McDowell's No. 1 extends 'Spirit of Friendship' through Karaoke

DDB Mudra South used the insight that music has always been at the forefront of young Indians' favourite hobbies

BestMediaInfo Bureau | Mumbai | September 24, 2013

Click on the image to watch the TVC.

McDowell's No.1 is the largest selling franchise in the world. It owes its success to the efforts in reinventing and being relevant to consumers over the last 40 years. Over the last four years the brand has been addressing its young Indian target audience with the positioning 'The No.1 spirit of friendship' with the intent to add cheer to moments of camaraderie and friendships amongst the youth.

But to connect with consumers at a deeper level, just communicating this is not enough. The brand vision has to lead to brand behaviour – the brand needs to show what it stands for. The core idea was take an integrated approach to communication where advertising was a part of what the brand would do. It was important to actively engage with the youth in a way that brought the positioning to life.

DDB Mudra South used the insight that music has always been at the forefront of young Indians' favourite hobbies. It is omnipresent as background to conversations, parties and having a nice time with friends. The hidden singer in young Indians is slowly emerging and finding an outlet for self-expression in Karaoke -- the erstwhile bathroom singer is finally out in the open. So much is the ongoing craze for Karaoke in the country that it is now considered an interesting activity to indulge in with friends and one of the main attractions that pull in youngsters to pubs and clubs. The brand wanted to enter the conversation, be a part of it and enable the youth to participate in this activity.

Hence, Karaoke became McDowell's No.1's perfect opportunity to reach out to its consumers and tell them what it is all about - fun and bonding with friends.

The McDowell's No.1 Karaoke app is an easy to download mobile app across all platforms, which plays out the background music of a variety of popular hits. The aim of the app is to create moments involving the participation of friends whenever and wherever, bringing to life the role of McDowell's No.1 as the No.1 spirit of friendship. McDowell's No.1 leveraged its brand ambassadors – the fun loving, entertaining, 6-hitting machine Chris Gayle and his friends, actor Purab Kohli and Indian Idol Chang, to come up with a fun commercial. We see Gayle agreeing to his friends' idea of participating in a talent show by singing a popular Bollywood number using the McDowell's No.1 Karaoke app. This leads to him becoming an instant hit and a singing sensation.

Even though the ad is about bonding and singing, it's not about being really good at the latter. What's important is that the group has fun doing it. And in the end that's what really matters.

Said Vipul Thakkar, ECD, DDB Mudra South, “The McDowell's No.1 Karaoke App is meant for a group of friends who want to have a good time regardless of the time or place. With this app you don't need to be at a party, or a specific venue, and neither do you have to be a great singer to enjoy karaoke. And what better way to communicate this than to show a hard-hitting batsman become a singing sensation and belting out totally different kind of hits from his app.”

The TVC:

https://img-cdn.thepublive.com/filters:format(webp)/

Credits:

Client: United Spirits

Brand: McDowell's No. 1 Soda

Agency: DDB Mudra South

Chairman & Chief Creative Officer: Sonal Dabral

President: Ranji Cherian

ECD: Vipul Thakkar

Executive VP: Sujay Ghosh

Account Management: Anil Nair, Deepak Rajagopal, Arjun Krishnadas

Creative Team: Vipul Thakkar, Saurabh Doke, Devaiah Boppanna, Vignesh Raja, Praveen Shekhar

Production House: 30 Seconds of Fame

Director: Uzer Khan

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

Info@BestMediaInfo.com