The winners of The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008.

February 16-29, 2008 The fortnightly from agencyfaqs!

The woman on top atJWT’s RMG Connect.

30

14

PROFILEMeera Sharath Chandra

Will the music channel beable to sustain its lead?

MEDIAOn a High Note

Hansa Research’s report onwhat Indian viewers want.

RESEARCHUntying the Knot

T H ERs 40

www.thebrandreporter.com

18

SAKAALMarathi and Beyond 16

FIRANGIWordly-Wise 22

IBN7Getting Tech-Savvy 22

WEB 18A Surprise in Store 2836

Inside: The winners of The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008.

36

3The Brand Reporter, February 16-29, 2 0 0 8

Image ConnectThe write-up on the Brylcreem

TVC made for interesting read. Itbeautifully brought out the fact thatthe product was linked to the cultur-al milieu of rural India.

Also, importantly, it not onlyfamiliarised the reader with the TVCand its objective but also stated thebackground which had inspired thepositioning of the product. Overall acrisp, yet comprehensively written,piece.

Niharika Upadhyayvia email

Business ForaysIt was interesting to read about

regional newspapers - “SoundBusiness Sense” - trying to woo thereaders and the advertisers.

I was surprised to know that thereare small players like Nafa Nuksanwho’ve had the guts to come outwith a business newspaper in a

regional language. But I wonderwhat would happen to these smallplayers, once the big players likeBusiness Standard, Economic Times andJagran jump in? Here’s a chance forsmaller players to make money bylooking forward for a buyout.

Ananya KunduHaryana

News FareThe writeup “Assorted News” did

not stop by saying that news channelstoday are incorporating variety andby merely explaining how they aredoing it. It put forth the views of amedia research head and a news edi-tor, giving scope to the reader todetermine his, or her, own stand onthe subject.

It brought balance to the debate ofwhether news channels shouldinclude programmes which pertainto ‘non-serious’ genres.

Sugatha PandeyMumbai

The fortnightly from agencyfaqs!Volume III, Issue 14

EDITOR & PUBLISHER Sreekant Khandekar

EXECUTIVE EDITOR M Venkatesh

CREATIVE CONSULTANTSPealiDezine

LAYOUTVinay Dominic

MARKETING Prasanna Singh

LOGISTICSRajesh Kanwal

ADVERTISING ENQUIRIESAshish Chauhan

Noida: (0120) 4077800,

4077819, 4077816

Gaurav Prabhu

Mumbai: (022) 40429702-5

[email protected]

Marketing OfficeB-3, First floor, Sector-4,

Noida-201301. Tel: (0120) 4077800.

Mumbai39, A to Z (Industrial) Premises

Co-op Soc Ltd, Lower Parel,

Mumbai - 400013.

Tel: (022) 40429701-5.

Subscription EnquiriesSakshi Kohli

Tel: (0120) 4077837

[email protected]

Registered Office

Cover Design Vinay Dominic

This fortnight...

Speaking the LingoIs it possible that the regional chan-nels are on the upswing? Though yourstory says so and the fact that bigannouncements like the GBN Grouppicking up a stake in Channel7, a Hindinews channel make the argument quitestrong. Bengali, Marathi and Gujaratiapart there are channels in smallerniches now that can turn out to be arage. Who’s ready to try Bhojpuri?

A SARANGI

Mumbai

The cover of this issue is about The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008, an agencyfaqs! ini-

tiative, which took place in Mumbai on February 14, 2008. This was preceded by a

day-long conference, Buzz Power, at the same venue.

Marketers love the idea of buzz - that is, of consumers talking about their brand with

other consumers. But people have so many interesting things to talk about: films, politics,

religion, sports - even bandhs. So why should they talk about our brands?

It’s easy for a Google or an i-pod to get discussed. But the bulk of us don’t have

such sexy products to work on. We work on toothpaste, soaps, tyres and banking

services. And countless such categories full of me-too brands where the battle is

fought on price - and distribution. So, why would consumers talk about our

brands? And yet, if you cast your eyes around, brands in apparently hard-to-dif-

ferentiate situations have managed to generate consumer excitement.

Look at Kingfisher. All airlines have pretty much the same aircraft, the same

airports and routes, the delays. Yet, Kingfisher has succeeded in making flying fun.

Take Bingo! I mean, what could you possibly do with another pack of chips?

But from the timing of its launch to the flavours to the retail display and advertis-

ing, this ITC brand has managed to get consumers to smile and talk about it.

Then there is Zapak. This online gaming portal is the buzz of the young and

they can’t get enough of it. And mind you, Zapak has managed to do this at a time

when online gaming was given up for dead in India.

On to TataSky. There are few categories that are harder to create buzz in than

this one. TataSky is not a media company. It is a distribution company – and what can be

more limiting? As if that was not bad enough, the law prevents companies in this category

from distinguishing their offering. And yet TataSky has managed to get happy consumers to

talk and spread the word.

The Buzz Conference was full of case studies such as these. And if you missed the

Conference this year, I do hope you will join us in 2009.

February 16-29, 2008 The fortnightly from agencyfaqs!

The woman on top atJWT’s RMG Connect.

30

14

PROFILEMeera Sharath Chandra

Will the music channel beable to sustain its lead?

MEDIAOn a High Note

Hansa Research’s report onwhat Indian viewers want.

RESEARCHUntying the Knot

T H ERs 40

www.thebrandreporter.com

18

SAKAALMarathi and Beyond 16

FIRANGIWordly-Wise 22

IBN7Getting Tech-Savvy 22

WEB 18A Surprise in Store 2836

Inside: The winners of The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008.

36

Sreekant Khandekar

In December 2004,the Bata India bal-ance sheet showed

losses of Rs 63 crore. Itwas a time for some soulsearching and the com-pany realised, as in thewords of MarceloVillagran, managingdirector & CEO, BataIndia, “the Indian con-sumer’s needs hadchanged and so had theexpectations from aretail store.”

The company turnedaround with a Rs 40crore profit in 2006. IfVillagran is to bebelieved, the companyhad a growth of 14 percent in 2007.

The company wantsto move out of its 600 sqft stores and launch aminimum of 80stores every yearabove 3,000 sq ft.“Customers are notgoing to see boxesanymore. Insteadthere’ll be over 1,000designs on displayand the customer can move aroundand touch and try the shoes.”

The company, last year in Octoberlaunched its first 10,000 sq ft four-floor mega store in Vadodara. Prior tothis, in July 2007, it opened a 4,800 sqft ‘Bata Flagship Store’ and a 6,000 sqft Superstore in Thane, Mumbai; and

in August, a 6,000 sq ftSuperstore in Hyderabad.

The company thoughhasn’t changed its targetaudience – the family –but it wants to have amore youthful andtrendy range, from itsown Bata sub-brands toReebok, Puma, NorthStar and Hush Puppies.In the last four monthsBata has added an inter-national range of shoeslike Comfit, Weinbre-nner, West-minster andScholl ‘Gelactiv’. Forwomen, it has an inter-national range of MarieClaire priced up to Rs 15,000.

According toVillagran, “There will bemore designs for women

“as per our internalresearch, women arechanging designsevery three months.”He adds that thoughmen are buying shoesmore than women,the growth in sales inthe women's category

is more than the men. Keeping up with the times, the

managing director hopes to regularlychange designs, as unlike in the past,so that after six months about 70 to80 per cent of the range is changed.Bata also hopes to add more varietyto its kids range – Bubblegummers.

4 The Brand Reporter, February 16-29, 2 0 0 8

Lakme - P&G> The Rs 2,200-crore Indian skin care marketis seeing much action. Lakme Lever, part of the HindustanLever (HUL) group has added another range of skincare prod-ucts to its range. The company has decided to promote its PureDefense skincare range through its beauty advisors and 1,200Lakme retail outlets across the country. In another move,HUL’s arch rival, Procter & Gamble India (P&G) has kicked offan aggressive consumer activation programme to populariseits skin care brand ‘Olay’ in Mumbai.

UB Group>Shopaholics have one more rea-son to rejoice. The UB Group’s first luxury retailmall will be launched at the Vittal Mallya Roadin Bangalore within the next six months. VittalMallya was Vijay Mallya’s father. The luxuryretail will be called UB CITY – The Collection,which will be housing some of the world’s bestbrands with brands such as Louis Vuitton,Gucci, Salvatori Ferragamo, Dunhill, Burberryand Rolex to name a few.

Koutons> While a number of brands are being launchedto cater specifically to the needs of women and children,Koutons Retail, a manufacturer of men’s apparel has alsoextended its brand for women and kids with the introductionof LesFemm, Koutons Junior and fashion accessories. Thetotal investments by the company in this vertical will beapproximately Rs 50 crore.

World Gold Council and D’damas>What is beautifuljewellery without a beautiful face? World Gold Council andD’damas Gold have named Jacqueline Fernandez, a formerMiss Sri Lanka, as the new face for their contemporary andlight weight 18 carat gold line-Collection g. She is also one ofthe fresh new faces in Bollywood and will be making herscreen debut in a Hindi film very soon. Prior to Fernandez,model Sheetal Mallar was the ambassador for the brand.

Travelguru>The travel solutions provider has launchedthe Travelguru Affiliate Program (TAP) that offers websiteowners an opportunity to generate additional revenue by pro-moting Travelguru products and services on their website.Anyone with a website or blog can join this programme byregistering on www.travelguru.com. By selling a reasonablenumber of hotels and flights, affiliate sites can aim to earn up to Rs 75,000 or more per month. Travelguru will providetheir online marketing expertise to assist site owners mone-tise their site and will provide the best creative banners fordisplay.

Pond’s>If only you could swap your age for a younger one.While that’s not possible, Pond’s Age Miracle, the anti-agingskincare range from HUL, had a programme for women wherethey could swap their old creams for Pond’s Age Miracle. Thisactivity was conducted across six metros and consumers couldvisit any Pond’s counter and exchange their old skin cream,used or unused, with a brand new Pond’s Age Miracle DayCream worth Rs 400, absolutely free. This was done in selectoutlets from January 15 to February 14.

Lycra Images Fashion Awards>Van Heusen Woman,received the ‘Most Admired Womenswear Brand of the Year’Award at the renowned Lycra Images Fashion Awards 2008.The winner for men’s range went to Allen Solly. Recently, AllenSolly launched ‘Allen Solly Youth’ catering to the young con-sumer who wants to look trendy and fashionable.

‘‘We think we cankeep the companytogether and dofar better with itthan Microsoftever will.’’

REJECTION OF MICROSOFT’S UNSOLICITED OFFER TO BUY YAHOO, IN A BLOOMBERG RELEASE.

The chairman ofthe UB Groupwants shoppersto spend more inluxury shopping,just like he does.

Offering money to promote aproduct on theinternet is becom-ing commonfeature.

BATA

The 1000 win-dows acrossthe country

will speak forthemselves.

MARK

ETIN

G

MOVEMENTS/APPOINTMENTS> GoAir has appointed Edgardo Badiali as the chief executive officer. He willreport to Jeh Wadia. Badiali is a senior aviation professional with over 15 years ofsenior management experience and 27 years of experience in the aviation sector.Before joining GoAir, he was the CEO of Italian low cost airline MyAir.

> Aviva Life Insurance announced the appointment of Monica Agrawal as itsdirector for corporate initiatives. Based in New Delhi, Agrawal will report directly toAviva India managing director and CEO Bert Paterson. Prior to joining Aviva, sheheaded Strategic Alliances for MasterCard in South Asia.

A compilation of some major account and people movements in the last fortnight

QUOTE OF THE FORTNIGHT

Villagran: thinkingout of the box.

Kansai Nerolac>After Asian Paints and Berger, it is timefor Kansai Nerolac Paints, to provide home solutions for itscustomers. The company has introduced 45 Impression StyleZones in Chennai, Bangalore and Hyderabad. Customers cancome to these zones where an associate will help them con-ceptualise their home on a computerising designing software.

I n i t i a t i ve

Serum Marketingand Communic-ation Services has

been commissioned to doqualitative marketresearch for Hindi daily,Amar Ujala (AU). “Serumwill let us know what’sworking and what’s notfor AU, following whichit will also suggest a cre-ative route to strengthenour brand further,” saysSunil Mutreja, president,AU. “Currently, the cre-ative duties lie with BEIConfluence, and once theresearch process is over,we will decide on the cre-ative duties,” addsMutreja.

Serum is the comingtogether of AbhinavDhar and Ajit Hoon ofDhar & Hoon andChetan Marwah.Sharing his views onhow Serum will goabout assessing the mar-ket for AU, Hoon says,“The brand develop-ment will start withresearch.” The researchwill point out areas in which AU is

connecting with its readers, and

those in which the read-ers want more. Theresult will be a proposi-tion created by Serum,which will work to opti-mise the brandpersonality.

The proposition willconcentrate on threethings – brand personali-ty, brand promise andproduct experience.“After conducting therequired research andinteracting with personsthat will have an effect onAU, Serum will recon-struct a propositionaround the brand, whichwill re-vitalise the brand,”explains Marwah. Theresearch will involvethree sets of people, theinfluencer group ormedia persons; readers ofAU; and readers of othernewspapers.

