The Language of Indian Commercials

9/11/2011

RITIKA SINGH
M.A PREVIOUS

When I say Yehi hai right choice baby, aha What comes to your mind? Its fresh/ It is a tad funny And... Its youthful!!!

And this instant connection with youth is not just established by the visuals of a few youngsters enjoying Pepsi but... it is youthful because it speaks the language of the youth. This is what I would like to discuss in my presentation: How language in commercials reflects the choice of a target audience. How ad makers deal with a multilingual society. The language of commercials that reflects society. INTRODUCTION What is an advertisement? It is a tool that helps brands to promote their products or services.

But if one looks closely a commercial can be both visually and linguistically challenging, making use of clever slogans, catchy songs, and striking visual images to capture the attention of viewers. I believe the language used by Brands hint at their target audience. Whether they want to attract the youth...or the middle class or if their product is for women or men.........how brands communicate their product to the audience they have in mind, is where language plays its vital role. I will consider some cases of ads that use language to show who their target audience is in terms of: 1. Age 2. Class 3. And gender ADS THAT TARGET A PARTICULAR AGE SEGMENT: Case I: Pepsi Pepsi was one brand that always focussed on the youth as its target group. When launched in 1989 in India, Pepsi entered the market with the tagline of

The choice of a new generation(1990). Pepsi evolved its language with the changing youth. It always managed to create an impact in the market by using the language of the youth and in turn also giving them a language to express themselves. Hence taglines like Yeh Dil Maange More and the more recent one of Yeh Hai Youngistaan Meri Jaan were quickly absorbed by the youth. Hari Krishnan Vice president of Pepsico: The one quality that makes an ad endearing is when it talks the youth language, and changing this language as the youth change with time has been the key reason for the Pepsi ads to make an impact. It was also the first to introduce a new language of Hinglish in Indian commercials. (Discussed later) Case II: Airtel When launched, Airtel wanted to target the business class and hence used sophisticated language to build its image. Its tagline at the time was: The first choice of Corporate Leaders With reduction in tariff rates due to rising competition Airtel wanted to shift its focus to the youth and its language absorbed youthful energy and lingo. The recent tagline of: Har ek Friend zaroori hota hai Instantly struck a chord with the youth of the country not only because it features the vignettes of friendship but the funky pseudo rap mixture of Hindi and English that the jingle had was the realistic language of the youth... Airtel promoted itself in the language of the target youth...This is how the youth of today communicates..Hinglish is a part of this mode of communication.. And by doing this Airtel clearly wanted to be on the side of the youth and used their language to communicate with them. This new focus to side with the youth was also very subtly put across in Airtels Impatience internet plan...Here the brand made a clear distinction of its target...there is a line in the ad and...They say we are impatient.

Although it does not directly say who they and we are, it is very clear Airtel again wants to be on the side of the youth...It again demarcated who they were targeting by the subtle use of language. Case III: Appy Fizz Two Cool Drinks To Hang Out With Again uses the youthful jargon. ADS THAT TARGET A PARTICULAR CLASS we wear cool suits, we wear shiny shoes were the blackberry boys!!! Vodafone blackberry boys. This was a very clever way of breaking a class stereotype with a product. Blackberry conceived to be a business class phone now is accessible to other classes and everybody can then become a Blackberry Boy Along with targeting a particular age group, the language and the medium of that language can also show whether ad makers want to brand their product as a luxury item or something for the middle and lower classes. Case II: Lux When Lux was initially launched as a premium soap they used the tagline: Beauty soap of Film stars" The name Lux itself was derived from the word Luxury. Then with time HUL decided not to be just for the elite class it changed its tagline to: " Bring out the star in you" -which urged the common man to beckon the inner star as the lowered price of the premium soap made it accessible to him. Here very subtly Lux played with words to include other classes in it target group. As compared to lifebuoy that always placed itself as a necessity rather than a luxury. Hence it targeted the middle and lower income groups by stressing on its utilitarian aspect of protection substantiated by the tagline "thandurusti ki raksha kartha hai lifebuoy, lifebuoy hai jahan thandurusti hai vahan" Case II: Tata Manza " Indulge in Style " . A class apart

