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Monday, November 10, 2008

Brand Obama: The only product that did well due to recession


Obama is President. Well, this is the first time I've followed a US elections closely and the brand Obama has done excellent marketing. He has changed the way elections are done, and has taken canvassing to another level.

For instance, I was watching a program last evening on cnn-ibn which was disecting the Obama victory and drawing Indian parallel's with Mayawati. During this program there was a video clip which showed Obama giving a speech in which he used the words "YES! WE CAN" frequently. What's interesting here was everytime he said "YES!", the crowd would follow-up with a chorus "YES! WE CAN". This speech was intented to pep up the crowd and instill belief that the US can recover from its current financial crisis. Man it seriously has instilled some confidence. Moroever the terms "YES! WE CAN" which in some sorts is a great slogan, has worked wonders for brand Obama. Now that is marketing personified.
Word-of-mouth, Slogans, Market Penetration, Buzz marketing, product bundling, etc etc name any concept in marketing and you'd see a great application in the Obama Story.

Consider the million regular bloggers around the world, you could be rest assured that 9 outta 10 of them would've offered views on Obama. This has resulted in a great word-of-mouth campaign. For those who remember the reception he got when he went to Berlin during his campaign, would agree with me that he literally got a celebrity's welcome! His brand awareness campaign has had amazing market penetration. Even the Coke's and McDonald's of the world took more time to be such a common household name, but Brand Obama has done it all in a matter of few months.

You know all hoopla that goes happens in India when there's an election. How many times has the Indian elections created such a hype that other countries keenly watch and analyse it? I would say none! Or take even the developed countries, the day i heard a few ppl talk about the UK elections was when Tony Blair stepped down and Gordon down took office!

The buzz about brand Obama has grown multiple folds and has done a great job. It has got people talking, writing, following it around the world. I feel marketers around the world should soon start using this as a benchmark to assess the success of their marketing campaign.

As Prof.Ray nicely put it 'Listen; The Obama story is not one that you look for in the annals of inspirational tales, instead its one that must feature in the Marketing textbook of tomorrow. It must stand testimony to the brilliance of a born marketer.'

So folks lets wait and see if Brand Obama lives up to its expectations or creates a widespread Cognitive Dissonance! ;)

1 comment:

MJ said...

Rajiv,
I agree that Brand Obama has attracted even outsiders like us to follow US elections.but this election was very special for various reasons.In the beginning the possibility of the first Afro-American president or the first Woman president brought the media attention Also the recession also fueled the media hype since the new government policies will have an impact on global businesses.and yes web 2.0 like youtube blogs have played a major role in this media hype