With more than 200 million U.S. consumers walking around with mobile phones, it's only a matter of time before marketers find a way to fully utilize them as an ad medium.
Calendar 2006 was not just a rocking year for mass market cars. Even for luxe brands, sales were sizzling hot. DaimlerChrysler, makers of the Mercedes Benz brand, has announced a doubling of growth in January-December 2006.
The AV Birla group has kicked off its retail plans by acquiring Hyderabad-based supermarket chain Trinethra Super Retail and its fast-growing online shopping outfit, Fabmall.
Continuing with the New Year revelry, Fever 104 FM is giving its listeners a chance to win some fast bucks. The FM radio station is launching a contest titled the ‘Fever Bolo’ contest, which begins from January 8 and will continue till February 2, Monday to Friday from 8 am to 8 pm.
Madhouse, a Delhi-based media and entertainment company into movie rental service is quite upbeat about 2007. The company has embarked on an aggressive advertising campaign involving print campaigns, below the line and above the line activities for the year to create awareness for the brand.
As part of celebrations of 60 years of Indian Independence, CNN-IBN is instituting an annual award ‘CNN-IBN Indian of the Year’, which will recognise the Indian/s whose contribution to the country has strengthened the foundation of the society and has helped build Brand India in the process.
B R Sharan has been appointed as Chief Creative Officer of Saregama HMV’s Cinema and Television Division. Saregama HMV, formerly the Gramaphone Company India Ltd, plans to re-enter film production following the success of the music of films such as ‘Gangster’ and ‘Bluffmaster’, which it has released.
The mobile value added services industry could be worth nearly $1 billion or Rs 4,560 crore by the end of 2007, from its current size of Rs 2,850 crore. This was revealed in the ‘Mobile Value Added Services Report’ jointly prepared by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and IMRB International.
Girish Shah, who quit as Marketing Head of Kingfisher Airlines in November 2006, has joined Anil Ambani owned Reliance ADA Group as Head of Branding. His new role will involve responsibility for the core branding of the group.
Lintas has decided to create a position that would work with all its agencies – creative, media and integrated – and report to the group's Chairman Prem Mehta. Taking over the post is Raj Gupta, who has been appointed as Chief Strategy Officer, effective January 1, 2007.
Tata Indicom has awarded its creative duties to FCB Ulka. It is learnt that the telecom player would focus on brand Tata Indicom in 2007. McCann Erickson is the incumbent agency. The account size is pegged well above the Rs 80 crore-mark.
Launched in India in June 2006, international women’s magazine, ‘Marie Claire’, is out to enhance its brand visibility in 2007. The magazine will be laying more stress on its promotional activities this year. Starting January 2007, the magazine has launched a mega subscription drive, which will continue till March 2007.
Lowe Kolkata has been assigned the creative and media duties for the promotion of Indian jute following a multi-agency pitch. The advertising campaign will be under the aegis of Jute Manufacturers Development Council and National Council for Jute Diversification.
The Indian Listenership Track (ILT) 2006 Wave 2 has been released and for the first time, Kolkata has been added to the list as well. There is good news for radio stations with listenership largely seeing growth and the conversion to regular listeners increasing. However, while the Mumbai market has shown growth for all stations, Delhi has registered a marginal fall.
The ILT 2006 Wave 2 results are out for Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata, and Radio Mirchi rules the roost in all the three metros. Radio City follows closely behind in Mumbai and Delhi, while Red FM occupies the second spot in Kolkata.
Preet Bedi, who had quit as President of Rediffusion DY&R in September 2006, has joined Percept Picture Company as CEO from January 2, 2007. Bedi would be reporting to both Shailendra Singh, Managing Director, Percept IMC, and the Percept Board. In his new task, Bedi would be spearheading the various projects that Percept Picture Company has lined for the year, which include as many as 22 movie titles.
The year 2006 once again reiterated the fact that titles mattered for the movie genre. In the Hindi movie genre, Zee Cinema had a good run in the year, but cricket brought MAX right up and the lead stayed in the following weeks. In English movie genre, STAR Movies and HBO had a tough fight, with STAR Movies scoring marginally.