"Mind"Space, "Mind"Book ..

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Posted by Radhika

Kolkata is a city where I have seen the highest amount of "Outdoor Advertising", in terms of banners, billboards and hoardings. There the hoardings are found in various shapes and sizes that almost cover the high-rises that mark the urban-ness of the city. Out of the thousands of brands screaming their lungs out, I remember one distinctly - Docomo. Why? On my way to the airport and back, Docomo advertising clearly dominated the rest in terms of number and distance covered. I clearly remember Hutch advertising in much the same way.. when all the orange logos turned pink overnight! (Fantastic Work!). As I look toward other cities I felt that outdoor advertising has been on an increase. An article I read reiterated my observation.


Traditional media platforms like television, radio and newspapers, are operating under tremendous pressure in the current economic recession. However, outdoor advertising segment is expected to register a strong growth in the coming years. After online advertising segment, the outdoor advertising segment has been the most dynamic in recent years. Outdoor advertising has been capturing share of advertising from television, radio, and newspaper.


Is there any particular reason behind this? Why would a company resort to branding in the same manner for a couple of kilometers without hardly any variation in size, design and concept? How effective is it? This century offers us a very unique thing that our previous generation did not enjoy - choices. The choices we have are so varied that it leaves us confused and traumatized. When there is an overload of information, decision making becomes as difficult as without much information. 


This somehow brought me to link the other popular media today i.e. the Internet. Companies today mark their presence through various tools like corporate website, online advertising, facebook, twitter, linkedin, blogs etc. The reason primarily is to enhance reach but the underlying motive is to increase brand presence. The more that the company logo gets familiar the more share it will occupy in one's subconscious mind. The conscious mind with the infinite offerings may not be able to take a decision by itself and here the subconscious mind can play a vital role. The familiarity of the colours, shape, tag line may not lead towards that choice but it will certainly be counted as one of the options towards the final "Yes." The reason that a lot of companies offer new packaging(Tropicana), new look(Yahoo!), new logo (Canara Bank) is solely to enhance mind share, to appeal subtly that "I'm here."