While the recent ad campaign of OLX is beautifully executed and strikes a chord of nostalgia, it falls short of establishing the functional attributes of the product, says KV Sridhar, Chief Creative Officer of Sapient Nitro, reviewing the ad in ‘From Logo to IMPACT’
Reviewing the recent ad campaign of OLX in Episode 23 of ‘From Logo to IMPACT’ on Bloomberg India TV, KV Sridhar, Chief Creative Officer, Sapient Nitro says, “I think it is beautifully executed in terms of story-telling. And then the empathy which you get with the elderly is beautiful. The casting is good and it has been shot very well. Also it looks pretty natural and comes across as very real. So in terms of all of these elements, the ad is really very fine.”
“However, there were two things in this ad that troubled me. One is the connect. OLX is not Google where you can search for anything – even go back 500 years. If someone were to make a reference to a past time period, yes one can go to Google and search and get some news about it, but OLX is different. It is simply a classifieds site. If someone puts up specific information on OLX you can find it, otherwise you don’t. On OLX you can’t go and find the source, then take the source and then search. This stretch is really a bit much and confuses people. More specifically, it confuses people about what the product actually does and what the ad is saying. These are clearly two different things,” he adds.
Talking about the second shortcoming, Sridhar says, “The India-Pakistan theme is overused and overdone. Also there is nothing novel about showing old people in this theme. Today, India is moving on and is very different. Here I must also make a reference to the Google campaign which reiterates how young people are searching and finding things for the older generations. However, this OLX campaign portrays a past which you can’t actually relate to. There is a disconnect with the people who are actually using the brand’s services. So while the execution has been good and the campaign might have done well for the brand, it misses out on establishing the product link.”
About the campaign
The campaign, conceptualized by Leo Burnett, comprises two TVCs hinging on the pangs of separation that people experienced at Partition in 1947. People had to wrap up their lives and cross borders within a span of days (sometimes even hours). In the process, they separated from many an object that defined their existence and relationships.
The first TVC is a crisp narration of how a young man who is researching for a documentary on music from the 1940s learns about an elderly woman who regularly frequents an old music store in the hope of finding an LP which contains a song that is part of her childhood - a song sung by her mother. The old lady tells the man that she remembers the name of the singer- Zahera Bano. Visibly stirred, the young man searches on OLX for LPs containing songs by Zahera Bano in that era and he gets lucky as a man from Pakistan has posted an ad to sell an LP that contains this song. The ensuing visuals clearly capture the overwhelming sense of joy and gratitude that the woman experiences when she is gifted the LP.
The second TVC at one level is a subtle portrayal of the nostalgia (of days gone by) that elderly people live with. The opening black and white visual captures a shot from Lahore Railway Station. It is August 12, 1947 and teeming with passengers who had to cross borders at short notice. The subtitles tell the story- this was the last time that Rohan’s grandfather (who now lives with him) had seen his father. The TVC progresses to the present - his grandfather recounts tales of his father and how he used to take pride in his possessions and etch his initials on them- a favourite being a camera. Rohan decides to search for it on OLX and surprises his grandfather. He finds it without much difficulty as a Pakistani man who now resides in the town in which his grandfather had grown up had posted this vintage camera for sale. For the old man, this find meant everything.
About the Show
Each week, the half-hour weekly show ‘From Logo to IMPACT’ - co- produced by exchange4media and Bloomberg TV India - brings together top CMOs, ad gurus and agency heads to provide an in-depth analysis of the hottest trends and news in the ad-media-marketing space. Its focus is on the new age economy and new entrants in the advertising space. The show is aired on Bloomberg TV India at 10.30 pm every Wednesday, with repeat telecasts at noon on Saturday and 6 pm on Sunday.
