Mere Pass ZooZoo hai!!

Amidst all the IPL hoopla, the new series of Vodafone ZooZoo ads stand out. You can read the entire story of the making, the production, the props and people involved in the campaign here at afaqs... Ads on youtube here.

Was speaking to my friend Kumar @ Ogilvy after browsing through the zoozoo fan club on facebook(it's got > 26K fans!!) a while back and then generally thought about the zoozoos...

1. Talk Value. It's a great example of awesome creatives generating a natural buzz for the brand in internet time. With the top end of the audience now digitally immersed, they are commenting on, participating in the zoozoo conversation.

Also the brand is giving back enough stuff - wallpapers, screensavers, ringtones, IPL related offers, special tag-me images, Zoozoo sounds(Zoozoo laughter and music tracks, ad previews, Twitter updates etc.

2. Stories. But is that enough? Perhaps not. Maybe there is space for an entire zoozoo world with zoozoobeings with their zoozoo antics! In a digital world, the digital creative has an infinite life and therefore if you have great creative content like the 'zoozoos' one could look at creating more stories for niche consumption and popular culture seeding. Of course vodafone has done good stuff through the zoozoo quizzes and contests!! But there is scope for much more.

3. Conversation Creative.Zoozoos are a great example of a new creative style - the conversation creative where the TV creative generates great and ongoing conversations in the digital world(and of course the offline world as well). The 26K+ fans on facebook, the 84 comments on the afaqs article, the twitter fan following are all adding on to the conversation.

While I quickly scanned through the comments on afaqs, stumbled upon some zoozooisms- "Mummy mujhe zoozoo lagi hai", zoomply great, keep zoo zooing, zoo che!!!

This is a new strain of co-created conversation creative that is being created in real time and the agency and brand team can brainstorm how best to make use of it...

It is interesting content which can either die a natural death or put to better use!
Also, is the brand bold enough to open up the Zoozoo creative for the consumers to play! A campaign that can create 26K fans in a short time has great UGC potential.

4. Amplification. The other area where brands need to put more focus is amplification of the 'core idea'. A great and viral-ble idea like the zoozoos should now be amplified and seeded into popular culture. Of course the facebook, twitter stuff is good but perhaps it needs to be amplified through the mobile phone to really blow up the idea in a big way!!

5. Surprise is the new consistency. In the consumers-are-bored-and-networked era, brands must learn to surprise their followers rather than needlessly bother about consistency. Zoozoos have nothing in common with the pug(apart from the simplicity and cuteness quotient) or the Vodafone boy-n-girl, yet they make for arresting memorable stories. The consumer mind has evolved to a stage where he/ she can store these multiple stories and enjoy them and connect them back to Vodafone.

We shouldn't worry too much if the Zoozoos get more Talk Value in the short term than Vodafone itself! Zoozoos, the pug are cute characters , obviously they will get talked about more than the brand name...

Once again, some inspiring stuff from Ogilvy and very digital-media-friendly creatives...

Fake IPL Player, Real Conversations

Spent the last 30 minutes browsing through the Fake IPL Player's blog. It's incriminating, it's salacious, it's bawdy gossip at it's best/ worst!

Now whether it's a (a)real fake guy, or (b)a marketing ploy(I hope) or (c)an actual player blogger(rarefied chance), this guy/team knows how to create smutty buzz and generate conversation! Aren't you amazed at his site traffic and the thousands of comments from visitors and followers!

For quite some time, I have been arguing the case for conversation as brand content. But it mostly goes over the head of body-copy-only guys. Well the fake IPL player comes to my rescue.

Here are a few random thoughts which are floating in my little sleepy mind post lunch...

1. Context is Everything. The fake IPL player's blog gives a lot of inspiration to creating engaging alternatives to vapid 'Hilaa Denge', 'Dhikha Denge', 'Bataa Denge' ads on TV. He/she shows how gossip, locker room talk, the management vs. the player jibes can be engaging content as well. Maybe brands like Sprite, Levis, Axe can do more niche social media stuff which can draw lessons from this guy!

2. Don't Control the Conversation.Most Indian brands try to control/ avoid the conversation in the blogosphere/ social media and read too much into the controlled conversation(read FGD). This guy's posts have a thousand plus comments!! Comments by readers, visitors are part of the conversation. They add flavour/ spice to the conversation(even though here it degenerates into uncontrolled bitching:-)

Maybe brands like Mentos, Sprite(again), some of the bike brands(Pulsar for instance) could encourage a more intimate conversation with their niche audiences instead of merely pummeling the great looking, expensive ads. (Okay, I love the Tarsem(?) made Pulsar ad, but after the 13th viewing I now reach out for the remote/ or better still close my eyes. Instead guide me to the making of the ad web-site or the making of the bike(to the more engineering inclined DTSi variety)

3. Celebrity is One Of usWe knew(for some time now)that celebrities are not always on a pedestal. They lost some of their halo when they signed their 10th brand contract:-) But didn't know really that he/she is merely one of us.

