Masturbation, menstrual blood, gay sex, bald head for hair oil... as more and more such shockers appear in the storyboard of ads, IMPACT deciphers the trend to see what’s in it for brands
By Neeta Nair
A few weeks ago, I received a forwarded message on WhatsApp, asking a very innocent question: “Papa, what is masturbation?” It was followed by a video link showing an adamant boy with his baffled father. Within seconds, I had joined the thousands of unsuspecting social media consumers who couldn’t help wonder how the father was going to swing that ball. Within hours, it was trending and the shock value it generated seemed to have got the conversation moving in favour of the campaign.
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At a time when brands are fighting to grab the consumer’s attention through a maze of mediums, often conflicting in nature, creating shock value seems to be a popular solution adopted by them. Be it the Dabur Vatika hair oil ad which over the years spoke about hair-related beauty and then suddenly changed its communication to ‘You don’t always need hair to look beautiful’ in its ad showing a cancer survivor or sanitary napkin brand Whisper’s ‘Touch the Pickle’ which addressed menstruation-related taboos, these ads manage to make people sit up and take notice.
While ads that shock are excellent conversation starters, do they really translate into real value for the brand? Take the example of the video ‘Sex chat with Pappu and Papa’ which was produced by Yash Raj Films and presented by Durex condoms. While the connect with the subject seemed apt for the Reckitt & Benckiser product, YRF associating with such a theme seemed a rather bold move.
Says Ashish Patil, Head of Y-Films, the youth division of Yash Raj Films, “Y-Films has always believed in detonating all boundaries with story-telling. So, our goal was simple - get the conversation started, do it in the cleanest, most honest and entertaining manner possible. Durex was and is super excited about this content as it’s in line with their larger corporate strategy of overall sexual well-being and health. Step one of doing that is not being embarrassed to talk about things. In fact, they’ve been very supportive helping us push the content across their international presence, being a multinational player, besides investing heavily on marketing/media to promote it. They’ve also run an innovative campaign where they’re donating one condom for every share of the content on ‘Sex Chat with Pappu & Papa’ to the Family Planning Association of India (FPAI). We are certainly hoping to garner big numbers for that.”
However, Patil says the team had to exercise extreme caution as far as the choice of words used in the video was concerned because a single wrong comment could have got the social media gunning for them. “There’s a danger for jokes around the topic to become double-meaning and tacky. And that would simply defeat the purpose of our campaign. We’ve taken care beyond the medical accuracy to get our tone right. Fortunately, in the world of Internet trolls, it’s incredible how positively the series has been received. We guess our intentions were always very pure and that comes through very clearly,” he adds.
NOT JUST ABOUT SALES
Another company which has been using millions of dollars annually to shape perceptions is Hindustan Unilever. The industry’s biggest advertiser, on many occasions, has used shock as an emotion to challenge stereotypes. Most recently, the campaign for Brooke Bond Red Label tea which featured India’s first transgender band won a Grand Prix at Cannes, and with it accolades at the global level. A more recent campaign featuring a tea date with a commercial sex worker tried to prove a point - that they too are working women and not very different from the rest of us.
Talking about sensitive subjects always leaves the window open for a little risk, especially for a company with a large and diverse consumer base like HUL. Agreeing with that, a HUL spokesperson says, “No matter how cautious we are, we are always vulnerable to criticism. It is our endeavour to stay true to what the brand represents and embodies. All our actions are taken keeping our consumers in mind. This is the reason that our communication has always resonated so well with consumers. Brooke Bond Red Label has always been about bringing people together. Over the last couple of years, we have brought this idea to life through our ‘Taste of Togetherness’ campaign, wherein we have challenged the deepest prejudices that keep us from forming new bonds.”
The intention here is not completely focused on increasing sales, but more on engaging customers and society at large with the brand purpose ‘Making the world a more welcoming place, one cup at a time’. HUL claims integrating content relevant to its brand purpose has got it an overwhelmingly positive response from consumers, making the exercise of walking the talk more successful.
