airtel Ad Analysis

Airtel is a telecommunications company based in India, owned by Bharti Airtel Limited. Airtel was founded on July 7, 1995 by Sunil Bharti Mittal. Its headquarters are in New Delhi, India. 

Airtel is the largest cellular service provider in India with about 155.8 million subscribers. It is the market leader in India with about 27.61% market shares. It is the fifth largest mobile operator in the world with over 207.8 million subscribers across 19 countries. 

The company started out by providing mobile services at first. But now it has expanded and is structured into 4 business units, namely, mobile, broadband services, digital television, and 3G services. 

In 2003 Airtel launched its new brand campaign ‘Express Yourself’. The ‘express yourself’ ad conveys strong messages to the audience without really talking to them. Just by using simple words and effective visuals they have efficiently managed to deliver their message to their audience which is to ‘express themselves’. 

Airtel rebranded itself in India on November 18, 2010. This was the first phase of a global rebranding of the brand. One of the reasons for this rebranding is because Airtel needed a more modern, refreshing and young look for recognition across a diverse international market. This youthful and international look was achieved through its new logo designed by a London-based brand agency Brand Union. According to Sanjay Kapoor, the CEO of Airtel, the new logo has 'airtel' written in lowercase which shows humility and appears friendlier than the previous logo.

Airtel positions itself as a brand that connects people with their loved ones. It doesn’t just stick to targeting the urban population but also focuses on the rural population, since it believes that it’s not just the urban but also the rural population that wants to keep in touch with their loved ones. This feeling of staying connected is universal as is their motive to help people attain it.

The signature tune of Airtel was composed by the Indian music guru A. R. Rahman. It became hugely popular and was the most downloaded mobile music with over 150 million downloads. A new version of the song was released on November 18,2010, as part of the rebranding of the company. This version too was composed by A. R. Rahman.  

The television ads for Airtel are created by JWT, New Delhi, India. 

Airtel, like most other telecommunications brands (for example, Vodafone and Idea), does not use humour in its ads. Instead it tries to connect with its audience through deeper emotions, emotions involved in relationships between a parent and a child, a couple and also between friends. It even tried to strike a patriotic cord in the hearts of its audience through the ‘no barriers’ ad which showed that there would be no barriers between people (countries) if only they talked to each other. 

The ad featuring A.R.Rahman was one of the first Airtel television ads. It shows how he came up with the signature tune of Airtel. By featuring A.R.Rahman amidst foreigners, the ad caters to a mixed audience, including people from Asia as well as Africa and the Channel Islands.

The Bharti Airtel ad touches the patriotic psyche of the Indian audience. By emphasising the word ‘indian’ in every example, the ad manages to establish a strong patriotic connection with the country’s audience.

The ‘join the dots’ ad explores the bond between a child and a parent. It shows how a father can be there for his child when she needs him, even in impossible work situations. This ad exploits the ‘cute’ factor when the child is seen talking on the phone with her father. Using a cute child in the ad enables the advertisers to win the audience over, since children are always good at connecting at a deeper level with people.

With the introduction of 3G services, the ads of Airtel too have become more international and contemporary. This caters to today’s modern generation.

The ‘endless goodbyes’ ad shows how lovers won’t have to stay apart from each other. This is made possible through the 3G services, which allows them to make video calls online, and this will help them to constantly be with each other virtually.

The ad which says that Airtel helps you carry your entertainment wherever you go, tells the audience that with the 3G services that Airtel is providing, the audience can constantly browse the internet, download and listen to music and watch videos online, no matter where they go.

Coming to the print ads for Airtel, all of them work effectively in selling their respective ideas.

The ad which features Kareena is quite a simple ad. But it does the trick, since it has Kareena in it, and who wouldn’t want to win a date with Kareena. 

According to a survey conducted by Airtel, it was found that people make calls to the same four or five people most of the time. The ad for the ‘special 5’ plan works well because it uses children to put across the message effectively. It says that people could use this particular plan and make calls to the five people closest to them at a lower rate.

The ad for the Airtel broadband connection shows teenage boys playing videos games, and the various game options which are available to them on the internet. This tells the viewer that the broadband connection provided by Airtel is fast and can even be used for fun activities like playing games online.

And lastly the two print ads for the ‘Airtel digital TV’ and ‘Airtel internet 3G par’ exploits the relationship between couples to put their idea across. The ad featuring Kareena and Saif was launched around new year’s. In this ad the advertisers have made use of the idea to ‘surprise your spouse with the perfect gift this new year’.The other ad that shows a couple sitting back-to-back listening to music together is an ad for the 3G services provided by Airtel, which shows that you can enjoy music with your loved one with an Airtel internet connection, anywhere.

