Exploring Elegance: The Story of ‘Your Phone’
Host Organization: Ogilvy & Mather, Bangladesh
Bangladesh is still a naive country in terms of advertising. Due to lack of knowledge and the courage of leap onto new media, it is not only unexpected but also a big step to rely on digital media. Over the years, advertising techniques have changed radically; mostly to cope with the changes in how consumers view and perceive things and to stand out in the clutter of today’s advertising efforts. While marketers are realizing the importance of differentiating not only in terms of their product’s USPs, but also in how they present and promote it to the consumers.
It is actually the creative agencies that truly believe in the continual change of the advertising era. However, in a country like Bangladesh, change comes at icy pace. Creativity is nurtured and encouraged but very few clients can completely trust their agencies to come up with something ground breaking in their campaigns and platform. The change in client proposition in any campaign is not always appreciated and encouraged. This duel of client and agency may sometime lead towards an idea that stands out from other campaign.
Symphony is one of the clients of our digital department. We often duel for the tagline of their product. Symphony ZV is one of them. Symphony’s marketing officials wanted to show the elegance of the product, whereas we fought for the better tagline.
By eliminating client-agency gap, Bangladesh has very recently experienced few innovative advertising techniques. Ogilvy & Mather, Bangladesh has successfully been a part of that change. The following report mainly focused on a case from Ogilvy & Mather, Bangladesh. The report also indicates the upcoming shift of the industry towards a more dynamic and pioneering change.
Introduction
Exploring Elegance
As David Ogilvy, the father of advertising states it, “We sell, or else.” The function of marketing – selling a product, hasn’t changed through the decades, but the strategies certainly have. Starting from the Egyptians carving public notices in steel to advertise back in 2000 BC, to today’s vastly used viral and online advertising; the world of advertising has undergone a continuous and dynamic change.
In different eras, at various times good advertisers used their creative skills or thoughts to break through the clutter where each day a person comes across hundreds of brands and its promotions. Today’s marketers are trying move away from the usual methods of advertising that includes television commercials, radio commercials, and billboards. It becomes difficult to make a brand visible; making people consume it and then stick to it, is a whole new challenge altogether. This is when marketers and creative agencies need a role play.
Advertising agencies know that they will continually need to find and create innovative new approaches to respond to major industry shifts underway. Another famous saying of David Ogilvy is, “if it doesn’t sell it isn’t creative”. It is one of their crucial responsibilities to make their clients see clearly and understand why only TVCs and billboards can no longer attract and retain consumer attraction these days. The idea has to be something unique that it stands out from other campaign and other brands, especially competitor brands. The next 5 years will hold more change for the advertising industry than the previous 50 did. Increasingly empowered consumers, more self-reliant advertisers and ever-evolving technologies are redefining how advertising is sold, created, consumed and tracked.
Objective of Report
General Objective
To study campaign effectiveness in terms of how client’s wanted to deliver the proposition and how we perfected it by persuading a different communication. How the campaign effect on people’s mind and change their buying behaviour.
Specific Objectives
- To measure effectiveness of the campaign.
- To carry out a survey to measure the effectiveness of these innovative modern day campaigns in terms of brand awareness.
Organization
Ogilvy & Mather Communications Private Limited Bangladesh; a lively organization with wonderful work ethic is the organization which was the host of my internship. In my three months with this organization, I have learnt how to implement the theoretical knowledge into practical arena of marketing. Thanks to the wonderful mentors who took their time to teach me everything about modern day advertising and marketing.
This section discusses the organization in brief, its operations, its clients and its values.
Backgrounds
Ogilvy & Mather, Global
Ogilvy & Mather is an international advertising, marketing and public relations agency based in Manhattan, USA. It operates 450 offices in 120 countries. Founded in 1948 by David Ogilvy, it’s one of the largest marketing communications networks in the world, servicing multinational and local brands in all regions. The symbol of brand-building capabilities is the balance of global and local brands within a worldwide network.
Global Clients:
Ogilvy & Mather board has produced work for a wide range of leading brands. Some of them:
- American Express (since 1962)
- British American Tobacco (since 1981)
- Amway (since 2009)
- Coca-Cola Company (since 2001)
- Louis Vuitton (since 2006)
Ogilvy Bangladesh
The doors to Ogilvy Dhaka’s offices opened for business in July 2007 – it was the 497th office in the Ogilvy network. In the short space of time, Ogilvy Bangladesh has been able to carve out a space for itself, both in the Ogilvy community, and in the business fraternity in Bangladesh. The agency’s operation has already been highlighted in Ogilvy Asia magazine. Moreover, its client’s ratings have been phenomenal.
