Marketing Ganga

Author: Shabbir Chunawalla

  • Digital Marketing of Movies

    In supplementation of the traditional movie marketing, we resort to digital marketing of movies. In some instances, the online presence of the movie is registered a couple of years earlier than its release date, e.g. Bahubali registered its online presence in 2013. There could be a variety of strategies the production house can employ while promoting a movie digitally. To promote Drishyam, Ajay and Tabu created news reports highlighting two different sides of the story. This was integrated to offline TV screens placed across the theatres. The consumers were asked to vote online for who they thought were innocent.

    So far films are promoted through YouTube and Facebook. This has expanded no to Snapchat, Instagram, WhatsApp and Viber. YouTube and OTT platforms such as Hotstar are important for movies, and exclusive content is fed here to promote maximum viewing. Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are the three primary platforms that Disney uses for engagement.

    Actors themselves are active on social media, and this is helpful in movie marketing.

    There is a growing trend to use videos across the digital platforms. Consumers prefer content to consume, rather than pure advertising communication.

    Digital should not make you oblivious to the importance of the traditional media for promotion. TV is still a family medium. Movies are a social outing. Newspapers still command good circulation. All mediums have certain strengths which must be understood before shifting to another medium. A TV commercial can encourage viewer to see a digital campaign. Communication media must be integrated.

    A film’s before release marketing starts three to six months in advance. Digital marketing budget is 10-15 per cent of the total marketing budget.

    It is almost double this year ( 2015 ) than what it was last year. In some international markets, both the TV ad budget and digital ad budget for Hindi movies is the same. In years to come, the digital marketing budget could go as high as 40 per cent of the total marketing budget.

    The tag line of ‘ lights, camera, action ‘ has changed to ‘light, camera, hashtag.’

     

  • Digital Ads and X-buttons

    In its early days, online advertising was just restricted to flashing banner ads and static pop-up windows. These days, the ads have become more creative and interactive. They pop-up and play automatically — as if viewers are challenged to shut down. They command the screen, either contracting or expanding. They move and dance across the screens. Ads are more pervasive and not easy to get past. The X- button is so tiny, and clicking it is a matter of luck. Sometimes, on purpose, X buttons are placed in the top left instead of the usual top right. Pop up ads were invented by Ethan Zuckerman  in the 1990s. These were intended to give advertisers a way to separate their message from the web page. Later, advertisers started tracking web users and served them targeted ads. Rocket Fuel and Rubicon project, autommated this process. This brought down the price of online ads. As the prices went down, the publishers squeezed more ad formats on their sites to maintain sufficient revenues to keep alive.

    On desktop computers, the web pages have turned into a maze The problem is more acute on tablets and smart phones. Many publishers have shifted to HTMLS which  helps them create new ad formats.

  • New Disruptions

    Clay Christensen is considered among the world’s most influential management gurus, on account of his article some two decades back ( 1995 ) in HBR in which he talked about a grave danger to established companies from disruptions. Since then disruptive innovation and disruptive technology have become very commonly used terms. His new HBR article tries to define a genuinely disruptive technology, which does not qualify Uber as a disrupter. Even then Uber does pose a threat to existing taxi business which has many inefficiencies. According to Chirstensen, a disrupter enters from the low end of the market. However, Apple’s innovations are all upper end. Netflix has disrupted Blockbuster. It took advantage of the pain point of the core customers. There are two types of disrruptive innovations other than what Christensen champions — insurgents who revolutionise old industries by using new technologies, and existing companies using their superior war chests and management skills to invade adjascent industries.

  • Iterating Grace

    Intresting Grace  is a satire of a programmer, Koons Crooks, from Silicon Valley who attains enlightenment.  That leads him to on a spiritual quest. He reaches  a volcano in Bolivia. He contemplates on the tweets of the transcendtal wisdom from venture capitalists. He was seemingly being trampled to death by vicunas. He leaves behind scattered writing. All tweets have been reproduced.

    The packages of this book were received by people working in the technology industry, and venture capitalists and journalists.

    Is it an effort of viral marketing ? Is it for product promotion ? Or is it a literary work ? It is  a mystery that remains unsolved.

    F arrar, Straus & Giroux is publishing a small paperback editron of Iterating Grace. Its authorship is suspect, and is attributed speculatively to novelists Dave Eggers and Joshua Cohen.

    The tale is just 18 pages long,. It is tragi–comic. It c costs $8 as paperback, an and $ 5 as e- book. Authors agreed to have their work published on the condition that their identities will not be revealed.

    The Tweet messages included in the book have been incorporated with the permission.

  • Digital Promotion

    Salman Khan’s Prem Ratan Dhan Payo was promoted by adopting the digital first strategy. Actually they wantd to addresses the young audience. All creative were launched on the web first, and later on TV. They used social media extensively to communicate with the audience about the film. All this was facilitated by the popularity of Salman which cuts across all age groups and social strata. People associated with the film  —  Salman, Sonam and Sooraj Barjatya spoke extensively to the digital media. The lead pair is active on the social media. They shared the content of the film.

