Today I came across an article in Tamil newspaper 'Dinakaran''s city edition paper. Seems Tirunelveli city police is investigating a murder - a murder of a 70 year old lady. The murder had happened in a crowded place but none of the residents/shop-keepers have given any useful info to the police regarding the same. May be not willing due to the fear of facing the consequences...
Tired of enquiring, police had distributed some 500 inland letters to the houses/shops in and around the scene of crime, with the address of Assistant Commissioner written in 'To' address, along with his cell number... In case, someone know anything regarding the crime, he/she can now mail this to police without mentioning his/her own address!
I am not sure whether Police have adapted the same strategy somewhere... But this is a kind of direct-response marketing, with an 'explicit call-to-action' and 'means of response'[here inland letter and mobile!] . Marketing is done everywhere - be it Indian Army or City Police!
Monday, June 22, 2009
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Marketing positively the negative
It may not take great efforts and awesome brilliance to market something which is 'good' or 'better than the rest'. The real challenge lies in marketing something which is obviously inferior!
The Hans Bringer Budget Hotel of Amsterdam accepted this challenge and came out with a 'very surprising' advertising campaign (It was now running for more than a decade). This Hotel had no 'best-in-class' spas or restaurants, nor world-class furniture in their rooms/suites (In fact they do have only pictures of chairs in the rooms :)) nor even a friendly service by its staff. The rooms stunk and there were even instances of dog shits in the lobby.
How can one market a Hotel of this category? Surprisingly, they decided to 'market' their drawbacks and to 'honestly' communicate the same to the public. Thus came the 'Worst Hotel in the World' campaign. As pointed out by Ogilvy Employee and blogger Rohit Bhargava in his blog, the idea was to ' lower expectations to a point where people could no longer be disappointed'.
Ads with attention grabbing lines like 'Now a door in every room' ; 'Now even less service'; 'Now a bed in every room' were used in their poster campaign and they started boasting that they are the 'World's Worst Hotel! The idea is to convey the true status of the hotel in a humorous way (Though at times it was bit exaggerated) to the public and give them the privilege of staying in the world's worst hotel.
The idea worked well and the hotel could increase its occupancy rate by 42%!
This surely is one of the rare cases of marketing positively the negative!
Thursday, May 14, 2009
World's First email...
Most of us would have known the significance of the following sentence.
"Mr Watson — Come here —I want to see you"
These were the first words spoken by Alexander Graham Bell after the invention of Telephone. I recently came across this and wanted to know what would have been the world's first email. As usual Google came to the rescue and I could get the following info.
Developer: Ray Tomlinson (also the first person to put '@' symbol in emails)
Year:1971 (SNDMSG was the program used for sending the email )
His email id: tomlinson@bbn-tenexa (BBN- his employer; Tenexa - Operating System)
However the saddest part is - the exact email message that was sent, was lost :( . Tomlinson later stated that the email consisted of something 'insignificant in content' (as he was using for test purposes) and was something like 'QWERTYUIOP' (First row of alphabets in keyboard).
So, though not sure, hopefully the world's first email should have been something like 'QWERTYUIOP'!!
"Mr Watson — Come here —I want to see you"
These were the first words spoken by Alexander Graham Bell after the invention of Telephone. I recently came across this and wanted to know what would have been the world's first email. As usual Google came to the rescue and I could get the following info.
Developer: Ray Tomlinson (also the first person to put '@' symbol in emails)
Year:1971 (SNDMSG was the program used for sending the email )
His email id: tomlinson@bbn-tenexa (BBN- his employer; Tenexa - Operating System)
However the saddest part is - the exact email message that was sent, was lost :( . Tomlinson later stated that the email consisted of something 'insignificant in content' (as he was using for test purposes) and was something like 'QWERTYUIOP' (First row of alphabets in keyboard).
So, though not sure, hopefully the world's first email should have been something like 'QWERTYUIOP'!!
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Invert !!
