MAXIMSPEAK: Zoozoo: Vodafone Benefit??

-Sitaraman Krishnan

Gone are the days when people used to zap TV channels during ad breaks. Companies are now trying to be as creative as possible with their advertisements. With the increasing cost of advertising, every second of the air time is becoming significant. The Indian advertising industry has realised this fact and is trying to improve the quality of content delivered to the viewers. The ‘Zoozoo’ ad by Vodafone is one such example.

The Indian Telecom industry is one of the fastest growing markets in the world. The number of mobile phone users has already exceeded 360 million and is expected to reach 500 million by the end of year 2010. With such a huge market available, companies are trying to cash on this opportunity. Currently, Vodafone, Airtel, BSNL, Aircel, Tata, Reliance and Idea are the major service providers in India. In a cut throat competition, the telecom companies are trying out to maximize their reach through promotions and advertisements.

Zoozoos are animated characters with egg shaped head, rounded belly, thin arms and legs created by O&M India, advertising agency to convey the different value added services of Vodafone. The peculiar Zoozoo actions were performed by women, children and some professional ballet artists. The characters in ads live a simple life, display emotions and speak a humorous language.

The strategy used by Vodafone for this ad series is very commendable. The launch was perfect choosing IPL2. Cricket is a religion in this country and showing the ads when viewership is maximum improves the brand presence. ‘Ad Recall’ is an important factor for any ad and the Zoozoo ads managed to have a positive impact by using characters that can be related to humans. There is a storyline for each ad which helps in this regard. Also, people look for variety in ads, and Vodafone provided it with 30 different ads each for a different Value Added Service.
Everything looks fine here. But is Vodafone using the right strategy? And did Zoozoos make people overlook Vodafone? There are more than 3 lakh fans in official fan clubs for Zoozoos in Facebook and Orkut in just 4 months. Without the name Zoozoo being displayed anywhere in the ad everyone knows it.

On the other hand, we know Zoozoo ads communicate the different Value added services (VAS) to viewers but how many of the 30 such services do we remember? The cost of switching is very high in mobile service provider market Vodafone is trying hard to consolidate its position. The high cost of switching, in the market where number portability is not available yet, leads to a possibility of the good ads becoming an entertainment medium.

After the launch of the Zoozoo campaign, the sales of Airtel still remain on top. So, was the intention of Vodafone more on creating brand presence and not on increasing sales? The strategy seems to increase the brand awareness and create a buzz about the brand. The same had happened when Vodafone came with the ‘pug’ advertisements which created lot of attraction from the kids to the environmental activists.

There are a few unanswered questions. Should the ad campaigns become more popular than the product itself? Zoozoos themselves have become a brand with a huge fan following. People may associate Zoozoo rather than Vodafone’s Zoozoo. But still, Vodafone is continuing its plans of increasing Zoozoo’s fan base by launching Zoozoo key chains, Zoozoo mugs, Zoozoo t-shirts, Zoozoo toys, etc. Recently on Independence Day, special videos were launched.

According to ‘The law of the mind’, being number one in the mind of people is more important than being number one in market place. The problem here is that changing the mind of an early adopter is not as difficult as changing the mind of a conservative. Vodafone is so far picking up the former but how well it can transform the latter depends on its future strategies. The sales and market share figures at the end of the year would give a judgement, till then wait and watch Zoozoos!!!

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