Video Ads on Websites

In  one of my previous posts, I said that soon on internet we will see the video ads, well that time has come sooner than later. I was visiting the site of New York Times and on the right side i saw a video playing, it got my eye and when i clicked that video clip it landed on the web site of the company whose ad was being played there
The landing page was of Bnp Paribas a bank. So it seems that the bank has taken an initiative in the field of advertising. This bank has started the trend and many will follow this. This is very good strategy, when you log into the site, you will listen sounds and the video playing your attention will automatically be diverted to the ad playing. And its not hust in Ny times web site, today I saw a similar type of advertisement in another site.
This trend is becoming popular very rapidly... This has bring all new era in the field of advertising, will it bring any threat to the television operators, or all the TV channels would shift to online??? Only time will tell..
Visit nytimes.com to see this ad. NyTimes

Posted by Maaz in

Video Ads on Websites

ICC WORLDCUP 2011 AND COCA COLA CAMPAIGN

The ICC World Cup is scheduled in February 2011 and this time Asia is the host for this prestigious tournament, the final of the cup would be held in India.
These tournaments are the feast for advertiser because they are viewed by thousand of audience and the interest level is maximum in these days. . .
When it comes to Pakistan, Pepsi and Coke are the two biggest rivals .. both tries to gain the maximum share of market...
traditionally Pepsi is the major advertiser and sponsor of Pakistan cricket team.. i don't know about this time...
BUT Coke is clearly outrunning PEPSI in advertising .. Coke has already started its world cup campaign with very good ad that arouse some zeal.... Pepsi is known for making such ads but this time Coke has overrun Pepsi in its campaign...
Pepsi has not started its campaign for the world cup yet.. i reckon it will start in early 2011.. but how much share would it loss by waiting for such a long  time...??
Only time will tell..

Posted by Maaz in

ICC WORLDCUP 2011 AND COCA COLA CAMPAIGN

Search Engine Optimization ... Thats advertising..!!

Search Engine Optimization techniques are widely used by many websites to promote their website and the products they are offering, The key elements of SEO are blog writing, content optimization, fourm posting, directory submission and blog commenting. The SEO methods are less costly and more effective. The research has shown that mostly people don't visit the sites or links which are paid placements. 

While searching on search engine say Google.com most of the searchers don't click on the links which are displayed under Ads. So it seems that displaying ads via Google is not very effective.

SEO brings another advantage to the advertisers. Where Google charges per click on the ads which are displayed through Adwords on blogs, the blog commenting technique is a free way of posting your link on the related blog, and it is not an ad as well so more chances that your customer will click on the link you have given on the certain blog.. Does these techniques are the threat to Google Adword program? to some extent it is , because when more and more people knows about these techniques they will make use of them and save their money. Because saving money is most important thing for any businessman in this era of economic melt down. 

Social Media Marketing via Facebook and Twitter is very strong as well, where Facebook is using Google Adsense program to earn lots of dollars, Twitter has no such program. Twitter and Facebook are widely used by all SEOs to increase the traffic of their sites. 

Internet is spreading like a web very rapidly so as the advertising techniques, internet has made advertising more cheap and effective. And this emerging field of SEO/SEM are going to be very popular in few more years... It has changed the pattern of advertising this can be little deceiving as well because all the SEOs are operating as normal users some are faking as fans of certain teams, some are operating as geeks .. It is very difficult to pin point the difference between SEO and the normal user. This is the reason that SEO techniques has been very effective over a passage of time...

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Search Engine Optimization ... Thats advertising..!!

Apple Becomes no 1 in Technology .. Just By Advertisement????

Advertisement is very important for establishing any brand and for maintaining brand loyalty with customers. But Advertisement is not the only point the product which has been advertised should have something in it, the product must be effective in other words for the success of any company its front hand and back hand should be strong. 

Apple's biggest rival is Microsoft, and Apple has beating Microsoft with a big margin and it has outrun Nokia as well in mobile phone industry (New York Times, 2010). Lets what are the key factors of Apple success.

The major factor of Apple success in HYPE, before launching any product, Apple creates so much hype that it becomes trend, the hype is created not by direct advertisement but through blogs and forums, the competitors whether have launched better product cannot compete with Apple when a new product of Apple is launched. 

Through constant blogging, Apple has created its brand loyalty, there are many people who always use Apple's product whether competitors are offering better products... From the beginning  Apple has maintained it's positioning as classic and premium products.. 