Both taglines stressed that the Manza is a luxury item meant for the upper class, an indulgence for the elite. Case III: Mc Donalds When globalization made Indian markets accessible to Multi Nationals like Mc Donalds it also gave them a challenge of Indianizing themselves to make them more appealing. Mc Donalds is very successful in doing this. It wanted to target the young students and the middle class and almost always its a tag line of Im Loving it is preceded by sirf 25 rupee mein -therefore they clearly want to remove the mental price barrier for the middle and the lower class. Case IV: Government ads: Use chaste Hindi for the Aam Nagrik to easily understand the crux of the commercial. Jan Hit mein Jari Jaago Grahak Jaago ADS THAT TARGET GENDER Gender is perhaps most easily identifiable of all...one does not need to look so closely at the commercial to understand their target audience in terms of gender. Hence I put forth just a few taglines where it is very apparent Case I: Maruti SX4: Men are back No other taglines deals more directly than SX4s Men Are back which directly highlight their target group. Men. Case II: Fair and Lovely: Fair and Handsome: This is a very simple example of word association with gender.

MULTILINGUAL SOCIETY AND ADS

Remember the Idea ad that had its tagline of Break the language barrier with an Idea! It was the one where a South Indian guy was taught how to say raem raem tau in Haryanvi This was a brilliant example of how multilingual India is and how ad makers themselves deal with such a society. If language is a tool that can be used by ad makers for promotion of a product, it can also be a hindrance, especially when it comes to breaking those linguistic boundaries. How do ad makers promote their product in a society with 850 mother tongues and 22,000 dialects? 1) Translation: Even though it is not very cost efficient brands do dub their ads in regional languages. Some large Indian and multi-national corporations have understood this and therefore conceive communication in Hindi and at least in languages of states which are their most important markets. Eg Johnson and Johnson dubbed its ads to tamil. Airtel har ek friend ad is also dubbed in Telugu, Marathi, Kannada, Bengali. Fiama di Wills has a malayam version of its ad. 2) Using gestural language. The Vodafone ads are a brilliant example here as the zoo zoos appealed across all ages and crossed the linguistic barriers by simply advertising using just visuals. Classic Cadbury ads depicted the joy of eating chocolate that could be understood by all with the tagline Kuch Khaas hai Hum sabe mein

Idea: What an idea Sirjee and India ho gaya hai 3G pe busy Idea is an example of Indianization of English. Idea first used Sirjee then the Indianized pronunciation of busy added to its appeal. Amul: Utterly Butterly delicious

Amul entered the Guinness Book of world records as the longest running advertising campaign as it maintained its appeal for 50 long years. Sometimes using very witty puns and sometimes using Hinglish to support its intelligent humour that held the attention of the educated common man. From national and global issues to popular movies, Amul incorporated everything into its campaigns. The little girl wearing the polka dotted frock immediately caught everybodys attention and the clever humour appealed to all ages and also the intelligentsia. HINGLISH: In the eighties taglines were either in English or in Hindi. For example Thumbs Up Happy days are here again! Gold Spot As crazy as crazy as we're about Gold Spot, the zing thing and Enfield was saying in chaste Hindi Yeh Bullet meri jaan, manzillon ka nishaan But then, Juhi Chawla crooned 'Yeh hi hai right choice baby, aha' -a new advertising language was born and embraced with gusto. Once an American brand like Pepsi gave it the stamp of cool, Hinglish got official status. Like Pepsi and Amul many brands used a mixture of Hindi and English to lure the Indian audience. From movies like JAB We Met or Love AAJ KAL to songs, Hinglish eventually has led to English not being regarded as a complete foreign language. English from our colonial past was taken and mixed with Hindi to Indianize. This not only reflected the language used by society but also gave them the advantage of getting a larger audience.

A McDonald's campaign in 2004 had as its slogan 'What your bahana is?' (What's your excuse?) Coke also had its own Hinglish tagline 'Life ho to aisi' (Life should be like this)

To conclude language can be a huge barrier but when dealt smartly with, can cross cultural and societal boundaries and can even sell a product!!