Advertising and Promotions: An IMC Perspective

1018 Pages·2009·105.06 MB·English

by  Kruti Shah, Alan D'Souza

A P
DVERTISING AND ROMOTIONS
A IMC P
N ERSPECTIVE
A A
BOUT THE UTHORS
Kruti Shah is a young and upcoming freelance marketing and
communications professional with diverse experience for her years. In
the past six years, her work has encompassed market research, product
launches, brand management, project management, website
communication, and business development. Kruti has worked as a
marketing coordinator for Fibre-Craft Materials Corporation, USA and
as a business development manager for Pidilite Industries. She has also
worked and consulted with Zydus Cadila Healthcare, Educational
Initiatives, Publicis Worldwide, and the American Red Cross of Greater
Chicago.
Currently, Kruti serves as the founder of the marketing and communications consultancy outfit
Thinking Ink, and as a visiting faculty of marketing and communications at Ahmedabad Management
Association and N.R. Institute of Business Management. Her areas of professional interest lie in
enhancing the quality of advertising for small and medium enterprises, exploring Internet
marketing, and devising new teaching materials and methodologies in marketing communications.
Kruti is an MS in Marketing Communications from Stuart Graduate School of Business, IIT,
Chicago and a gold medallist MBA from Nirma University, Institute of Management. She has co-
edited the book ‘Inspirational Gems to Empower your Life’, which has successfully run over five
editions winning wide acclaim. Kruti devotes her leisure time to trekking and travelling, and
expresses her creativity in Bharatnatyam and Kuchipudi dances.
Alan D’Souza has over three decades of experience in Industry,
Academics and Institution  building. A post-graduate from the
Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, (IIMA), he has
worked with Companies such as Boehringer-Knoll, Glaxo, Shilpi
Advertising and Mudra Communications. His industry experience
includes developing the marketing and communication strategies
of   ethical pharma and OTC brands such as Euglucon, Isoptin,
Farex, Complan and Nycil. In the advertising arena he has
contributed towards building brands such as Cera, , Vimal, Rasna,
Dhara, Symphony, Yera etc. He has wide international experience
and has consulted with companies in the UK, Sri-Lanka, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Kenya,
Nigeria and Rawanda. He is one of the founder members of MICA (Mudra Institute of
Communications, Ahmedabad). He has set up MICORE (Mudra Institute of Communicatons
Research) the first Institute of its kind in India dedicated to Communications Research. He is
visiting faculty at many of the premier management institutions in the country. He also has a
significant number of publications and case studies to his credit.
Mr D’Souza is currently Director, Goa Institute of Management, one of the premier management
schools in the country.
A P
DVERTISING AND ROMOTIONS
A IMC P
N ERSPECTIVE
Kruti Shah
Visiting Faculty
Ahmedabad Management Association
and
Founder, Thinking Ink
Alan D’Souza
Founder Member, Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA)
Former Acting Dean, Mudra Institute of Communications Research (MICORE)
Director, Goa Institute of Management
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Advertising and Promotions: An IMC Perspective
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RBZLCRBFDAXDA
To my beloved parents Hema and Mukesh
for their blessings, and to my husband
Saumil for his unflinching support
– Kruti Shah
To my parents, Alzira and Paul, my wife Rose,
and my children, Akhil, Alok and Alisha
for their continued love, support
and encouragement
— Alan D’Souza

F
OREWORD
I forget what I was taught. I only remember what I have learnt.
— Patrick White
I have spent my entire career in the marketing communications industry. In these three decades, I
have experienced over and over again the truth of Patrick White’s words. I have seen that ‘taught’
advertising is incomplete without hands-on experience. This is true to other industries as well, but
maybe, much more so in a business that is all about people, ideas and creativity.
This book ‘Advertising and Promotions: An IMC Approach’ by Kruti Shah and Alan D’Souza is
unique since it strings Kruti’s youthful enthusiasm and diverse industry and academic experience,
with over three decades of wisdom that Alan has collected in the Indian advertising industry. The
book balances the rigours of communication plans, strategies and theories with the no-bars-held
creativity and fun in execution. It also gives insights into the pressures and pleasures of work in an
ad agency.
This amalgamation of academic and professional approach, coupled with a comprehensive
coverage of major promotional tools and their integration, fulfils a burning need of the academia
and the industry. Most good textbooks in this space are of foreign origin. They lack examples and
case studies that Indian students can relate to, and hence fail to grasp the subject comprehensively.
This is where the authors’ experience is invaluable.
I wish good luck to the authors and commend them on their excellent effort.
I am sure you will benefit a lot by adopting this textbook as a part of your curriculum.
Madhukar Kamath
MD & CEO, Mudra Group
4th July, 2008

