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April 2005 saw the all-out declaration and dawning of the 'Bombay Battle' (Mumbai's print media war). The big daddies of the print media industry were all on the battlefield: fully armoured, and wielding freshly sharpened swords. The Hindustan Times (HT) and Mumbai Mirror relentlessly bombarded consumers with their communication; DNA (Daily News & Analysis) even more so. And 'The Biggest Daddy of the City', The Times of India, aggressively hooted that all forty pages of their mother paper would now be in full colour.
More than any of this communication blitz we were facing, the whole city was abuzz contemplating the situation. Was DNA going to dethrone The Times of India from its lofty perch when it launched in a couple of months? Could a peculiarly 'Delhi paper' possibly even claim its stake to the pie? Would the mammoth backed Mumbai Mirror oust the Mid-Day from of its long enjoyed stronghold? Stranger questions were raised. In retrospect, the newbies descended on the city and the jury was out for a disappointing miniscule duration of time before it was back with its verdict: Nothing had changed. The rulers of the roost were still just that. And that all the hype created was, well, just hype created.
Through all this — now seemingly senseless deliberating, contemplating, show of strength, screaming and general all round madness — there was interestingly but a single silent warrior. Secure and confident with their standing in the hearts and minds of their patrons and advertisers alike, it just sat back and disinterestedly glanced over the mayhem from time to time. That a DNA or HT would eat into their readership hardly bothered its team. They had a good product and all those who mattered to them knew it.
All embroiled in the 'Bombay Battle', some boasted about how many subscribers they had, a sizeable time before the launch date; others tried to seduce subscribers with more supplements, colour pages, price-cuts and even prizes. The silent contender, on the other hand, lay low and loomed large.
Enter The Indian Express! As soon as the hysterical furore blahed down, it raised its head, with not a 'campaign' but literally a social movement, as you will see. Curious about the how's and why's of it all, we got in touch with all involved in this new avatar of the heritage brand.
Says Gautam Mukerjea, General Manager - Marketing, The Indian Express, "We were looking at revitalising ourselves… especially with all these new papers coming in! We also wanted to conduct an introspection exercise for the brand: where it was being exposed; what it was heading towards; and to define the way ahead. At the end of the day, it was a 26-pager against competition that was a 50- or 100-pager with lots of supplements; where Aishwarya Rai makes front-page news. They've taken that route, and it's fair enough: that's their joint proposition. But we had to probe further and decide what space we wanted to occupy. 'Journalism of Courage' has definitely helped us over the years, and that is exactly what we are all about. So we thought about what sort of 'journalism of courage' would interest the reader."
The Indian Express is arguably the most investigative of its journalistic peers; more importantly, they follow everything till the end, but what were the other avenues they could venture into? So they brought on Rama Bijapurkar, Strategic Marketing Consultant, on board, to work out a strategy. They realised that it was imperative to look at what they were really doing for their readers; how they were going to pay them back; and how they could work better; while at the same time, keeping their proposition intact. "So what we came to was that we stood for 'journalism of courage': which in turn, explains India to you; which in turn empowers you to choose a better quality of life; which is what we are really communicating. So we built brand realisation. And in the process, we also made a few small changes in the product: like a few changes on the front page to make it more healthy rather than enraged-mindset and expose-prone," explains Mukerjea. And that is how 'India Empowered' was conceived. Needless to say, roping in Vyas Giannetti Creative (VGC) was a fabulous move on Shekhar Gupta's (The Indian Express, Editor and Chief) part. When he appointed the agency (replacing Lowe) to create for the entire Indian Express bouquet of publications, he is quoted to have said, "We were on the lookout for an ad agency that was like The Indian Express, with attitude and distinctiveness to match. I'd say the Express and VGC has been a great match." Clearly he was not wrong.
Mukerjea expounds, "We were not going to get into the price wars; we were most definitely not going to take that 'buy two take three' road. And we were certainly not going to give birth to countless supplements unless, of course, they have reader relevance. So what this new campaign has done is make the reader sit up and take a fresh look at us, which is what our objective was. Then there was the primary and most important aspect of the editorial level."
To read the entire story, buy a copy of Impact Advertising and Marketing magazine dated October 10-16