The key business of Apple is Desktop Computers, but Apple has not become No 1 by innovating new computers, but its growth is mostly due to the launch of iPod... Apple sales boomed when it launched iPod, since then Apple has become Apple of Many Eyes, after iPad it launched iPhone then its recent product iPad, the key thing to understand in Apple success is that though Apple's products are of premium quality and are innovative but better products are still available in market but still they are unable to beat Apple.. Reason?? very simple, while other companies uses television ads and internet advertisements to promote their product, Apple uses very sophisticated technique, i.e., marketing through social media, blogging and forums...

This  mode of promoting products is very cheap and much effective... Apple creates so much hype through these mediums that it's almost impossible to beat Apple's any new product, unless other companies shift there advertising  models to the Apple's..... 

Apple's advertising model is worth discussing in the lectures of Advertising.

Posted by Maaz in

Apple Becomes no 1 in Technology .. Just By Advertisement????

IBM Ad Displayed at NY Times Website..!!!! Perfect!

Just  look what a Eye Catching Ad has been displayed by IBM at New York Times website, thats the perfect way of displaying ad

Posted by Maaz in

IBM Ad Displayed at NY Times Website..!!!! Perfect!

Ufone VS JazZ

The competition between ufone and mobilink jazz is heating up.. we can also refer it as a war between ufone and jazz.. Mobilink Jazz started this war when it mocked ufone commercial and directly attacked Ufone.. as expected Ufone has done a counter attack by mocking and making fun of jazz's package and commercial as well...
Now there is clear war going on between these two brands both are making fun of each other and mocking each others slogans and commercials... the competition is always considered as healthy because during competitions brands bring new ideas and take risks to out run the competing brands....
Looking at the telecom sector advertising in Pakistan one brand has to compete with three other major brands.. but now ufone and jazz are clearly competing with each other and they are paying less or no attention to the other brands....
This war between ufone and jazz will give major advantage to Telenor... Telenor has never done comparative advertising in the past..it focus on its own brand image and service it provide indifference to other brands..
Zong wil also gain some advantage... it has started its comparitive advertising campaign once again of sim portability it may not be successful under such circumstances but its worth a shot... ZOnd need to focus more on its services and packages it is providing rather than sim portability...

Posted by Maaz in

Ufone VS JazZ

Mobilink JazZ gone bad ???

JazZ has now started comparative advertising, in its latest advertisement, JazZ has made fun of ufone's ad and the package as well, Now Ufone got the taste of its own medicine... But considering the ad made by the jazZ,, they have used to same fonts and the same graphics as is used by the Ufone... JazZ has made an effort to regain the market of youngsters by displaying that ad.... but there is one major issue from advertising point of view...Jazz in this particular ad has given free advertisement to ufone by using the same fonts and also saying out loud the package of Ufone....

Comparitive advertising is good strategy but you have to be very careful not giving free advertisement to the other brand.. In pakistan it is seen many a times while doing comparitive advertising, brands give free advertisement to other brands...

ANd there is one other issue ... JazZ has now announce an open war with Ufone.. now Ufone will react to that big time and it would be intersting to watch.. NOw the jazZ's marketing team will be very busy for next few months...

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Mobilink JazZ gone bad ???

INDIAN ACTORS IN PAKISTANI MARKET???? UNWISE

First Lux used Katrina Kaif as a brand embassador for Pakisani market, which was a bold and strange move by lux because traditionally Lux has been using Pakistani models for Pakistani market and Indian Models for Indian market... which was effective .. but now they are using same inidan models for both the markets... this may casue some issues in Pakistani models because they have beenn ignored... And then we saw Shahid Kapoor in Clear Men shampoo ad... First Atif Aslam and Amina Haq were brand embassadors then thy used Christiano Ronaldo and now Shahid Kapoor an Indian actor to target Pakistani market.. this is strange because now companies are considering both markets as same segment... Nokia has been displaying indian made ads in Pakisani market but they didnt feature famous actors so they can use those ads...
Following Lux now Head and Shoulders is also using an Indian actor and model Karina Kapoor to promote its product in Pakistani market... there is big fan club of inidan actors in Pakistan but its not that significant.. Major portion of Pakistani people donot relate themselves with indian actors they watch movies for entertainment but donot relate themselves to these actors..... SO in my opinion using Indian models for pakistani audience is not a wise move...
Companies should use Pakistani stars and models if they are using celebrities to promote their products.... Using Pakisnai people for Pakistani market is more rational and will give better results.....