¡¡¡spuǝıɹɟ ,ʎouuɐ,/ǝsnɯɯɐ uɐɔ ʍou ˙˙˙ (: ʇxǝʇ ǝɥʇ sʇɹǝʌuı/sdılɟ ɥɔıɥʍ ǝʇıs ƃuıʇsǝɹǝʇuı uɐ ǝǝs oʇ pǝuǝddɐɥ
To read this, you have 2 options:
1. Take your laptop/monitor in your hands; rotate it to 180 degrees or twist your head to 180 degrees (which ever you feel comfortable)
OR
2. Copy the above line and go here
Choice is yours :)!
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Corporate Attire (?)!
Adopting things from the west and adapting to western culture can't be blamed altogether; until they benefit us and improve our status quo, at least to some extent.
We switched to shirts and trousers from our age old dhotis. The reason is ‘convenience’. We are no longer going to step into a paddy field and sow or reap. We do not have a compelling reason to fold our dhotis to our knee height to avoid mud and dirt. Time and professions have changed. Shirts and Trousers are perfectly suitable for Indian males. Logic holds good!
But when it comes to corporate attire (those suits/blazers tightly knotted with ties), I could not get the logic behind adapting to those kind of dressing. We are not in a land where snow falls or prickling cold waves pierce our body. Surely it is not an ideal one for our climate. Leave those Executives who travel in an ac car, work in an ac room and sleep in an ac room. Perhaps they may need this attire. But why are you forcing the same on other employees (especially Sales guys) who ride their bikes in scorching sun in Indian roads?
Some may argue that in this globalised world, we have to adapt to the west in order to survive. Learning English and working in nights are okay. This kind of adaptation is necessary. But dressing is our right. We have to choose our dress which is convenient for us and not for someone else’s sake who is sitting in some other country. We should not do this just because he is paying us.
In Gulf, males are still sticking to their customary dress even for International meets. I am not saying that we have to go for our traditional dhotis. Pants/Trousers and shirts are convenient for us in all ways. Why to cover that with a blazer/coat and further knot with a tie?
Won’t we feel comfortable and relaxed without that tie and blazers?
We switched to shirts and trousers from our age old dhotis. The reason is ‘convenience’. We are no longer going to step into a paddy field and sow or reap. We do not have a compelling reason to fold our dhotis to our knee height to avoid mud and dirt. Time and professions have changed. Shirts and Trousers are perfectly suitable for Indian males. Logic holds good!
But when it comes to corporate attire (those suits/blazers tightly knotted with ties), I could not get the logic behind adapting to those kind of dressing. We are not in a land where snow falls or prickling cold waves pierce our body. Surely it is not an ideal one for our climate. Leave those Executives who travel in an ac car, work in an ac room and sleep in an ac room. Perhaps they may need this attire. But why are you forcing the same on other employees (especially Sales guys) who ride their bikes in scorching sun in Indian roads?
Some may argue that in this globalised world, we have to adapt to the west in order to survive. Learning English and working in nights are okay. This kind of adaptation is necessary. But dressing is our right. We have to choose our dress which is convenient for us and not for someone else’s sake who is sitting in some other country. We should not do this just because he is paying us.
In Gulf, males are still sticking to their customary dress even for International meets. I am not saying that we have to go for our traditional dhotis. Pants/Trousers and shirts are convenient for us in all ways. Why to cover that with a blazer/coat and further knot with a tie?
Won’t we feel comfortable and relaxed without that tie and blazers?
'ஓசி'
'குடிக்கிறது ஒசி காப்பி, இதுல நக்கல் வேறயா?'
'தினமும் ஓசி-லயே பேப்பர் படிக்கிறான் அவன்'
I was wondering for quite some time, what this 'ஓசி' meant and where it came from. Some googling finally let me know the answer. The root of the word is not in Tamil or in Sanskrit. Strangely, it is in English!!!
We would ve seen some official govt letters with words 'On Government of India Service' printed on the top of the envelope.. The East India Company (during British rule) used to send letters without postage stamps, but with the words 'On Company's Service' or 'OC'. [Source: http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/fr/2005/08/26/stories/2005082600210300.htm]
Later on, this 'OC' becomes 'ஓசி' in Tamil!! (Approximate meaning: 'Free')
ஓசி-ல இந்த info கொடுத்த Google-க்கு நன்றி!!!
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