IPL: A Black Swan Event

Just a thought……Does IPL come under the umbrella of Black Swan Events? or Is it a scripted tournament, if yes than I must say it is better than even most of our Bollywood movies (to avoid any controversies I will not be talking about the latter here). Well according to me it is a Black Swan event the reason being:

IPL 1 Rajasthan Royals won the trophy. (At no point in time one could have said that they will emerge as winner)

Then in IPL 2 last year’s toppers came down and last year’s bottom two teams were put in the final.

The sudden shift of IPL from India to SA in season 2 (but everything was managed in such a way that it felt like they knew it was going to happen…U cannot make an event of such a big scale happen in about a few weeks time).

In IPL 3 when everything was going in favour of IPL, it was struck by a controversy (I think we all are well aware about it THE LALIT MODI CASE). Now the question in front of us is that, will IPL still enjoy the massive support it had managed to get in past 2 years?

And last but not the least: Will Lalit Modi regain his lost position? We here at Brandistics support Mr. Lalit Modi and hope to see him back in action. Because according to us: If IPL is ‘Manoranjan ka baap’ then Mr Modi is ‘IPL ka baap’. Well whatever the result may be we think it will again be a random one, which will come as a blow to us.

We have already seen in our previous posts that IPL stands way ahead among all the other sporting events. Now let us see how this greatness of IPL has lead to growth of various things with respect to India. They are:

Emergence of Brand India (As it is promoting itself as a game played by the Indian mass. Ad campaigns like Saare Jahan se Achcha are helping it to achieve the milestone)

Emergence of a business within cricket, thus making it a very lucrative option for Indian business houses who are ready to invest in sports.

At the game level, it has provided the young talented players of India, a stage to showcase their talent (I think this is the main reason why most of us are seeing cricket as a career).

It has promoted cricket as a commodity rather than a brand. This has brought down the emotional attachment of people with the game as a whole, but it is exploiting there emotion by targeting different states/parts of India by forming different teams representing different parts of India.

It has lead to the emergence of cricket as a competitor to football and basketball.

With this we will end this post. Stay tuned.....

Positioning IPL

Ok..... let me start this post with a question....What is the first thing which comes to your mind when an advertisement says: “We’re number two; we try harder”? Yes we think of only one company that is AVIS. This advertising campaign made us forget all about the number 1 company in that field that is Hertz, and all our focus shifted to Avis which positioned itself as a number 2 and promised to work harder so as to satisfy us.

Positioning has now become a process by which marketers try to create a distinct image in the minds of the prospect for its product, brand or organization. We will not be wrong if we say that Positioning is a game which companies play in the today’s me-too market place. Before the launch of IPL the only thing which would have been in the mind of Mr. Modi would have been that how to position this event in the mind of people of India.

So in 2008 Max came up with a wonderful concept in the form of an advertisement which placed IPL as “Manoranjan Ka Baap”. The idea here was to show that the IPL was better than anything and everything which was in existence at that time. It was a pure source of entertainment for the audience and had everything in it drama, action, emotion etc. All in all it was like a 3 hr blockbuster movie which could get audience bounded to their seats.
So looking at the facts mentioned above I would like to give this advertisement a mighty 8 out of 10. Because it left no stones unturned to seek the attention of the audiences and made the event a true hit.

Then in 2009 Max came up with a 60 second commercial which was a series of shots which showed different people from all over the country doing the same thing at the same time. In the first shot we saw, many people are sitting in a park, reading the newspaper and turning the pages of it at the same time. In the second shot cooks in a restaurant twirl rotis in the air at the same time. In the third shot, a class room is full of kids and all ask for permission to go to the washroom at the same time. Then we see people at Mumbai’s VT station are hailing a taxi at the same time. Then a final voice is heard which says – ‘Ek desh ek junoon, DLF IPL sirf MAX par’. This advertisement was a true classic because this created a binding between the people of India and IPL, which was being projected as an Indian entertainment event (the significance of this advertisement also increases because this was the year when the venue of IPL was shifted to SA due to security concerns, so coming up with such a concept of promoting an event as a nations event was wonderful).
I would like to give this advertisement 9 out of 10 because this was successful in holding the Indian audience’s attention even though the event was shifted to South Africa in a limited span of time. And hadn’t this commercial been successful the whole existence of IPL could have been under a major threat because of a simple fact no audience means no sponsors.

Then finally we come to this year’s IPL which is again back with an interesting commercial which says – “Saare Jahan Se Achcha Hindustan Humara” which shows captains of different teams standing in a stadium.
This ad campaign acted as a medium to get IPL back to India and position it in the mind of Indian audience as an event which is truly Indian in nature. The background music of the ad further exploited the patriotism of Indian population. So I would like to give this ad campaign a 8 out of 10 because of the wonderful concept of clubbing an ad with the nations tune of “Sare Jahan Se Achcha”.

With this we end this post of how did IPL positioned itself amongst the Indian mass. Stay tuned....