Posted by Maaz in

INDIAN ACTORS IN PAKISTANI MARKET???? UNWISE

Pepsi VS Coke in Ramzan 2010

PEPSI AND COKE the biggest rivals of all time.. traditionally PEPSI had uper hand in Pakistani market over Coke.. but since 2000 when coke has came back it came strong and started penetrating market.. now in my opinion through advertisement Coke has outrun PEPSI in Pakistani market as well.... For last decade, Coke has shown some brillliant ads and for past few years it has clearly outrun PEPSI its only rival in beverage industry...

In Ramzan, both brands made ads according to Ramzan to relate with Muslims of Pakistan..PEPSI has reduced its price by 5 Rs.. and has shown a low budget ad which is unusuall of PEPSI because PEPSI has always made high budget ads in its previous campaigns.. but this time it is stick to low budget and simple ad... it seems that the advertising agency hasnt put any effort to make a campaign of Ramzan...

In contrast to PEPSI, there is a tremendous high budget and most creative ad of COKE and it is related to Ramzan as well... It is clear from the ad of COke that coke's advertising team has put great effort and came up with a big idea to promote Coke in the month of Ramzan...

SO this year Coke has beaten Pepsi by miles in its campaign for the month of Ramzan......
This competition has allowed us to see brilliant ads of Coke in past, present and we will see in future as well...

Posted by Maaz in

Pepsi VS Coke in Ramzan 2010

Mobilink and Warid left youth?? ??? ? ?? ?? ??

It is evident from the advertising campaings of Ufone, Djuice and Zong that their major focus is on youth of Pakistan, they are targeting people around 18 years and so on... The focus of these brands is on more sms packages and night package that attract the youngster of Pakistan mostly university and college going students.. we can say that the focus of these brands is on students and they show the students in their ads as well.. and there is tough competition among these brands..
WARID since it was launched in Pakistan, gained attraction of older population around 30 to 40 years.. warid for different reasons never attracted the youth as Djuice or Ufone has attracted because of their commercials.. Now warid has decided to keep its market and is focusing on more mature audience.. In warid ads mostly marred women are shown so they are targeting that market...
MOBILINK after hiring Ali Zaffar seemed to have recaptured the market of young people.. but this move wasnt much affective .. Mobilink tried to attract youth by making some funny and some emotional ads...
But now it seems that Mobilink is also leaving that market... And in young audience the rule of 2 will prevail i.e., two brands become leaders these are ufone and djuice...

BUT THIS IS SUCH A HUGE MARKET THAT BOTH WARID AND MOBILINK WILL TRY HARDER TO CAPTURE THAT MARKET... LETS SEE WHAT THEY WILL DO IN NEAR FUTURE.... :p

Posted by Maaz in

Mobilink and Warid left youth?? ??? ? ?? ?? ??

Olpers in Milkpack oUt???

Like previous Ramzan, Olpers has came up with another big ad with the begining of this Ramzan, and its getting more and more attention and gaining more and more customers, Milk Pack is again laging behind... But this time not only in advertisement but there are some serious flaws in Milk Pack's Supply Chain... for past two months i have been noticing that Milk Pack is not available in market in the begining and at the ending days of month...The reason is unknown for this but due to this flaw in supply chain, People are shifting towards Olpers becuase milk is the necessity and when one brand is not available, people automatically shift towards the other brand... as milkpack is not available so many people have shifted towards Olpers...

ANd apart from this the price of Olpers is also low as compared toMilkpack.. All these factors are causing milkpack to lose its loyal customers... And Olpers is gaining maximum advantage from this....

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Olpers in Milkpack oUt???

Mobilink Following Telenor.....

Telenor started a social awareness program in Pakistan about six months ago with the name of Karo Mumkin... the campaign started with a heavy advertisement and then telenor stopped promoting that campaing because they had got a good response and many people had posted ideas on the web site...
Now when Independance day of Pakistan is coming on 14 August, telenor restarted that campaign and this time they showed the ideas .. and now the idea that will get most of the voting will be awarded in the Karo Mumkin Show of which they didnt specified the date but i reckon it will be on August 14.
NOW Mobilink is following suit of Telenor... telenor has also started the same campaing with little difference... when i saw the ad first time i thought that it was telenor's ad ... MObilink did made a good move but they made a one big mistake... they have made the same ads as telenor had made.. NOw the one who will not see the full ad will consider is to be the ad of telenor... its good to use social campaign but should not copy other brand that you give them free advertisement and mobilink is giving free advertisement to TELENOR... i will give 5 out of 10 marks to MObilink in this campaign.....

