India Ad Review

Milte hain ek lambe break ke baad!

2008-02-29T05:58:00.000-08:00

Much against my own wishes, I would have to stop posting on this blog for some time. And quite ironically, the reason for stopping the blog is same as that for starting it - exposing misinformation and half-truths.

This is how it connects.

About 6 months ago, I fulfilled a many-years-old dream of mine - to work in an advertising agency. I joined one of India's biggest and most respected (and envied) advertising agencies. While this had made me happy beyond expectations, it has also led to closure of this blog.

I have been told that I can't post about ads that my agency makes. Since I would myself be the most uncomfortable to expose some ads and turn a blind eye to some others, I have decided to stop posting anything new on this blog, till I am a part of the world of advertising. And knowing myself, that would mean "for a long long time".

Till then, all I can say is, don't believe everything you see and hear. So long!

Centre for Science in Public Interest

2007-11-15T16:00:00.000-08:00

Something from the phoren lands

The 'Centre for Science in the Public Interest' is a Washington, D.C. based, FDA award-winning institute that works exactly what its name implies, in the field of Foods and Beverage products.

Here's a link to an article on its site about how companies use the liberty of language to make claims that fool customers.

A couple of them given here:
- A soft drink that burns more calories that it provides, is sold as something that controls weight.
- A cereal says it has the soft creaminess of yogurt, whereas what it actually has is yogurt powder.

A disclaimer here:
Given the source and its credentials, I don't think they would have erred on any of these findings. But unlike other information normally published on this blog that is verified first hand, these claims are not, hence I do not take responsibility for errors if any.

India Ad Review Issue 15: Lifetime Plans on cellphones

2007-07-15T17:00:00.000-07:00

While this post is about a not-so-recent practice, the trigger is the new ad by Reliance Communications for their offer of Lifetime validity at Rs. 499.

Most GSM and CDMA operators in India have an offer about a prepaid service that gives lifetime validity, which basically mean free incoming calls for life. As with everything else, there are some "conditions apply" to this.

First, when a telecom company offers a plan with lifetime validity, the "lifetime" refers to the duration of the company's telecom licence, a meaning very different from a general understanding of the words "free for life" and "for a lifetime".

Second, even for the duration of the telecom operator's licence the incoming calls are not free for long. The subscriber has to recharge his account with a certain minimum total every few months for the connection to remain active.

For example, in case of Hutch in Mumbai, the connection remains active only if the subscriber recharges with a total of at least Rs. 200 every 6 months.

With all the conditions, I hope it requires less than a lifetime to figure out the exact benefits of these offers.

Read a similar post about playing with the word 'lifetime', by Siva at Biz Dews.

India Ad Review Issue 14: Webdunia

2006-12-02T21:08:00.000-08:00

This post will talk about a dot-com ad which talks about a huge potential market for advertisers. But surprisingly, it does not give any information about itself.

The dot-com is WebDunia and the ad is displayed below.

Among all posts on this blog on mis-information, this one takes the cake and the icing and the cherry on it. Reading the ad, one feels that WebDunia, combining its reach across the various languages it offers, reaches 24.6 million Indians.

Far from true.

The text after the asterisk says:
Source: Total Internet users in India are 60 mn - ITU survey 2006. 41% prefer Indian lang websites - Juxtconsult "India Online '06 survey"

Quite a far-fetched conclusion from the data. Lots of errors here:
* Webdunia is offered in some Indian languages, but not all Indian languages. So it is possbile that while an Internet user might prefer a language, say Bengali, Webdunia may not be available in that language.
* Also, while there are 24.6 million internet users in India, who prefer Indian languages, it is possible that some of them may not have even heard of webdunia.com. Some of those who are aware may have never logged on to the site, and moreover, some of those who have logged on, never came back.

So it is all left to the reader to understand what exactly is the benefit of advertising on webdunia. Hardly a good thing to do when some of the websites are ABC Electronic-certified and give concrete numbers.

India Ad Review Issue 13: 7 Up Lemon Bite

2006-10-19T01:12:00.000-07:00

If there was ever an award for fooling people, this ad for 7Up Lemon Bite would win it hands down.

