Professional Documents
Culture Documents
AGEMENT
Kaun Banega Crorepati has become a phenomenon in India. The show brought a parad
igm shift in
the manner in which Indian Television operates. The same can be said with Indian
Idol, the first of its kind reality show in India that gave an ordinary Indian
the chance to taste instant stardom. You might be wondering as to what is the co
nnection between the two. Well, it is Airtel. It was the leading sponsor of both
these stalwarts. But the business acumen of Airtel is reflected by the fact tha
t it did not stay as just a „sponsor‟ like many of the others. It created cohesion o
f the brands. It was much more than a strategic alliance. Since 2004, when Kaun
Banega Crorepati was launched, three seasons have been aired. Airtel has been a
lead sponsor for all seasons. The Airtel subscribers were given a special chance
to directly enter KBC. In fact participation to the show was only restricted to
the Airtel subscribers and BSNL/MTNL landline users for the first couple of sea
sons. With Indian Idol, the Airtel subscribers got an exclusive chance to enter
the show.
About Airtel
Airtel comes to you from Bharti India Limited, India‟s largest integrated and the
first private telecom services provider with a footprint in all the 23 telecom c
ircles. Bharti Airtel since its inception has been at the forefront of technolog
y and has steered the course of the telecom sector in the country with its world
class products and services. The businesses at Bharti Airtel have been structur
ed into three individual strategic business units (SBU‟s) - Mobile Services, Airte
l Telemedia Services & Enterprise Services. The mobile business provides mobile
& fixed wireless services using GSM technology across 23 telecom circles while t
he Airtel Telemedia Services business offers broadband & telephone services in 9
5 cities and has recently launched India's best Direct-to-Home (DTH) service, Ai
rtel digital TV. The Enterprise services provide end-to-end telecom solutions to
corporate customers and national & international long distance services to carr
iers. All these services are provided under the Airtel brand.
2
AIRTEL: The Communication Campaign
Marketing Management Group Project 3 - Trimester 1
The Communication Campaign: Airtel
Airtel is undoubtedly a pioneer in the various communication campaigns that it e
mploys to market its products. Bharti Airtel is the number one telecom operator
in India and pledges best quality service to all its customers. The company is a
market leader and hence, is an innovator to the hilt. It has employed various c
ommunication campaigns to highlight the unique offerings from its stable. To thi
nk of it, we all accustomed to the entourage of advertisements of Airtel both in
the print and television media. But the company does not stop there. It has rea
lly done wonders to itself by foraying into the other not so hackneyed forms of
communication. Pause for a while and think over it… how many of us have sat throug
h a cricket match without seeing the Airtel Logo as a sponsor in some or the oth
er respect. The publicity hoarding alongside shows the acknowledgement of Indian
Idol and Kaun Banega Crorepati for the success of Airtel.
Express Yourself
When communicating a brand is being discussed, what can be more indicative than
the tag line of the brand? “Express Yourself” epitomizes communication hence, is abl
e to establish an instant connect with the audience at large. The clarity in com
munication is striking. Airtel is a mobile telecommunications provider. Hence, i
t has to encourage people to talk.
“Power to keep in touch” (1995) This era saw the beginning of mobile communication i
n India. Every mobile handset would cost as high as Rs. 45,000. Only the elite i
n society that could afford to keep mobile phones. Hence, the tag line 'Power to
keep in Touch' designed to make the user feel 'in control i.e. be powerful'. Th
e logo was coloured black, in uppercase and with bold lettering, all signifying
power. It positioned the brand in premium category aimed at elite class of socie
ty, more as a lifestyle brand. Airtel decided that the brand should always demon
strate its leadership–be it in network, innovations, offerings, services and capit
alize on the first mover advantage. To keep in sync with the target audience, it
sponsored games like Golf. The reasons for changing the „Power to Keep in Touch‟ ta
gline are as follows: Now, cellular service operators could drop their prices an
d target new customer segments. As the category developed with prices going down
sharply, Airtel began talking to a wider spectrum of potential users. This give
s the birth to the new Tagline. This was also a time when customers needed to be
educated; interest levels were high, but the customers' exposure to the cellula
r world was limited. Airtel took out full and half-page ads in newspapers, answe
ring queries like "what is roaming?", "what is coverage area?" and "how to make
international calls"
“Touch Tomorrow” (1999) Airtel started talking to new segments of customers by posit
ively positioning and establishing itself as a brand that improved the quality o
f life. The new campaign was launched to facilitate entry into new markets. This
new market was essentially the mass market. A new logo for Airtel was devised.
It was in red, black and white colours with „Airtel‟ enwrapped in an eclipse. The lo
go were indicative of the core values of the brand: Leadership, Performance and
Dynamism. The reasons for changing the „Touch tomorrow‟ tagline are as follows:
8
AIRTEL: The Communication Campaign
Marketing Management Group Project 3 - Trimester 1
It started to look from a regional level to pan India position. To become an Ind
ian leader, Airtel needed to change its tagline.
“Live Every Moment” (2002) In 2002, Airtel signed on music composer A R Rahman and c
hanged its tune to "Live every moment": Rahman's signature tune for Airtel has t
ransformed musical advertisements for ever. This strategy was launched to captur
e the imagination of the customer. The tagline denotes that each and every perso
n in India lives every moment (emotions, feelings etc.) of life. And Airtel help
s in doing so. The focus was on the endless possibilities of technology to make
life good and advertising became twopronged: a product-driven communication that
showcased new offerings like the Magic prepaid card, and an emotional communica
tion that showed younger people.
