… just another blahg …

Free some underwear from those irksome dangling tags to get a pretty good product: Hanes Tagless Underwear. Then come up with some well-conceived copy to sell it: Because the world gives you enough tags. Add a tri-series of neat artwork. So far, so good, right? Now, add a dash of sensationalism, let a mindless handful of viewers get a peek, and there it suddenly is: the perfect recipe for a disaster. McCann India is the ad agency in question and their campaign - now withdrawn - had 3 print ads. The first showed a man bearing the burden of a vivid bunch of “gay” things, the second had a guy pulling at a similar collage of stereotypically “black” things, and the third depicted an assortment of “Pakistani” stuff - each with the same words at the bottom. Hanes Tagless Underwear. Because the world gives you enough tags.

People have been calling the campaign “anti-gay” and “racist”. How is it either of those things? The fact that it was seen as biased is odd; it’s anything but! (The only thing that does bother me about the campaign is that people who aren’t really aware of the stereotypes in question will indeed become so after seeing it.) Yes, the executions are hard-hitting for the times, but I also think that the basic brand idea borders on brilliant! And that is what McCann’s defense should have been - instead of the spineless apology they actually mustered up.

Much of course has been said on the topic of logos, but here are my two cents, nay phils.

There’s a logo for a ‘horseracing city’ in Dubai called Meydan. The logo is simple. It’s a sort of variegated blue background. On it, in a white and very legible font is: Meydan. A thoroughbred destination. That’s the English version. I saw a similar looking logo in Arabic the other day and knew instantaneously what it was for - even though I am thoroughly uninitiated when it comes to reading the script.

Compare this to tonnes of other logos around that try and do too much - fancy color schemes, an effort to communicate not just the company but it’s holding company as well, fonts that overwhelm, and taglines so verbose or rehashed that they repel. It’s often pretty unnecessary, largely ineffective and highly forgettable stuff…

So ditch the clutter and think Nike, Fedex, and Apple instead! I believe the message is simple.

Millward Brown recently did a worldwide study to measure brand loyalty. One of the questions they asked was: would you be ready to permanently tattoo a brand logo on to your arm?

Almost 20% said they would be willing. Of them, the most popular response was Harley Davidson. If you are thinking that’s because of Harley’s rough-n-toughness, then consider the brand that came in a close second: Disney. So, obviously, it’s less about brand-consonance with the concept of tattoos, and more about the brand itself. Not surprising then that Cocoa Cola came in third?

Now guess which brand was fourth…

It wasn’t Apple, no. Go here for the answer, but think about it for a moment first - just for the fun of it!

I’m sort of amazed by it all.

Take a quick look at these commercials. The first is from Airtel - I applauded its creativity wholeheartedly just a few weeks ago. The other - and presumably older of the two - is for New Zealand Telecom. (I happened upon the second on this rather noteworthy blog.)

You might find the overlap between the two spots intriguing…

So what do you think: coincidence, plagiarism, or just cryptomnesia?

Have you often wondered why the television set seems to blare much louder during the commercials between programming?

I dug around a little and it appears that the peak levels of commercials are actually no louder than that of the shows they pepper. It’s just that the average level of sound in TV ads is greater and so the perceived loudness is higher too. But I digress. Regardless of whether or not they do get louder, they sure seem to get louder, and so we turn the sound off/down or change the channel.

Wouldn’t it make sense for advertisers to tone the sound down so that we aren’t knocked off our sofas? To keep us from constantly clutching at our remotes, one finger on the mute button, in dread of the commercial breaks? Perhaps on more than one count…

Communication researcher Carson Wagner has recently found that watching anti-drug commercials under conditions of low attention is actually more convincing than watching under conditions of high attention. One reason offered up as an explanation for this phenomenon is that when pro-drug viewers are watching with full-on attention, they have the resources required to find faults with the message. They refute it and, in so doing, are less persuaded by it.

That kind of ‘counter-argument’ of the ad’s message doesn’t happen when viewers are watching the commercials in their peripheral view. In the latter case, the associations between the concept ‘drug’ and the concept ‘bad’ are subtly reinforced, despite - and perhaps even especially because of - a lack of complete attention on part of the viewer.