AU was started inAgra in 1948. It has a cir-culation of around 17lakh copies. The daily hasa healthy readership inChandigarh, Punjab,

Haryana, Himachal Pradesh andJammu & Kashmir.


i-next>The youth of Dehradun can now read a newspaperjust in the manner they talk – a mix of Hindi and English. i-next,the bilingual compact daily from Jagran Prakashan, launched itsseventh edition (first in Uttarakhand) in the city recently. Thedaily, which is priced at Re 1, was advertised heavily throughthe outdoor medium in the city.

RADIO CITY>FM channels mostly play Bollywood songs.Radio City 91.1 FM is out to break that monotony, with thelaunch of RC Live - a nationwide hunt for India's best Hindiband. RC Live is divided into three regions – North (withentries from Delhi, Lucknow, Jaipur), South (Bangalore,Hyderabad and Chennai) and West (Mumbai, Baroda,Ahmedabad, Surat, Nagpur and Pune). The top band fromeach region will then compete for the title in Delhi onFebruary 29.

It is not that people wantonly bhoot-pret and sex. Ifthat is so, why should NDTV,CNN IBN or IBN7 work? Andthey are working.ANURRADHA PRASAD, MD, BAG FILMS & MEDIA ONINDIANTELEVISION.COM ON THE LAUNCH OF E24, a GEC

My FM>Bhaskar Group's radio station, 94.3 MY FM is avail-able now globally on www.myfmindia.com. Popularentertainment shows of all its stations will be available onlinein the form of podcasts. Podcasts of popular RJ shows can beeven downloaded to iPods using iTunes. Besides, the site alsohas MY Club, a platform to send song requests, find moreabout music and Bollywood and blog on interesting topics.

The jury panelincludes nameslike PrasoonJoshi, PiyushPandey and RBalakrishnan

The company hasalso increased itsdistribution to5,000 towns

AMAR UJALA

The proposi-tion will look

at threethings –

brand person-ality, brandpromise and

product expe-rience

Mutreja: looking torevitalise the brandME

DIA

> Bharat Kapadia, former executive director of the Bhaskar Group and popular-ly known as ‘Bharat Bhai’ in the industry, is all set to join Jagran-18 Publications,the 50:50 joint venture of Network18 and Jagran Prakashan in the business printspace, as chief executive officer and managing editor. Prior to the Bhaskar Group,Kapadia worked with Chitralekha and played a strategic role in turning the brandinto a strong regional player.

> Chintamani Rao, chief executive officer, India TV, has decided to move on.Rao is an economics graduate who spent more than three decades in the advertis-ing industry before he joined India TV in August 2005. During this period, he hasbeen associated with agencies such as McCann Worldgroup, Lintas and O&M.


MOVEMENTS/APPOINTMENTSA compilation of some major account and people movements in the last fortnight

NDTV Profit>The online version of business news chan-nel, NDTV Profit, has undergone a revamp to become an‘online personal finance manager’. The website claims tohave de-cluttered and overhauled its Portfolio Tracker,adding features that will now serve as a NetworthCalculator. Users can now send in their questions onInsurance and Taxation and get answers from experts.

> CreativeLand Asia has won itself the offline and online creative duties forBigadda.com, the social networking site launched by Reliance Entertainment in 2007. Nopitch preceded the development; the agency was merely asked to work on a trial project.

ACCOUNT MOVEMENT

Mirchi ‘KAAN’>‘March against Mediocrity’ is the theme ofthe ‘Mirchi KAAN Awards’, which enter its fifth year. Theawards, for which entries close on February 22, 2008, honourexcellence in radio advertising in India. The creative fraternityand advertising agencies,can send in their entries (radio spots)aired between January 1, 2007 and January 31, 2008. Withthree ego sizes, namely Gold, Silver and Bronze, the awards willbe spread across 20 different categories.

Cartoon Network>Indian kids are blogging and areequally net savvy, as the youth. At least Cartoon Networkseem to think so, and upgraded its website cartoonnetworkin-dia.com, to Web 2.0 technology. The enhanced website offersfeatures such as video-on-demand, user-generated content,blogs, message boards and gaming functions.

TimesJobs>If spam SMSes offering ringtone down-loads weren't enough, get ready to be bugged byrecruiters, using the latest technology offering from

TimesJobs.com - XpressHire. Recruiters can send SMS toselected multiple candidates with a single click throughTimesJobs.com. In turn, candidates too can respond immedi-ately and send their applications through SMS.

TATA Sky>DTH service provider, Tata Sky has reduced itshardware price by 50 per cent to Rs 1,499. Competitor dishtvclaims 2.7 million subscribers, while Tata Sky's claim standsat 1.5 million. Will dishtv bite the bait, which currently sells itshardware for Rs 2,950?

Mills & Boon>The popular roman-tic series that fuelled the fantasies ofmany a teenager over the world in the 1900s, hopes tobridge the missing link - Indian youth, uncomfortable withEnglish – by bringing titles in Hindi and other regional lan-guages. The content of the romantic series will be Indianisedand include characters in local settings. The India TodayGroup has signed a deal with Harlequin Enterprises, to printand distribute the novels in the region.

Around 10 newtitles will bereleased in thecountry everymonth

The daily is tar-geted at stylish,confident andsmart upwardlymobile people.

In an advertisement inthe November 12,2007, issue of Mint,

and the November 1-15issue of The BrandReporter magazine,Hindustan Times’ busi-ness daily, MINT, hadclaimed that it was thesecond - most read busi-ness daily based on aninternal report. Least didit think that the adwould stir up a hornet’snest. The complaintfiled against MINT tothe AdvertisingStandards Council ofIndia (ASCI) has beenupheld recently.

The ad appealed toadvertisers, saying thatMINT was the mostviable option for them.It drew comparisonswith other business

dailies, including

Business Standard, HinduBusiness Line and TheFinancial Express. WhileMINT’s readership fig-ures were internal, HBLand FE’s figures werefrom IRS 2007 Round 2,and BS’ figures werefrom IRS 2006 Round 2.

According to theASCI directive, the adviolates Chapter 1 of theASCI code. TheConsumer ComplaintsCell (CCC) concludedthat the claim, ‘MINT –No. 2 business daily inDelhi and Mumbai’, wasnot substantiated. RajanBhalla, publisher,MINT, said that thecompany is yet to hearfrom ASCI and will takea decision only after that.He however said thatMint stands by what ithas said in the ad.


Wipro> There’s some comic relief in Wipro. The famous car-toonist Mario Miranda will be creating an advertising campaign.Cartoons created by Miranda, will reflect culture, attitude,belief, emotions and life for recruiting talent and employee com-munications. These cartoons will also be used in calendarsdesigned specifically for Wipro.

Cola War>The unrelenting winter chill has not deterred thecola companies gearing up for summer. Coca-Cola’s Sprite hasalready rolled out a television commercial (TVC) for 2008. Andnow Pepsi has announced plans to roll out a TVC featuringHindi film actors Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone, itsnewly-signed brand ambassadors.

IPL> Indian cricketers such as MS Dhoni, RP Singh, VirenderSehwag and Anil Kumble will now be under the hammer. All ofthem and others too, will be up for grabs in the upcoming auc-tion for the Indian Premier League (IPL). The price range will befrom $300,000-400,000 per year for each player.

Advertising is about breaking theclutter and that is the challengeeven when you’re approaching acreative director. Exaggeration isa part of our profession so I don’tmind ornamentation. But when Ilook at CVs, I look for honesty and

not artificial propaganda.PRASOON JOSHI, NATIONAL CREATIVE DIRECTOR, MCCANN ERICKSON IN BRAND EQUITY.

> Grasshoppers has added two accounts to its kitty. Flight Shop and InternationalInstitute of Financial Markets (IIFM) are the two new businesses on which theagency shall be working on.

> Kewal Kiran Clothing (KKCL), the menswear company, has shuffled the cre-ative duties for its brands. The brands - K-Lounge will be handled by FortuneCommunications, Integriti and Lawman by Think Theory, and Killer and Easies byKaran Rawat, former creative director at Bates.

ASCI

The ads weremisleading

by ambiguityand wereunfair to

competition.


The saga of life for Mr and Mrs Jogle and the TATA Magic van.The story is being narrated by the van driver. Agency: Rediffusion DY&RCreative Director: Rahul Jauhari, Nilanjan Dasgupta Production House: Chrome Pictures Director: Amit Sharma Client Servicing: Vinay Kanchan, Partha Sarkar

A young man is candid about two-timing his girl friends and get-ting away with it. Reason - Sprite his drink of course.Agency: O&MCreative Director: Titus Upputuru Production House: Soda Films Director: Rajesh Krishnan

New TVCs

MOVEMENTS/APPOINTMENTS> Preet Bedi, who joined Percept Picture Company (PPC) as chief execu-tive officer in January 2007, has quit with immediate effect, citing personalreasons. At PPC, Bedi was responsible for the feature films, ad films and liveevents, television software and distribution divisions. Before that, he held the postof president at Rediffusion DY&R, where he spent almost four years.

> It may be a coincidence, but JWT has just lost its second person to BBDO.After Josy Paul’s exit to BBDO India as chairman and national creative direc-tor, Amit Sutha, regional planning director, too, has moved to BBDO’sMalaysia office. Sutha had spent a little over two years at JWT, handling a hostof brands such as Lux, Godrej Appliances, Adlabs, Big FM, STAR One, STAR Plus,STAR World, UTI, HPCL and Monsanto. This was his second stint at JWT; he hadworked there (then known as HTA) earlier in 1998.

ACCOUNT MOVEMENT

ADVE

RTIS

ING

Most Debated ADS� An interesting and entertaining way to take the promiseforward. Are there more executions like last time? - Ratnakar� Nice impactful thought to the right TG. - Ajay Sharma� Cant stop laughing. Well done. - Sangeeta� Very very funny. And so fun. It's a pity it isn't all over televi-sion. I first discovered it on your site. Guys, this is the kind ofadvertising we need. Even for discounts and cheap fares. - Sunny � This bollywood father-son concept goes on well. Lets seehow the others turn out. - Happy Singh

� Nice matchsticks? kaha se mila? I need them...I have runout of them need to light my fag.... - Baruah� Idea was good for a common man but is it really practi-cal the lighting of matchsticks,otherwise watch the adkeeping ur bheja aside - Rohan Pimparkar � It's total rubbish. It sucks. How cheap your sensibilitiesare to praise this kind of junk. Time for Ford to move theaccount. - Roma� perfect . a picture can say a thousnd words. certainlypecfect illustration in a miniamum effort . good - nayab

Comments are from ‘second opinion’ of agencyfaqs! Only the TVCs which got the maximum commentslast fortnight are featured here.

The newly-launched musicchannel, 9XM has reason tocelebrate. According to TAM

Media Research statistics for C&S15-24, HSM (hindi speaking mar-kets), 9XM has garnered top positionin the music-channel space. InJanuary 2008, the channel’s genreshare was 49 per cent, way ahead ofMTV (23 per cent), which was atsecond spot and Channel V (11 percent), which was third. That’s a roar-ing start for 9XM that was launchedin October 2007.

How did 9XM detract itsstrongest competitors, MTV andChannel V, which are not just popu-lar music channels but also brands inthemselves? Calling these channels‘old’, Vikas Varma, head, musicentertainment, INX Media, says,“These channels are what my dadgrew up watching and worshipping.”He believes that 9XM’s core proposi-tion of being true Bollywood musicchannel is paying off. “9XM isstrong, vibrant, colourful and eter-nally optimistic. Its king is ShahRukh Khan, prince is Ranbir Kapoorand it loves Hindi movies,” isVarma’s rather poetic summary ofthe channel’s proposition.

MTV is not taking its dethroningtoo seriously. While MTV India’s

general manager and vice presidentcreative and content, Ashish Patil,didn’t refute the data as hogwash, hesaid it was too early to derive any-thing out of it. He lists a few reasonsthat contributed to the milestone that9XM achieved. According to Patil,first, the channel has pumped inupwards of Rs 20 crore on distribu-tion. Second, there are no advertisingbreaks in 9XM’s programming,which results in no tune-outs. “Idon’t think this is a sustainable busi-ness model,” he cautions. For Varma,it is purely ‘music’ and ‘vivacity’ thatattracts youth to a music channel,while Patil believes that constantinnovation helps to be in the goodbooks of the viewers. That is also afactor that lures advertisers.

9XM’s launch strategy of usinganimated characters and no veejays orreality shows came as a surprise.Varma even tagged the VJs of popularmusic channels as being ‘self-fulfillingVJs with American accents’ and thatmusic channels were becomingclones of the general entertainmentchannels by airing reality shows andsoaps. “Honestly, it’s a no-brainer andmaybe someone had to stand up andsay that the emperor is wearing noclothes. 9XM did just,” says Varma.

Patil vehemently differs on this.