The setting is that of a Dhaba, where a guy suddenly notices that lemons from all 'nimbu-mirchhi's hanging on the trucks there, are suddenly gone. The reason - Fido Dido, the 7Up icon, has taken all these lemons. He puts all of them in a glass, shakes it nimbu-sherbat-style and zap! The glass has become a bottle containing 7Up Lemon Bite.

The ad even ends with a truck-driver tasting it, finding it sour, and saying, 'Nimbu maar ke'.

Seeing the ad, the viewer would quite obviously think 7Up contains lemons. However, the fine print says something else...

"Contains no fruit. Contains added flavours."

So it's not lemons, it's just lemon flavour!!

Think any ad gets more misleading than this one???

India Ad Review Issue 12: Airtel

2006-10-18T10:07:00.000-07:00

Almost every big cellphone service provider has by now advertised about how good its network is.

Hutch did it with the 'Pug' commercials and said, 'wherever you go, our network follows.' Airtel did it the girl-at-boarding-school and guy-visits-rural-school-teacher ads with 'wherever you are.' Idea, quite recently, did it with a monkey stealing away the phone.

Almost all ads used obvious puffery for their claimed network strength. But this one ad by Airtel goes a bit 'out of service area'.

The ad shows 3 girls in a tent. 2 of them debate over whether to view news or listen to music. Just then, the third lady intervenes, and they mutually agree to watch movie clips. Just then, they receive a call from 'Home'.

There's nothing technically misleading about the ad, since all of it possible given the multimedia instrument and the network's GPRS connection. But quite oddly, when the movie clip is being played, the top panel of the phone reads 'contacts'. Take a look.

If watching movie clips is really possible, why not show it on the phone "as-is"? Why super-impose the clip on some other display?

As Agent Smith said it, "Why? Why, Mister Anderson, why?" (Matrix Revolutions, The: 2003)

India Ad Review Issue 11: Pepsodent

2006-10-07T14:01:00.000-07:00

There is no way you would have missed this ad from Pepsodent.

A kid is roaming around in a super market singing different versions of "Akkad, Bakkad, Bambey, Bo" and choosing something for himself from a huge variety of chocolates, lollipops, toffies and stuff. His mother notices and there's an obvious worry.

Then, the voice-over talks about the 10 problems caused by eating so much of sweet sugary food. The 10 problems are then, put up on the screen too. The VO continues with claiming Pepsodent helps fight these problems. Take a look at this screen schot from the ad.

If you care to count the problems shown, yes, they would add up to ten. But the funny part is that these are not really 10 unique problems. There are only 5 unique problems: Cavities, Germs, Plaque, Decay and Bad Breath. They have been simply been repeated to total to 10 problems on screen.

Also, do notice the size of the text that is at the bottom of the screen. It reads:
1) Fights 20 common teeth and gum problems
2) Brush twice a day
3) Visit the dentist regularly
4) Avoid excessive consumption of sweet food

You may want to read the first one again.

The company expects people to believe that Pepsodent will help fight 20 problems when it wants to claim for only 10 of them, and still lists only 5!

Others are probably 'top secret information'.

I found a "Humsafar"

2006-10-05T23:41:00.000-07:00

How does it feel when you meet someone walking on the same path, and having the same destination, as yours?

Ask me!

I just discovered a site that does something similar to what I try to do with this blog. (It does it in a much bigger way, though.)

It calls itself 'Mouse Print' and can be reached here. From what I gathered, the people working for this site put up information about the fine print in both TV and Print ads in the US. It even has an RSS feed that can be subscribed to from here.

Now I have a much better idea on how to make this blog much better!

Update to IAR Issue 2: Himani Navratna Oil

2006-09-04T22:35:00.000-07:00

This post is an update on the India Ad Review Issue 2, where I have talked about Mr. Amitabh Bachchan's ad for Himani Navratna Oil.

In the recently released TV advertisement for the same brand, it's Mr. Shah Rukh Khan saying he has been using this oil to battle stress, tension and the tiring shooting schedules for his years in Bollywood.

Watch and enjoy the ridiculous claim - one that, as mentioned earlier, is difficult to prove or, more importanly, disprove.

India Ad Review Issue 10: Zee News

2006-07-07T08:40:00.000-07:00

This issue is a bit different from the usual ad-bashing.

This time, the target is an ad by a Hindi News Channel - Zee News - that uses Television Ratings (TVRs or TRPs) to attract more advertisers.