P
REFACE
“The truth isn’t the truth until people believe you, and they can’t believe you if they don’t know what you’re saying, and they
can’t know what you’re saying if they don’t listen to you, and they won’t listen to you if you’re not interesting, and you won’t
be interesting unless you say things imaginatively, originally, freshly.”
– William Bernbach, the legendary American advertiser and former CEO of DDB Needham
With products attaining parity, communication remains the only major differentiation tool for a
marketer. On the one hand, the field of communications is becoming increasingly popular due to
its significance and the immense scope for creativity that it offers. On the other hand, a review of
communication these days reveals that a large chunk of it is neither creative, nor strategically sound.
Moreover, it is not always socially responsible. Makes us wonder… what is going wrong? One
reason is the haphazard, hit-and-miss approach towards the subject. Creativity that is not leashed by
sound strategic roots, or strategy that is not given creative wings can fall flat on a communicator’s
face.
We have seen this happening umpteen number of times, and recurring yet again. Examples
abound, such as the NDA government’s brilliant ‘India Shining’ campaign that bombed and saw
the Congress returning to power even after an ad spend of Rs. 500 crores and a focus on India’s
improving economic conditions and achievements. Or take the cases of the failed relaunch of the
Onida devil—the green-horned popular ad persona of the ’80s and ’90s, the disastrous sinking-
without-trace of Vanilla Coke that had done well in blind tests, or the disappointing Pepsi TV
campaign that generated immense interest through a teaser campaign. Why was it only analysis-at-
hindsight that revealed that the feel-good factor of the ‘India Shining’ campaign failed to connect
with the masses, as pointed out by Congress’ Aam aadmi ko kya mila counter-campaign? Or that the
idea of envy as personified by the Onida devil was relevant when there were only 4-5 colour
television brands in the market, not when the Sonys and Panasonics were ruling the roost with their
sheer foreignness and technological prowess? Or that even a Wakaw by the film star Vivek Oberoi in
an Elvis Presley-cum-Shammi Kapoor getup can be “wrong positioning,” “irrelevant advertising,”
or “removed from the Coca-Cola mother brand”? Finally, no excuse can be allowed for a creative
from the house of Pepsi that fails to meet expectations and sustain interest even after the featuring of
three popular Bollywood celebrities. While we are certainly making headway in international
awards, the question that we need to answer is whether our communication is becoming more
effective.
Why This Book?
A review of current books on the subject reveals that there are two major categories in which they
may be placed. There are advertising and promotions textbooks on one hand, and professional
reference books on the other. The former target students and have their foundations in theory.
x Preface
Undeniably, they provide practical examples, as the very subject of communications cannot be
taught without examples. But there is none to very little hands-on, execution-oriented coverage.
The professional reference books primarily address the needs of practitioners with the spotlight on
execution and functional nitty-gritty, giving a slip to boring theory. This has created a lacuna
between the two where we’d like to position our book.
For Whom?
While writing this book we consciously kept two distinct sets of students in mind – those who
would be more interested in the managerial aspects of communication, and those who would be
more interested in mastering the creative aspects. In that regard, MBA students who specialize in
Marketing and choose an elective in IMC or Advertising comprise our prime target audience. This
is because many of these students will go on to become creative campaign designers while others
will grow to be effective managers in marketing communications or brand management. Apart
from this, the book is also oriented towards the needs of students of those sectoral institutes and
business schools that offer specialized courses in the areas of marketing communications.
To take care of its management-inclined audiences, the book features sections and chapters on
the conceptual understanding of IMC, objective-setting, media planning, budgeting, dealing with
legal issues and such, whereas sections on creative execution of advertising in various media, as well
as coverage of other promotional tools cater more to the creatively inclined, i.e. those wishing to be
involved in the actual making of an advertisement as well as students going into client servicing or
account planning.
To meet our objectives, this book addresses students with a textbook-like format. But it goes a
step further than giving them a fleeting, textbook-ish exposure to advertising and promotions. It
covers basic theory with practical examples, and then moves on to the real essence of
communication. The text delves into important execution-related details, such as the art of
brainstorming for creative ideas, rules of copywriting, designing print advertisements, making a
television commercial, understanding camera moves, etc. And it does this without losing focus on
the core curriculum of marketing and communication programmes.
So why do we think that this academic-cum-professional blend is a better approach? From our
own teaching experience, we have come to believe that our intense and vocational approach will
interest and educate students better. We’ve found that the serious student of the subject always
wants to know about the how part – how is communication actually created or what happens behind
the scenes. We have written this book to serve the purpose, more so with its special emphasis on
the Indian scenario. Thus, the book aims to serve as a comprehensive text for students and amateurs
interested in marketing communications in general and advertising in particular.
Contents of the Book
This text introduces students to the concept of integrated marketing communication, and its major tools,
techniques and media, with a special focus on advertising. Admittedly, we are particularly inclined
towards advertising, since we believe that it is this tool that offers the highest opportunity for
strategic and creative work. This is because advertising is the most used form of communication yet,
and any other form of communication almost always involves some advertising. Hence, an entire
section of our book is dedicated to understanding the creative strategy in advertising.