“This is where we were 10 yearsback, when we did ‘Chito-Chat’,which was music plus trivia. Havinganimated characters on the channel isinteresting, but having them onalways is not. One can’t relate tothem. What 9XM has is a very uni-dimensional offering,” claims Patil.About reality shows, which clearlyare MTV’s forte, Patil believes 9XMis completely mistaken. Citing‘Bakra’ and ‘Roadies’ as among thelongest running reality shows on tel-evision, he says, “To think that theyare not liked by viewers is ridiculous.We have begun the fifth season ofRoadies now and the show has grown500 per cent over the first year.”

For music channels, competitionalso comes from radio. Calling radio

a source ofaudio wallpaper,Varma says that TVscores higher oninteractivity. Patil ofMTV avers that therehas been an impacton revenuedue to theadvent of FMstations.“Now, advertisers have more optionsto choose from. And more playersare fighting for the same advertisingdollar,” he says. According to MTVAsia’s study, the single largest sourceof music for youngsters still remainstelevision, followed by radio and theinternet. �

[email protected]


With no VJs and no reality shows, the music channel from INX Media has topped thefirst six months TAM data. Will it be able to sustain the growth? By Sapna Nair

On a High Note9XM

Source: TAM Peoplemeter SystemTG: CS 15-24 yrsMarket: HSM

Period: Aug ‘07 to Jan ‘08Daypart: 21:00 to 23:00

THE SOUND OF MUSIC

9XM

B4U Music

Aug ‘07

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Sep ‘07

Oct ‘07

Nov ‘07

Dec ‘07

Jan ‘08

Channel V

YO Music

Zee Music

Music India

MTV

Lemon

ETC

The Sakaal Group is not onlydiversifying into other medialike television and online, it is

also targeting some of its print publi-cations at other states.

These include AgroWon - an agri-culture-based Marathi daily(circulation of 43,469 inMaharashtra, as per ABC, January-June 2007) targeted at farmers, andTanishka - a Marathi monthly target-ed at women (claimed circulation ofabout 50,000). The Group plans totake these magazines to Punjab,Gujarat and Rajasthan in the lan-guages of these states.

It also plans to launchan English daily, SakaalTimes, in Pune, Goa and afew other states. The pub-lication will be launchedin Pune and Goa simulta-neously towards the endof March or the beginningof April. The all-Indiaprint run, according toSrikant Patankar, generalmanager Sakaal Group ofPublications, would be inexcess of 2.5 lakh copies.

In the English space,the Group already hasMaharashtra Herald andGomantak Times in Puneand Goa respectively.Maharashtra Herald has aclaimed circulation of40,000 copies in Pune.Gomantak Times, has acirculation of 6,300copies in Goa (as perABC, January-June,2007) and Gomantak, aMarathi daily publishedfrom Goa has a circula-tion of 33,000 (as per ABC,January-June 2007).

Sakaal Times, according toPatankar, will be launched with aninitial print run of one lakh copies inPune and 40,000 in Goa. The closestcompetitor for the daily is the Timesof India, with a circulation of about1.75 lakh in Pune and 6,091 in Goa(as per ABC, January-June 2007).The group is yet to decide the coverprice for the English daily.

In March/April, the group, in asso-ciation with Neo Television (anotherventure owned by Abhijeet Pawar,

publisher of Sakaal) will launch SaamTV, an infotainment channel.

It will compete with Zee Marathi,ETV Marathi, Mi Marathi and DD’sSahyadri apart from news channelslike Zee 24 Taas and Star Majha. SaamTV, according to PradeepkumarKhire, director - operations and HR,Sakaal Group of Publications, “gets itsname from from Sama Veda, which isrich in music and culture.” Most ofthe programmes will be interactiveand based on reality shows. The chan-nel will also have four slots for newsbulletins. “The USP of the channelwould be the six Es – educate,

engage, enlighten,enrich, entertain andempower – as laid downby the American PressAssociation,” he adds.

In 2007, the grouphired consultants likeMcKinsey to suggesthow the group couldmetamorphose from apublication group into amedia group. McKinseysuggested a revamp andSakaal came out with anew look and designfrom January 26 thisyear. The services ofrenowned newspaperdesigner Mario Garcia(of Mint fame) wereavailed. Garcia, saysKhire, “made the news-paper reader-friendlyand more appealing. Itwas his suggestion thatwe took the masthead tothe left from centre.”

Sakaal has a claimedprint run of 10 lakh

copies in Maharashtra. Pune con-tributes about three lakh copies(ABC, January-June 2007). Thepaper has a cover price of Rs 2.50 onMonday and Wednesdays and Rs 3on other days. According to Patankar,it is printed from nine centres andhas 52 sub-editions. The nearest rivalis Lokmat, which, according toPatankar, has a circulation of about11 lakh copies in Maharashtra.However, in Pune, “we are theundisputed leaders,” he says.

Khire says that increased focus onthe group’s on-ground activities like

Madhurangan, a forum forwomen with 27,000 mem-bers, will help increase thegroup’s credibility. Thepaper will also use its officialMarathi blog(sakaalblog.blogspot.com),to publicise its plans andexpansions and to “empowerMarathi journalism.” TheGroup also launched India & GlobalAffairs (IGA), an internationalEnglish quarterly, on January 14.Edited by Dileep Padgaonkar, it istargeted at politicians, bureaucrats,CEOs and global corporates.

IGA (cover price, Rs 350) tracksemerging trends in areas, such asdiplomacy, strategic affairs, trade,technology and culture. The maga-

zine, with an inaugural print run of20,000 copies, goes to 92 countries.Only 3,700 copies are sold in India.The Group also has a Marathi gener-al-interest weekly magazine –Saptahik Sakaal – which has a claimedcirculation of 55,000.

It seems that the 76-year-old hasfinally woken up to competition. �

[email protected]


AnEnglish

daily anda TV

channelare the

weapons.

The Sakaal Group of Publications which brings out Marathidaily is in expansion mode.

SAKAAL

Marathi And Beyond

Khire: going for thesix Es.

It is the law of nature that ‘every-thing that begins must come to anend’. But the saas-bahu sagas on

television have always defied MotherNature’s decree, spiced up withunreal elements like the death andrebirth of the protagonists orinscrutable 10-20 year leaps in time.STAR Plus’ hot property, Kyunki SaasBhi Kabhi Bahu Thi has taken morethan two leaps and is almost in its1,682th episode, while Kahaani GharGhar Kii is in its 1,525th.

While programming heads callthese gimmicks inevitable in order tomake the plot interesting, viewers arealready cat-calling their efforts. Infact, Shailja Kejriwal, when she wascreative director at STAR India, hadsaid, “These ‘K’ serials can go on for-ever. They won’t ever reachsaturation point. It’s just like life goeson, generation after generation.” Butif the research conducted by HansaResearch for Starcom is anything togo by, the characters in the soaps willhave to age and die.

Starcom commissioned Hansa tounderstand the psyche of the Indianviewer, at a time when the generalentertainment genre is boomingwith new players and content hasbecome the sole differentiator.Starcom’s hypothesis was that view-ers are bored with the current soapsand are looking for a change in con-tent. The objectives were to gaugeviewer preferences. The sample

comprised 250 individuals fromMumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad,Bhopal and Moradabad, in the age-group 18-54 years, belonging to SECA,B,C – who spend at least twohours per week watching television.

The research revealed that nineout of ten Hindi television viewerswant a change from the saas-bahusoaps and three out of five viewersseek faster, racier and more progres-sive programmes with a definite end.

According to the research find-ings, two-third of the viewers findthe current TV serials long-drawnand never-ending. Over 50 per centof respondents expressed confusionin the story lines of these serials.Respondents in the smaller townsexpressed preference for simplerstory lines and were even moreinclined towards change thanrespondents from Mumbai. Viewersof Sony and ZEE wished to see pro-gressive and contemporary stories,while viewers of STAR Plus admittedthat they would stop watching cur-rent programmes if new contentwere made available on TV.

Some other feedback from viewerswas that the serials being aired todaywere unreal, inappropriate to watchwith family, repetitive, portrayedwomen in a bad light and had a nega-tive influence on the youth.

The research also showed thatviewers preferred stories with fewercomplications and sub-plots withinthe story, exposure to internationallocations and foreign cultures andhigh production values. Reality showsand dubbed content scored high in theviewers’ preferences. More than halfof the surveyed audience agreed towillingly sample any content that satis-fied these needs.

This could be a wake-up call fortelevision channels that are living indenial under the pretext that theviewer is hooked on to what is being

dished out. Perhaps, the time hascome for programming heads of tel-evision channels to make changes inthe content. The new and fastidiousIndian viewer is evolving; and story-telling needs to be re-defined tosatiate the needs of this audience. As

Nikhil Rangnekar, executive direc-tor, India – West, StarcomWorldwide, puts it, “There is a colos-sal need to overhaul the currentcontent and to provide viewers withmore progressive content.” �

[email protected]


A report by Hansa Research and STARCOM reveals that Indian television viewerswant change. By Sapna Nair

Source: TAM Peoplemeter SystemMarket: HSM

TG: CS 4+yrsDaypart: 21:00 to 23:00

ALL GOOD THINGS...Avg Monthly TVR of Kyunki Saas... in ’07

0123456789

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

Source: TAM Peoplemeter SystemMarket: HSMTG: CS 4+yrsDaypart: 21:00 to 23:00

...HAVE TO ENDAvg Monthly TVR of Kahaani Ghar... in ’07

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

DecNovOctSepAugJulJunMayAprMarFebJan

Untying the Knot RESEARCH

Last month, UTV announced itsnew channel World Movies,which would bring world cine-

ma to India. Come March, NDTVLumiere – a joint venture betweenNDTV Imagine, Manmohan Shetty(Adlabs’ founder) and Sunil Doshi(film producer) – will also bring con-temporary world cinema to India,though on a much larger scale.

NDTV Lumiere will buy under-production titles, mostly fromEuropean countries (includingFrance, Germany, Italy andEngland), Japan, China, Korea,Turkey, Latin America, Africa andArabic countries, and release them intheatres in India.

The second stage will be to bringout DVDs with a window period of15 days to 3 months. At the thirdstage, the films will be premiered onthe channel – NDTV Lumiere, or ona pay-per-viewbasis on DTHplatforms, beforebeing available fordownload onndtvlumiere.com.

According toVidyuth Bhandary,general manager,NDTV Lumiere,“There is a nichemarket, in whichpeople want towatch the best ofworld cinema. They get to see thiseither during film festivals or pro-cure them from abroad or get piratedones locally. We’ll be catering to thisaudience.”

However, he agrees that the the-atrical release would be urban-centric and limited to multiplexes.“That’s the beauty of multiplexes.Even movies like Bheja Fry, Khosla kaGhosla and even Taare Zameen Par,were such huge hits, just by word-of-mouth publicity,” he adds.

The website release would beregion restricted – to SAARC coun-tries. Besides letting peopledownload movies – which will beencrypted and would expire after acertain period of time – for a price,the website would also feature blogs

and forums onworld cinema. Itwill allow peopleto pose questionsto directors andproducers, which,according toBhandary, thecompany will tryand get answered.

The companyhasn’t worked onthe DVD andonline-download-

ing pricing as yet. “It would be stupidto keep a premium price when youhave companies like Moser Baer try-ing to bring down CD/DVD pricesto about even Rs 25. At this point, Ican only say that the price wouldn’tbe higher than what HollywoodDVDs are priced at today,” he says.

Meanwhile, the channel wouldhave old masterpieces as well, to fill a24-hour slot. Ninety-five per cent ofthe movies would be subtitled inEnglish, while some animations

would be dubbed in English. “We areopen to subtitles in regional lan-guages as well, whenever the marketdemands so,” Bhandary adds.

NDTV chose to name the ventureLumiere, after the Lumiere brotherswho brought cinema to India fromFrance on July 7, 1896. On that date,six silent film strips, made by theLumiere brothers, were shown in

Mumbai’s Watson Hotel. “It is onlyfitting that more than 100 years later,the movement that is bringing a newwave of cinema into the countryshould be called NDTV Lumiere,”says Bhandary.

NDTV Lumiere also plans toorganise seminars and workshops,where the world’s best producers,directors and technicians would bebrought in to conduct sessions.“When you take something from thesociety, you have to give back to it,”says Bhandary. Though he agreesthat, at times, a fee would be chargedto attend these workshops, which canbe a separate revenue stream.

NDTV Lumiere is looking toattract premium advertisers from cat-egories like telecom, finance andbanking, who would be interested inadvertising across platforms – the-atre, DVDs, retail points, the TVchannel and on internet.

Bhandary is not too worried aboutcompetition from UTV’s WorldCinema. “UTV’s venture is restrict-ed to television, whereas we'll begoing into all kinds of platforms.Also, I feel that competition will onlyhelp increase the pie, which current-ly is very small,” he says. �

[email protected]


Alternatesources of

revenue areplanned fromdownloadable

content.