It is very difficult to resist the temptation to write at length about TRPs, but that's for some other day and some other blog. Let's just go by the ceteris paribus condition here.

The following TRPs were advertised saying "In the race for the No.1 position, Zee News is just a step away from the top spot."

Now, look at the numbers supporting this claim.

If 8 rating points is "just a step", what would you call 1 and 6 rating points - the respective gaps between Zee News and the next two channels?

India Ad Review Issue 9: Head and Shoulders

2006-07-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

Some ads are just plain shocking. One of them is this one by Head and Shoulders Anti-Dandruff shampoo.

Take a look at this not-so-clear (hence useless, but still!) shot taken by my 1-year-old 6600.

This is a true shot from the Head & Shoulders bottle itself. It reads - 'New best ever. Removes more dandruff in 1 wash vs 3*' [italics mine]. The ad in India features Bollywood female actor Priety Zinta saying the same thing.

As usual, the not-to-be-missed words are the one that follow the asterisk. They are - 'one wash of H&S vs. 3 washes of non anti-dandruff shampoo.'

What am I supposed to make of this? Well lots of things:

1) Even non anti-dandruff shampoo are able to remove dandruff. Else, why was the 'more' needed above. OR
AD shampoos work as good (or bad) as non AD shampoos. So why use AD shampoos at all?

2) The ability of Head & Shoulders is so bad in absolute terms that it compares itself with non AD shampoo. OR
Head & Shoulders wants to create an impression that it is a better anti-dandruff shampoo compared to other anti-dandruff shampoos. It does this by putting the asterisk. And then, to probably avoid the legal battles, it gives the details.

It actually does not matter what conclusion we choose from above. None of them is good for the H&S brand image.

By the way, H&S had done this earlier as well. An old ad for H&S said that the company's (Procter and Gamble's) research institute had tested "India's top 2 AD shampoos" and the results said that H&S was the better one. Any guesses on which was the only other brand that H&S considered privileged and deserving enough to test in its own labs?

Again, the same question, why only top 2 brands?
Financial constraints? Unlikely!!!
Incomplete information, resulting in the viewers getting fooled to believe? Very likely!!!

A post by a Doctor

2006-06-17T22:58:00.000-07:00

This post is not quite related to India, nor to advertising as such.
But yes, it perfectly fits with the purpose of this blog!

Linked is a post about the way a treatment for infertility 'Ovulex', is marketed. It is written by Dr Aniruddha Malpani, an IVF specialist from Mumbai, India, who operates a blog to make patients more informed.

A nice read. Read and ponder...

How good is this blog?

2006-06-15T05:51:00.000-07:00

To the regular reader, I may come out as an insecure person.
To the first time reader, well, that's true.

How good is this blog? I keep asking this question time and again.

Then, once in a while, I come across blogs like this Seth Godin's one on the same issue. But I doubt it is of any help to me. My problem is I do not know what the reader thinks. Last time I put up a similar post, I got only a couple of comments - fortunately, both of them positive.

But it still does not take away my insecurity. How good this blog really is?

India Ad Review Issue 8: Pepsi TV

2006-06-07T04:08:00.000-07:00

Another ad that exploits the emotional attachment of Indian youth with cricket, and the demi-god status of cricketers.

This is not about the complete campaign of Pepsi TV. Just a single ad from it. I will not divulge my views on a cola brand selling sipper-snackers and other stuff. That is, not on this blog.

There is this one ad from the campaign, which shows a group of guys really enjoying every moment of a cricket match on TV. Priyanka Chopra enters and says, "Wohi break lo, jo players lete hai" (means 'Take the same drinks break that the players on field take'). And then, a Pepsi drinks cart smashes into the room and the guys enjoy Pepsi.

So what's wrong here? Players do take a Pepsi break, don't they?

Not all playes do. Actually, as far as my understanding does, most players won't drink soda water as a refreshing drink while playing cricket under the sun. They would probably go for water or juice or something.

Of course, the cart does say Pepsi, but that is because that space has been sold as an ad spot, similar to the commercial break on TV. But that doesn't mean the players are drinking Pepsi.

Note: Compared to the other posts here, this ad does not completely mislead the viewers. I agree. But given the impact of this ad, I thought this was an important issue. Not all players take a 'Pepsi break'. Hey, not even most players do!