The celeb can be reviled(SRK is called Badshah Dildo on this guy's blog- now how worse can it get from here). In contrast,the big brands largely treat celebs in an anachronistically sugar-coated way replete with a fake smile, fake swagger and fake talk!!

And the funny thing I feel is that all this bad talk and gossip from blogs like these won't really harm the celebs. But they will just make the Dish TV, Hyundai and sundry other badly made fake-talk-fake-smile ads even more boring for some of us!!

Celeb bashing might be more interesting than celeb grovelling!!

Well hats off to the fake IPL player and his blog!. You are giving us all real-time lessons in generating conversation(even though it's smutty). We need more brave brands and a mutant strain of journo-copy-writer-gossip-columnist to perfect this art for Indian brands.

BMW Vs. Audi Outdoor Skirmish

Ajay, our Tribal planner mailed me this nugget. It seems new fighting between BMW and Audi has started in Santa Monica, USA!

AUDI hung up a commercial on the main street with the text: "The entirely new AUDI A4. Your move BMW."

BMW thought about it for a week and hung up on the next building a much bigger advertisement hoarding, "Checkmate!"!! (source: interesting-thingz.blogspot.com)

Pepsi : The Recycle Video

Somebody mailed me this a while back. Probably their best video in some time:-)

Good Tea & the Future The Way We Want It To Be

Just finished my second cup of well-made Darjeeling tea in my favourite white cup! Ah the small pleasures of life...Getting ready for a long day of book research and writing after a two week hiatus...

Had read this post by Scott Goodson, the Strawberry Frog CEO on the different agency models and the need for extreme agility and adaptability among agencies in times of recession/ slowdown. You can read it here...

It also got me thinking about the need to adapt as a worker-ant/ employee/ networked knowledge worker/ creative portfolio worker...Thots not exactly in order...

1. The department must die. I feel the rate of our contribution dramatically increases with our ability to collaborate across the blurring boundaries of department. I am talking strategy, creative, servicing, digital media, OOH, research, brand identity...Though there are no visible signs of 'the department' dying in an Indian agency any time in the near future. Long live the fiefdoms!!

2. Employee NetworksThe agile companies must respect, use and reward employee networks. At 437 LinkedIn connections, I am perhaps a little more useful than I was a year back:-)This is a social network. But it's also a knowledge and personal network that can do great stuff together, solve issues, share experiences. Suddenly, the sum of all these employee networks can become a potent force for the small agile company!

3. Portfolio Working. I had been wanting to do it ever since I first read about the concept in Charles Handys' book - the empty raincoat! As we increasingly get hurtled into the ever closely knit creative-knowledge economy, opportunities to do portfolio work(not just for pure creatives) but everyone has risen through the roof...

4. Make New ConnectionsWhile the economy has slowed down dramatically, the potential to make new business connections has never been greater.

Take 1 jar of open mindedness and enthusiasm + add a full saucer of environment scanning + heat it a little + shake it with new thinking + add 1 table spoon of new ideas and approaches and hey you have a new business idea or model or new portfolio friends...

eg. A specialised Bollywood/ A/V content Marketing Agency*, Youth Marketing Company, Personal Branding Consultancy, Low cost SOHO brand building packages(this one came as of yesterday as I was approached by a London based company for a guest blog post)

Gmail, LinkedIn, Skype ensure that this souffle comes for FREE!!

5. Re-skillingMost of us(all of us) sit on a few kilos of unused talent. A minor re-skilling can polish up those and can be gainfully employed in a portfolio way. In the past 3 months or so, at a personal level, I have discovered that I could be a trainer, executive coach, youth/ culture/ Bollywood film marketer...It's just that we sit on our asses waiting for things to happen(at least that was my case) Whereas the environment is right for re-skilling and creating new revenue models(both for the company and personal)...

6. The Un-Company ManWhen I was looking for a job two years back, a very senior media person(ality) said that I wasn't much of a company man(the spirit of the remark was a wee bit pejorative)...However, if we look at the debris of corporate America and the loss of jobs closer home, the company as the sole provider of financial security and stability no longer exists. It's both a scary and a liberating thought. In fact now may be the best time to finally come out of the life long shackles of the COMPANY.

The company will definitely exist; but that will no longer be the sole/ desired work model. Like I said, (a) portfolio working, (b) greater degree of employee entrepreneurship, (c) company as a employee collective, (d) virtual creative/knowledge worker networks and more are/ will emerge stronger...

I feel the time, the tools and the environment is just right to create the future the way we want it to be!!

The Evolution Of Communication

Source : Mike Keefe's cartoons