With more than one chan-nel bringing in world cine-ma to television, moviefreaks are in for a treat.By Dhaleta Surender K

NDTV

Bhandary: Giving back to society

ReelWorld

FOTO

CORP


Sahara One Media & Entertainment is all setto break new ground with the launch ofFirangi channel. With an assortment of pro-

grammes from across the globe, this channel willintroduce world television to Indian viewers.Though the content is foreign, allthe programmes will be dubbed inHindi.

Rajeev Chakrabarti, businesshead, Firangi Channel comments,“The box office success ofSpiderman 3 and other movieswhich pertain to the genre ofworld cinema is a clear reflectionthat international content gels wellwith Indian audiences. Hence, weare confident that there is a readymarket for Firangi channel.”

According to Chakrabarti,while Indian audiences have been exposed tointernational content through kids’ programmesand Hollywood movies, there is a dearth of inter-national content in other genres. “This channelwill expand the range of international programmesacross a wide spectrum of genres and also exposeaudiences to foreign cultures,” he explains

Detailed research preceded the launch of Firangi.

The objective of the research, which was undertak-en by Ormax, a media consultancy firm, was toassess the audience perception of existing pro-grammes on television channels and gaugeexpectations from fresh programming content. The

findings showed that people weretired of long-drawn serials andwanted more contemporary andbold subjects. This was true ofaudiences across age groups. “Theresearch findings clearly reflectedthat the television entertainmentlandscape was in need of a new for-mula. Launching Firangi seemed tobe the most obvious thing to do”,states Chakrabarti.

Targeted at adults in the agegroup of 20-45, programmes on thischannel will span a wide range of

genres, including sitcoms, world-famous novellas,adventure series, crime thrillers and world cinema.The channel will adopt one-hour format shows andrestrict its episodes to a span of six to eight months.To ensure that the content is contemporary, onlynew movies and programmes that are currently pop-ular in other countries have been sourced.

Chakrabarti assures that the initial selection of

content has been done very carefully, keeping inmind Indian sensitivities. “The good part is thatthe Indian audience today is a mature and discern-ing lot. Hence, not much adaptation is requiredand certainly not for all programmes,” he adds.

Moreover, there is strict adherence to theguidelines of the Indian censorship board. “It isimportant to understand that Indians are open tobold concepts, as long as they are portrayed withinan acceptable context,” surmises Chakrabarti.

He explains the rationale behind choosingHindi over English, even though a large proportionof the programmes will be from English-speakingcountries. “We want to be seen as a unique channel,which at the same time, relates to the masses. If wedub the programmes in English, we lose that edge,”

Asked why the channel was named ‘Firangi’,Chakrabarti says that no other word could haveexplained their positioning better. The tagline forthe channel is, ‘World ki best kahaniyaan’.

Whether this channel will be a trailblazer orevoke a lukewarm response will only be knownwith time. But it seems that the time for introduc-ing viewers to world television has come. If thecontent speaks for itself, people will eventuallycome around. �

[email protected]

SAHARA

While most channels are trying to differentiate programmes, Sahara hascome up with an exclusive format. By Proyashi Barua

Worldly Wise

IBN7, the Hindi news channelfrom the Network 18 Group,hopes to break the myth that

Hindi audience do not acceptsophistication and that they do nothave global aspirations - a myth,which the channel’s managing edi-tor, Ashutosh says has been createdby the “elitist English channels, whohave been living in a time warp.”

From February 11, the channelsported a new look. The biggestchange is the replacement of physi-cal sets with virtual sets, that allowsto change the backdrop of theanchor with a flick of a button. Thecolour scheme is “in sync withCNN-IBN.” The IBN7 logo hasmoved to the right with a navigationbox below it. The box allows thechannel to show teasers of upcom-ing programmes supported by

visuals, instead of mere text. Thebox also gives another room foradvertisements - all visual, graphicand textual.

IBN7 though is not the firstchannel to use virtual sets. IfAshutosh is to be believed, otherchannels have been using them forjust a couple of hours in the entireday. But IBN7 would use them outthrough the day. Physical sets toowould be used though sparingly, justto break the monotony.

“Our target audience remains thesame. But we have to realise thatthis audience has evolved and it isthis audience that has forced us tochange. Today, the big brands arebeing consumed in the smallertowns. They have global aspirationsand want to live in luxury. Theydeserve the best of the technology,”

the managing editor adds.Ashutosh goes on to say that it is

the Hindi channels who haveevolved over time and made theEnglish channels emulate them a faras technology is concerned.However, where they differ, is thecolonial mindset they have. “Theywere the same in 1994 and still arealike in 2008. They have these age-

old programmes. They can talkabout Barak missiles, but how dothey matter to a common man, whohas different set of problems,” heasks, adding, “It is the Hindi newschannels that have empowered thecommon man. Hindi channels can-not be like English channels as far ascontent is concerned. The Hindiaudience’s perspective and evensocio-psychology is different. ”

It’s just not the look that haschanged. Even some of the pro-grammes have been renamed andgiven a twist to attract more viewers.Its prime-time show Sports Zonehas been renamed as ‘Clean Bowled’.“Let’s be realistic. India is a cricketmad country, so why not give themwhat they want,” says Ashutosh.Other sports news would be a partof the general news. News Reel (5PM - 7 PM) has been renamed DoGhante, and is targeted at viewers insmall towns.

Ashutosh promises morechanges over a period of time,which he is not ready to reveal,except that “there will be moreinterview-based shows.” �[email protected]

IBN7

The channel is set out to grab more eyeballs with its newlook and revised content. By Dhaleta Surender Kumar

Chakrabarti: providing newchoices for viewers

Ashutosh: throwing a challenge tothe English news channels


Will the Intrusion-of-Privacy issue hinder

the growth of internet advertising?

INTRUSION OF PRIVACYWILL HINDER THEGROWTH OF INTERNETADVERTISING BY TAKINGAWAY THE CREDIBILITYOF THE SERVICE AND THEADVERTISER AS WELL.This would lead to low ROI

for both, the advertiser and

the publisher.

By intrusion, I mean serv-

ing ads and/or targeting

without the user knowing

that he is being tracked and/or

using customer data in a con-

text that the user could not

have thought of.

Case in point being the

recent behavioural targeting

‘beacon’ that Facebook.com

released and the backlash.

As long as the user is aware

and can decide to opt-in or

opt-out, in my opinion, it is

not an intrusion. There is a

fine line between behavioural

targeting and treading on per-

sonal details. Businesses are

custodians of user trust and if

they violate it, the industry at

large will suffer.

THE IDEA IS TO COMMU-NICATE WITH THECONSUMER ABOUT YOURBRAND WHEN HE MAY BELOOKING FOR IT. IF ADSERVING BASED ON TAR-GETING PARAMETERSwas the beginning, we will

soon evolve to universally

accessible databases which will

address consumers by instant-

ly tapping into their past

purchase history, need sets

and purchase cycles.With mil-

lions of pages online, it often

becomes difficult for con-

sumers to find what they are

looking for, negotiate choice

and decide.

Marketers are compelled to

find innovative ways of reach-

ing out to the customer.

Relying heavily on any one -

banner ads, search, blog,

social networking will pro-

duce diminishing returns

after a certain point. The

strategy is to optimise the

mix, create innovative dia-

logues and measure

responses.

AS ONLINE ADVERTIS-ING CONTINUES TOEVOLVE, ADVERTISERSARE NOT INTERESTEDIN MARKETING TO ANAUDIENCE OF ONE,BUT RATHER LARGE groups, where they can create anad that speaks to many. Today,web technology has developed toan extent where we can identifyuser behaviour without actuallyintruding into his/her privacy onthe internet. This technology helps in commu-nicating to our advertisers whena consumer is most likely to takeaction on product purchase overthe internet. We can create awin-win scenario for both adver-tisers and consumers with highlyrelevant advertisements.Therefore, it is possible to ensurethat we appropriately targetmore relevant ads to the users,based on their categorised inter-ests.

INTERNET ADVERTIS-ING TAKES MANYFORMS, AND NOT ALLINTRUDE PRIVACY.CONTEXTUAL TARGET-ING HAS PROVENTHAT TARGETINGconsumers based on their intent -information search, yieldsresults. Privacy intrusion hascome into focus with the adventof behavioral targeting (BT) andalso with the attempts of socialnetworking sites to translate mil-lions of users into sustainablerevenue. Both do, in fact ,serveadvertising based on user behav-iour or registered information.But as contextual advertising hasshown us, users don’t mind click-ing on ads that are relevant tothem. If publishers adopt a per-mission-based approach to BT,and if users can control how theironline behavioural data is used, itwill still be a viable advertisingopportunity. But is it accurate and can it yielddemonstrably better results isthe key question that will affectgrowth more than the privacyissue which can be resolved withestablishment of best practices.

Business Head, Fropper.com VP, Emerging Markets, Yahoo! Inc. Sr, VP and Director, Arc Worldwide Business Director, Media2Win


For Nina Lekhi, owner of the Baggit brandof bags and accessories, entrepreneurship ischild’s play. She set up the company at the

age of 16 and today, over two decades later, herbrand of bags with its trademark 'gg' has, sheclaims, a turnover of Rs 7 crore.

“I never imagined that I would run a businesslike this someday,” says Lekhi. After flunking inthe first year in her college, Sophia Polytechnicin Mumbai, Lekhi took up a couple of part-timecourses like screen printing. “I decided to use allmy extra time in something constructive andcreative. So I got hold of a tailor and I would buycanvas and use my screen printing knowledge tomake bags,” she says. The name ‘Baggit’ wascoined when she and her friend were singing

Michael Jackson’spopular number ‘Beatit’ in the changingroom of a swimmingpool. She later workedas a salesgirl withdesigner MikeKripalani that gave hermore exposure to thefashion and accessorybusiness. Later, shestarted selling her bagsthrough his stores andother stores as well.

Today Baggit man-ufactures and sellsabout 20,000 piecesper month; it has fourexclusive stores inMumbai and one inAhmedabad and willhave an exclusive store

each in London and Paris respectively. The num-ber of stores in India will go up from five to 50in the next three years. The brand also sellsthrough large format stores like Lifestyle,Shopper’s Stop and Globus. “We were offered tomake bags for Shopper’s Stop and Westside fortheir in-house labels, but at that time I made a

choice and said ‘I want to become a brand, andnot just remain a supplier’. I was very certainthat I wanted my bags to have a brand identity,”she declares.

The company is looking for a turnover of Rs11 crore in 2007-2008.

Lekhi aims to create a ‘Made in rural India’ tagand has set up a packaging and weaving unit inthe rural area of Sindhudurg, close to Goa.Lekhi’s husband, who quit his career runs aschool, the MET Rishikul Vidyalay in Bandra,which adopts the ISP (Infant SiddhaProgramme) technique to offer a holistic modeof education to children. Together, they are alsolooking at another place for a rural project, forher business and also where this school could beset up. “This way employment, production, andeducation, everything gets taken care of,” sheexplains. Lekhi recently won a Progressive Awardfrom PETA for not using leather in her productsat all.

She attends office only about three days aweek and works closely with 5-6 in-housedesigners. From one tailor and herself to beginwith, Lekhi’s team now comprises a staff of 200people in-house and 500 others outside. Shemakes sure her team meditates in the afternoon,after which they are served health food like sal-ads, dates and khichdi for lunch. “I believe thatwhatever you want for yourself, you should giveothers,” she says.

Lekhi enjoys spending time with her familyand also loves playing outdoor sports. “I loveplaying with my daughter and the kids in mybuilding, I’m the only adult playing with them,”she grins. Be it balancing her business with fam-ily and maintaining spirituality in her life, Lekhiseems to have got over that initial failure well.

[email protected]

Who’s That

Web18, the internet arm of theNetwork18 group, is on acontinuous roll. It has

recently come up withStoreguru.com, an online retail portal.Since the group already hasHomeShop18, the new ventureunderstandably comes as a surprise.

“Both at the operational and own-ership level, Storeguru.com andHomeShop 18 are two distinctly sep-arate entities,” says Surya Mantha,CEO, Web18. He explains thatHomeShop18 is owned directly byNetwork18. On the other hand,Storeguru.com is owned by Web18,which is an unlisted umbrella com-pany for all Network18 webproperties, and in which TV18 alsohas a considerable share. Mantha

states that HomeShop18 was sup-posed to be primarily an offline setupwith an extension on the web; whileStoreguru.com is a dedicated onlinesite with complete electronic retail-ing solutions, which “envisagesrevolutionising the concept of onlineshopping in India”.

Storeguru.com is poised tobecome the next amazon.com.Hence, it has been designed in amanner which appeals to the con-sumer psyche at multiple levels.“The unique Brand Warranty pro-gramme is one stellar initiative whichwill set Storeguru.com apart fromthe competing ecommerce portals,”says Mantha. As per this programme,the brands will directly warranty theproducts and these endorsements

will be indicated on the site.To achieve brand salience with the

target audience, individual portals ofthe Web18 group have gone in for anumber of brand promotions. Themost recent of these is the ‘Stir upyour Dreams’ contest byBuzz18.com, the media and enter-tainment portal of the Web18 group.The portal is organising this contest inassociation with Café Coffee Day andFun Republic, to encourage buddingtalent in the film industry. Interestedcandidates are required to record amonologue, on the theme of ‘Hope’,

either in English or Hindi and uploadit to a special window on the website.The judges for these entries areTanuja Chandra, Anupam Kher andMahima Chaudhary. The winner willget a role in one of Chandra’s forth-coming projects and a three-monthdiploma-acting course worth Rs 1.5lakh in Kher’s acting school.