India Ad Review Issue 7: Fairness Products

2006-05-10T21:53:00.000-07:00

This issue is a bit different from the previous ones, in the sense that here I will be looking at one full category rather than a particular ad.

The brands and claims being talked about are Fair and Lovely (HLL), Fairever (Cavinkare), Fairglow (Godrej), Fair One (Elder Pharmaceuticals), among others.

Most brands contain ingredients like turmeric or saffron, or other or a collection of herbs and ayurvedic preparations that ultimately somehow make the skin fair, when used over a period of time.

Now let us look at some facts regarding our skin colour.

The colour of our skin comes from a chemical called Melanin, also called skin pigment. This same pigment is also responsible for the colour of our hair and of the iris of our eyes. This is what Wikipedia has to say about Melanin. Another source, giving a much simpler and shorter explanation of melanin and pigmentation, is this.

The basic skin colour, i.e. the amount of melanin in our skin, is decided by our parent's genes, like most other features of our body. The skin then changes colour over time, due to age, and based on exposure to sunlight, dirt, pollution, etc.

The skin colour would also depend on how much care we take of our skin. If we do not wash our face regularly, for example, dirt and sweat and germs would damage our skin, making it dark, ugly and cause acne / pimples, blemishes, etc.

That's where these so-called 'fairness products' come in. These products (in fact, anything that helps keep our skin clean) help us reduce that damage.

But that's it. That's all these products can do - keep your skin clean. Not make it fair. Because they can't influence the amount of melanin in the skin.

It does not matter even if we use the fairness creams for weeks, or keep the soap on the skin for 30 seconds before washing, as some of the "directions for use" or claims would say. The fact remains that the skin colour can at best be maintained by taking care of it, but can't be made fairer, to look beautiful.

In that sense, I quite like the idea of calling a cream as a freshness cream (Afterbath from Paras Pharmaceuticals) or simply 'Clean and Clear' (J&J), because ultiamtely that's all it does.

Atleast they don't mislead the audience. What say?

RSS Feed

2006-05-04T05:55:00.000-07:00

Another post without a review. My apologies for that.

This post is to let you know about RSS feeds.
Now, instead of visiting my blog regularly to check for new posts, you can get alerts whenever I post a review on the blog. This can be done using an RSS reader.

Simply put, an RSS reader tracks the sites in its list for updates and keeps all the updates together to make it easier for you to read them.

How to do it:

- Get an RSS reader. The one I use is Google Reader. You would not require a Google invite to use it. Just use any current email address of yours as your username.

- Visit my blog through the Reader, and click on 'subscribe to this site'.

Voila! It's done. Henceforth, a new post on my blog will also show up on your reading list in Google Reader.

Will post a review soon. Till then, enjoy the commercials.

Update # 1: June 7, 2006

About a week back, I shifted to Bloglines.com as my RSS reader. Much better than Google!

Comments Please

2006-04-24T07:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, so the site meter tells me that people visit my blog.

But are they the same ones visiting regularly?
Or is it that a visitor comes once, gets bored / unimpressioned and moves away?
Only you can tell me.

I am looking for some support. So here it goes... I say it directly... please comment!!!

India Ad Review Issue 6: P&G's Rejoice

2006-04-18T06:37:00.000-07:00

I admit I am late this time. But this story has a happy outcome, which makes me write on it.

Let's start with the ad first. A lady in her early twenties, wearing nice shiny, smooth hair, comes to her mother, and tells her that she got her first salary today. Her mother notices her hair and says, "Oh, that's why you have used expensive leave-on conditioner?"

Then comes the explanation that Rejoice now has shampoo and leave-on conditioner and comes for only Rs. 2. The ad ends with the lady offering her first *full* salary to her mother in a See-Ma-no-obnoxious-expenses style.

Looks a nice ad pointing out benefits at a low price. Not after you know that the whole ad is in Hindi, and that in the Indian market, there is a brand of conditioner called Livon from Paras Pharmaceuticals. Add this to the fact that a very small part of the market really knows about "leave-on" and "wash-off" conditioners.

