Marketing is something even a new born practices – he knows how to promote himself – how to attract clients. It is INNATE and can’t be discovered. My attempts are to just make readers realize that marketing is inbuilt in everyone’s life and how companies are Re-innovating and utilizing it.

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Jerry Welsh the Marketing Guru who coined the term AMBUSH MARKETING defines it as “a marketing strategy in which a competing brand connects itself with a major sporting event without paying sponsorship fees.” But the serious question to ask remains – “Is AMBUSH MARKETING limited to sports events?”

Take another concept called PARASITIC MARKETING often used interchangeably with ambush marketing – which most experts feel is the same – invading / exploiting others’ marketing efforts.

Let us try to look at this from a clearer point of view:

Ambush is a military tactic, where one attacks from a concealed position. Simply put, not fighting on fair terms. Ambush marketing is eating into pie of customer’s attention that has been garnered by a third party without actually paying for it. Parasitic marketing is almost the same – I ride on someone Else’s created wave of awareness and modify the message in the minds of the consumers.

For example, Coca – Cola pays money to ICC in 1996 to become the main sponsor – gains exclusive rights within the stadium for the Cricket World cup. But, Pepsi comes with a “Nothing official about it” campaign to counter it. Pepsi sports mega balloons outside the stadiums with huge logos. So, inspite of Coke shelling out money – its return on investment is affected by Pepsi’s entry. Pepsi gets publicity even without paying sponsorship fees. It has associated itself to the World cup…

The startegy is even more prominent in this example:  Say, Reebok is the official sponsor of a sports event and Nike distributes free t-shirts and caps at the entrance to the stadium and visitors sport the t-shirts inside the stadium – free publicity to Nike without paying a penny towards sponsorship again. I haven’t paid money to make my brand visible in the tournament but I still increase visibility relating myself to the event by indirect means.

Knowing Shah Rukh & Ganguly, the main pillars of KKR, were former ambassadors of Pepsi; the current star players like Ishant Sharma are present ambassadors of Pepsi – Coke makes an entry; SPRITE offers to sponsor KKR team and these men are left with no option to pose with Coca Cola banners and bottles… Intelligent advertising, eh? – Next time, I see Ishant Sharma with a Pepsi can – what credibility does it give?

Now back to the main question- Is it limited to SPORTS EVENTS and sponsorships… No, is the lucid response.

Heard of the recent tug of war between the old rivals – P&G and HUL?

P&G ran a teaser for Pantene from June 23 2010- ‘A Mystery Shampoo!! 80% women say is better than anything else’ (P&G was planning to reveal the answer to the teaser on August 1 2010). August 24 2010 saw another hoarding next to the previous one by HUL saying ‘There is no mystery. Dove is the No.1 shampoo’ – so, no sports event but a clear parasitic effort. One company conceals the efforts of another [indirect ambush strategy is legal and has no protection if you are affected]. SOME call it Guerrilla marketing. Teaser campaigns run a major risk of Ambush /guerrilla marketing. The jet – kingfisher episode is an exquisite example.

HOW ABOUT THIS?

Campaign runs for a week – “Balbir pasha ko AIDS hoga kya?”..Bharat Matrimonial comes up with a campaign – ” kyun nahi hoga, divorce kyun nahi hoga?”…FINAL TAGLINE of its campaign: “ isiliye kaha tha  – jeevan saathi bharat matrimonial  se chunne ko…” (conceals the efforts of the AIDS campaign – ain’t it?) – Ambushing need not be from your direct competitors only.

So, the next questions – Is it limited to teasers and hoardings? No. Read ahead.

What about an Akshay Kumar look alike admitted in a hospital for he hurt himself chasing a Thums-Up bottle – hasn’t it led to sabotaging the advertising expense incurred by Coca- Cola India for the Thums-Up ad? Then isn’t it ambush marketing? Most call it spoof advertising. Other examples are Sprite’s Seedhi baat no bakwas, where in you destroy/sabotage a positive image built in the consumer’s mind by your competitor.

Is that all? what about look alikes ? A new entrant paints the paste tube red and names it ‘COLGATTE’ to deceive consumers (direct ambush marketing – does have legal recourse)

Companies PUSH their product by giving dealers HUGE MARGINS. Sunfeast (ITC) in Chennai actually survived by the same method – Isn’t it a parasitic method too, if retailer says the other product(Good day) is out of stock and sells your product?  Good day has created the necessary Top of mind recall – a customer has evaluated options and comes to the store to purchase the biscuit but the competitor distorts the image. Haven’t we seen this in multi brand outlets wherein a retailer who gets higher margin from Samsung says Onida has replacement issues? Ambushing your competitor – aren’t you?

Since, Guerilla Marketing, Ambush Marketing, spoof advertising are all defined earlier – it is not advisable to change their definitions or explanations or paradigms.

However, I feel that all these techniques are similar. Their aim is not to capture simple attention but a clutter free mind space – and for this they try to throw out the message retained earlier pertaining to that of a competitor. A blanket term could be TRICK marketing where you create and modify consumer perceptions that your competitor has already paid for (competitor may have already acquired the consumer’s attention or yet to acquire).

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1. Marketing the INVISIBLE

Ever seen tire ads on TV?

Remember the illustrious “Intel inside” campaign?

As a retail customer – do you or I go about buying chips for PCs or tires or for that matter cooling towers?