    Audience gives the feedback on the social media. It is possible to course correct on digital based on that audience is telling you.

    Rajashri works with YouTube, and close to 100 digital video platforms. They have close to 20,000 hours of content in their digital library.

    India is a mobile first market. The youth is a digital first audience. They are in talk with a number of brands who ant to sponsor their digital content. Of course, they can integrate their products and brands to the content. Brands warm up to digital very fast. This is just a beginning.

    Advertising is a major source of revenue for the digital media. Paid subscriptions will evolve very soon as payment gateways and cellular infrastructure evolve too.

  • Hungama : Digital Entertainment Company

    Hungama is synonymous with music and movies. It has been set up in 1999. It is an online promotions company — a digital media company. It has rich content of 7500 films in 12 languages. They have partnered with 52 different studios. They have 400-odd content partners. To begin with, they started with music and music videos. Here they introduced gamification — on making a playlist, you get the points. These points can be redeemed for digital gifts. In digital entertainment market, Hungama reaches 62 million consumers everyday. By pricing the services, they get a revenue of Rs. 3000-Rs. 3500 crore.

    In content consumption, the biggest category is music consumption ( 60 per cent ). It is followed by film and music video ( 40 per cent ). The category that is growing most is video.

    The three big pillars in this business are the content, technology and distribution. Hungama is way ahead in content. They have worked hard on technology. There are many devices, and they have to be where the customer is.

    Their 97 per cent business comes from subscriptions and consumer purchases. They also do advertising, sponsored programming and create a sort of channel with a brand around it.

  • Estee Lauder

    She was the daughter of East European parents and her parents called her Esty. The world later knew her by the name Estee. John, her chemist uncle, prepared herbal remedies and face creams over the family stove  which later became the basis for the first line products in her Estee Lauder line. She became the goddess of beauty. She set up business in New York, US, and now the products are sold in about 150 countries. Estee Lauder expired in 2004. Leonard. A Lauder, the elder son, inherited the legacy. He is 79 in 2011. As chief executive, he ruled over the company. His younger brother Ronald Lauder established the Clinique brand. William Lauder, son of Leonard , served as CEO, from 2004 to 2009, but stepped aside after an extra-marital relationship was exposed. Freda, an Italian, succeeded him. He as a non-family man, a professional.

    In 2010, Estee Lauder posted a sales of $7.8 billion.

    Estee Lauder believes in product quality and distribution to elite retailers. Freda made E. Lauder a leaner, faster and more collaborative company. As the Lauders no longer run the show, there is buzz that the company may go to P & G one day. William Lauder denies this.

  • Politics, Media and Business Relationship

    Businessman generally do not express their candid opinion about the budget and the government policies. They do not want to cross the sovereign’s path. Still business is the main source of political funding. It is said that such funding is only for goodwill and has no quid pro quo. If a business seeks special favours,  there is separate payment, but there is no clarity what proportion of such payment is retained by an intermediary and what proportion reaches the party coffers. Businessmen, politicians and bureaucrats have a complex relationship. Bureaucrats have to sign the clearance of the policy favouring business. In practice, political power trumps financial power. Politicians have now realized that businessmen gain far more gain through favourable policy decisions, while they stand to gain very little. This has led to a new phenomenon where politicians enter business. They want a stake in business. Businessmen too have entered politics by joining political parties and becoming parliamentarians. Media power is an essential ingredient in this mix. Both politicians and businessmen would like a friendly media. Business takes over established media to improve its clout. They buy the stake in media. In South, many politicians run the media. Businessmen finance politicians and political parties, and use media ownership as an additional weapon. Media defends them from politicians if there is such a need or can be used to further a political party’s interests. Media thus becomes a handmaiden especially during electioneering.

  • Google’s Searches through AI

    Google keeps investing in AI which it uses for videos, speech, and translation. It has now started using it for searches. This system is called Rank Brain. It converts vast amount of written language into mathematical entities called vectors. This conversion is facilitated by AI. It takes the unfamiliar queries by comparing them to familiar queries. The results are filtered. Hundreds of signals are received by an algorithm before the search results appear. Rank Brain is one such signal, but is a significant signal. Google has made machine learning a transformative process. Facebook too uses AI techniques to filter the newsfeed. Microsoft uses AI to enhance capabilities of its Bling search engine.

  • Principles of Net Neutrality

    1. ISPs should not hinder the provision of any web site ( except when there is a clear show of harm ) .
    2. No prioritization or throttling of certain data over others.

    ( No technological form of preferential availability and/ or access ).

    3.   No discrimination on the supply-side. Offer certain content or services at comparatively lower costs. Extreme when there are no data charges ( zero rating ).

    Net neutrality protects diversity on line — source diversity, exposure diversity.