Timeline:
- June 2006: Ogilvy & Mather was registered in Bangladesh as a Joint Stock Company.
- December 2006: Merged with Marka, a local mid-size agency to get an early foothold.
- October 2007: Transition was completed and Ogilvy opened its doors for business.
- March 2008: Officially launched its operation in Bangladesh.
Integrated in the firm’s corporate culture is Ogilvy’s concept of 360° Degree Brand Stewardship©, defined as a willingness to use the broadest array of tools and techniques to understand, develop and enhance the relationship between a consumer and a brand.
Following to that, Ogilvy is a full-service agency catering to ATL, BTL, Activation and webbased solutions. Be it the launching of a new package from Teletalk, a brand campaign for KSRM, a thematiccampaign for Golden Harvest, Campaign for Pond’s My 2nd Honeymoon show, Eid campaign for Aarong or Ramadan campaign for Transcom Food Ltd. Ogilvy is always up for the challenge.
Clients
Ogilvy Bangladesh’s list of global clients includes British American Tobacco, Unilever, Kraft, Perfetti Van Melle, Motorola, Novo Nordisk, Ajinomoto etc. Among local clients, Aarong, BRAC Bank, Kabir Steel (KSRM), Bashundhara Group, Daily Sun, Teletalk etc. are also worth mentioning. The illustration below shows the wide range of the agency’s clients:
Global Creative Support
For many of Ogilvy’s global clients, extensive adaptation is done of regional and international works. Ogilvy Bangladesh is very well connected to the other offices, and has resources to bring in any job that has been done around the region for clients. It even works in languages other than English and Bengali. In certain cases, where a large number of adaptations are necessary, they get referred to RedWorks.
RedWorks
It was established as a SBU of Ogilvy Bangladesh, geared to provide support in studio production of offline and interactive projects. The 10 member team performs miracles, with same-day turnaround for projects – for demanding clients like Rolex, Dove, Time Warner Group, and American Express.
Quality Control
Ogilvy vouches for every creative element that leaves the office premise, stating its perfect quality that that been checked and re-checked thrice over. The systems in place does not allow for mistakes to go unnoticed, since meticulous care is taken by the trained staff to maintain that quality. From the visualizer, to the studio in-charge to the account directors, everybody pores over the materials before they get finally released.
In today’s market, there is an increasing demand from clients for quality yet cost effective solutions to all communication material regardless of print, digital or broadcast. Ogilvy RedWorks is WPP’s advanced implementation facility offering large-scale creative and production services.
RedWorks Dhaka HUB was established in late 2008 as a state of the art cost effective offshore production HUB mostly to support Ogilvy and RW offices in New York, Hong Kong and Singapore. RedWorks offers the best value for money with high quality, both for digital and print maintaining strict quality control for every delivery.
In 2013 we turned our focus in developing the solution for local market and re-launched as RedWorks Dhaka. As the horizon of digital communication is expanding the need for expert to join in became the need of time. Very recently, due to change in the main architecture of the organization, the name ‘RedWorks’ has been demolished.
Ensuring Effectiveness in Advertising
This section discusses certain examples where many variables have been kept under consideration in order to make advertising effective. An advertisement is only effective when it successfully and positively hits in the decision making process of the consumer. Thus an advertisement needs to consider the relevant internal physiological factors during the complete decision making process.
A Basic Model of the Consumer Decision Making Process:
Stages in the Consumer Decision Making Process:
Motivation:
A consumer needs to be motivated to purchase. An advertiser must know who his target customers are and how he shall demonstrate their ‘Need’ to them, so shall they easily recognize the problem.
Changes in consumers’ lives often result in new needs and want, for example – changes in financial condition, employment or lifestyle. The 3G teaser series for teletalk 3G campaigns showed to the youth that there is something yet to come which would help them live boundless and make life much faster and easier. The ad simply motivates the youth right away. The thematic advertisement that followed next was a continuation to the teasers – highly motivating and extremely unique.