Now let's look at the ad again. Rejoice, a shampoo, contains a leave-on conditioner. Given that a shampoo has to be washed off, it sounds stupid to put a leave-on conditioner in that. Point two, why call it a leave-on conditioner, and not just a conditioner? Because "leave-on" sounds as good as 'Livon', which is a premium brand that spends a hell lot of money on advertising.

So to the general public, it sounds like Rejoice @ 2 Rs. contains Livon, whose one time cost would be about Rs. 4.

So, P&G conveniently piggy-backs on all the efforts of Livon, and promotes Rejoice, to Livon's detriment.

No wonder Paras Pharma sued P&G.

Last when I saw the ad, it said "expensive conditioner" with no reference to the "leave-on" types of conditioners. Here's a thumbs-up for the Paras Pharma guys, way to go!!!

Update # 1 (06 May 2006)

Just saw this ad again.

After the suit filed by Paras Pharma, the revised Rejoice ad carries a clarification that 'leave-on' in the ad refers to the "generic leave-on conditioners" in the market. Typical to 'clarifications' in TV ads, the text here is barely noticeable and hardly readable.

Sadly, all the negative aspects pointed out in the above post are still present in the ad... and all the arguments against P&G still hold true.

India Ad Review Issue 5: Mosquito Repellents

2006-03-31T10:47:00.000-08:00

What better day than Fools' Day to write on this!

So there goes another ad about the mosquito repellent brand calling itself "Machcharon ka Yamraj"!

If you have been even half-awake while watching TV, you would have noticed that all mosquito repellents say that they kill mosquitos. Ever wondered, then, how come you don't see the 'dead bodies' of the deceased? That's because mosquitos were never being 'killed' in the first place, they are just being repelled.

Now what's this 'repel' thing, you ask. Imagine that there is a magnet with a 'N' and 'S' written on it. What happens when you take another magnet and put its 'S' side next to the 'S' of the magnet? It moves away. This is what happens when you switch on that mosquito repellent machine.

The simplified idea is this. The machine heats up and vapourizes the liquid. This vapour spreads around the house and mosquitoes don't like this vapour. Probably, it suffocates them, probably, it smells like an open gutter to them, and they go away. In short, the liquid shoo...s the mosquitoes away, not kill them.

How come then, that all of them say they kill mosquitoes?
Probably, if they said the truth, we won't trust them. Probably we won't buy them. But now that you know about it, will you?

Comments, clarifications, etc. as always are welcome.

India Ad Review Issue 4: Savlon

2006-03-17T07:19:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, it's nice to be wrong!

This is one of these times.

I had prepared an issue some time back on one of the ads. Later, I came to know that while apparently the ad was misleading, the fact was that it just didn't give enough information.

Here's the story:

Being a researcher, I find it ads that give off statistics more interesting than the ones that don't. Not because I feel important or something, but because they reveal how easily statistics can mis-lead.

The ad for discussion is by Johnson & Johnson, for their brand of antiseptic liquid, called Savlon.

Earlier, J&J had tried banking on the trait of Savlon not giving a burning sensation when applied on the wound. This was because the market-leader Dettol from Reckitt-Benckiser did exactly that.

However, that strategy apparently bombed. And so, J&J had a new ad. In this one, we see a student of medicine shaving at home, and cutting his skin in the process. His Bhabhi offers him an anti-septic liquid. He refuses and promptly opens his bag and takes Savlon out. When asked why, he says 70% of the doctors use Savlon.

That's all this ad says. The 2 most surprising things here are: one, he just says 70% without any further explanation. And he does not give a reason to that preference. Any guesses on whether the audience will accept this claim in an ad?

-------

Later, when I tried to research this myself, I came across an article which explained how Savlon is a better antiseptic than Dettol. According to that article, there are two types of germs - called gram-positive and gram-negative germs. While Dettol kills only gram-positive germs, Savlon kills gram-negative germs as well.

I do not understand the difference between the two. I also do not understand how important it is to kill the gram-negative germs. But what I do understand is that this quality may make a lot of sense to the doctors, which gives them a reason to prefer Savlon.

So in this sense, I can rest assured that there may be some truth in their numbers. Point taken.
Now I wonder, would it have helped if the ad gave out this explanation?
Or is the ad better off with half the information?

