Promote. Don’t preach.

Indians are a breed apart. In more ways than one. They never cease to amaze; even fellow Indians!

One of our many idiosyncrasies is our ability and audacity to use things beyond what they are meant for. We use our office staff to do our personal things. We use washing machines to make lassi. And the one that has become fashionable of late is brands using advertising as agents of social change. The last one to attempt it, and pay the price it deserves to pay, is Tanishq. A jeweller who has been jailed by angry netizens!

I am not passing value judgment as to whether what the netizens did was right or not. People are entitled to their opinions. But brands are a different matter. Advertising, a whole lot, dissimilar.

I have no problems with the marketers of Tanishq supporting inter-caste marriages or asking people not to burst crackers during Deepavali. I myself stopped bursting crackers decades ago. But I don’t wish to make an ad for a client asking others to do so.

Why?

Because it’s called advertising, for a reason. It’s a tool to promote brands. Not an op-ed piece that I write to promote my ideals.

In this over-communicated and over-cluttered times, advertising in itself is over-rated. To reach consumer effectively and communicate efficiently takes some doing. A lot of doing, in fact. To communicate the one thing about the brand is increasingly becoming difficult. How can one expect to promote the product and push their thoughts and ideals too?

Advertising, in a way is like the Indian army. Their primary job is to protect. The nation and the brand, as the case may be. It doesn’t have religion. It bears no caste. It should harbour no thoughts of its own. Importantly, both are not instruments of social change. That job is better left for others to attempt.

Advertising should speak only one language – brand!