So the long running ‘Open Happiness’ theme for Coca-Cola is being replaced with a new tagline: Taste the feeling. According to the CMO, Marcos de Quinto, “We have been just talking about the brand, but talking very little about the product.” The new anthem is a montage of everyday moments with product consumption. That sounds mundane but the announcer theme ad is quite watchable. Interestingly, according to Adweek: four agencies—Mercado-McCann, Santo, Sra. Rushmore and Oglivy—produced…

I find tourism campaigns fascinating. The basic principles of marketing communication (or any communication for that matter) are the same across product categories. They all need to persuade us humans to change mindset or trigger a behaviour. These principles are unlikely to change for another million years as they deal with basic human behaviour mostly – which hasn’t changed in a million years. However, tourism advertising is a bit different because the ‘product’ cannot be changed…

The long running ‘girl magnet’ positioning of Axe had its high points over the years. There were some fun films under Axe Effect – the memorable ones included the ‘falling angels ad’ and the stunt at London Victoria, the masseur one (No.8 in this list) and a few others. Over time, the ads became a bit jaded, predictable and even crass. I guess even the brand management team were worried about the danger of this predictability…

Movie marketing, at least in India, has become quite predictable. Release of an ‘action poster’, audio release, teasers, trailers, participation in TV programmes (especially as a judge on a talent show), social media promotions & contests are all common now. Even in Hollywood, it is common for actors to make the rounds of late night TV shows and give interviews to entertainment channels and so on. In this context, the marketing of Zoolander 2 caught my…

Between bookmarked sites, Twitter and RSS feeds which showcase advertising, I come across many new creative ideas every week. As with advertising in real life, only a handful are memorable. Here are my picks for the week ending 8th January 2016. Cillit Bang: The Mechanic Every sub-category in FMCG, especially household cleaners have their category codes. When it comes to floor cleaners and dishwashers the residual imagery is that of housewives, before-after or side-by-side demos…

Since this is the season for crystal-ball gazing, predictions and listicles, herewith my unsolicited, light-hearted take (no offence meant) on things which will not change this year for the ad industry: 1. Agency press release announcing big wins: you know the type which says that the agency has already won zillion trillion crores worth of billing over the past 3 months. Usually this is followed by news of clients (mentioned in the above press note),…