Abig chunk of advertising and marketing communication is still busy giving one way sermon to consumers. It seems that the brands still believe that a piece of communication is an end in itself. Create your ad and the consumer will connect — don’t bother if it is absurd, unrealistic and even out of context. As the agency and client are drifting apart and are operating from their silos of individual expertise — most of the time the communication which apparently, may appear interesting, clever, and even creative falls into a no man’s land in the domain of consumers leaving them cold, passive and indifferent. Everyday hundreds of such ads are created and bombarded to hapless consumers ignoring the simple truth that nothing works with consumers till they are stirred and moved. Till they are given a role in the scheme of the brand so that they realise they are not the passive recipients of a service but have an active role to play.
Take the issue of green cars. Across the world all major car brands talk about technical eco-innovations, but the impact they make on the car drivers are zero. Ask any car driver and they’ll tell you that it’s all green noise. The more manufacturers and brands talk about new fuel, new engine configuration, innovative combustion processes and so on, the more they reaffirm the belief in the car user’s mind that this is a technology-related problem and the solution can come only from the car manufacturer. Such a mindset hides one vital piece of truth —that even the most sophisticated, eco-friendly car can cause huge carbon emissions if driven in a wasteful way.
“echo-Drive” the digital consumer relationship programme of Fiat is unique in the sense that it appealed to people as drivers, not as passive customers, to address the problem of growing carbon emissions. Fiat’s “eco: Drive”, is an application that made it possible for drivers to use a USB stick to collect driving data drawn from more than 32 sensors in their cars. This data could then be transferred to the drivers’ personal computers, to analyse their everyday driving by providing an overview of how s/he rates in four key categories: acceleration, deceleration, gear-changing and holding consistent speed. The device also gives drivers access to personalised tutorials on how they can change their driving to achieve fuel savings. The company used the social media to build an international community of eco:Drivers by allowing users to share their results, organising a pan-European competition to find the best eco:Driver. Thus a communication contact program-me brought together consumer, brand, and product, in the digital as well as real world on the same platform and created a huge PR buzz for Fiat. The result was that Fiat won 12 industry awards, becoming one of the most creatively awarded digital marketing initiatives of all time.
Back home in India it is heartening to see some brands are taking bold steps to shake consumers up from their complacency and telling them that they have a powerful role to play in the context of the brand. An interesting radio spot narrates how a police man flags a driver and forces him to stop his engine and then goes on to explain how switching off the engine at every red signal results in a saving of 20 per cent of his fuel money. Red signals are not traffic stoppers they are actually banks. Nazariya ki baat hain baba…it is only how you look at things.
I quite like the recent CEAT Tyre campaign. Tyre companies have been talking about the safety feature of tyres for ages with technical details like firmer road grip, greater width of the tyre, faster water dispersion technology in design and so on. The CEAT ad campaign is different in the sense that it has kept the safety message implied and squarely puts the responsibility of safe driving on the biker himself. The four ad campaigns build their story on the insight that obeying traffic rules is not just good enough to drive safely in a country like India. It is even more important to pre-empt the irresponsible behaviour of others on the road. The inherent message from the brand to the biker is — life is full of such irresponsible people who will never mend their ways. It makes better sense to be more alert with an improved brand of tyres that have a firmer road grip.
Responsibility makes one a man /woman and let that wisdom not be limited to liquor advertising — only “those who appreciate quality should use it responsibly”. This is an axiom of life and also of marketing.

The writer is vice-president, Consumer Insight & HFD (Human Futures Development), McCann Erickson India. He can be reached at kishore.chakraborti
@mccann.com