How brands are making the most of Rahul Bose's banana moment

We spoke to experts about moment marketing and how brands are leveraging Bose’s tweet

e4m by Shreshtha Verma & Noel Dsouza
Published: Jul 30, 2019 9:00 AM  | 5 min read
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Actor Rahul Bose’s tweet about being charged Rs 442.50 for two bananas at Hotel JW Marriott in Chandigarh, last week, opened a floodgate of humourous tweets and posts on social media.

Brands like the Taj Hotels, Amazon Prime, Policybazaar, The Park, Oyo, Pizza Hut  joined the bandwagon and cashed-in on what is being called the ‘Rahul Bose Banana Moment’.

We spoke to experts about moment marketing and how brands leveraged Bose’s tweet.

Azazul Haque, Chief Creative Officer, Mullen Lintas, said moment marketing is an extremely cost-effective tool.

When asked how this idea of moment marketing helps brands, Haque added it makes the brand younger and active. “A little cheeky idea on a popular trend is extremely cost-effective as the brand rides on an existing trend. Witty, Clever are other traits that brands embody when they join such conversations. So moment marketing is an extremely cost-effective tool to have top of mind recall for a day”, he said.

According to Haque, certain things just hit the right humourous chord and brands always look for such moments like the Rahul Bose incident.

Sabyasachi Mitter, Founder and Managing Director of Fulcro, said that brands have latched on perfectly to ‘Rahul Bose Moment’.

He said that moment marketing, in general, allows brands to stretch the boundaries of their creative freedom which they can’t do in the course of normal brand communications.

“The Rahul Bose banana episode lent itself naturally to brands having a ball and showing off their creative prowess and quite justifiably so,” he added.

Sumanto Chattopadhyay, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, 82.5 Communications, said he liked the Taj group’s reaction the best. He said, “The Taj one was the best because it was classy and understated, in keeping with the brand image.”

While some experts saw it as an amazing move from brands, others had a different opinion on the matter.

According to Pramod Sharma, Executive Creative Director, Rediffusion, brands should look at bigger events. “For me, none of the creatives broke the clutter. The trending topic was not a big event that brands could leverage. Something like Chandrayan is an event that can be leveraged. I don’t think it is so significant to get noticed,” said Sharma.

Similary, Dr Kirti Sharma, Assistant professor Marketing MDI, believes that moment marketing is unlikely to have a long term impact on brands. It is more likely to be seen as earning brownie points over a competitors misery.

Dr Sharma explained that social media users have a short attention span. Hence moment marketing is unlikely to have an overall impact on the consumer.

Sameer Makani, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Makani Creatives said that in today’s 'always-on' social media world anything can go viral. "This Rahul Bose fad is another such example where moment marketing has yet again managed to connect brands to their audience. Brands like Oyo, Natures Basket, Pizza Hut, etc amongst few others have leveraged this trend efficiently to their benefit. With regards to the moment market or such cheeky ads, Amul is the one brand that inspires others. Oyo rooms with the tagline that says 'Don’t slip! For 442, you can get a whole room!” is unusually interesting', he said.

 

While the Rahul Bose Banana Moment proved to be an amazing opportunity for brands, Neha Misri, Social media evangelist and marketing professional, said that brands should also be careful while cashing in on such moments for marketing.

“While it is good to be magically ‘spontaneous’ at times, but going too far with the message can backfire for your brand,” she added.

 

 

Here are some of the brands that made the most of the moment.

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Eat pizzas? like a bose! #TastiestPizzasAt99

A post shared by Pizza Hut India (@pizzahut_india) on

 

 

Insulation tape from #AnchorByPanasonic protects you from all kinds of shocks. Well, almost. #RahulBoseMoment #ShockProof #Banana #GoBananas pic.twitter.com/vEl3aPF4a6

 

 

 

 

(With Inputs from Noel D'Souza)

 

 

Published On: Jul 30, 2019 9:00 AM 
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