Speaking on her association withBuzz18 for this contest, Chandra says,“Today, there are numerous talenthunts being organised by televisionchannels in the genre of music.It isheartening to see the exposure theyare giving to young people I stronglyfeel that this trend needs to be repli-cated in the acting industry as well, asthere is lot of unrecognised talent,which otherwise cannot come to theforefront.” According to ChandrimaPal, editor, Buzz 18, “We are consis-tently trying to explore a plethora ofactivities which would bring us closerto people. This initiative and othersreflect the larger philosophy of theWeb18 group, which believes that thestrategic formula to a web’s populari-ty is consumer connect.” �

[email protected]

WEB18

The B2C space is buzzing with a new shopping portaland an acting contest ? By Proyashi Barua

“I did not want toremain a supplier and

refused offers from bigretail stores.”

Mantha: to each his own

Managing a staff of over 700 comes easy to this entre-preneur. By Surina Sayal

FOTO

CORP

In an industry where the commoncomplaint from women is aboutnot getting the top job, Meera

Sharath Chandra is one of theexceptions. The recently appointedpresident of RMG Connect is veryupbeat about her mandate. In herwords, “There are very few creativepeople who are comfortable withtechnology, and I am glad, I madethe choice.” She adds matter-of-fact-ly, “Women are anyway morecreative.”

A graduate in literature and with aMaster’s degree in journalism, Sharath started hercareer with MAA Bozell. The reason she cites for tak-ing up advertising was not only because there was nomoney in journalism but, also that advertising was ‘somuch glamour in the space’.

Sharath has moved from Mudra Advertising,where she was the NCD. Her stints after MAABozell were in JWT, Avigna Tecnologies andContract.

RMG Connect was one of the early movers in thedirect marketing space because they were also one ofthe early movers in the CRM (customer relationshipmanagement) space. Sharath explains her role inRMG , “Since I come from a digital background, mymandate is to make digital as strong if not strongerthan the other conventional methods of direct mar-keting.”

Sharath’s confidence stems from the fact that sheran a digital creative firm with her sister in 1998called Avigna Technologies. The venture happened

when Sharath realised that AvignaTechnologies was the first Intel invest-ment in any dotcom company. “Allaround me, dotcoms were mush-rooming in 1998. I realised that thereare geeks on one side and there are theadvertising people on the other. Butthere is no advertising person whoknows technology and no tech guywho can get creative at the drop of ahat. So we found that there was ahuge empty space where technologycan actually take your skills on brandcommunication online and apply it toa new medium. It seemed terriblyinteresting at that time.”

However, the honeymoon did notlast long and the company went bust.But not before the sisters had madesome exciting assignments for manyclients including Lakme - where a webkiosk was designed with a camera infront of it. “It took your face on itwhere you could apply your make up.Suddenly, it was an experience of thebrand which we were bringing to anotherwise geeky space,” she explains.

After the internet bust, Sharathjoined Contract Advertising, Chennaias the branch manager where she says,“I got involved in reading balancesheets. By that time the dotcom busi-ness had picked up again and I knewthat it would stabilise and make acomeback. So I was biding my time toget back into this media.”

When asked what made a hardcoreadvertising person so passionate aboutthe digital space, Sharath says, “We areprojecting ourselves for the futureand readying ourselves for it. Therewas a time when only the metroswere net connected. We are all gettingourselves future ready. Also, today

there are hardly any creative people who know tech-nology.”

Among the agencies which she has worked with(Mudra, Contract and JWT), Sharath says her mostexciting time was in JWT. “Because, the brands Iworked on while at JWT were extremely meaty.Citibank, Sunsilk, BrookeBond, Ford. I got secondedto Detroit while working on a project on Ford – mar-keting a car for women, in a world where the dealerswould talk to women only about colours and uphol-stery – absolutely unnecessary elements.”

Sharath’s early years were spent in Mumbai andlater after her father retired early, the family moved toBengaluru and then to Chennai. She likes to read ‘funbooks’ to de-stress and also writes poetry.

Today, Sharath lives in Mumbai and says, shemight shift to Chennai when she retires, but in thesame breath she says, “But I don’t need to retire early,because I know digital.”�

[email protected]

PROFILE I MEERA SHARATH CHANDRA I RMG CONNECT

“Women are more Creative”

“My man-date is to

make digitalas strong as

the othermediums”


SCOTCH-BRITE

Scotch-Brite aims to scrubout competitors by posi-tioning itself as a superiorscrubber. By Surina Sayal

Scotch-Brite’s new TVC startswith a man rolling over in bed to

find his wife missing. In school, achild paints her mother with vesselsup to her face. The background scoregoes, ‘Kahan hai mummy?’

The female voiceover explainsthat the lady is cleaning vessels,thanks to a bad scrubber. ‘UseScotch-Brite,’ exhorts the ad. Thefinal scene shows the family in a pil-low fight and the mother joining in.

Grey Bengaluru worked on thiscampaign; and the team includesNCD Priti Nair, Vishnu Srivatsav andJacob Thomas from creative andHarikrishnan, Akshay Ananth andArindam Biswas from client servicing.

Production house Doctor Filmsproduced the film, which wasdirected by Sudhir Makhija. Thebackground score was given byRupert Fernandes. Srivatsav, creativedirector, Grey Bengaluru explains,“We wanted to define a clear com-munication platform forScotch-Brite.” The brief from theclient was to communicate Scotch-Brite’s superiority and efficacy.

Scotch-Brite’s target audienceincludes housewives in the agegroup of 25-35, SEC B2, C1.Thesecondary TG includes SEC A1, B2housewives in urban households anaudience that currently uses ordi-nary scrubbers and traditionalscouring mediums and has no majorcomplaints about the efficacy ofthese. �

[email protected]

FOTO

CORP


Parents have always agonised over howteenage children show a cold shoulder totheir suggestions and sometimes don’t even

listen to them. The latest TVC from MOTORO-LA for its MotoYuva W230 mobile might just addon to their blues.

The TVC opens in a house and shows a youngman with his mobile earphone on, looking forsome food in the refrigerator. His father appearssuddenly and says angrily, “Rahul, yeh kya kar rakhahain tumne ghar ka? Saari cheezein is tarike se faili padihui hai, jaise ki yeh ghar nahi, koi akhara hai.” Theyoung man tries to say something but is stoppedby the continuous badgering of his father whogoes on, “Yeh joote rakhne ki jagah hai? Aur ye baal kab katwaye the tumne? Arre bees saal ki ho gayeho, behave like an adult. Aur moje tumhare wahan padehue hain?''

At this point the young man decides to cut offhis father’s babble and slyly switches on the musicon his MotoYuva W230. He enjoys the popularsong by singer Adnan Sami, Ishq Tera GaramMasala, on his phone. There is a slight glint in theson’s eyes, when he slowly realises that the beat ofthe song is almost in sync with his father’s out-burst. The voiceover says, “Naya MotoYuva W230,with MP3 player, FM with recording and 2 GB

expandable memory. Ab apni suno. Hello Moto.” According to Lloyd Mathias, director market-

ing, mobile devices, MOTOROLA, the insightcame from the fact that youngsters today usemusic as means to shut themselves from the rest of the world. “The creative leap in this TVC is that the young man is using music to cut off hisfather’s nag,” he says.

When asked why Bachchan was not being usedin most of the recent commercials of Motorola,Mathias says, “We don’t want Abhishek to beMotorola and Motorola to be Abhishek. We’ll usehim on and off and whenever relevant. TheMotoYuva is for the young consumer. Earlier, theneed for this consumer would probably be for abicycle, and now, it is a mobile phone.”

The TVC created by Ogilvy & Mather (O&M)includes the creative team of Piyush Pandey,Abhijit Avasthi, Vikash Chemjong and BasabjitMajumdar and the film is made by PrasoonPandey of Corcoise Films.

The phone is in the Yuva series, and the team inO&M wanted to play up the music features asthere is a dedicated music button in the handsetand also MP3 player. Commenting on the creativ-ity of the ad and offending parents with the theme,Avasthi says, “If you objectively look at it, the

father’s reaction is somewhat old school. Honestly,what does ‘baal kab katwayethe’ have to do with theson’s ability to do anything? Moreover, the sonwasn’t allowed to make his point. The music syn-chronisation in the film was almost like watching alive music video.”

Pandey reveals that the entire film was shot in a set which was created after a thorough study of how a passage in a house would look like whenguests are not coming and especially in the morn-ing. The father’s role in the film is done by Virendra Saxena, a popular television and film actor.

Pandey chuckles when asked if Saxena was cho-sen because of his on-screen ‘irritable father’image. “I wanted to get an actor who would be ableto improvise. Because I knew that I would bechanging dialogues and his anger has to be in syncwith the song,” he says.

The song, Ishq Tera Garam Masala, was chosento create a contrast of sorts. “On one hand the song portrays about love and on the other, thefather is shown berating his son. It also had to be asong which had a perfect interlude for the emo-tional outburst. It could not be too long or short,”says Pandey. �

[email protected]

MOTOYUVA W230

The latest TVC from MOTOROLA comes to the rescue of youngadults - through music. By Chumki Sen

Cut Out the Cackle

In the movie Bunty Aur Babli,Abhishek Bachchan tried sellingthe Taj Mahal to an unsuspect-

ing foreigner; but in the new Idea adfilm, he plays the role of a loud,goofy tourist guide who shows offthis wonder to a group of foreigntourists.

The 60-second TVC starts with aforeign tourist admiring the TajMahal. A quirky, loudly dressedguide (Bachchan) appears and talksto her in broken English, “HelloMadam, you want guide? I give fullstory, best price.” He offers his visit-ing card and the tourist takes itwithout saying anything. The guidekeeps pestering her and enquiresabout what language she under-stands, but gets no response. Hestarts to walk away as her friendjoins her, and both of them areshown communicating in sign language. The guide realises that she

is deaf and mute. Again, he turns to walk away, when he gets a mes-sage on his mobile phone saying,‘Need a guide’.

The girl indicates that she mes-saged him. He happily proceeds toshow her group around. In hisunique English, he says, “So ladiesof the gentlemen, beautiful monu-ment for a beautiful lady. Symbol oflove,” simultaneously sending heran SMS with this message. Shereplies with another SMS saying,‘What an idea’. He looks at her andshyly repeats, ‘What an idea’. That’swhen he realises that she probablymeant the Taj Mahal and he quicklypoints it out to everyone sayingloudly, “What an idea, arre arre whatan idea I say”.

This is the second film in the‘What an idea’ campaign. It is alsothe second film that Bachchan hasstarred in, after he was appointed

Idea’s brand ambassador last year.The first film for the campaign andits brand ambassador featuredBachchan playing a village sarpanch(head) who ends a caste discrimina-tion issue by instructing everyone touse only their mobile numbers astheir names. From a social issue to a love story, the Idea ads seem tohave all the elements of aBollywood movie.

Both TVCs have been created byLowe; the team that has worked onthe ad includes Nikhil Rao, AshvinVarkex, Jaymant Dabholkar, SatishRamanathan and Kapil Bhagat.

Rao, group creative director,Lowe, says, “We were taking thesame idea forward from the last ad,which was ‘An idea can change your

life’. The core thought is of a lovestory between a guide and a tourist.”

Rao informs that the conceptcame about after some brainstorm-ing; the specific idea of a deaf andmute tourist was arrived at when aclient servicing person suggested an SMS campaign for the deaf andmute.

Through this TVC, Idea is alsoadvertising its SMS, a service thatnot many other service providersfocus on.

Chrome Pictures, the produc-tion house that had directed Idea’slast TVC, has worked on this ad too.Amit Sharma has directed the film,while the background score hasbeen created by Samiruddin. �

[email protected]

IDEA

The Taj Mahal gives the cellular company a brightidea. By Surina Sayal


There has been a growing buzz aroundThe Buzziest Brands of the Year Pollever since it began in 2006. The partici-pation has grown, the poll has been

written about in the media and the best of it all, ithas begun to raise questions about what leads tobrand buzz. In other words, isit possible to consciously worktowards getting consumers totalk about your brand?

That is why agencyfaqs!

organised the day-long Buzz Conference inMumbai on February 14, followed - in the evening- by The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008. And to adda new and deeper dimension to the pollingprocess, we also brought in a six-person jury witha background that reflected someof the many aspects that go intocreating consumer word ofmouth – from advertising topublic relations to on-the-

ground

presence to the very product itself.If one was a master marketer and the other the

CEO of a major electronics company, the thirdwas one of the best known names in the TV busi-ness. Their skills were complemented by amaverick ad film maker, a top notch PR pro-fessional and an entrepreneur in the

events business whose firm hasmanaged to create some trulyhuge properties on the ground.