The same could easily apply to selling brands. The ads would play at slightly lower volumes and yet reiterate the connection between the ‘brand’ concerned and the concept ‘good’. It would be a softer sell, sure, but a sell nonetheless. And at least it wouldn’t encourage viewers to turn the darn telly off or have them change the channel to escape those in-your-face “breaks.”

Also, commercials that are replayed incessantly might not become as off-putting as they do when they are too loud. Anyone who watched the India-Australia test match at Perth on TV this week could vividly recall the Airtel annoyance. It actually made my father swear he would never subscribe to Airtel - even though he considers its message quite good. The intrusiveness of the ad somehow got attached to the brand for him, and I suspect that he is not alone.

So, advertisers, hear hear! It would probably be wise to turn the volume of your ads DOWN.

Kudos to Airtel and the chaps at Rediffusion DY&R in India for the new direction in which they have taken the campaign.

It’s almost predictable, which is precisely why it is close to genius. Much like the Corona campaign: on-the-tip-of-your-tongue intuitive. The trick often lies in hitting on a concept so seamless that everyone - from consumer to creative to CEO - takes a look and wonders why they didn’t think of it first. Nice!

Airtel’s reliability index better be pretty good though, or users might have to take the brand with a pinch of salt! Good for beer, not so much for a mobile network - no matter how noble its advertising.

It’s neat how certain internet gimmicks have been wildly successful in transcending language barriers and publicising brands across the globe. Not always elegant perhaps but often powerful! You’ll see what I mean, if you enter your first and last name in the two boxes on top, and then hit the ‘visualiser’  bar on this link.

I once had conflicted feelings about Starbucks, but am now an unabashed fan of the brand. See a few years ago, I tried hard to avoid Starbucks, and patronized several local coffee shops in Austin instead. I purposefully focused on the boring luxury of each Starbucks store and the small component of free trade coffee they sell. I was appropriately peeved when they bought out Peet’s, and yes, rolled my eyes regularly when the person ahead of me got a grande-non-fat-three-pump-vanilla-soy-latte-extra-hot-no-whip.

Then I moved to  LA where there weren’t as many local-coffee-places-with-parking in my neighborhood. And so I became thoroughly happy with my 2-percent-grande-iced-latte-for-4-big-bucks again. Then Highland Perk opened up in Eaglerock. Yay, I could now act-local-think-global again!

That’s till I stumbled in on a groggy Sunday morning and absent-mindedly asked for a “grande percent latte” out of habit. The much-tattooed many-pierced coffeemaker replied, “Don’t know what grande is, nor what percent means. The latte I understand.” So I laughed a bit and he mumbled: “I don’t respond to Starbucks-speak.” Why is that, I asked. And he said, “Because they don’t really care about coffee, and if you go there, then neither do you.” I was annoyed because, as you know, the decapitalist (if you will) in me had been awaiting this bickering barista’s inclusion in my daily routine for a while…

Even so, I went on to amicably say I’m from Austin and how I miss its strong local coffee shop culture - sort of indicating that it’s not out of choice that I go to Starbucks. Bu he didn’t thaw a bit, no. So I left and took my dog to the park and sipped his latte. And it was good, but no better or cheaper than Starbucks - which is where I stopped off on the way back for a refill. I could say I did that only to avoid dealing with His Highandmightyness again, but really, it was then that I gave up hating on the Starbucks I love. Call me what you will. =)

Now I’m back in India where, despite the profusion of international brands that have hit, Starbucks has not yet arrived. But I’m currently visiting Dubai and it’s been around here for a while. As you can imagine, I’m one foot out of the door and in my sneakers so I can run.

PS: Starbucks also makes an effort to spark social change and I find that commendable. Whether or not the at-times-controversial effort is made solely in the interest of increasing their ’star’ and - consequently - ‘bucks’ factor is anyone’s guess. At least they make it.

I had the honour and pleasure of meeting Santosh Desai recently. He is one of India’s foremost account planners and a weekly columnist (typically in the role of a commentator on popular culture) for the Times of India. Chatting with him was uplifting for he is eloquent, down-to-earth, and has integrity. It gives me great hope that people like him (those with a holistic bent of mind) have a voice in advertising and media in India.

