This time around, the Idea Cellular campaign champions the cause of environmental awareness.
After the breakthrough “Walk when you talk” campaign, Aditya Birla Group’s Idea Cellular has come out with another hard-hitting message. This time it’s championing the cause of environment by urging people to use their mobile phones instead of paper.
The ad begins with the grim picture of rapidly depleting forests and indiscriminate felling of trees to feed paper mills. Abhishek Bachchan, as the lone surviving tree, then gives the idea of replacing paper with mobile phones and, as in all Idea campaigns, the word spreads around. From reading newspapers to music notes, people start using the mobile screen as a substitute to paper which eventually rejuvenates the forests.
According to Idea Cellular Chief Marketing Officer Pradeep Shrivastava, the brand looks at championing ideas that will appeal to the masses. “We choose ideas that are powerful enough to change the way people live,” he says. His rationale is that the market for mobile telecommunications services is overcrowded and no provider can claim to differentiate itself on the service platform. Hence, Idea opted for effective communication to differentiate itself. With this in mind, the brief given to the company’s agency, Lowe Lintas, was simple — set up a problem and provide a telecommunications solution to it.
To be sure, the telephony company undertook quick research to develop its stratergy. “We had to make sure that we appealed to all age and income groups,” says Shrivastava. Accordingly, he and his team spoke to people across segments on their environmental concerns, and it turned out that paper wastage was high on their list.
This is the sixth in the “What an Idea Sir ji” series. The first was set in a village ridden with caste wars. Bachchan steps in and suggests that instead of names, which reflect the caste, all individuals should be known by their mobile numbers. This would get rid of the caste system. And with that Idea Cellular established the “What an idea, Sir ji” punch line. “The reason we’ve stuck to this theme is because we’ve had much success with it,” adds Shrivastava. “We’ve received excellent responses based on our brand health monitor.”
The second ad showed a deaf and mute tourist in Agra with Bachchan as a guide who uses SMSes to communicate with her. The next ad saw Bachchan as the head of an educational institute. The ad reflected the barriers girls face in education. In the ad, Bachchan suggests lessons on the mobile phone to universalise education.
The fourth ad in the series broke in January last year, close on the heels of the nation’s general elections, and showcased the use of mobile phone for democratic decision-making. Then in September 2009, it came out with the “Walk when you talk” commercial.
Just like the democracy campaign, this time too, Idea Cellular has got the timing spot on. The goings-on in Copenhagen and the increasing environmental consciousness of governments and consumers have given causes like this a shot in the arm. Shrivastava though maintains that it is purely coincidental. “We’ve been working on this for nearly three months now. It took a while to come out because of the computer graphics that we used.”
Idea Cellular began life in 1995 as Birla Communications. A year later it was rechristened Birla AT&T and then again in 2001 it was named Birla Tata AT&T. However, shortly after, the much-talked-about joint venture fell through and Birlas bought out the entire stake. Finally in 2002, Idea Cellular was launched. Along the way it has acquired smaller operators like Escotel and Spice. At present, the company claims to be the third largest telecommunications company in terms of revenues and the fourth largest in subscriber base which stands at 55 million.