AN EVERGREEN FORMULA
Advertising agencies have always experimented with shock value, be it the 1995 Tuff shoes ad in which Milind Soman and Madhu Sapre posed nude with a snake wrapped around them, or the Bipasha Basu and Dino Morea ad for Swiss undergarment brand Calida, which had to be discontinued on instructions from the Ministry for Cultural Affairs. While sex has always made news in the ad space, there are other issues which shocked thanks to the progressive thoughts they highlighted, such as the Femina ad with Minissha Lamba which attempted to create a positive aura around re-marriage.
Says Senthil Kumar, Chief Creative Officer of JWT, “Ads with shock value are effective in garnering attention and creating impact for the brand, but it does not pay to do it once and move on to softer skills. If shock value is part of the brand’s DNA, then you must go for it. Doing it once may help you stand out in the clutter, but employing it as a key communication code should help you be consistent and kick-start a surge of expectations from audiences. Then they will look forward to what this brand is going to do next... How far will it go? When you trigger such conversations, the brand does benefit in the long run.”
Titan is a brand that falls under that bracket, because every new ad addresses a social behaviour and often tries to trigger a change, like the Katrina Kaif commercial for Titan Raga, where a watch brand’s campaign for the wedding season was telling women that they should not get married for the wrong reasons. Another Titan brand, Fastrack, has always been known for its revolutionary messages conveyed in a quirky and crisp manner. One such ad ‘Closet’, simply shows two girls walking out of a cabinet ending with a tagline ‘Come out of the closet’. Fastrack’s other campaigns that didn’t fail to surprise are ‘Sorry for what’ and ‘Mature is in’.
Myntra’s ethnic wear brand Anouk has also followed the practice of showing a progressive thought in each of its ads, starting from the ‘Bold is Beautiful’ campaign, talking about lesbianism, eve-teasing and being a single mother. The lesbian commercial was much talked about because of the treatment given to the subject and story-telling without going overboard.
Says Mohua Das Gupta, Associate Director Marketing, Myntra, who handles the Anouk vertical: “Consumers in the ethnic wear category have been largely stereotyped, unlike those of the Western wear brands, which is seen as liberating and evolving. We wanted to change that notion and show that the modern Indian woman defends her choices in life and is not scared to voice her opinion. We have highlighted it through our commercials. The shock value is interwoven with consumers who will use the brand.”
But while everyone we approached talked about the bold subject of the Anouk films, few could remember the brand which made these compelling ads. “Today, we are being quoted alongside brands like Tanishq or Tata which too talk about women’s empowerment. Doesn’t it mean that Anouk has managed to break through the clutter in some way? But this is not the end; there is a lot that still needs to be done for the brand,” says Das Gupta.
SHOCK VALUE & PUBLIC SERVICE ADS
Advertising always is for a purpose and the purpose can vary from increasing sales to highlighting your brand’s message, to building your brand and emotional equity to creating awareness for a social cause. In fact, a number of commercials today that use shock to make a statement fall under the Public Service Ads (PSA) category. The best example is the ‘Make Love Not Scars’ campaign created by Ogilvy which won a gold at Cannes this year.
Says Harshad Rajadhyaksha, ECD, Ogilvy & Mather, Mumbai, “We didn’t start out with the intent to shock, but to figure out the best possible way to get people to stand up and take notice. The idea of a real acid attack survivor facing the camera and giving beauty tips affected us deeply, that’s why we felt this is the most pertinent and most impactful way to get the communication across. But yes, the reason why we liked it was also because it had a certain shock value.”
The Reshma Beauty Tips video was a public service announcement for Make Love Not Scars, a movement led by acidattack survivors who want a ban on the sale of acid, available for as low as Rs 100 in the market. Kainaz Karmakar, ECD at O&M, who worked on the campaign, says the premise - that no makeup can undo the harm that acid sale can do to a victim - had much more impact than graphic details published in newspaper reports about acid attacks. “The objective of the video was to garner 25,000 signatures for a docket to make an appeal that has already gone to the Prime Minister. As of today, we have more than three lakh signatures,” Karmakar adds.
