Culturally appropriate: Motoyuva ad
There is lot of debate happening on my blog post on Motorola advert. So I have decided to now write my answer in a post. The ad in question is for Motoyuva w230 and it shows the father scolding the young boy for creating a mess in the house. The boy puts the earphones and listens to songs on his mobile shutting out his father.
My simple assertion was that the underlying message behind this ad was not culturally appropriate.
One of the recent replies is from Maneet who works in the mobile industry. I am quoting from his response for the full response you should read the comments below my earlier post.
“They chose to catch the youth audience’s attention by telling them that they can shut out the world’s problems around them by listening to music on thier motorola phone. ” “Lets allow Motorola (who has since almost shut shop in India) a bit of creative space to advertise.”
I quite agree with Maneet that we need to allow Motorola some creative space to advertise. I think all I would like to point out is how this ad could have been done differently.
In India, mobile phones are bought by parents, so if it is promoted as a device to alienate parents I am not sure that will work. I think a positioning that shows mobile phones as a device that strengthens bond between parents and growing up adolescents has more chances to succeed in a country like India.
If we take the above ad for example, when the father starts scolding the kid, he should have just let his mobile phone ring with a ringtone of his father’s favorite song. That would have immediately put father’s mood at ease. And father could have been shown asking his son about how to get that ringtone in his mobile phone. The son could have shown him how to do that and while the father enjoys downloading his favorite songs on his mobile phones, the son could have cleaned the house while listening to songs of his liking on his mobile phone. And the tagline could have been - “papa bhi khush, beta bhi khush.”
I am not saying that my idea is better or it would have succeeded, but the point is that why make ads that show mobile phones as making kids irresponsible. 
11 comments
I see your point Priyanka and I agree with the overall thought.
I guess advertisingwise, we shall have to broadbase it a bit to understand it a bit better.
While we have this Motorola ad and also the Virgin Mobile ads (and also ads of Titan Fastrack watches launched recently), we also have ads by -
Idea - Where a Principal of a Convent (Abhishek Bachchan) helps an Old man educate his grand daughter by using a Mobile Phone as the means of communication. (Mobile Classrooms) What an Idea Sirji !
Airtel (much as I dont like talking about them as they are competition) where a boy gifts his father (who lives in a village), a phone stating that its like a thread connecting them as they used to use when they used to goto the Melas in younger days.
Recently Reliance has started a campaign (Though thier service is bad) where Hritik Roshan calls up his old friends and teachers and elders and even people who work around him like spot boys. The effort being to reach out to people and let them know you care.
On the whole, there is good and there is not so good happening. Cultural Values were never about walking the straight & narrow path. A little deviance is what brought Vasco da gama to India. A Little deviance made Galileo realize that the Earth revolves around the sun. A Little deviance made Ashoka realize that killing is meaningless and he has to find his self inside him.
I again make my point that such advertising (watched for a month) has impacted our cultural values as much as watching WWE (for years) has made all kids wrestlers (which it hasnt).
While of course, we should not stop discussing these issues. The clearness of mind will come in handy when things do go out of control.
Keep at it
and btw, the next time you are in India, I am taking you to meet my Advertising agency
They might learn something. And of course, you will get a coffee for all your troubles !
Ya I understand you & also I will get some use full idea from this as I am SEO - so this type of view will help in my personal & profestional life also..
@maneet I agree that the three examples of ads that you have given are culturally appropriate but I don’t agree that advertising doesn’t have impact. Just to clear the conception ads are designed to have an impact. In 30 seconds they want to motivate people to go out and check out their product. If not, they are a fail. When introducing a new technology such as mobile phones about which people have no prior experience admakers are trying to tell people how they can incorporate it into their life to enhance it.
Regarding WWE, it has select viewership and the viewers watch it for its entertainment value and not to emulate its behavior.
They are both different genres, if compared to books - WWE is more like science fiction which people read more for enjoyment. Ads are more like “How to -” genre
@maneet thanks for the offer of coffee. I will accept that but not in lieu of talking to advertising execs. that is work and work is not coffee
Ok. Firstly, thanks for taking my views at face value and accepting the examples I gave. Such writings happen during times of extreme clarity on the subject. During work that clarity usually escapes you because you are rushing making things happen in a world that is not constant.
Ok, now to the fun part… the points I’d still like to debate.
I agree Social media - advertising like movies, television, news, music and books (and now social networking on the net) shape the way an individual and even more powerfully, the society thinks and behaves. I have personally behaved in a certain way after reading a book or watching a movie. The shaping of the mind through influencing human emotions happens. Eg. The lines ‘So What, I’m still a rockstar. I got my rock moves….’ by Pink has made me get up and get going recently. Its inescapable.
Its a more powerful form of peer-to-peer interaction. Because Social media is assumed by the human mind to be an endorsement of society of the message that is being given.
Hence your point that advertising does influence, I believe is true. The quality, popularity, cultural acceptability & frequency of exposure of a stimulus given by the social media determines how much effect it has on us
That is my only point of debate on this kind of advertising.
I dont believe one off advertising like the Moto Yuva ad influences much because it came on TV for a couple of months and now is gone. Conduct a research and you might find it is remembered by very few.
The bigger problem in such cases would be the advertising campaign theme of ” Move On’ from ‘Titan Fastrack’. It champions the concept of social & sexual ultra-promiscuity. I say so, because it has a long term presence, multiple messages and hence larger chance of affecting the minds of the youth. It puts a stamp on the flippant desire of all of us to escape the emotional stress of relationships while still enjoying the pleasure of the company of people we find attractive. Its endorsing what has started becoming culturally a possibility. I suppose this is what happened in the US in the 70’s. And today the divorce rate there is above 50%.
Anyways.. this debate can go on. My mind needs some coffee and a bit more of the gym.
Coming ?
and may I suggest that you change your handle from ‘admin’ to Priyanka/Priya ?
It sounds like I am talking in China. Where I could be persecuted for expressing any views that the ‘admin’ might not endorse
You might want to accept my view that ‘Priyanka’ is a beautiful enough name to be mentioned as a handle
“In India, mobile phones are bought by parents”?? You seem to be really disconnected from reality
@ashok, that’s what I learnt in my conversations with college kids. Do you know of any studies saying otherwise? I would like to know.
@maneet, thanks
I have changed my name from admin to Priyanka.
@maneet, i agree you need clarity for such thoughts. I accepted your examples because I am familiar with those ads you mentioned.
First I would like to point out that ’social media’ (facebook, twitter) is different from ‘mainstream media’ (TV, newspaper, advertising). I am glad that you agree that media does have influence on people, however that effect may vary and is subject to many factors.
I agree that one MotoYuva ad doesn’t have the potential to change society. If you remember, in my earlier post I never talked about the impact of ad on society, I merely talked about the portrayal of Indian youth.
I haven’t seen the ‘Titan Fastrack’ ad so I wouldn’t be able to comment on it. I would appreciate if you could send me a link. And again I would like to reiterate that we cannot be sure whether the ad will have impact on people’s behavior. For that we will need to do a study but what we can study is how it portrays the product of people.
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