To balance the many points

INDIA’SBUZZIEST

BRANDSThe winners of The Buzziest BrandsAwards 2008 were an exciting bunch.Here they are!

Telecom service provider Airtelhas achieved an extraordinary

hattrick in the third year of thepoll. In spite of a strong challengefrom a different runner-up eachyear it has managed to stay at thehead of the pack.

Airtel’s victory this year hasbeen marred by the fact thatamong surfers, it comes in at No2, behind brand Reliance.However, four of the six jurymembers have voted for it, send-ing it surging past Reliance.Thanks to the jury’s favour,Airtel’s voter percentage hasleapt by more than 22 per cent to58.7 per cent.

It’s been a great year for the air-line brand (more that now than

a beer brand). The buzz that itschairman Vijay Mallya manages tocreate and sustain, and the com-pany’s takeover of Air Deccan,taking their combined marketshare zooming, has created a hugebuzz around Kingfisher.

After appearing at No 8 and No7 for the last two years,Kingfisher has shot to third placein the popular vote, behindReliance and Airtel. It too hasreceived four jury votes, helping itscrape past Reliance to the over-all runner-up position with a solid54.5 per cent in voter percentage.

This brand has been gettingbuzzier every year, feel visitors

on agencyfaqs!, clearly puttingbehind the many controversiesthat have engulfed it. The fact thatthe brand now appears in relationto a larger spread of companiesdistributed over two businessgroups seems to have helped it.

In 2006, Reliance figured at No13, and climbed last year to No 5on the back of a significant jump invoter percentage to 18.0. Thisyear, it has managed to more thandouble that to 42.8 per cent, a trulyamazing feat. However, it hasreceived only two jury votes,pulling it down to third place.

58.7% 54.5% 42.8%Note: Voter percentage is the percentage of voters who supported a particular brand.

2008 2007 Brand Voter Percentage

of view on what makes up buzz, voters’ opinionon agencyfaqs! received half the weightage and thejury the other half.

THE BUZZIEST BRANDS AWARDS 2008

What made these awards different was thatthere were no invitations to entries. Neither

was there the protection of product categories orgroups. Brands made it to the shortlist based onwhether large enough numbers of people hadlooked for them on agencyfaqs! in the year gone by.

Things didn’t get easier for brands even whenthey got on to the shortlist of 60 brands. Votersand the jury members could each choose only fiveof the 60 brands, irrespective of the product cate-gory to which they belonged. That’s because youcannot allocate buzz by category.

That’s why, right through, there is a common listwhich includes brands from such disparate cate-gories as telecom service providers to airlines tobathing soap and hair oil. And that’s why winning aBuzzy is so tough. It’s hard and it’s straightforward.

The top three received the Buzzy Gold, BuzzySilver and Buzzy Bronze. From No 4 to No 13were placed in a single category: the Buzzy 10.

There were two other awards: The LongestBuzz for the brand that has consistently done wellover the last three years. And the Newest Buzz, aspecial from agencyfaqs!, for a new brand that hasdone exceptionally well in the polls.

THE ABSENCE OF VODAFONE

We have received so many comments and somuch mail asking why Vodafone has been

excluded that we’d better explain it first – especiallysince the brand whose business it took over, Hutch,was among the top three in both 2006 and 2007.

The basis of the shortlist of 60 brands was thenumber of searches – and hence curiosity aboutbrands through the year – on agencyfaqs! SinceVodafone came on the scene only in November,searches for it fell short of the mark.

Now on to the winners of TheBuzziest Brands Awards 2008.

BUZZY 10IDEA

Undoubtedly the big surprise in thelist this year, having appeared on it

for only the first time.Seems almost certain thatit was advertising in thiscase that has spurredinterest in the brand: theidea of going beyond caste, religion, or even namewas certainly a big idea and one that both surfersand jury acknowledged.

Surfers have voted it to seventh position butthe jury has done even more, giving it three votes.That is why Idea ends up so close to the perennialfavourites, at No 4, with a great voter percentageof 34.1.

NOKIAThis great Finnish brand, which dominates themobile handset business, began at No 4 in 2006,rising to runner up in2007, before settling atNo 5 this time around.However, at 33.8 percent, its voter percent-age is the highest it has managed until now.Popular vote has placed Nokia at No 4. However,it has ended up a rank lower after the jury vote(two for the brand) is taken into account.

GOOGLEThe Poll is still work in progress, being in only its third year. In the first two years, we hadn’t includ-ed online brands. This year we have, which explainsthe presence of bothGoogle and Yahoo! aswell as Zapak.

There is little needfor speculating whythis extraordinary online search brand has done sowell: almost nobody can do without it and its con-stant urge to innovate can leave users almostbreathless with wonder. That considered, the folksat Google may wonder why the popular voteplaced it at only No 9. However, two of the jurymembers plonked for it, moving it up the ranks toNo 6 with a voter percentage of 25.

THE TIMES OF INDIAThis is the only media brand that has done consis-tently well in the Poll, the only other brand fromthe category to feature regularly in the list being

STAR, which always appears somewhere in themiddle of the rankings (this time at No 26).

After featuring at No 6 and No 7 in the last twoyears, The Times of India has slipped to No 13 in thesurfer vote, which is surprising considering itshuge Lead India campaign which concluded onlya few days ago. But two jury votes restored it tolast year’s position, No 7, with a much better voterpercentage, 22.5.

TATAYou would associate the Tata name with respect,dignity and trust. But buzz?Yes, apparently that too consid-ering the number of moves thegroup has made last year: be itthe takeover of Corus or theunveiling of the Nano.

Voters on agencyfaqs! were

37The Brand Reporter, February 16-29, 2 0 0 8

Brand Voter Percentage

THE FULL SET

Idea 34.1

Nokia 33.8

Google 25.0

The Times of India 22.5

TATA 19.4

Happydent 18.7

ICICI 16.1

Motorola 15.3

Coca-Cola 13.1

Hindustan Unilever 12.6

No. 51: Britannia, 52: Ford, 53: Lux, 54: Nestle55: Parle, 56: Toyota, 57: TVS, 58: Godrej,59: Yamaha, 60: Johnson & Johnson

1 1 Airtel 58.7

2 8 Kingfisher 54.5

3 5 Reliance 42.8

4 - Idea 34.1

5 2 Nokia 33.8

6 - Google 25.0

7 7 The Times of India 22.5

8 12 TATA 19.4

9 - Happydent 18.7

10 10 ICICI 16.1

11 4 Motorola 15.3

12 11 Coca-Cola 13.1

13 21 Hindustan Unilever 12.6

14 20 Cadbury 12.5

15 - Fevicol 12.1

16 6 SBI 11.4

17 37 Maggi 9.1

18 - Raymond 8.8

19 - Zapak 8.5

20 9 Maruti Suzuki 5.9

21 19 Pepsi 4.3

22 - Sony Ericsson 3.8

23 - Microsoft 3.5

24 25 Bajaj 3.0

25 - Nike 2.7

26 28 Star TV 2.2

27 - Yahoo! 2.1

28 36 Hyundai 2.0

28 16 Levi’s 2.0

28 - TATA Indicom 2.031 22 HDFC 1.8

32 17 Amul 1.7

32 23 Hero Honda 1.7

34 - Chevrolet 1.6

34 24 Sony 1.6

36 14 Asian Paints 1.5

36 30 LG 1.5

38 - Santro 1.4

39 26 Surf 1.3

40 38 CitiBank 1.2

41 39 Dabur 1.1

41 48 Parachute 1.1

41 44 Pond’s 1.1

44 32 Honda 1.0

45 33 Colgate 0.9

45 41 Lakme 0.9

45 34 Mahindra 0.9

48 - Wipro 0.8

49 31 Samsung 0.6

49 18 Titan 0.6

Note: Voter percentage is the percentage of voters who support-ed a particular brand.Each jury member had the same weightage as 196 voters.Note: Voter percentage is the percentage of voters who supported

a particular brand.

POWER OF TEN

so impressed that from No 14 and No 12 in thelast two years, they voted it up all the way to No 5.After the jury vote (only one aye) had beenaccounted for, Tata dropped to No 8.

HAPPYDENTHappydent is by far the tiniest brand among the‘heavies’, and it’s got here – for the first time too –entirely on the back of some great advertising.

Voters have taken it all the way to No 6 but afterthe jury’s point of view was taken (one vote),Happydent settled at a very creditable No 9.

ICICIThis financial behemoth has consitency of themost interesting kind written all over it. It is aBuzzy 10 win-ner at No 10. Itwas also No 10in 2007. Thepopular vote placed it at No 10 – and even after thejury’s vote (one yes), it has remained at No 10. Itsvoter percentage is marginally higher than it waslast year at 16.1.

MOTOROLAJust as Idea is the big surprise in 2008, Motoroladid the same last year when it entered at a high No4 on the back ofan amazingchange in its for-tunes as reflectedin its zooming sales. In voter estimation it wasplaced at a much lower No 11 this time and, afteraccounting for a solitary jury vote, it stayed there.

COCA-COLAIt has always done better than its rival Pepsi in thePoll. It’s beensteady at No 11 forthe last two yearsand, on the popu-lar vote did justthat bit worse in 2008 at No 14. After taking a soli-tary jury vote into account, it comes in at No 12.

HINDUSTAN UNILEVERMost of the names in this list are umbrella brands:company or group brands as also product brands.This is the onlycompany thathas severalavatars (Lux,Surf, Lakme) in

addition to itself in the list. As Hindustan Lever, thename featured in the middle of the list, standing atNo 21 last year. The promotion of its new name,Hindustan Unilever, probably did the trick, takingit to No 15 in the voter list and 13th overall.

LONGEST BUZZ: AIRTEL

Airtel also wins the trophy for the LongestBuzz, recognition of its ability to generate the

highest excitement around its brand for thelongest period of time.

It has stayed at No 1 in spite of having a differ-ent, strong No 2 sniping at its heels in each of thethree years: Hutch in 2006, Nokia in 2007 andnow Kingfisher in 2008.

NEWEST BUZZ: ZAPAK

To Zapak goes a special award from agencyfaqs!for creating so much excitement around

online gaming in just over a year of launch.Though Zapak could not make it to the Buzzy 10,it got strong support from surfers who placed it atNo 8 – one ahead of even Google in buzz terms.

WINNERS AND LOSERS

With an additional 10 brands in the shortlist(the number was increased from 50 to 60

this year), it was inevitable that there would bemore losers than winners among the brands fromlast year. Forty five of the 60 brands in the list hadalso figured in 2007. Among the first timers to theList, remarkably three featured in the top 10: Idea,Google and Happydent.

Among the brands from last time, Maggi was the biggest gainer, rising from No 37 last year


THE GAINERS THE LAGGARDSMaggi 20

Cadbury 6

Hindustan Unilever 8Hyundai 8Kingfisher 6

Levi’s 13

Motorola 7

Maruti Suzuki 11SBI

HDFC 910

Top 5 Winners & Losers

Dilip CherianConsulting PartnerPerfect Relations

India’s image guru,Cherian is consultingpartner at PerfectRelations. He is theformer editor ofBusiness India andObserver newspapers.

He is also a columnist and a business analyst.

Murali SivaramanManaging Director &CEO - IndianSubcontinentPhilips ElectronicsIndia

Sivaraman’s careerhas spanned across 5countries in the past20 years. He started

his international career as managing director for ICIPaints Singapore and ASEAN Countries. The growth ofICI in China led to Murali being invited to the Houseof Commons, UK to provide oral evidence on ‘Doingbusiness in China’. After 20 years in ICI, Murali joinedPhilips.

Peter MukerjeaChief StrategyOfficer INX Media

Mukerjea is the chiefstrategy officer in INXMedia. He is respon-sible for providingstrategic direction tothe company. He has

extensive experience in media, advertising & mar-keting. Mukherjea was the CEO at STAR India andplayed a pivotal role in re-launching STAR’s flagshipchannel STAR Plus as a Hindi channel in 2000. Hejoined News Corporation in Hong Kong as advertis-ing & sales director (India) for STAR. Prior to this,he worked with DDB Needham Advertising in HongKong and at Ogilvy & Mather in Delhi and London.

Prahlad KakarCEO & CreativeDirector Genesis FilmProduction

Kakar is the CEO andcreative director forGenesis FilmProduction, India’soldest and foremostad film production

house since its inception in 1977. He has ruled theadvertising world with his brand of irreverenthumour and has created award winning commer-cials. He is also a worthy recipient of theprestigious Lifetime Achievement Award, for hiscontribution to the Advertising and Film Art (2000).

Lloyd MathiasMarketing Director -Mobile DevicesMotorola SouthWest Asia

Mathias is currentlyspearheading a brandturnaround atMotorola. A part ofMotorola’s India coun-

try council, he leads the development of integratedmarketing & communication strategy. Mathiasbegan his career in sales with Onida, worked withthe UB Group’s Spirits Division and was executivevice-president of marketing at PepsiCo India. Hisinterests lie in consumer behaviour & retailing.

