Are you thinking of getting a new mobile connection? There are over ten service providers offering half-a-paisa per minute billing. Or getting a new life insurance policy? There are over a dozen companies offering you guaranteed seven-year high on NAV (whatever that means). Or a new car? There are over 15 models to choose from in the small car segment. Oh, I haven?t mentioned a hundred channels to watch mothers-in-law exploiting their child brides.
Life was much simpler two decades ago?with the ?choice? of a single phone connection provider, buying your LIC policies from your friendly neighbourhood uncle; visiting friends and relatives in the second-hand Fiat and watch Mahabharata on Sunday mornings.
The fight for attention of audiences has begun. Among all the marketing noise, you can try to outshout the competition, but that is an expensive proposition. Smart companies are using unconventional methods to create a buzz around brands and getting their consumers to smile?using pranks. And in this digital age, there is an unexpected payoff?consumers viral out pranks to their friends and family, creating a virtual cascading effect for the marketing message. These range from venerable companies such as BBC and Toyota to new kids on the block such as Google and c2w. What better day to pull this off than on a April Fool?s day?
Let?s start off with BBC. The respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in. Many called the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this, the BBC diplomatically replied: ?Place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.?
Playing pranks gives powerful companies on the planet a more human, impish image. Google has a long tradition of playing pranks on its consumers on April Fools day. It once announced a new ?MentalPlex? search technology that could read the user?s mind to determine what the user wanted to search for, eliminating the step of typing in the search query. This always led to a page full of April Fool?s results.
Another prank was Google Gulp, a fictitious drink, announced in 2005. According to Google, this beverage would optimise one?s use of the Google search engine by increasing the drinker?s intelligence. It was claimed this boost was achieved through real-time analysis of the user?s DNA and carefully tailored adjustments to neurotransmitters in the brain.
In the Indian context, one most popular hoaxes in the recent past was Kavita Bhabhi, a spoof on Savita Bhabhi. The fantasy starts with a visitor to the Bhabhi?s house, c2w gave the users a chance to personalise their fantasy and be ?the visitor? to the Bhabhi?s house. But little does the user know that this fantasy would end up being an April fool joke by the c2w team.
The Kavita Bhabhi story didn?t just end with the climax scene; users were given an option to share it with friends via email. Kavita Bhabhi was not restricted to the website?she had a profile on Facebook, Orkut and even had conversations on Twitter. With so much hype, it caught the attention of the media, leading some publications to feature the site of April 1! Kavita Bhabhi was the most searched term in Google Search from India for April 1, 2009. This year Kavita Bhabhi invites users to watch a pole dance. Check out what happens next by visiting kavitabhabhi.in.
The writer is COO, Contests2win.com