The other campaigns made by the agency that managed to awaken people to a certain cause are the post-pickle campaign for Rakshabandhan, which cautions against the use of the word Behen**od while making conversation; an OOH campaign against Polio where one of the rods on which the hoarding was perched was bent in such a way that the outcome resembled a child suffering from Polio, the Mumbai Police ad post Nirbhaya rape case, which was shown extensively in theatres, and the Dainik Jagran ad which shows little kids in school surrounding the father of a child who was forcibly being taken away from the classroom and told to shun education.
DOES STUNT MARKETING WORK?
‘Shockvertising’ is meant to pull you out of your comfort zone and force you to take notice but there are times when it gets reduced to a mere stunt. The brand either gets lost or takes a hit in the process. Prasoon Joshi, Chairman, Asia-Pacific, CEO and Chief Creative Officer, India, McCann Worldgroup, Asia-Pacific and India spells it out: “What will you do with shock value? The electricity which just shocks you is not required; the electricity which lights you up is. So, as far as it’s not a gimmick, I am fine. If it is just for effect, it will not build a brand. It will give the message for a while and get your attention, but if that gimmick becomes bigger than your brand message, I have a problem with it. What’s the point if people remember the gimmick and forget the product, how will it help me build the brand then? I would rather be boring, as long as I am building my brand.”
For example FabAlley, which positioned itself as a fashion brand for women who don’t care about fitting in or standing out, roped in stand-up comedian Radhika Vaz to debunk the seriousness of fashion opinions. It may sound like a not-so-scandalous idea, but only if you skip this one minor detail of how she did it all standing naked on the stage. It did succeed in creating a stir but many argue that that the shock value of Vaz’s nudity overpowered what the script wanted to convey.
Jagdish Acharya, Founder, Cut the Crap says, “The brand clearly was hoping to make the video go viral. I don’t think it worked for FabAlley because creatively, it didn’t connect. What is it that FabAlley was trying to say by suddenly referring to themselves as a rebel brand? It works to the extent that you get some free PR but at the end of it all, does it get converted into action or at least a positive disposition towards the brand? The answer is no. So one has to be very clear about how he connects a shocking idea to a brand.”
A HIT FORMULA?
Most creative hotshots don’t see shock value as a sure-shot formula for success, but only use it if they feel that the best way to convey the brand message is by shocking viewers into action. However, there are brands which approach agencies with a clear brief involving the use of shock value. An agency head who did not wish to disclose his name, said that a start-up had approached his team saying that they want to stir up a controversy and were keen on going to jail to push their brand into the limelight! The agency thought it was bizarre and declined to pitch for it. But the fact remains that while shock value may not guarantee a sure-shot surge in sales for the brand, it definitely gives companies, especially startups the window to make their presence felt in the market.
But are big brands also equally receptive to the strategy of creating a controversy around their ads to get attention? Manish Bhatt, Founder- Director, Scarecrow Communications says, “We recently made such a pitch for a soon-to-be launched product by one of the biggest business houses in India. While we didn’t spell it out in the commercial, it involved the use of a controversial term. The marketing team loved the idea but they were extremely jittery about presenting the idea to the top honchos of the organization, sensitive about negative PR. There was a client who once told us that only three things sell - sex, glamour and humour - so use them in our commercial! But yes, there are exceptions.”
In 2002, the Maharashtra State Commission for Women gave the infamous Duryodhana Award for gender insensitivity to Bhatt’s team for the Yellow Pages ad where a husband is shown searching for the telephone number of a divorce lawyer after his wife delivers a dark complexioned baby. “It was talked about extensively and was in multiple ways politically incorrect, but who would have thought the Tatas would buy the idea,” Bhatt chuckles.