Here is one of his columns from the TOI. I think it nicely demonstrates how his unique brand of acute observation, unapologetic introspection, and nuanced articulation might generate deep insights in to why we feel and do the things we feel and do. (How this sort of thinking might be relevant to understanding consumer behavior is perhaps easy to see, but more on it later.)  

THE FEAR OF GIVING

Old ladies begging in winter nights get me. I am always shaken, disturbed and moved in a way that goes beyond sympathy or pity. It seems colossally unfair that one should be so vulnerable, so shrivelled by penury at this stage of one’s life. Of course the sight of poverty always induces guilt pangs, the homeless make one uncomfortable, the idea of street children failing to find avenues to channelise their obvious energies is difficult to live with but, for some reason, the idea of old ladies in winter wearing smudged glasses held up by strings has the most powerful emotional impact on me. And yet, for all the trauma this sight induces in me, I find it impossible to actually reach into my pocket and give her anything.

I think about it with increasing desperation and then the light turns green and I am free to go. I dream of making a grand gesture, of emptying out my pockets on an impulse or going round the city distributing blankets but of course I do nothing. And I don’t think I am alone in this. While a large part of our attitude towards the economically underprivileged is made up of indifference, there is a small but significant part that is unable to take the step from concern to giving. What explains this inability, this paralysis that stymies good intentions?

And I am not talking about the rational arguments against giving charity to people who beg on the streets. There are those argue that begging is a nuisance and giving only encourages dependence. You frequently hear accounts of how when meaningful work was offered to the people who were begging, it was almost always turned down. Without getting into the argument for or against encouraging begging, let us focus instead on those situations when we have no conceptual problems with giving something but find ourselves unable to bring ourselves to do so. 

Perhaps, what prevents us from giving is that it appears to be a cheap way to buy absolution. It seems too easy, to rid oneself of guilt by offloading some money into an outstretched hand. Are we merely purchasing a cheap ticket to heaven, finding a way to postpone facing up to some deep sense of guilt at our relative good fortune? 

The other possible reason is that the problem seems too vast for one small gesture to make any real difference. The sense of “so what will it really change’’ might stop us from taking that small step. 

The enormity of the problem mocks at the futility of our gesture and makes it appear to be an act of indulgence aimed at making us, rather than the person begging, feel better. The feeling that there is no symbolic way of shouldering responsibility, that once we cross the threshold and take any action then we somehow become responsible for the problem in its entirety. And if we are not ready for that, then it is perhaps better to do nothing at all. 

In some deep-rooted way, we are afraid of playing God with other people’s destinies. The act of giving seems laden with arrogance; we attribute superiority to ourselves based on material comfort and somehow this feels wrong. It feels wrong that one should be in a position to make such a difference to someone else’s life.

The transaction is too naked, the difference too palpable for comfort. Also, there is this other problem with playing God—we need to be completely fair and impartial. 

Who is to say who needs our charity the most—is it the shrivelled old woman or the urchin without a leg? Do we give on the basis of an internal pathos-meter that measures the relative direness of the need? Do we then end up summing up human beings by the size of their afflictions? 

And hence the irony of doing nothing for those in need not out of callousness, but out of some form of respect for them as people. 

Perhaps this too is only a way to rationalise indifference. Perhaps this whole debate is too self-indulgent in the first place. And it certainly changes nothing. 

The next time an old lady raps on my car window, I will still be a deer in her headlights, trapped between my fear of arrogance and a need to do something.

Read more from him here. (Search for ‘Santosh Desai’ or ‘City City Bang Bang’ on this link.)

Watch these 2 ads pitching deodorants for men.

Axe is marketed as Lynx in Europe, so did Unilever rename Axe as Zatak in India? Apparently not. Turns out Zatak ads are simply “inspired” by the Axe creative. I’ve always found the Axe idea vaguely off-putting and imagine anyone who “buys” the spoofy campaign to to reek slightly of desperation if not BO. Even so, I’m not surprised that it won several awards for its creative and planners. I mean the concept is occassionally funny albeit in a boy’s club kinda way, and the Clicker idea was actually pretty catchy. But back to Zatak. I’ve got to say it stinks, if from nothing else, then from its utter lack of originality.