Whenever India plays, we will enable all to join & cheer for the team: Sukesh Nayak

While IPL has brought in a flood of ads, Cadbury has come up with a campaign with a difference - #CheersForAllSports.

The campaign, conceived by Ogilvy, invites people to an interactive platform and support Indian teams that are participating in other sports, apart from the IPL. It banks on the brand messaging of how Cadbury brings smiles and gives people a reason to celebrate.

The campaign starts with players from other arenas of sports talking about how they are disheartened by the way the citizens don’t support them as they do in cricket. Cadbury then invites people to be a part of the tournament virtually and cheer for the Indian team.

Through the campaign, the brand has created an ecosystem, a microsite where people can access a sports calendar and spot the sporting events happening around the world. For the same, they have partnered with Jio Cinema and Star Sports, and sports federations to help users stay connected. 

Sukesh Nayak, Chief Creative Officer at Ogilvy, spoke to e4m about the concept and the timing of the campaign and the thought behind it.

“We have seen how players are reaching out to the public to come and support them. India has been doing well in recent times in sports, it does require the love that it needs. ‘Cheers For All Sports’ is creating a platform that basically will follow the Indian sporting calendar and whenever India is playing, we will enable everyone to join and cheer for the Indian team whether it is wrestling, boxing or hockey in stadiums across the world. So that's the ecosystem that we are creating because we believe as a brand this is exactly ‘Kuch Achcha Ho Jaye’.

Asked about how the brand was positioning itself with this campaign, Nayak said the brand always had a positioning of ‘Kuch achcha ho jaye, kuch meetha ho jaye’ and that is what it has been doing for long with every passing campaigns.

“Cadbury has been a brand that stands for generosity. We stand for small fellows. As a brand, we have a tagline ‘Kuch acha ho jaye, kuch meetha ho jaye’, and that's all we have included in all our global platforms. In the last IPL, we did a campaign for the ground staff. That's our brand’s direction. So, it's not just a one-time thing, it's an overall larger TG that we work on. Once we have that, we creatively work on it so that the world takes a note of that.” 

According to Nayak, they worked on the campaign for seven months, partnering with Wavemaker to get the right media mix. Ogilvy is the creative custodian of the brand, but to get the creativity out in the public one requires the right media mix and a good media partner. “Without the right media mix, any idea will never reach the audience and they will never know about it.”

When asked about the challenges faced by the agency, Nayak said that with a great partnership they didn’t face any difficulties to bring this campaign alive. “There is no challenge. You have to have the audacity to be brave. Whenever you think out of the box, there will be difficulties in how to execute and that's where you have to work with the best people and collaborate to make sure those ideas are executed well.”

Nayak also mentioned that as a custodian of the brand Cadbury they will be doing multiple activities through the year but the brand tonality will remain the same - to be generous, not just in words but in actions.