AskHarishBijoor

A Google-eyed Nation

By Harish Bijoor

Q: What’s with condom advertising in our country. There is little to choose from. The latest campaign from Moods is however interesting. Any take on this?

-Rakhshit Pratap. Jaipur

A: Rakshit, condom advertising has been a relatively closed-door syndrome at play in the country for obvious reasons of the mass consumer sensitivity to the subject.  A very creatively used category though, if you look at all the ads that India has seen thus far.

The Moods campaign is a refreshing way of looking at Condoms.  Goes in sync with the mood of a nation on the morph in its mentality to the condom category at large.

Condom advertising in India has traversed from the sublime to the ridiculous over the decades of condom advertising acceptance.

While Nirodh (the nationalized condom?) kept the condom category as a functional category that helped contraception, Kama Sutra took it to the point of adding sexy zing to the wardrobed sex lives of Indians.

Moods does it differently here in its latest sets of executions. Moods actually uses a quiet and suggestive language altogether. It uses the branding opportunity provided by the condom inner-pack very well. It is a highly campaignable piece of advertising that can use any and every situation to brand intent. It is quiet, sedate, and happily does not use sweaty half-nude bodies in a state of presumed coitus. Despite not using all these visuals, it leaves you behind with a clear brand message that Moods is it! That everyone is using Moods! Whatever the mood, whatever the age, and wherever. That everyone you ever thought would never use Moods is using Moods as well. That sex happens everywhere, never mind whether it is inside a Museum or
in the cramped quarters of an aircraft toilet.  Interesting.

I do believe the creative is very well handled and can be a true-blue
global piece of communication, relevant to every copulating culture.

Q: When does a company get into brand-valuation?

-Maria Nazareth, Mumbai

A: Maria, a company considers brand valuation at a point of time when it wants to assess its true-blue health.

This health is something it can leverage monetarily. At times this brand valuation number can be used to sell stake in the brand, or for that matter even mortgage a part of the brand to a bank or a financial institution. Most of the brand valuation exercises we do is to help brands monetize their intangible asset, the brand. In many ways it helps tangibilize an intangible.

Q: Telecom seems to have emerged the top advertiser in recent years beating FMCG. Why?

-Sapna KK, Kottayam

A: Sapna, in the last few years, we are seeing telecom as the top advertiser category while FMCG has fallen down the order. Correct.

It is all about margins and value. The FMCG sector is really going through trying times, fighting to retain margins, and fighting to stay relevant as branded offerings in a sea of commodity options that seem to be emerging as well. The FMCG category is also under margin pressure from the emerging organized retail. As the percentage of sales volumes grow in organized retail, traditional margins which were enjoyed by marketers are under stress. Add to this the climate of uncertainty. All this makes for the FMCG player to be that much more cautious. I do believe in media spend terms, the FMCG marketer is going through what I call a "cautionary recession". The volumes are more or less intact, the moneys to spend are there as well, but the attitude is one of saving for a rainy day.

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