Posted by Maaz in

Mobilink Following Telenor.....

DR AMIR LIAQAT HUSSAIN

When ever the month of Ramzan came, so came the different campaings .. last year the mega campaign was of Olpers.. But this year there is a new mega player in market..
Amir Liaqat Hussain has great fans following and is highly respected among the people of Pakistan. Especially House wives ... So it is always wise to use a celebrity like this in promoting cooking oil because your target market is housewives...
Now it was not expected of MEEZAN COOKING OIL..
Meezan while hiring Amir Liaqat Hussain as brand embassador has made a very effective move.. and no other cooking oil can now beat Meezan atleast during month of Ramzan... The use of cooking oil is maximum in month of Ramzan... By its current campaing which i assume will be run for all month, Meezan will gain quite a big chunk of market this year...
After this campaign, meezan cooking oil will emerge as a big player in cooking oil market....
I persume that Meezan is now looking to compete head to head wiht DALDA and HABIB Cooking Oil..
Lets see how they response to this mega move of Meezan..

Posted by Maaz in

DR AMIR LIAQAT HUSSAIN

FIFA WORLD CUP

The world's biggest sporting event has finally ended, and with this the advertising campaigns of different companies has also faded with the World Cup. When ever there is a major sporting event, every company tries to make most of it by making relevant ads and displaying these ads at the right time.... Looking FIFA WC from Pakistani markets point of view, there were only two major companies who make most of this event.. One is Clear Shampoo and the second one is PEPSI, other companies like Ufone and JazZ tried but werent able to make effective ads and give exciting offers..

The Clear Shampoo had the strategy in mind 16 months ago when it hired Christiano Ronaldo ( world's highest paid footballer) in its ad, Clear has been using Ronaldo t0 target the market which is obviously young men, Clear came up strong in the world cup they also offered exciting offers during world cup and made most of the tournament and is indeed the winner of the FIFA WC 2010..

PEPSI who always in front in all the major sporting events made most of the FIFA WC 2010, it hired not one but different super stars of different countries and made a wonderful ad, the ad was based in AFrica so they did attract the African market and the other major markets as well ...

Comparing two PEPSI and CLEAR,.. later had better strategy because they have been featuring a major superstar for past year... PEPSI has made a better ad ... so over all both did a good job.. !!

Posted by Maaz in

FIFA WORLD CUP

ZONG phone on hai.. Did zong missed the spot????

Zong has been using different strategies for penetrating the target market. Zong’s ads have been considered as effective and creative not less than big ideas.

Now a days there is a trend in all mobile companies attracting target market by giving free minutes and sms to the customers who have switched to other brand. NOW Zong’s marketing team came up with a different idea they are trying to gain customers loyalty. When zong displayed the first ad of “winner kaun ahi jiska phone on hai” it was expected that the pacakage is to reward the loyal customers.

But there is a big flaw in this promotin as far as I think. ZONG could have make it an exceptional offer but it jus missed the spot. Currently the promotion states that keep your phone on and you my get free minutes and sms, its just like other promotion schemes, zong tried to make this as a promotional scheme for the loyal customers but in reality it is not…

NOW the question is how zong could have made it more effective and long lasting.;… well the answer is very simple I am amazed why no body has th0ught about it…. It would have been much more effective and long lasting if it states tha…

FREE MINUTES AND SMS AND MINUTE FOR THOSE WHOSE SIM IS ON FOR THE PAST ONE YEAR OR TWO YEAR OR IS ON SINCE FIRST CHARGE….

If am the customer, I would be obliged by that offer and I will never switch brand … because in such case there is a chance of missing free minutes ans sms and every body likes free things.. :P

So my suggestion is to make the promotional schemes after lots and lots of thinking…

ZONG tried but I don’t think that it would be much effective

Posted by Maaz in

ZONG phone on hai.. Did zong missed the spot????

PEPSI VS COKE .. is war over???

PEPSI and COKE are the two biggest rivels in beverage industry in the world. Both are competing head to head for approximately two centuries. These two companies compete with each other with the powe of advertisement.

