makes people happy and then blog, tweet, upload videos and generally create a social media buzz around it for one whole year! Consumers will get to vote, suggest and complain as with any social media campaign. - [via psfk]

From redefining an icon to digging deep into the latest trend, the Coca-Cola Company is all about branding and maybe a secret formula or two. Given the composition and benefit of the product in question, that is the way to go!

Branding Brown

We all know the kind of hype generated by Dan Brown and his books revolving around Harvard professor Robert Langdon. Recently, the character was brought to life by Tom Hanks as summer blockblusters. But apart from being adapted to the big screen effortlessly, Brown's books have a certain brand of their own.

His contemporary J.K. Rowling has claimed her place in fiction fantasy with the Harry Potter series. Her USP being magic and her audience young. Although Brown's latest offering, "The Lost Symbol" has not been able to overtake the sales figure of “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”, his books does have a heady mix of mysticism and skepticism, young and old, good and evil. His canvas is larger and his audience older.

But the branding of his protagonist is impeccable. Notice how he describes Langdon's Harris Tweed jacket and collegiate cordovan loafers right at the beginning. What his character wears is part of who he or she is. The BlackBerry and iPhone users in the story are different in their profession, their attitude and their personality. So are the coffee and tea drinkers.

Then comes the branding of the books in general. Described as "brain candy" by the Chicago Tribune, Brown's books can be categorized as a masstige brand. Though accessible and understood by the masses in general, they have a certain prestige associated with them. After all, we are following a "Harvard Professor" in his quest to unlock the mysteries of the world and save a life or two in the process.

Also, the deliberate mismatch in the characterization where academicians form the core of a thrilling plot fit for the Jason Stathams of the world is an obvious play at consumer(reader) aspirations. The actual readers of his books will be likely to be a bookworm whose idea of a Sunday is not chasing fanatics around the globe. So when Brown picks up a Professor from a mundane weekend and places him right in the middle of a chaotic international disturbance, his readers are already hooked. Aspiration as a brand attribute is pretty common in the world of advertising.

Brand Involvement is another key feature in his stories. The codes need to be unraveled, the symbols understood and the mystery solved. He keeps the reader two steps ahead of the protagonist making him or her feel smart.

The marketing of the book is another story altogether. Every form of media is tapped resulting in Doubleday announcing that Brown's "The Lost Symbol" has already sold more than 1 million copies after being on sale for one day in the United States, Canada and Britain. That total includes preorders for the book, which has been at or near the top of Amazon.com for months. The eBook version has been in the news too though the actual sales figure have not been released by Doubleday. The publishing industry is evolving as I write. Not so much the branding. The book, the author and his main character is and will remain a study in passive branding.

Crowdsourcing for Flavors

"Vitaminwater is turning to Facebook fans to come up with its next flavor. The Flavorcreator Facebook app, which launched this week and runs through Oct. 20, is designed to crowdsource the company's next product." - reports BrandWeek.

I am sure Vitaminwater has done enough research before spending money on this venture but I could not help think of Henry Ford's famous quote "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses."

I checked out the Vitaminwater Facebook application and found that it demands a lot of time of the user. So if you are looking for the ever elusive involvement quotient, it's high. But I still don't know if this is a good idea. Let's wait and watch.

Progress is Beautiful

Created by San Francisco-based Venables Bell & Partners

I know how this Audi Ad is dangerous if imitated, breaks all traffic rules and generally makes no sense. But I am not here to judge or over analyze till all the fun is gone. Now and then, I simply love the thrill of a car chase and nobody does it better than the transporter himself. Aired during this year's Superbowl, this commercial shows Jason Statham behind the wheel of an Audi A6.

Last year's Superbowl had Audi do a parody of the famous "horse head in bed" scene from The Godfather. According to the NewYork Post, "Audi says the ad scored well with dealers and helped traffic to its Web site jump almost 200 percent. It reported a 7 percent decrease in sales in 2008, although that was far better than most of its competitors. At the same time, Audi saw its US market share rise slightly, from 0.7 percent to 0.6 percent."

After a gap of two decades, returning to the Superbowl circuit in 2008 seems to have turned out well for the car company. So this year, Audi has increased its marketing budget by almost 20 percent and again targeted the big daddy of media spends. Post Superbowl 2009, American audiences are being shown shorter versions of the 60 seconder.

With most car companies talking directly to the consumer about savings and assurance programs, Audi's tone and style is like a breath of fresh air.

Sometimes it pays to be different. The recession will not last forever. Meanwhile, let's just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Make Way for eBooks and Book Ads

Last month, Barnes & Noble launched an online store for digital books with 700,000 titles. Moreover, they intend to stock more than a million eBooks in the coming 12 months. To read them, you can download the free eReader from their website which is compatible with iPhone, iTouch, BlackBerry, PC and Mac. It is interesting to note here that it is not compatible with either Kindle from Amazon or the Sony Reader. To get ahead in the battle of eBooks, Amazon recently released a free software to turn our iPhones and iTouch into Kindles.

If all this wasn't enough, now there are talks of placing ads in e-books! Imagine scrolling down Pride and Prejudice to find an ad for a toothpaste. Thankfully, the ads will try and be contextual or be based on the customer's user profile. As if that is any relief.

Don't get me wrong here. Though I love the smell of a brand new book and lose track of time in a bookstore, I am not really averse to the idea of eBooks. I am all for technology and moving on...and of course, marketing.

I see the bright side like how ads in eBooks will bring down the cost of both the books and the reading devices.

The ad revenue will positively impact the author, the publisher, the e-book store, the device manufacturers.

The competition between Amazon and Barnes & Noble will result in more and more eBooks and also a better reading experience.

The printing world is anyway trying to revamp itself through this digital revolution. One more change wouldn't hurt.

But what if this trend trickles down to print? According to Austin Modine in The Register, it is a possibility for anybody who wants to avail of a lower price in an on-demand book from Amazon.

Now that may be taking things too far. Or is it the future of reading?

Branding India

Creative: Prakash Verma, Nirvana Films. Digital Work: Crayons Advertising

Source: http://adoholik.com

I have been writing for travel websites for more than a year now and the way I see it, each city is a brand. Each country needs to be placed right, much like a product. Tourism is an industry which needs to be promoted, much like a service.

Often what bothers me is how India is misrepresented time and again. The poverty is highlighted, women are shown as helpless or oppressed and everthing somehow points at some kind of slum tourism. Any trace of luxury or well-being is strictly avoided.

In a recent World Hum article, I came upon the sentence "In all my train rides so far, she was the first Indian woman I’d seen traveling solo; the first who wasn’t dressed in traditional clothing, and herding children around the train." Well, in all my years in India I have had plenty of opportunity to see women travelling solo, mostly for work and obviously not "herding" children.

The only time I saw the true flavor of an Indian city captured was when I caught an episode of Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations" on the Travel Channel.

I believe that the right advertising can make or break a brand so I thank the makers of the Incredible India Ad (see video above). It tries to give the right picture of India and succeeds beautifully. The ad portrays the country's diversity without resorting to visuals of the underbelly. Yes, every country has a seedier side to it but why would anybody want to use that to attact tourists beats me.

If we want to brand India, let's do it right.