India Ad Review Issue 3: Mid-Day and Mumbai Mirror

2005-11-08T06:30:00.000-08:00

At the outset, I would thank all for their comments and wishes. It is a great feeling to know someone took the effort to read my ideas and then, took the extra effort to give his/her opinions on that piece.

Coming to the topic for this issue, I will talk about two newspapers in Mumbai and their outdoor ad campaigns. These two newspapers are Mid-Day and Mumbai Mirror.

A brief introduction about the two papers. Mid-Day's Mumbai edition, for a long time, was the only successful tabliod in the country. Mumbai Mirror is another tabliod (called a "compact" though) launched in Mumbai by the Times of India Group (Benett, Coleman and Co.) Mid-Day celebrated 25 years of existence in Mumbai in the year 2005, the same year when Mumbai Mirror was launched. Mid-Day carries a daily supplement called "HitList", while Mumbai Mirror carries "Mirror Buzz". The ad campaigns are of these supplements.

It was sometime late 2004 or early 2005 that Mid-Day started the campaign. Hoardings around the city advertised the content of HitList. So there was Entertainment, Health information, Gossip, and a lot more that appeared in the HitList. And it "came free, daily with the Mid-Day".

Within a few months, the Times Group launched Mumbai Mirror. It started off advertising its compact size, and a couple of months later, switched to adertising its promotion scheme, where the readers could win as much as 1 crore for reading the paper.

Next, was the same line of advertising as mentioned earlier for Mid-Day - you could now get a lot more stuff in your daily newspaper... entertainment, health, film news, etc. And obviously, it came free. All of it was in the supplement Mirror Buzz, "free, daily with the Mumbai Mirror."(Incidentally, before this campaign was started, the whole paper Mumbai Mirror was given free daily to the readers of the Times Group's broadsheet daily - The Times of India.)

But, is this "free" stuff really free? Would the readers be paying the same price, had there been no supplement?

Let us look at it the other way round as well. Would the newspapers be charging the same price, had there been no supplements?Any which way we want to look at it, I seriously doubt a positive answer. So why are they calling it "free"? Well, because, as they say about promotion, a thing would sell more if something's given free along with it. Regarding newspapers, it creates a (false) impression that the reader is getting more value for the same money paid.

I feel the reader pays only for the cover story, considering the fact that both papers are tabliods. So does that make all other pages, full with other news and more ads, free?

The next imaginable thing, going by these ads, would be - buy the first page, get the remaining 35 pages free, daily with the Mid-Day.Hey, how about this? Buy the masthead of Mumbai Mirror and get 40 papers free, daily with the Mumbai Mirror.

These campaigns remind me of a scene from a Hindi movie called "Khoobsurat". Here, actor Sanjay Dutt explains his "business" to the head of the Family. His business is of "Wada-Pav", a typical Mumbai-ite's staple snack.

He started this business in a state in the US, with the scheme - "Buy Wada-Pav for $1, get chutney free." Then, he went to another state and started the scheme - "Buy Wada for $1, get Pav and Chutney free." In his last state, he started the scheme as "Buy the chutney for $1 and get Wada-Pav free." Of course, this was supposed to be a joke in the movie. I doubt if that was the case with these two ads as well.

And then they say, "Free" doesn't work anymore in advertising. How can it?

India Ad Review Issue 2: Himani Navratna Oil

2005-10-25T07:30:00.000-07:00

In this review, I will talk about celebrity endorsements.

No, not my opinions on whether the chosen celebrity is the correct fit or not. Far from it. The review is about the moral / ethical issue of the way a celebrity is used in the ad.

The ad I have chosen is quite old. It is of a company called Emami. This company had signed on Amitabh Bachchan as the endorser. The ad is for a brand called Himani Navratna Oil.

Earlier, the brand was endorsed by Indian film actor Govinda. The communication platform was that it gives a cooling effect and thus relieves stress.

For the Amitabh Bachchan ad, the communication remained the same. The ad went something like this:

Amitabh Bachchan says that he has now spent 25 years in the film industry. And it was very stressful - emotions, drama scenes, action scenes without a double, etc. He then goes on to say very emphatically that the whole experience of shooting for a film is very tiring. He also spent many sleepless nights because of headache that came as a result of this stress. Some more blah blah and then he says, "But these years went on nicely because I had one magic with me - Himani Navratna Oil".