The fierce competition between the companies has given rise to many big ideas in the advertisements of both the companies and bold steps. Coke some decades ago changed its traditional formula to capture the market but it had negative impact and PEPSI celebrated that day as their victory. For last two decades, PEPSI has been fierce in its advertisements and had even outrunned Coke in Asian market. But Coke came strong with the begining of new millenium and with attractive advertisement it is enable to regain the market share.

Coke has made so many brilliant ads and captured the marke that Pepsi had to take major steps to regain its glory and market share.

In early 2010 PEPSI has taken a very bold and risky step whcich no one has imagined. In order to regain its share, PEPSI changed its traditional Logo.

Coke had learnt a bitter lesson when it changed its formula now the time will tell how the PEPSI's loyal customers will react to this strategy of PEPSI... is this the victory of COKE finally after so many years or the war has taken to the new level... The time will tell..

Posted by Maaz in

PEPSI VS COKE .. is war over???

Setting Trend

Advertising is all about brining new ideas of delivering messages and provoking customers to take desired action. In Pakistani advertising industry, there is fierce competition when it comes to the advertisement of mobile phone companies. Every company is spending billions of rupees in advertisement, and bringing new ideas.

ZONG is the only companies that has been setting trends in advertisement, since its launch, ZOng's ads have been different from the other cellular companies, when others were using jingles, zong shifted the trend by using jingle less advertisements and focused on simple communication. Now the creative team of the zong has come up with another different and trend setting idea.

the zong has made black and white ad with effects of old picture to advertise the new package. The zong has used the concept of charlie chapplin to communicate the message. the character in the add are not saying a single word rather just acting similar as in charlie chaplin or pink panther movies, and the message is communicated by simple voice over.

The ad is effective and is shows the importance of creativity and idea in advertisement, this is indeed a big idea because it is unusual and different no other company has thought about it before,

From the past two years the looking from the prospective of an advertisement critique, the advertisement of zong is the best as compared to other advertisements in telecom sector of Pakistan.

Zong is using creative ideas and is thus successful in term of making the right ads for the target market...

a

Posted by Maaz in a

Setting Trend

WALLS CHANGING PEOPLE BEHAVIOR

Walls ice cream is changing the rules of the game through its advertisement, Omore ice cream which claimed of becoming market leader within five years has been over tuned by walls through the power of advertisement. walls has been advertising heavily since July, and now when winter started, it was expected that the there would be no advertisement of ice cream or cold drinks because people behavior changes in winter season and there is no propensity of buying ice creams or cold drinks specially in northern Punjab region.

But the walls has discovered an all new market now it is promoting ice cream in winter season as well and the ads are made so to convince people to eat ice cream no matter its winter or summer. This is a great move by walls ice cream to boost its sale and capture the market. This type of strategy was used by Nescafe' when it was advertising coffee in summer and convincing people to take coffee in summer as well...

These companies are changing the behaviors of people to increase the sales of its products, and through effective advertisement they have been able to meet their target....

NOW the interesting would be to see how Omore is gonna respond to that, Omore is still using the similar advertisement and there has not been any innovation in ads since its launch... how Omore will respond to this is a big question mark??

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Posted by Maaz in advertisement

WALLS CHANGING PEOPLE BEHAVIOR

Lifebuoy Shampoo Discovered new target market

LIfe Buoy Shampoo in order to gain the maximum share has discoverd all new market to promote its product. LIfebuoy is not he main stream shampoo and its positioning is not very good as compared to sunsilk and pantene. In pakistn these two shampoos are main stream product and share the major chunk of market share.

Sunsilk and Panten shampoos always uses young models to attract the custormers, the customers of these shampoos are young female and they always use young female models to promote the product.

lifebuoy has realised this that it cannot compete with these two well established brands by focusing the same target market. SO lifebuoy has changed the reules of the game, it has discovered all new market to promote its product. LIfebuoy is now using teenage girls in its commercial and it is targeting teenage girls unlike other big brands. this has been a very wise move by life buoy by discovering the new market to promote its product...

THis move will increase the sales of Lifebuoy significantly and will help the company to achieve the desired positioning. And this will also put Lifebuoy in the line of main stream shampoos.....

Posted by Maaz in

Lifebuoy Shampoo Discovered new target market

Social Marketing

Posted by Maaz in

Social Marketing