“Express Yourself” (2003) 'Express Yourself' was successfully launched taking the ow
nership of the entire space of telecommunication and strengthening the emotional
bond that Airtel had established with its customers over the years. It highligh
ts the capability of Airtel in terms of performance and network coverage. This c
ampaign was launched in regional languages as well. Airtel also modified its log
o to give it a more energetic and younger look. By this time, the emotional angl
e was predominant it was a stark, black and white imagery that could stand out i
n what was becoming a highly commoditized, crowded market.
Airtel seems to have consciously decided to go for the belly of the market and a
ggressive market expansion, while its major competitors seem to be targeting rel
atively more sophisticated consumers (as in the case of Vodafone). There isn't a
great deal of differentiation in terms of pricing, services, schemes and so on,
but there are differences in approach. Overall, Airtel is focused on functional
ity and efficiency while Vodafone is more focused on warmth and emotions. Even t
hough one may contemplate the creativity quotient of the Vodafone advertisements
a notch higher than that of Airtel, Airtel has the pie by the sheer force of un
iform physical presence all throughout the country. Vodafone has a fragmented pr
esence.
9
AIRTEL: The Communication Campaign
Marketing Management Group Project 3 - Trimester 1
Creative Execution of Messaging Strategy: Not many brands have been as creative
and as an outcome innovative, in all the paraphernalia of communication tools as
has been Airtel. The Airtel ads, be they on paper, on television, on a hoarding
, or anywhere, have a distinct recognition and appeal. The gamut of advertisemen
ts Airtel has used seem to have maintained a specific genre among them. The adve
rtisements have more often than not talked much more about the values than the p
roduct or the service. Or maybe the product and the benefit have always been ver
y intrinsically knit into a value. The creativity in communication can also be a
ssociated to the innovative ways of seeking attention that Airtel has deployed,
especially in outdoor advertising. Talking about broadcast advertising; it is ge
nerally acknowledged as the most effective and powerful advertising medium as co
mpared to others. And Airtel has made full use of it. The ads range from depicti
ng two boys playing football defying borders, to a couple [Film actors Madhavan
and Vidya Balan] romancing sitting at home, from a person coming home to find 10
s of celebrities waiting for him [Airtel TV], to a young lad going out of villag
e staying connected to his father. All these ads were built on a story and a val
ue perceivable by the viewer of these. Some were set in a far off no man‟s land, s
ome in a village and others in an apartment‟s living room. Almost never has there
been an ad where someone straightaway came and sung about the features of an Air
tel connection. A common feature of all these ads has been the instantly recogni
zable signature tune composed by A R Rahman. Some of these ads have a sense of g
randeur about them while others have family orientation, relations or innocent l
ove as the underlying storyline. Airtel advertisements have always maintained an
up market feel about them. They have never been loud and in a way they always h
ave been very decent and simple. The celebrities also have always been suitably
chosen for each of these advertisements depending upon the image of themselves t
hy have created in common public. To add to all of this a very catchy slogan alw
ays goes along with these ads. Examples would be,” Express yourself”, “Barriers break
when people talk” and “Pyar ke beech mein kabhi dooriyan na aayen”, i.e “May there be no
separation between love” and many more.
10
AIRTEL: The Communication Campaign
Marketing Management Group Project 3 - Trimester 1
The effect of these advertisements has been phenomenal. The inherent strength of
the Airtel advertisements in this media comes from the creativity put into the
advertisements that has let them create an identity of a provider who is dependa
ble, reliable, and in a sense “THE BEST”. Very importantly, all these ads have been
supplemented positively by giving the best service among all the networks. On th
e flip side, the weakness of this media is in the relative high cost and the num
ber of irrelevant audience reached as Airtel has positioned itself as a comparat
ively premium product. The second important communication tool would be outdoor
advertising. It is generally more suitable for brand enhancement and reinforceme
nt that it is for a new product setting feet in the market. This is one area whe
re Airtel has shown real innovation and at times out of the box thinking. Consid
er for instance making letter boxes in the shape of Airtel SIM cards, or lamp po
sts with the lamps enclosed in huge SIM cards. Or just picture a train running a
cross cities and painted all over with the Airtel logo. It grabs instant attenti
on. Airtel invests heavily in the outdoor advertisements in all the cities and t
owns across India. Its advertisements can be prominently seen across billboards
and hoardings. These billboards often have stills that remind of the latest Airt
el ads being run on television. They are an efficient way of constantly remindin
g of the value enforced by the TV commercial. The main advantage is the cost eff
ectiveness as compared to TV, but they don‟t enjoy as high an exposure as TV ads d
o. Airtel puts in a lot of effort in its outdoor publicity. It is evident from t
he uniqueness in their ways of advertisement. As a method for its brand reinforc
ements, Airtel has often tied up with TV shows ranging from the biggest of all K
BC, to Indian Idol and many others. Other than that it has been a major sponsor
of many prominent cricketing events too. Airtel hasn‟t been a just a dormant spons
or whose name will be seen only in advertisements, but it has made sure its pres
ence was felt during the on time of the show as well. For an example, whenever a
contestant used to phone a friend in a KBC show, instantly the Airtel tune got
on, the logo got displayed on the screen and the host very politely mentioned th
at the call is getting connected owing to the Airtel network. Such indirect form
of advertisement has a huge advantage in the sense that the attention of the au
dience doesn‟t have to be solicited; instead the target customer is already all ey
es and ears to the television. But the disadvantage crops up from the fact that
almost negligible information can be conveyed about the product per say. But as
the main objective of this form of indirect advertising is in reminding the audi
ence about the presence of the brand, it solves its main purpose effectively.
11
AIRTEL: The Communication Campaign
Marketing Management Group Project 3 - Trimester 1