Ride like a pro

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Bajaj Pulsar's new stunt-packed campaign targets the growing tribe of serious bikers.

The road ahead of two bikers is jammed. The narrow street is choked by cars, trucks, cycles and people. But the bikers aren't willing to spare a second being stuck in the jam. The rider on the black vehicle speeds up over a raised platform and jumps over a waiting truck.

His companion prefers to take a narrow stairway in a close-by building instead; he rides up his red bike on full throttle, making a startling contrast with an image of revolutionary leader Che Guvera painted on the wall behind him. He then enters an elevator and reaches the building's roof.

What follows is a series of niftily shot stunts "" the black bike hops from one terrace to the other and lands on the roof of a building, with the people in it feeling the impact; the red bike leaps off a terrace, somersaulting onto a moving truck and managing to land on its wheels.

Not surprisingly, the film carries the disclaimer "Performed by experts. Do not attempt these stunts". The 90-second-long ad is set up against the backdrop of Cuban streets and has a catchy Arabic soundtrack.

It ends with the bikers screeching to halt, the back wheels lifting in the air, to let a lady and her goat cross the road. Then comes the tag line: Bajaj Pulsar 200 DTSI, distinctly ahead.

This new Pulsar ad campaign by Bajaj Auto for the 200 DTSI was launched last month and, like the previous Pulsar campaigns, it is also an attempt to woo bikers to upgrade to larger bikes, an area of strength for the company.

"No other automobile works on the thrill factor as bikes do. Since this is a bigger bike, the imagery had to be a notch higher, and hence we chose to portray the extreme sport of free running," says Amit S Nandi, general manager, marketing, Bajaj Auto. (Free running is a sport where the rider perfoms acrobatic stunts to overcome various obstacles.)

The thrust on larger bikes is easily explained. Bajaj has a 60 per cent plus market share in the 150cc and above category of motorbikes. Also, since companies enjoy higher margins in larger bikes, Bajaj has made persistent efforts to attract bikers to larger bikes.

At the same time, the company claims, the new Pulsar 200 DTSI is targeted at the more serious biker and hence has been designed with many features akin to those on sports bikes. The bike flaunts features such as oil cooling, tubeless tyres, a naked drive chain, split pillion seat and others that are normally seen on sports bikes.

Since the target audience is rather different this time, the company's current communication, too, is different from the earlier.

In the past, the Pulsar was branded on two platforms "" one, showcasing performance, and the other, featuring its typical male/macho character. For instance, one of the ads in 2001-2002 showed the Pulsar turning its "head" to follow two nurses sashaying down the road, while another showed it pulling a girl's dupatta.

But given its focus on the professional biker who craves performance more than anything else, the current commercial has stuck to showing imagery in this regard alone.

The company says that the macho image works best to attract college-goers who are conscious about the impression their bikes have on young women. But this time, the brief was simple: excite the serious, rather professional rider, one who is likely to spend his weekends on long riding trips.

Abhijit Avasthi, group creative director, Ogilvy & Mather, the agency behind the ad, agrees with the logic.

He says, "The serious biker doesn't care much about sexy-looking women. What turns him on is performance; hence the new ad attempts to showcase the power, manoeuvrability and freedom that a skilled rider can enjoy on the Pulsar 200."

Also, by giving the impression of being a more powerful bike, Bajaj is hoping that it can motivate the 150cc and 180cc Pulsar buyers to upgrade to the 200cc instead. The 150cc and 180cc Pulsar cost Rs 58,000 and Rs 59,000, respectively (ex-showroom price).

At Rs 65,000, the new 200cc Pulsar is not parked too far away. Also, to further the up-market feel, the bike is only sold at the 50-odd pro-biking outlets Bajaj has across the country.

Once the script for the ad was approved by Bajaj, O&M approached Malaysian filmmaker Farouk Al Jaffery of Planet Films "" the same director who had shot the earlier Pulsar commercial in 2004 "" to film it. Though the film has a Cuban backdrop, it was shot, in about a month, in various lanes, by-lanes and buildings in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The last Pulsar ad aired more than a year ago. So Bajaj is ensuring it gains high recall this time. The company has cut five edits "" one for 90 seconds, two for 60 seconds and another two 40 seconds "" and plans to air more than 100 spots a week on around 15 to 20 television channels. Since it is targeting the youth, the advertisements can be seen on channels such as MTV, AXN and Discovery.

The company had also advertised on sports channels such as Set Max during the recently held Cricket World Cup, and mass Hindi channels such as Star Plus and Zee. It plans to run this campaign for the next two months before popularity surveys decide its fate.

During these two months, the company also plans to carry more than a hundred hoardings in the top 15-20 cities in the country.

As seen with most companies these days, Bajaj, too, has taken campaigning on the Internet seriously. The company is advertising on home pages of large email websites such as MSN and rediff and a few biking content websites like ProShop.

Also, a clip on the making of the Pulsar has been passed on to Pulsar groups on various social networking and group sites to create virals.

In fact, according to Avasthi, his team regularly monitors comments and posts on these sites to get vital consumer insights. The company is also planning to launch radio commercials in the top 10 cities soon.

It seems Bajaj is throttling its bikes for the future. Apart from the 200cc, a 220cc Pulsar in also on the anvil. And reports in the media suggest that the company is also likely to launch a 250cc bike in less than a year. Looks like a busy year ahead.

WHO DID WHAT

Client: Bajaj Auto

Agency: O&M

Creative: Abhijit Avasthi, Rajneesh Ramakrishnan and Samir Sojwal

Client servicing: Albert Pereira and Alok Kalra