Perception
Perception is the process by which an individual receives, selects, organizes and interprets information to create meaningful picture of the world. It is an individual process and depends on internal factors such as a person’s beliefs, experiences, needs, moods and expectations.
The perceptual process is also influenced by the characteristics of a stimulus such as size, color, shape, intensity and the context to which it is seen and heard.
In the following print ad of Tang five different flavors were introduced by creating an essence of five different colors and demonstrating the fruits itself to help consumers build the perception in their minds about the five discreet flavors. The sunglasses emphasize on summer and how the drink shall be so soothing in such weather.
Attitude formation and Integration
Attutudes are important to marketers because they summarize a consumer’s evaluation of an object – brand/company. It represents positive or negative feelings and behavioral tendencies. Marketer’s keen interest in attitudes is based on the assumption that they are related to consumers’ purchase behavior When positive attitude about a brand is formed, consumers choose it over other alternatives and this leads to a positive behavior – making a purchase decision.
The following advertisements for Tang, shows how a positive association may help to create a positive attitude towards the brand itself. They try to behave like a part of the consumers’ life. By offering Eid greetings and delivering a demonstration of product relevancy to the festival it creates a positive attitude right away and consumers exposed to it naturally generate a positive attitude towards the brand itself. It shows that Tang truly cares for their consumers.
Learning:
After the purchase have been made, consumers truly learn about the product and whether they would stay loyal to it or not solely depends on their post purchase evaluation.
Thus Advertisements must not be so farfetched and flattering that it raises the expectation of the consumers which the product would fail to deliver. This would lead to dissatisfaction and rejection to further use or repurchase which certainly is not the objective of any marketer.
Exploring Elegance: The Story of Your Phone
This is a project of Symphony smartphone where the client’s brief was to communicate the polished design and the elegant & fabulous featured phone. The client’s wanted to communicate the elegance of the phone. Initially the campaign was only for digital platform and the client wanted to ensure 4,000 pieces of handset sold by 30 days (not in the brief). We took the challenge and found out that we can communicate a very different thing which will not only ensure the sell, but also take the brand on a very new level.
Symphony: Xplorer ZV
Symphony always tries to deliver the highest possible technology in the smallest possible price. So far, due to their approach towards customer, Symphony holds approximate 40% market share of Bangladesh. Symphony Xplorer ZV was the dream of the customer of Symphony brand. As it has all the features and technology of a very high end mobile and it has surpasses its predecessor Xplorer ZIV in every aspect of its feature and looks.
We have distributed the campaign into three major parts.
Pre-launch: Engaging creative were developed to overcome the mindset of ‘lower price equals compromised quality’ and creating demand during this phase. In this phase, we surveyed about the feature we are offering and if the TG wants it or not. Being a tech geek, I can tell that the smartphone is truly admirable because of its low price and the feature offered. People are asked to share their thought what they want to see in their upcoming phone.
Launch: We have introduced and educate the benefit of features like; Otca-core processor, Gorilla & Dragontrail Glass, Camera, Memory capacity etc. during launch phase. Educating TG was very important as the feature Dragontrail Glass is a new feature that the other brand still did not offer. We came up with the tag line ‘It’s Your Phone’ as the fans of Symphony Facebook page actually voted for this phone. In the process, we gather another information about the habit and purchase behaviour of smartphone in Bangladesh.
Post-launch: We have developed an android based game which idea actually came from me and appreciated by both the seniors of Ogilvy members and client. The idea was to develop an agent based game where the agent has to fight enemy and reveal the feature of Xplorer ZV. Engage through a gaming competition at post-launch phase.
Campaign Effectiveness (Based on Facebook):
In most cases, the intended outcome of a social media campaign is to strengthen and increase awareness of a brand. One of the appeals of social media marketing is the fact that, as a digital campaign, it is possible to measure various metrics and so evaluate the effectiveness of a campaign. The following are some methods by which one can measure the effectiveness of the social media campaign.
Brand Reach & Exposure
Measuring a brand reach or potential viewers of the social media campaign is not quite as easy as tracking the total number of Facebook fan followers the campaign has. For the actual number of reach and exposure, one has to be an admin of the page and also the ad manager of the account.
Engagement and activity
By measuring how many users engage and interact with the campaign or product page’s messages one can evaluate the appeal and interest of that brand’s marketing efforts. The more engagement there is seen, the more effective and valuable the campaign is.
