Social Movements as brands

Building a social movement brand is an awesome experience as well a tiring one. Many such brands have been able to garner unconditional support in the recent past and some have even been able to get a lot of money pledged for the cause. Many times it depends on who is the man (or woman) [...]

Video killed the radio star. Twitter killed the blogger?

Apparently the first video run on MTV was Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles. It was supposed to be a signal of times to come.
It was true for a long time. People ended up seeing music rather than just listening to it. Music Videos were a rage. They could see the stars in [...]

An interview with Kiruba Shankar

I had mentioned in my ‘commitment post’ that I would attempt to have at least a couple of interviews of professionals from both the online and offline world. Here’s the first one.
Kiruba Shankar – who was once referred by Gul Panag as a Twitter Superstar was kind enough to answer a few questions.

A few pointers [...]

Price Discovery And Web 2.0

Back in 1996, when I was working with Tata Press Limited, I happened to experience my FIRST flight journey. A bit of a background! I was among the top two sales persons in Chennai branch and was selected owing to my knowledge and interest towards printing as a subject. The job was to travel with [...]

MTV changed the world? Eat this!

It’s close to midnight and something evil’s lurking in the dark
Under the moonlight, you see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes
You’re paralyzed
‘Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one’s gonna save [...]

Me, my boss & myspace

“Whaaaaa??? You are not on Twitter?”
“Nope! I have heard it all the time. Twitter is not just online anymore. I get to read tweets from celebrities on every newspaper”, my boss said looking at me without raising his head.
“Yeah! Almost all newspapers have a twitter beat now”, I said with total abandon. Half the newspapers [...]

Traditional Marketing is dead. Long live traditional marketing!

This article is on a related note to my earlier post.
My father used to tour a lot as part of his work and for time periods like 15 days at a stretch. Those were days when having a phone was a ‘luxury’ and the favourite mode of communication always used to be India Post.
If I [...]

Online presence – an oxymoron. Look for the written word

Many marketers still suffer from the ‘I want a web presence’ syndrome. They believe that having presence as a website and by advertising in online they have done good to their marketing plans. Alas! Web 2.0 as internet marketers prefer to call it, has a mind of its own. Did I hear “Jabulani”?
Web 2.0 is [...]

The Elephant Gets Its Due

By no means is this a measure! But I find this pattern emerging. After all one of the largest population in the state of California is Indians, and we seem to be pushing them hard! Not just that! Despite poor connectivity, sad (well, almost sad!) state of telecom infrastructure, corrupt polity delaying opening up of [...]

Religion, Sex & Branding

My professor once made a classic statement and it stuck in my mind.

“Almost any product can be sold if we involve Sex OR Religion OR both”

I happened to believe him. And Indian advertising reiterated that statement way too many times. Many brands in our country have stepped on this path and have been successful either [...]