The Scarecrow team has made several ads that bank on shock value for better brand recall like the print ads for Rupa undergarments, showing a bare-bodied model holding a rooster in a strategic position with a tagline below that asks - what’s your size? The commercial for Royal Enfield is another one, showing a fully grown man who is still joined to his mother with his umbilical cord intact, along with the controversial Suhaag Raat TVC for Hanes undergarments, more recently the ‘Blue Film Festival’ for Spykar jeans and the anti-smoking video featuring Sunny Leone and Alok Nath.
Bhatt says, “There will always be certain categories where you will have to keep saying a few controversial things. In the antismoking video, we have not shown anything revealing, but shown Sunny Leone. If showing her is a problem, then it would have become an issue when she first appeared in Bigg Boss. We have not spelt out what the son wants as his last wish, leaving everything to the audience’s imagination. We call it the theatre of the mind. We always play it safe, people get it anyway!”
Giving the perspective from a brand’s viewpoint, Siddhartha Pahwa, CEO, Meru Cabs, says, “At times, just a simple message, no matter how powerful it may be, may not break the clutter in the advertising space. If one has to break the clutter, there has to be an element of shock in it. But that shock has to be built well into the communication and into the product. If it’s a shock only for the purpose of getting attention, it loses its relevance after that first few seconds. So you must look at how that shock builds into the story, into the communication and product. Without shock, whatever may be the message, the reception is going to be very lukewarm, especially with the attention span of the consumer going down big time.”
SHOCK: THE CHANGING DEFINITION
The definition of ‘shocking’ has changed over the years - what was shocking a few decades ago, might be considered perfectly acceptable today. For example, there was a steamy ad featuring Malaika Arora and Arbaaz Khan for a brand called Mr Coffee with the tagline ‘Real pleasure doesn’t come in an instant’. Acharya says, “While it was an innovative way of connecting the tagline to the brand, it backfired for the brand with home-makers refusing to ask for that brand of coffee at retail stores out of sheer embarrassment. This was a time when coffee was not even remotely related to dating and we didn’t have the CCDs of today everywhere. The ad was ultimately banned and I have never seen another commercial from that company since.”
Today, an ad like the Durex commercial with Ranveer Singh may raise eyebrows considering that an A-list actor agreed to do a condom ad, but its treatment would not have made it run into problems with the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI).
A commercial by Skore condoms which shows a woman frisking another woman in quite a titillating fashion appears to be playing on the lesbian fantasy, but it comes from a product category which often uses shock therapy to sell. Sometimes, it is not the ad but the product that sends these shockwaves, as in the case of the brand 18 Again’s vaginal tightening cream.
Priti Nair, Co-Founder, Curry Nation, the agency which made the 18 Again commercial says, “Even if I had made a fivesecond PPT flashing the product name, it would have become a controversy because we were selling vaginal tightening cream. Within a week of its release, the ad went viral and the whole world wanted it banned including women’s groups. The FDA sent the makers of the product a notice and told them to pull it back from the market threatening to take them to consumer court. Some women even came and told me how losing their virginity was the single most painful experience for them, so how could I glorify it through my tagline ‘Feel like a Virgin’. Was Madonna stupid to make a song on it? Honestly, I showed the ad to my grandfather and he had no problems with it because there is no skin show or anything that is not sensitively portrayed in the ad. Our research showed that many women in India are using alum to tighten their vaginas, but talking about it in public was still taboo.”
The ad came at a time when the digital revolution was catching on in India. Today, most ads that shock are shown only on digital platforms. While some say it allows the brands ample time to communicate their thoughts because of lack of any time constraints, others claim that they are playing it safe by showing the ad to a relatively mature audience on social media as opposed to mass mediums like TV or Radio. So, has that made the job of the advertisers easy? “It has in fact made it more difficult,” says Karmakar of O&M. “Why is it that we still remember many of the ads from the 80s because you had one Doordarshan, and that’s all you saw? You were a captive audience, unlike people on social media. Today, I am not just competing with other ads but with media coming at viewers from all directions - WhatsApp, funny videos on your Facebook timeline and so on. Unless my video is relevant to the consumer, he is simply not going to click on it, so I have to think how do I shock him?”
@ FEEDBACK neeta.nair@exchange4media.com