For Facebook, measuring engagement can be evaluated by the following:
- Number of clicks the links of the page receives
- Number of times the messages are commented on
- Number of times the messages/content are liked and shared
After the announcement, the TG of Symphony went berserk and go for the product. Within 5 days’ time, the first lot (4,000 pieces of handset) sold out and customers request to bring more handset. In spite of being BDT 15,000 phone, Xplorer ZV sold more than 16,000 pieces of handset within a month.
People visited the Facebook page and the website to know about the phone. We push beyound Facebook and serve placement ads in Bikroy.com and publish some article on how we did this. Eventually a lots of people were asking for a review video. After delivering the review video, we go for another big plaform, Google. We serve placement ads and Google search ads for Xplorer ZV. Local news portals were covered and mobile ads were served.
Primary Research
The proper use of communication and a unique idea led to the success of the campaign. From the secondary research it can be concluded that the campaign has been highly effective and interactive with their target market and indeed was very unconventional in the way they performed and organized the entire campaign. However the fact is inevitable that, this was an example of a campaign that used multiple media for advertising among which facebook was the most important one. The entire campaign process, revolved around the concept of social media and interactivity.
A buzz was created by the unconventional advertising channel: Facebook and even the sales value of the product had a leap during the campaign period. It could be assumed that even though our social context is such that often clients feel skeptic about going for unconventional tools, Facebook is an excellent media and it does not require going for generic media like Television, radio and so on.
Assumption:
Lower price equals compromised elegance.
Significance:
Through the survey I have tried to extract information from many areas. Often sales are high during the campaign but people do not remember the campaign and feel connected to the brand unless they are a part of it or have been exposed to it frequent times. It is vital to choose the right route and media for every market.
Target Group:
The respondents were 13 – 45 years old both male and female resident in Bangladesh. They are students, new executives and working people in various sectors. They belong to middle to affluent class of the social class.
Area:
Online
Distributing and monitoring:
The survey was run by posting an online questionnaire in the Facebook page of Symphony. I have posted and conducted the survey myself and reported my instructor in timely intervals.
Type of questions:
The questionnaire made for this survey, with mostly closed ended questions in order to acquire the exact data from them.
Sample Size:
100 people were taken as the sample relevant to the target market.
Findings
- Sample study
There were mainly 3 groups.
Students were roughly about age, 13-27years doing their College, Undergrad, Masters and MBA. They were spontaneous and dynamic.
Servicing and working groups are of all ages starting from 25 to 40 years. Among them, there weren’t many who do not use the internet or not active on Facebook.
- We have been reviewing your query and we have found out that you want Gorilla Glass in your phone. How many of you want to see Gorilla Glass in your next phone?
Please reply ‘Yes/No’ in the comment section.
This was a question asked to the respondents in order to find out their thought.
- Many of you wrote us that you want 13 MP Sony IMX sensor camera and RAM of 2 GB. How many of you agree that we should create a phone with 13 MP Sony IMX sensor camera along with 2 GB RAM? Please reply ‘Yes/No’ in the comment section.
- You wanted to have a phone with 16 GB ROM which is expandable up to 32 GB. Do you agree that you want such massive store limit?Please reply ‘Yes/No’ in the comment section.
- While answering your comment on our post, we came across such comment that you want Octa-Core processor, massive storage, Gorilla Glass & 13 MP Sony IMX sensor camera. How many of you want to have such featured phone in your hand? Please reply ‘Yes/No’ in the comment section.
Conclusion
Studying all the findings, it is determined that only based on feature centric promotion and the idea can meet the product’s desire and also make it look elegant despite saying so. Though it is said by the father of advertising, “The Consumer Is Not a Moron, She’s Your Wife” it is the duty of a good advertiser to present the product in a manner that it is meant for them.
With changing time, people and their perceptions are changing too. It is vital to keep experimenting with new advertising methods and concepts in this changing era and adapt to various situations. It is observed that it is very well accepted and appreciated. It is to be forgo that ‘The client is always right.’
Symphony Xplorer ZV campaign was fairly effective among its target group, however in order to remain in the top of minds of the consumers it needs to come up with continuous new innovative ideas. Consumers mostly do not remember this for long and the effectiveness fades away, the only way one may do justice to it is by continuous development and execution of new ideas and campaigns.
