Manmeet Sabharwal's Marketing Blog

Parle Agro had launched Hippo sometime back in 2009.Hippo is a brand of wheat munchies(snacks/chips).After launching Hippo back then,Parle Agro has come up with a TV commercial now in Feb 2010.

Snacks/Chips as a category has evolved a lot in past few years in terms of advertising.With the likes of Lays,ITC Bingo coming up with interesting ads,Hippo has joined the bandwagon(or the brandwagon).
The commercial is nice and features a satire on evil practices in general.With a Bollywood backdrop song,’Pyaar Baant te Chalo’.It ends with a saying that cause of every bad thing in the world happens because of hunger.So eat Hippo,fight hunger…

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Nirma is a heritage brand which has transformed constantly.It has been one of the earliest branded detergent powder in india.As a product it kept on improving in response to the competition and changing customer preferences.Most of us can relate to the ‘NIRMA’  jingle very well.

This jingle and positioning has been nearly constant over the years.Nirma as a brand has enjoyed good position in brand awareness and recall.In recent years it has faced a lot of competition.From Wheel to Tide,the list is long.

Now few days back,a new Nirma ad has been released.It has the same jingle(unchanged) but the way it is…

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Dalda has been a big brand in india from past 7 decades.Dalda was a brand of vanaspati ‘ghee’.A vanaspati is basically mixture of vegetable oils that have been converted to solid form by the addition of hydrogen.
Dalda was basically used as a cheaper subsitute to the original ghee(clarified butter) which is inseparable from our Indian cuisine.People who couldn’t afford ghee used dalda instead. In fact Dalda became synonymous with vanaspati.Dalda meant vanaspati and vanaspati meant dalda.

I even heard that people used to refer any general cheaper substitute as Dalda.e.g.any cheaper brand for any product would loosely be referred to as Dalda.On the…

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TATA is a brand which can be used to market any thing under the sun.Whether it is Trucks,Cars,DTH,Tea,cell phone(CDMA or GSM),Tea,Software,Graphics etc etc TATA has marketed all of them well and made them the market leaders.
TATA hai to achcha hi hoga ! (If its TATA,It would be good).This is general public perception about TATA.
TATA is built on trust and quality.
Now yet again TATA has diversified and stepped into a new market (where trust is paramount ) i.e. Cold Beverage market.They have a new offereing called TATA TiON.The market is not exactly cold beverage but non carbonated and natural cold drinks…

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Till now we were experiencing a wave in advertising which was Animation based Ad campaigns.Vodafone,Virgin,Videocon,Limca(HP campaign) and many more all coming up with their animated campaigns.
It was always said that animation is cheaper in recession as the actors,models and brand ambassadors incur a huge cost.
But now comes the fusion.Aamir Khan in his new Coca Cola ad is animated as a Video Game Character.

He came first in Ghajini the game as an animated character Sanjay.Now this new animated avatar.
Here is the Ad

The Making of the above ad can be seen here.
Coca Cola is trying something new here.Pepsi have always been associated…

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It gives me immense pleasure when i write about marketing campaigns which are like ‘Jaago Re’.When the motive of a marketing campaign is just not profit but larger than that.When It has power of changing society and  starting a revolution then its above a campaign definitely.
When Tata Tea launched ‘Jaago Re’,All stood and watched.’Jaago Re’ was a catch line and it made people think.Then they took the campaign to new heights and made it very successful.
Now TATA Tea is back with its new campaign on similar lines ‘Aaj Se Khilana Bandh, Pilana Shuru’.This version takes the issue of corruption and…

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Few days back i saw this new Munch Ad.I was just surfing through the channels and saw this ad.I laughed very badly after watching the ad.It was hilarious.I am not a very big fan of Cadbury’s Pehli Tareekh campaign,so enjoyed this ad even more.
My marketing teacher believes that Cadbury’s campaign is awesome.Atleast for one day(the pehli tareekh) they are able to wipe out all the competition(which is about 4% of the market). but still i was never impressed by the total campaign.But this munch ad campaign really is awesome .
This is not the first time we are seeing this…

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Argentina recently saw a new change in their lives, A new soft drink Pecsi or not so new softdrink Pecsi.Actually Pepsi has come up with a new campaign in Argentina in which Pepsi has been renamed Pecsi.
When speaking Spanish, especially with an Argentine accent, people tend to say “Pecsi” instead of “Pepsi”. They have said it like this for years, and Pepsi has responded by launching a campaign changing the second P to a C, believed to be the first such change for the venerable brand.
According to a recent survey, 25% of the population says it that way. So BBDO…

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Nearly a year back i noticed small kiosks near many stations in mumbai.All station roads had these small brown colored kiosks with 2 3 guys standing.These brown colored kiosks had Hindustan Unilever written on them.Those guys had a big container type of equipment with them.One day i and my friend went to them(due to Brand Hindustan Unilever) and asked what was it all about.
They very professionaly told us about this new Water Purifier from Hindustan Unilever.They kept explaining it and the word Hindustan Unilever was very prominent in their description(Unilever were attaching their heritage with it to sell it as…

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