Some voice-over gives the benefits of the oil and the ad closes with Amitabh Bachchan again saying "Himani Navratna Oil".

At the first look, it seems like just another ad where a celebrity endorses a brand. But look closely, and it hits you. Amitabh is saying not just that he uses the product, he is saying he has been using the product for the last 25 years. Now that is as good (or bad) as lying.

Technically speaking, an endorsement is when the celebrity says "I would recommend this product to you." Saying "I use this product, and I recommend it to you" is still acceptable. But saying "I have been using it for the past 25 years" is something I would strongly protest against.

But then again, technically speaking, Mr Bachchan never says I used this for 25 years. He says that these 25 years passed on smoothly because of this product. Of course, the layman's interpretion won't differ, but I think the lawman's would.

So effectively, the law (if any) is not broken in letter. But try explaining this difference to the millions of Mr Bachchan's fans who literally worship him. If not anything else, they would start using the product because Mr Bachchan says he has been using it for the past 25 years - a statement that can neither be proved true nor be proved false.

So what's next? Amitabh Bachchan has been drinking Pepsi for the last 10 years. He has been wearing Reid and Taylor in all his movies. He has been using Nerolac paints in (and out of) all his homes. Probably, he has been eating Cadbury's Dairy Milk ever since he was born. Hey, how about buying life insurance policies only from LIC till he dies?

Mr Bachchan had once responded to a question on endorsements by saying that he is a brand owned by his company, and has a responsibility toward the shareholders of his company. Well, Mr Bachchan, what about your responsibility toward (if nobody else) your fans, who would believe anything you say?

As Peter Parker's Uncle Ben said in the movie 'Spiderman' - With great power, comes great responsibility. Need I say more?

-----------------------------------------------------

With this post, I will effectively make this blog what I want it to be - a series.

So here's all the best for me. Hope my reviews are good enough.
Comments, as usual, are welcome.

India Ad Review Issue 1

2005-09-09T20:00:00.000-07:00

Hi.

This is the first part of a long series which I plan to write about my ideas on promotions in general and advertising in specific happening in my country. Before that, I will explain my stand.

I am crazy about advertising since time immemorial. I simply used to love ads for a long long time. But during my post graduation, thanks to my readings on the topic, I realised that the way we are using advertising is appalling. A direct result is that people do not believe ads at all. They consider all ads as just tall claims without any facts backing them.

I do not hope that my posts would change all that. But at the very least, I hope to strike a chord in the reader's mind. Probably, there will be one advertiser less among those who misuse advertising.

Let's start with the first review.

Review 1:

The show 'Super Sale' on Channel Star One The ad starts with 2 guys holding 20 bucks each. One says "I went to a cyber cafe, chatted for a hour for 15 bucks and have a "cutting" (a half cup of tea) and some chane (gram)." Then, the second guy goes on to say that with the same 20 bucks, he was able to buy a brand new PC, thanks to the show "Super Sale".

Watching this ad, I thought that there is actually some kind of a 'sale' on the show. Curious on how I can buy these items, I switch on to the watch the show... and then, get the catch.

The items mentioned sure are available for a lesser amount, but the currency is not the same. Based on the format of the show, three participants try to answer as many questions correctly as possible to earn points. At the end of every round, the top scorer gets a chance to 'buy' something with those points. Since these points are much lesser (anywhere between approximately 1% to 5% of the actual value), the host calls it a "Super Sale".

So, you may ask, what's the catch? It is this. The comparison is utterly misrepresented. Throughout in the ad, both the guys show Indian currency - the INR. However, the "money" used in the show to buy the things on "Sale" is Super Sale Currency. While the host does refer to it as Super Sale Currency during the show, it is nowhere mentioned in the ads. Even during the show, when a participant's scores are shown on the screen, they are prefixed with "Rs."

Now that, I do not know how, was allowed to appear.

There have been a lot of ads which misrepresent facts, or simply exaggerate under the pretext of puffery. But this one, I think, is the height at which one can go to create hype about a forthcoming show. If India did have any laws on advertising, this one would constitute crime.

So what next comes from the channel? That I can buy a diamond mine for 1 Rupee? Oh yes, the catch here would probably be that 1 Rupee equals some hundred crores of Indian Currency, which just 'coinicidentally' is also called "Rupee".