I would like to conclude by saying that Airtel would not have been the market leader in India, had it not been for these effective ads made by JWT, which has done an extremely good job in positioning Airtel in the Indain as well as the international market.

MY LATEST FAVOURITES

At the moment these are my favourite print ads. It’s amazing how such simple ads with no images or graphics can convey such strong messages to the viewers.

The ad about donating eyes strikes a chord with the viewers and hence encourages them to do what the ad is asking them to do- donate eyes. This is done effectively by using (or in this case, not using) particular letters to put across a persuasive message.

The ad to quit smoking has a great impact on the viewers, without using any gory images, but instead just by using a few words. These words are used to put together a simple but at the same time powerful message for the viewers. The impact of the message is created by playing around with the thickness/ boldness in the font of the letters, which tend to become thinner as we reach the end of the sentence, signifying weight loss due to smoking.

Such is the power of words. And when such words are put together to execute an idea in the form of an ad, it can greatly influence people towards or away from a cause. So an ad is never too simple, because even the simplest of ads can convey a lot to the audience.

THE IMPACT OF ADS

In spite of being a movie buff myself, it’s always been ads that have fascinated me more than movies. I agree that a well-made movie does have an impact on you, but that’s what it’s meant to do, isn’t it? And it gets enough time to make that impact. Ads, on the other hand, barely get a few seconds to get their message across to the audience. And in those few seconds, they’re supposed to create an impact, impress the viewers and convince them to buy a particular product or service.

A good ad is one that leaves an impact on you- you either love it or hate it- but if it has managed to stay in your mind (for reasons positive or negative), means the advertisers have done a good job. Next time you see the product, you’re instantly transported back to the ad. An example of a good ad leaving a positive impact on its audience is the’ Vodafone Delight- the little things you do for me’ ad with the school girls in it, which claims “isn’t it nice when someone makes you feel special?” This is an excellent ad by Nirvana Films. And it’s impossible to not like this one.

Examples of ads that have annoyed viewers but have still managed to make an impact on them because of their high levels of obnoxiousness are ads for Bingo (especially the glad bangles ad) and Time Pass. The next time viewers see the product in the market, they are reminded of the ad and are curious to find out what the product is all about. This in turn increases sale of the product, like we can see in the case of Bingo, which seems to be doing pretty well for itself, considering the annoying ads through which it was promoted. But, ultimately, Ogilvy & Mather should be commended for annoyingly (but innovatively) making even an ordinary product like potato chips stand out and do so well in the market.

Since there are so many ads today, they have to be at either extreme- brilliant or the exact opposite of brilliant- to make a place for themselves in the minds of the viewers. That is why we see quite a few products adopting the ‘exact opposite of brilliant’ method today to grab the viewers’ attention. And it seems to be paying off in many of these instances.

THE JOURNEY OF ADS

Ads have come a long way from what they used to be a couple of decades back. From the innocent utterly butterly delicious ‘Amul’ ads then to the dangerously seductive ‘Axe’ ads we see today, ads seem to be becoming more and more sex oriented all the time. I guess advertisers have figured out what sells and are exploiting all those shallow men (and women) who fall for it.

Axe ads (now followed by ads for all other deodorants for men) have got to be the most chauvinistic ads I’ve ever seen. Ads like these portray women as mindless creatures who get aroused just because a man smells of a particular brand of deodorant. Men (the target audience) are told that if they buy this product, they can get any woman they want. In spite of all the chauvinism in these ads, I can’t deny the fact that the marketing strategies of these ads actually work. So much is wrong with all their ads, but in the end it’s the sales that matter, and they seem to be doing pretty well in that department. Well, at least as consumers we know how shallow a level we’ve stooped to.

In most ads today, women are portrayed merely as objects of desire. Whether they are needed in an ad or not, they are put almost in every ad, just to increase the sale of that product. Unlike in older days, when you knew what was being advertised for with just a glance at the ad, today, the viewer has to keep guessing the product being advertised, since most of the screen space and time is unnecessarily taken up by skimpily clad women, even for products where they are not needed.

Ads today create a desire for products in their audience, be it by using overly seductive women in them, an expensive car, or by promising to make you fair in a week.  Unlike the olden days, we have a lot more brands to choose from today, which means a lot more brands playing with our desires and trying to convince us to buy products by creating an artificial need for them in us. This need for most products today is created by using sensual women in ads. And the sad part is that it works!