Sabbas JosephDirectorWizcraftInternationalEntertainment

Joseph, one of thefounder directors ofWizcraft InternationalEntertainment hasbeen actively involvedwith media from the

beginning of his career. His career-graph includes astint in journalism heading the editorial teams formajor newspapers. He is also an active member ofthe entertainment committees of CII, FICCI andEvent Management Association of India.

Brands which gained - or lost - the most ranks com-pared to last year.

up to No 17. Surfers had, in fact, placed it evenlower than they had in the past at No 46 but a juryvote resuscitated it in the rankings. HUL roseeight ranks to No 13: equally voted by both surfersand jury. Hyundai rose by eight steps to No 28, itsbest so far (it had been No 29 in 2006).Twobrands, Kingfisher and Cadbury rose by six rankseach in 2008 while Parachute rose by seven.

To move up within the top 10 is obviously thehardest and Kingfisher managed to do that.Cadbury’s No 14 that it managed was the best todate (it was No 17 in 2006). Parachute’s No 41may reflect mostly good luck since at its voterscore of 1.1 a whole host of brands have scoreswithin fractions of one another.

SURFERS AND THE JURY

The surfers and the jury of six experts (each ofwhom had five votes) seemed to largely agree

on a whole host of brands. But obviously therewere some where they didn’t quite look at thingsthe same way.

The two brands that gained hugely because ofthe jury’s inclinations were Raymond and Maggi.Raymond, appearing for the first time, was ratedpoorly by voters, only No 56 in popularity terms:but a single jury vote took it all the way to No 18.

Maggi has featured in the past two years butonly at No 37 and the No 39 last year. Left to vot-ers, it would have slid to No 46 in 2008 but a juryvote took it to its best ever: No 17.

The Times of India and SBI were two otherbrands that the jury rated as having more buzzthan did the surfers. The popular vote put themedia brand at No 13 as against its final No 7. AndSBI crashed in surfers’ eyes from No 6 last yeardown to No 21 but a jury vote allowed it to No 16.

Among the brands that lost out because theydidn’t find favour with the jury, Zapak suffered themost. The popular vote had it at No 8 but since ithad no support from the jury, Zapak slid to No 19.

Maruti Suzuki appeared at No 12 among votersbut ended up at No 20 after the jury’s weightagecame into play. And Pepsi came in at No 21 (andnot 16) for the same reason.

HOW WE DO IT

Every year, we examine the innumerablesearches on agencyfaqs! to identify brands

that visitors look for most: we then create a short-list of the top brands (60 this year compared to 50in the past).

Next, we ask surfers on agencyfaqs! to vote forthose brands among the shortlist which, in theirestimation, had the greatest excitement or buzzaround them in the year gone by. Each surfer isallowed to vote for a maximum of five brands.

To ensure that there is no digital ballot-stuffing,voters have to click on a link sent to their emailaccount. In all, 1,569 voters participated (thoughnot all validated the link) this year as opposed to 969 in 2007. The poll was carried out betweenJanuary 21 and 31, 2008. A jury of six eminent professionals was introduced this year. Their background reflected the many aspects of market-ing and communication that go into creatingpositive word of mouth – from advertising to PR to on-the-ground presence to the product itself.

CASTING VOTES(How the jury vote affected the outcome)

Brand Final Rank Popular Rank Gain/Loss

DEBUTANTS ALL(The first-timers)

Idea Google

Happydent Raymond

Zapak Sony Ericsson

Microsoft Nike

Yahoo! TATA Indicom

Chevrolet Santro

Wipro Ford

Brands

Raymond 18 56 38Maggi 17 46 29TOI 7 13 6Zapak 19 8 -11Maruti Suzuki 20 12 -8Pepsi 21 16 -5

Buzz Power, an initiative organised by agencyfaqs! and Kingfisher Airlines, washeld at the ITC Grand Central in Mumbai on February 14. It was followed bythe awards presentation. Presenting a photo feature of the event.

The audience in rapt attention atthe presentation.

A VERY BUZZY TIME

Meenakshi Madhvani (SpatialAccess Solutions), MadhukarKamath (Mudra), Ravi Deshpande(Contract), Vikram Malhotra(Kingfisher), Sripad Nadkarni(MarkeGate Consulting) taking ashot at ‘Buzz is what buzz does’.

Above: A case study for Bingo was presented by Hemant Malik ofITC Foods (top); while Vikram Mehra (right) of Tata Sky presentedhis company’s case.

Kiran Khalap (Chlorophyll Brand & Communications Consultancy), Abdul Khan(Tata Teleservices), Andrew Levermore (Hypercity) and Gunjan Srivastava(Philips Consumer Lifestyle) at the third session

The second session with Yateesh Srivastava (Centurion Bank of Punjab),Seema Modi (Heinz India), CVS Sharma (Arc Worldwide), Faisal Farooqui(Mouthshut.com) and Siddhartha Roy (Bigadda)

Honchos from the world of branding took a shot at decoding the implications ofthe term ‘buzz’ on brands and consumers – not an easy task by any measure.

Vikram Malhotra, general manager,marketing, Kingfisher receiving theBuzzy Silver from K V Sridhar ofLeo Burnett and Shibani Ahuja,member, Mouthshut.com

Above: Arun Mehra presenting the Zapak case study. Zapakalso won the Newest Buzz Award; Right: Airtel’sChandrasekhar Radhakrishnan receiving the Buzzy Gold Awardfrom K V Sridhar of Leo Burnett and Sanjoy Dutta, an architectby profession and member, Mouthshut.com

Kaushik Roy, president, Brand Strategy and Marketing Communication,Reliance Industries, received the Buzzy Bronze on behalf of the company. Onstage with Rajasagar and Sridhar.

Girish Shah, head branding, Entertainment, Financial Services and Corporate,Reliance ADAG, receiving the Buzzy Bronze from Rajasagar, Mouthshut.commember; On stage with Kunal Nagaonkar, Reliance ADAG.

Since Buzz is created by consumers, we also invited someMouthshut.com members, who are prolific bloggers on products, to give

away some of the awards.

As the evening progressed, the audience warmed upto the celebrations.

Above: Raina (OOH Media), Joshi (McCann Erickson), Bharat Kapadia (Jagran-TV18) and Sreekant Khandekar, director, agencyfaqs!Below: Mahesh Chauhan (Rediffusion), Aniruddha Banerjee (PublicisAmbience) and Anant Rangaswami (Campaign India).

Meeting of the advertising maestros - Prasoon Joshi(McCann), Ishan Raina (OOH Media) and Nitish Mukherjee(Leo Burnett)

Above: Raina (OOH Media), Chandradeep Mitra (OMS), Mangesh Borse(Symbiosis Advertising), Sridhar (Leo Burnett) and Sanjay Tripathy (HDFCStandard Life Insurance); Below: Nandini Dias (Lodestar); Sridhar andMukherjee (Leo Burnett)

The evening of February 14, 2008: Cyrus Broacha caught the audience off-guard with somepenetrating Valentine’s Day questions.

ALL

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RP, M

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T H E


Isaac Newton found inspirationwhen an apple bounced off hishead. Similar “simulation”

attempts on my part have not borneas famous results. That’s becauseeven given the rampant miniaturisa-tion of technology, an apple fallingon your head is still prone to makeyou lose consciousness and defilethe environment with some choiceexpletives. Getting “hit” with an ideais clearly more linked to first aidthan I had originally anticipated.

Technology is like that in manyways though. While originally, itsrole was seen as enabling mankind to enjoy the sweet fruits of abjectdecadence, the kind Rome sofamously lusted for. But what’sthreatening is its rapid and intrusiveprogress that has created an economywhere distraction is a reality andattention a scarce resource – nowthere, stop surfing the internet andpay attention.

Marketers stake fortunes on thefact that they will somehow be able togarner the attention of the prospect.But today, every attempt they make inthis direction is resulting in adding tothe general state of distraction inwhich we seem to be living.

Let me get to the point by elabo-rating on a few truths that seem to beemerging given this scenario.

Given the nature of our businessand how we compulsively need tobrand everything before we take itseriously, let me call them the Laws ofDistraction. But these are simply theresults of how technology is preventing us from paying attentionto some of the basic activities in whichwe are involved. This time around,we will dwell on how mobiles and thelike have hijacked our attention.

Law 1: Do not expect eye contactany more during conversations

The next time you are in any kindof meeting, or even a conversa-

tion of sorts, notice how much eyecontact you get. That’s assumingthat you personally are trying toestablish some. People seem to be

ensconced in their own technologyenabled world and are in the midstof multiple interactions, with pre-cious regard for geographicalconstraint. As you try to explain toan irate, but distracted client, whyhis precious shelf strip was delayed,you begin to wonder what was thepoint of showing up for a meeting inthe first place.

Every movie begins with arequest to keep mobiles on silent,part of what is called “cell etiquette”.There now seems to be a need toreturn to the basics of human inter-action, respectful eye contact andundivided attention, while conduct-ing conversations.

Law 2: Expect traffic jams to lastlonger

The journey to office now hasassumed the proportions of a 13

episode soap opera. Amongst otherreasons, this may be also becausemost drivers carry on parallel inter-actions via their mobiles – manydeals are conducted and alliancesannounced.

Everything, but the road and theambient vehicles seem to demandattention. The result? The few pre-cious minutes that don’t seem“technology intruded” see the driversextremely agitated. The fact that youcan be reached even when you aredriving, adds to the stress levels,

results in shorter fuses, lesser patienceand a constant endeavour on the partof most drivers to defy the immutablelaws of physics. The obvious after-math is that some bloke is trying to getsomewhere faster, flouting some ruleor some signal, sometimes both, andthe rest of us have to sit twiddling ourthumbs behind the inevitable mass ofvehicles piled up ahead.

Law 3: There will be no suchthing as a truly private moment,so many relationships will actual-ly last for a shorter time

Before the advent of mobiles, onetruly went home after leaving

office. Today, your mobile is actuallyyour office premises – somethingyou don’t ever lock up. And that’sjust on the professional front. Themore naughty ones amongst us canstill “carry on” many interactionseven when we are in “committedcompany”. Technology facilitatesintrusion, courtship and “a change of mind”. It truly has a mesmericeffect on us.

Mobile technology also allows forgetting out of sticky moments inrelationships. Where previously, faceto face interaction would have beenmandatory, today an SMS is increas-ingly becoming the way many youngpeople end relationships. It would beinteresting to try and establish a cor-relation between mobile use anddivorces; while many other factorsplay a part, there still might be a casefor Short Marital Services

It was once wisely said that themobile is the third screen that oneinteracts with (after the TV and thecomputer) but that seems dated now.Today, the mobile screen is whereour attention usually turns. I wouldreally have liked to conclude on abrighter note, but I seemy mymobile ringing. �

Some of India’s well-known professionals write on issues that they feel passionately about

Vinay Kanchan is Business Head,

Rediffusion DYR, Mumbai. He is also the

patron saint of Juhu Beach United, a football

club that celebrates the ‘unfit, out of breath

media professional of today’.

VINAY R KANCHAN

Laws of Distraction

GOGO

L


Women are not the ones to con-sole themselves with the small

luxuries of life during hard times.This was proved through a survey byInformation Resources Inc., con-ducted in the latter half of last year.The survey revealed that as the econ-omy slowed and women from lowerincome groups in particular wereaffected by rising prices, cosmeticpurchases particularly through masschannels, declined. Among cosmeticslipsticks, and, more specifically - liptreatments - were the least purchased.This is a sheer contradiction to theobservations of Esteé LauderChairman, Leonard Laude, who is

credited for identifying a market phe-nomenon in which sales of lipsticksactually accelerate during an econom-ic downturn. At least this held trueduring the recessions of the early1990s and 2000s.

But if the market for lip colourslooks colourless in the face of a eco-nomic slug the explanations for itcomes in varied hues. Not just lip-sticks but other categories of thecosmetic market face a drought insales during trying times of the econo-my. According to IRI data reported byDeutsche Bank, overall cosmetic salesfell 2.2 per cent to $790.4 million lastquarter, with sales of lipstick off 1.9

per cent and overall lip treatmentsdown 10.9 per cent. However, the factthat the sale of lipsticks, even in spe-cialty and prestige outlets were clearlylagging behind other makeup cate-gories is suggestive of the fact thatwomen overall are shifting their pref-erence from lipsticks to other staplesof makeup like skin foundation. Asianand Black women are increasinglyscouting for lip colours which com-plement their skin tones. And it isonly the speciality retail outlets whohave colour matching capabilities.This probably explains why brands

like Esteé Lauder and Bobbi Brownwhich have launched in specialtyoutlets have reported less decline oflipstick sales compared to massbrands. There have been many puz-zling factors about the cosmeticmarket of late and they have defiedboth expectations and predictions.Marketers are not sure whether adeepening economic downturn willchange the equation and lead morewomen back to somewhat lessexpensive mass brands or perhaps tomore lipstick. �

GreenpeaceGreece:Light Bulb Atable light with a greenpeace

poster tied to it saying ‘‘Useenergy saving light bulbs’’. Thetagline reads ‘‘Save the planet fromyour own home.’’