Then what are these ads doing – Why are they targeted at the retail customer? This can be thought of as a way to create a pull – If there is enough awareness about the cooling tower and the brand is visible, then the new 5 star hotel is forced to buy this tower or in other words the 5 star hotel pays a premium for this tower so that it can extract the benefits created by this ad campaign.

Precisely why Intel chips sold like hot cakes. There are stories of fledgling PC manufacturers doing well because of the INTEL chips embedded in them.

Remember the third grade biology lessons of Brood Parasitism – The cuckoos laying their eggs in the nests built by other birds – similarly, the companies extract the fruit of the brand value created by another marketer – the only difference being that these companies cannot free ride like the cuckoos and end up paying a premium. But shelling out a premium is still friendly on their pockets. It is better than investing in a marketing campaign not knowing what its result would be. Here, the clever business men pay the premium after the campaigns have succeeded and command intense brand recall among their clientele.

There are well researched topics in marketing called “ingredient branding” – microprocessors are ingredients of a PC; sweeteners are ingredients of beverages and readymade foods. The oft quoted examples in this space are Intel, NutraSweet etc. For those who would like to know/recall NutraSweet, here is the story

NutraSweet, an artificial sweetener found in around 3000 beverages/foods, started advertising using a theme – “why some things taste better than others?” – A revelation about the features of an ingredient that went into products consumed by everyone on a daily basis. After a few years, there was a remarkable change in consumer preference for NutraSweet and products that used the sweetener were clearly associated and identified.

But this article is not about ingredient branding – the concept I’m trying to put forth is about products that are invisible to the retail customer like cooling towers which can’t be termed ingredients of a 5 star hotel. A tyre for example is not targeted at the retail customer, so in some sense it is an invisible product. So also the sweetener that goes into Pepsi or the spice that goes into Frito lays. Ingredients are subsets of this INVISIBLE product category.

So companies are awakening to marketing the INVISIBLE – they rope in the end consumers and kindle interest and goodwill about their products so that their immediate customer pays them more money. A good tactic – but caution is to be exercised as it may backfire. Since these products are invisible, the campaigns run over years before they yield results. Also, the campaigns if successful get so absorbed that the brand finds it difficult to enter unrelated areas. This can be seen in the case of Intel which would take pride in calling itself an innovating company (has several trademarks to its credit). But the consumer can never dissociate Intel from microprocessors…

So do not panic if tomorrow,

CHICK ROOST (a chicken breeder cum supplier) comes out with an ad saying – “All the chickens into the yummy burgers are ours”

Healthy Chicken (poultry feed company) responds saying – “The burgers are yummy because we provide yummy feed to chickens”

An association of farmers also enters the race and says that “we produce yummy grains that makes the chicken feed yummy”

This is a healthy trend as the consumer is made aware of ingredients, invisible constituents that make life worthy, sorry YUMMY J

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1. ITC Brands in Hotel and Apparel Category

The evolution is interesting to study –

Companies tried getting their ads outdoors – so it was banners/hoardings in addition to ads on TV, radio & print media

Then it was essential to create curiosity in every ambience – so the concept of ambient marketing took over – be it the dumb bell shaped holder in a bus(ad for a fitness company) or a broken floor with a buried microphone (ad for BBC) – all these attempts did catch the attention of many consumers.

Next they tried catching hold of every product right from eggs to sick bags in airplanes. People sold their foreheads and other body parts (!!!) as ad space and there were many takers in the marketing sector.

But there were places that were left untouched… How could the people in the advertising sector and the marketing circle not think about this marvellous ad space for so long? What a sin?

Just imagine a closed place where people are always left alone – it is always DND, no mobiles/pagers – in fact they love privacy – no friends and acquaintances – this rule was common to everyone –NO EXCLUSIONS whatsoever.

EUREKA – so came in the concept of ADVERTISEMENTS IN WASHROOMS – the concept I like being termed “loo advertising”. Malls, pubs, bars & cine complexes are the HUBS – they host ads in their Washrooms. The space sells like hot cakes. There are agencies that specialise in these kind of ads – Admedia is claimed to be the biggest player in UK and owns about 25,000 washroom panels. There are loos which are designed like ski resorts, urinals are designed such that they resemble a football ground or a golf course – ads for Sports channels.

Advantages:

1. Undisputed consumer time – no clutter in customer mind space
2. No chance to switch or avoid
3. High brand recall seen
4. Most of the ads seem to be engaging – captive;  e.g.  Marico came up with hair strips in the loos which could be plaited/braided. This was for their product which was a hair detangler
5. Highly gender specific – no cross usage ever seen àhence, no reluctance seen in condom, sanitary napkin ads in the loos
6. Several ads have tear away business cards, discount coupons which encourage footfall
7. Increases brand visibility

The disadvantage of this concept is that it might put off a few people – “please let us have some peace at least here” – this might add to a negative image for the brand.

So care must be exercised. Brands which have an oomph factor, elements of naughtiness/sexiness – positioned as humorous, hep, sexy could go in for this strategy. Their image that has been established would be enhanced. A good example would be that of Axe brands and ads. However, when a soft brand wants to exploit this space, it needs to design its ads in such a way that breaks away from this FUNKY factor & still communicates its mild tone conquering attention without angering the consumers. One of the finest example would be that of this social campaign for drunken driving.

So next time you visit a LOO look out for ads and brands – Be a wary consumer…

- Saradha G, feel free to write back at geeyes18@yahoo.co.in

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