The campaign
I don’t have to think hard to know, which campaign is my best yet. Even after eight years, it smiles back at me — the Aditya Birla Group series of commercials. To define what makes this campaign worthy is also to recount my ongoing journey with this project. I cannot see the two as separate.
It would be unfair to say that there aren’t other campaigns that we have created that aren’t good. Of course, there are. However, it is the sheer longevity and dedication to a well- thought-out brand positioning we have sustained over six years that gives this campaign the stature and gravitas that perhaps others may not measure up to.
What works
To stand the test of time (and times have changed over the last 10 years), staying true to your core message. To entertain beyond just standing out in the crowd, and to be so technically slick that it complements content, but doesn’t take over. All of this makes the Aditya Birla Group campaign so complete for me.
How we began
VGC’s association with the Aditya Birla Group is from its inception. We had worked closely with the client to evolve the group logo, extending into a comprehensive identity, and further partnered on various initiatives on a continuous basis.
Going mass media was a watershed moment for the brand. Early, when we pondered with the client about a mass media communication plan, the question was not about what position to take. Instead, it was if advertising the brand was relevant at all? Aditya Birla Group was largely into commodities and other B2B businesses. Usually, such businesses don’t consider it necessary to get into mass media.
Yet, going through deeper discussions with Kumar Mangalam Birla and Pragnya Ram, head of corporate communications, we all felt convinced that it was indeed the right time to take the brand out to the market. The group had successfully transitioned from a ‘License Raj’ era to an open economy corporation of impressive scale. It had consolidated its enviable foundations even further through the astute stewardship of Kumar Mangalam Birla. Its national and international reach was notable. More significantly, its ambitious path into the future meant that we needed to further establish the brand amongst investors, and create a deeper understanding of the group to potential talent. And, of course, reach out to the opinion makers and media.
We took the collective decision to talk about the group as a whole, and not speak about the individual companies and their activities. Especially since the ongoing communication to the group’s specific target audience was already achieving that. Our insight was two-fold: one, the name Birla is part of our nation’s psyche and historical legacy from independence days. Two, Aditya Birla, the founder, had expanded the group’s presence across a global geography.
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The direction was clear
The corporate brand always speaks a statesman language and goes even beyond. ‘Taking India to the World’ was born out of this very insight as the tag-line, positioning the brand as an Indian multinational. The stylised surreal visual imagery has become its signature treatment. The films have aimed to achieve scale and stature, depicting the group’s presence across geographies, employing a multinational team. The breathtaking, epic quality of the films help them to transcend a rather simple corporate message and take its position of owning the nation’s new growth story, making every Indian proud.
Building a campaign
While the first film spoke of the global footprint of the group, the next two emphasised on the multinational team. The most recent ad film highlighted the key sectors of this diversified corporate. At the outset, in 1998, when the group had conducted research, only the name Birla was recollected. The first film, in this campaign series, was launched in March, 2004. Since then, an independent tracking study has shown that Aditya Birla brand has scaled up dramatically, being one of the most spontaneously recalled.
A mutual partnership
I do believe that such dramatic brand positioning can only be achieved when a client is equally committed in building stature through its entire business ecology, going beyond just a commercial, which is the case here. While
I can look back on this campaign with pride, I also look forward to where it is going with great passion. The potential is huge and the effects are manifold.
Will it work today?
It is working even today while we are presently working on the next level of this campaign.
One needs to take a long-term position if working on a corporate brand strategy, unlike for an FMCG or telecom. Fortunately, it had worked. If it had not worked, we would have course-corrected. In this particular case, we arrived at the strategy with a lot of long-term thinking in place.
Every time we work on a communication, the client also backs it up with an independent tracking study. We found that the tracking study is showing positive results. As of now there is no reason to deviate from it, what we are doing is adding more depth and detail to it.
Preeti Vyas
Chairwoman, Vyas Giannetti Creative