Advertising Agency: FortuneAdvertising, AthensArt Director: Stelios Livanos Copywriter: Panagiotis TogiasPhotographer: Tasos Vretos

Jornal doCommercio: RobotAn enormous robot holding a copy

of a newspaper against a city sky-line. An extraterrestrial creature liesbetween his feet and the ad copy isplaced on the left upper corner.

Advertising Agency: RGAComunicacao, BrazilArt Director: James Williams Creatuve Director: Ricardo Rique Copywriter: Rico Lins

There are myriadtheories for the

decline in lipstick sales

Astudy by market research firm Harris Interactive, com-missioned by En sequence an interactive television

company, established that 66 per cent of interactive TVviewers would be interested in interacting with commer-cials that piqued their interest. The study was conductedonline, between November 29 and December 3, 2007 witha sample group of 2,949 adults in the US.

The study also revealed that the demand for interac-tive television is not limited to reality shows, but cutsacross all genres.Interactive television provides a richadvertising platform to marketers as it facilitates audienceengagement with the brand. According to MicheleBodgan, senior VP of En sequence, the company createdover 25 interactive campaigns for advertisers such asFord, Nike, Jeep and Reebok. �

Tesco, one of UK’s largest retailers is looking at tappingthe convenience shopping space of China by opening its

first Tesco Express store in Shanghai. Incidentally Tescoalready operates more than 50 hyper markets in China’seast coast (owing to a joint venture with a local operator).Now the chain is contemplating the addition of smallerstores in their portfolio. Tesco which entered the Chinese

market nearly a decade after international retailerCarrefour is now charting an aggressive growth chart, asChina is one of the world’s fastest developing economies. China is one of Tesco’s smaller overseas markets, but theretailer could spend up to £300 million a year developingstores in this market if it opens 10 new hypermarkets ayear, says Shore Capital in a recent report on Tesco’s inter-national businesses. �

Hyper Presence

Fusion Ad

Touch-up story


The once ubiquitous choice formedia planners in advertising

agencies, ‘soap operas’ are witnessingan erosion of their audience base.This explains why ad spend on theeight network soap operas fell toabout $1.04 billion in 2006 fromabout $1.15 billion in 2004 (accord-ing to TNS Media Intelligence).

Procter&Gamble has undertakenan initiative which it hopes will infusefresh interest in the fading genre ofsoap operas in the US. They are rein-venting the programming formula ofGuiding Light, a CBS soap, and pack-aged it with enough potboiler story

lines to give prime time twisters stiffcompetition. The February 29episode of Guiding Light is somethingto look out for. The production crewis outfitting itself with 8-pound digi-tal minicams that will enable EllenWheeler, the show’s executive pro-ducer, to shoot over charactersshoulders, across tables and followpeople as they descend stairways orwalk around town. This has beenespecially construed because researchhas shown that audiences are tiredoff old production methods and lookforward to programming with specialeffects in realistic settings. �

The Campaign for a Commercial-FreeChildhood (CCFC) is emerging as a

ubiquitous helpline to parents in the USwho want to protect their children fromadvertising messages. A case in pointis that they were instrumental in scrap-ping a promotion that fast food majorMcdonald’s had undertaken for schoolkids in Seminole County. As part of ajoint business partnership with theschool board of Seminole County,McDonald’s was offering students freefood prizes for good grades. The offer,announced in conjunction with a smiling

picture of Ronald McDonald printed onreport card envelopes, was valid forkindergarteners through fifth graders.But things changed when a disturbedparent approached the CCFC whichimmediately swung into action. Thenew envelopes will now bear the letter‘S’ for Seminole County instead ofRonald McDonald’s picture. �

Not for Ads

The elaborate upfront presenta-tions which have been

synonymous with the initial interfacebetween media network executivesand potentialmedia buyers inthe US, are likelyto be downsized.Agency represen-tatives areexpressing theirneed for moreone on one meet-ings with a specific agenda. Theirbasic consternation is that these pre-sentations are in any case preceededand followed by separate meetingsand hence they are time consuming.Some media network executives

seem satisfied with these arguments.But there are some media networkexecutives who feel that scrappingthese events might not be in the

interest of any-one, especially inthese transitionaltimes when thereis an advent ofcommercial rat-ings, growth ofDVRs and emer-gence of

concepts like digital video distribu-tion. Marketing budgets too areestimated to be on the rise. Hencedownscaling a presentation formatmight lead to losing fresh business. �

Compiled by Proyashi Barua

Does Size Matter?

All for Soap All for Soap

The Brand Reporter, February 16-29, 2 0 0 8

Titan Titan has launched Octane a collection of chronograph, multifunctionand retrograde watches. The Octane collection embodies speed, ener-gy and power. It is available in over 35 different styles and is pricedbetween Rs 5,000 and Rs 7,500. The Pulsar and the Adreno which sportminute and seconds recorders are two highlights of this collection. Adistinct feature of this collection is the intricate dial and the contempo-rary urban and sporty designs. The Octane collection is available at allWorld of Titan showrooms, leading multi-brand outlets and departmen-tal stores across the country.

52

ASUS ASUS, a leading technology brand has launched the ASUS Eee PC inIndia. The Eee PC has built-in WLAN and offers comprehensive internetconnectivity which is simple and fuss-free, with or without wires. TheEee PC is seven inches and weighs 0.92 kg. It comes with flash-basedstorage capacity and a built-in webcam for compact mobility.The specialsolid-state disc design based on built-in flash-memory gives it a greatshock-proof advantage over the traditional notebook PCs.For the pro-fessional, the Eee PC comes with a powerful selection of software tomaximise personal productivity. The dictionary is an especially handyreference while reading electronic books downloaded from theinternet; the Open Office suite of software enables the user toopen, edit and create documents, that are compatible withMicrosoft Office. The Eee PC is sold at Rs 18,000.

Mitashi Mitashi Edutainment has unveiled a range of music play-ers namely the MW1 1GA, the MPF 1001, and the MPF1005. The MWI-1G has a 1.8 inches high definition displayand it can support MP3,WMA and OGG music formats. It isUSB2.0 compatible and has built-in-speakers. Coming witha multi-language OSD support and IDA tag display, it ispriced at Rs 3990. The MPF 1005 has 1GB memory andcan support MP3 and WMA music formats. It has a voicerecording function, tele book e-book support, and syn-chronised lyric display. Coming with a built-in lithiumrechargeable battery, it is priced at Rs 2,290. The MPF-1001 has the basic features of the MPF 1005 and a FMradio, voice recorder and double ear phone jack. It ispriced at Rs Rs 2,790. These music players are availableat all leading electronic showrooms.

Ecco Ecco the premium internationalfootwear brand from Denmarkhas recently launched theEcco’s Supercross, a collectionof sports shoes for women.The Supercross range is madeeither exclusively out of fullgrain leather, seude and textile

or a combination of thesematerials. The shoes come witha textile lining and an integrat-ed heel support system. Another speciality of theseshoes is that they come with aremovable insole. The moistureabsorbing insole offers maxi-mum breathability.Available ina variety of trendy colors, thisrange is priced onwards fromRs 7390onwards and is avail-able at the ECCO Concept Shop,Square One Mall, New Delhiand at all leading footwearstores across the country.

Elecom Elecom Co a manufacturer and distributor ofaccessories for portable computers has tiedup with India Digital Life Style Distributors tobring a fashionable range of computer periph-erals for the Indian market. The newly launchedrange is targeted mostly at women and includes uniquelydesigned earphones, an optical wireless mouse (Palvo) whichcomes in seven vibrant colours and carry cases for laptops, digi-cams, external HDDs and cameras. The carry cases are madefrom low-resilience polyurethane having excellent shock absorb-ing properties, which in turn ensures the safety of the electronicdevices.This range will be available at leading retail chains inDelhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai.

Oriflame Oriflame has recently introducedDivine Sensual in its premium

range of perfumes.Divine Sensualcomes in fruity,floral and earthyfragrances.Vanilla, sandal-wood andamber are someof the fragrances.A 50 ml bottle ofDivine Sensual ispriced at Rs 1390.However it isavailable at anintroductory priceof Rs 890 for themonth ofFebruary and issold through reg-istered Oriflame

distributors.

Where else would you fi nd in-depth coverage of the state of the media, advertising and marketing industries? Our dynamic, eagle-eyed editorial team brings you news and razor sharp analyses fortnight after fortnight.

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JOBSWITCHOrganization Name: CheilCommunications IndiaPositions: Retail Architect for BTL& Online Marketing ManagerLocation: New DelhiProfile: Retail Architect for BTL:The candidate would require beingan individual who has experience incorporate / Retail architecture. Theperson needs to be someone who isgood at coordinating things with thecontractors and vendors as well ashaving experience in clientservicing. The applicant must haveknowledge and experience increating Brand shops like Sony, LGetc. Experience of 5 – 7 years is amust for applicants with the rightqualification.Online Marketing Manager: Therequirement is for samsung.combusiness, the individual should beI.T or Systems Graduate / PostGraduate having required technicalas well as marketing knowledge.The applicants should have 5 – 7years of work experience with 2 - 3years of project managementexperience and strong andsuccessful client management skills.Email: cheilindia.hr@samsung.com............................................................Organization Name: MediaturfPositions: Finance ManagerLocation: MumbaiProfile: The incumbent would berequired to handle day to dayaccounting and bank managementwith supplier bills scrutiny andrecon and payout management aswould have to take care of Liaisonwith statutory auditor, taxconsultants and company secretary.The person should have a B.Com /M.Com / CA-Inter degree with 5 –10 years of relevant experience.Email: [email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: Wagh BakriTea GroupPositions: Senior Sales coordinatorLocation: MumbaiProfile: The successful applicantwould be required to co-ordinatewith C&F dept., Sales team atMumbai and H.O. at Ahmedabad.Also, would have to handle SalesPromotion activities at Mumbai andanalyze various data and generatereports which would help the Adand Sales Promotion team. Theindividual should be a PostGraduate in Management with 5 – 7years of experience.

Email: [email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: BJN HotelsPositions: Head – CorporateCommunicationsLocation: MumbaiProfile: The person would beresponsible to handle the completepublic relations & corporatecommunication for the entiregroup. The applicant must have anMBA or Masters inCommunication with 8 – 15 yearsof relevant experience in events / PR/ media / advertising and exposureto hospitality Industry would beadded advantageEmail: [email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: R2S GroupPositions: Manager Operations Location: New DelhiProfile: The incumbent would berequired to check Quality executionof the projects, organizing elementsinvolved in the projects, Sourcingand managing vendors & supplierson regular basis and to Executeproject cost effectively and withinthe time frame. The applicantshould have 4 - 7 years of relevantexperience in Operations andProduction in Events andpromotions with a minimum of 3years in leading a team. Email:[email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: ICG(Integrated CommunicationsGroup)Positions: Associate AccountDirectorLocation: New Delhi & BangaloreProfile: The applicant must have in-depth understanding of BTLcommunication, Experience inprospecting new business leads andhands-on involvement in projectmanagement and Strongmanagement and supervisory skillsin leading a team of dedicatedproject managers. The applicantmust have minimum 8 - 10 yearsexperience in client servicing andmarcom project management.Email:recruitindia@xtentiagroup.com............................................................Organization Name: PositiveCommunicationsPositions: Senior MediaConsultants / PR ManagersLocation: New Delhi, Mumbai &Bangalore

Profile: The candidate should havegood hands on experience on MediaRelations, useful media contactswith technology, healthcare,business, general and lifestylepublications. The successfulapplicant should have 2 - 5 years ofprior experience in a PR agency ormedia house while having excellentmedia relations, should be able toco-ordinate with clients individually.Email: [email protected],careers@positiveindia.biz............................................................Organization Name: 4DMarcommPositions: Account ManagerLocation: NoidaProfile: The candidate should beAmbitious & confident with a lot ofpassion to get good work out whilebeing able to take up new challengeswith the ability to bring in newbusiness. The individual shouldhave at least 7 years in servicing andstrategy and should be enthused bythe idea of Business DevelopmentEmail: [email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: ExplocityPrivate Limited.Positions: Senior Manager - Sales &MarketingLocation: HyderabadProfile: The candidate should havethe ability to generate revenues forthe company through advertisementsales and should have the ability towork with a team to meet thisobjective. The applicant would berequired to have knowledge ofadvertising sales and should havegenerated business through them asthe individual would be required tohave 5 - 8 years of experience inadvertisement sales with print.Email: [email protected] ............................................................Organization Name: Adlabs FilmsLimited (FM Radio Initiative)Positions: General Manager - OOHDivision (Big Street)Location: Mumbai & BangaloreProfile: The candidate would berequired to carry out monitoring ofoperational methods, practices andprocedures and recommendschanges as required. The applicantmust have 7 - 9 years of postqualification experience withexcellent leadership skills with aneye for detail.Email: [email protected]............................................................

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The winners of The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008.

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Transcript of The winners of The Buzziest Brands Awards 2008.