Retirement in the pre liberalisation era meant spending time with the grand kids, going on a pilgrimage, spending the afternoon on a rocking chair and followed by an evening walk.
Life insurance advertising in India has come a long way from the days of LIC using the ‘loss of a partner and the life thereafter’ as an emotional trigger to push people to buy into a plan. As I see, the top 3 reasons for fresh wave in the communication are as follows:
1. Entry of private players with the ULIP plans
2. Life expectancy has gone up and so have expectations from life
3. Younger generation looking at pension plans as investments
I am going to share and discuss five brands that are active and aggressive players in the market atleast with their media spend.
Max New York life pension plan
The latest ones to be currently on air, Max New York Life takes the cake and the bakery for their refreshing take on what one can actually do post retirement. The ad actually made me look forward to my retirement!
HDFC Pension plan
HDFC ad actually plays out all the things, which you would have to do, when you don’t save for your retirement which includes depending on your children to support you. It works because the script is fantastic and is so beautifully woven into their brand promise – SAR UTHA KE JIYO
AEGON Religare Pension Plan
Religare ad is a simple play up on inflation and its effects. Would have fallen flat if not for Irfan Khan screen presence. They somehow could not replicate the huge build up that they achieved with the teaser outdoors which said “Kya aapko KILKB hai? (KILKB standing for Kya aapko kam insurance lene ki bimaari hai)
One of the very rare ads which actually had a strong call for action, it invited the viewer to relook and recheck how much he would require post retirement.
ICICI Retirement solution
One of the early movers into this segment. This ad was a watershed in its category. It drove home the point of retiring from work and not from life. Retirement planning till then was something which the younger generation would not relate to instantly. By turning the problem on its head, the ad looks at all the things that one should keep doing no matter what stage of their life they are in.
SBI Plan
Brilliant script. Perfect casting. Great emotions. Need I say more
Do share your opinion and thoughts on this.
That was insightful, specially the ad reviews, though you could have said a little about SBI too.
ReplyDeleteThanks Rekha for your comments. Since the SBI ad was the most talked and loved, i did not want to add my two bit to it. but specifically to answer your request, i think the SBI ad works at a different level altogether. it actually showcase that money is actually not required in an mature relationship but you can still surprise your loved ones during special/al unusuoccasions.
ReplyDeleteheyyy...this is really good ....never thought about these ads this way , and the way the message has changed over the years !!!
ReplyDeleteThese blogs are really adding to my ad GK :)
thanks Amit :)
Interesting views indeed. I have two points to make. Firstly, I found a discord in one of the HDFC ads which I felt moved away from the overall campaign theme - SAR UTHA KE JEEYO! In the ad, we see a father happy & emotional at the prospect of his daughter giving him a bigger car. His peers in the same campaign were unwilling to take a helping hand from their grown-up children when getting off a train!
ReplyDeleteMy second point is related to AEGON-RELIGARE launch campaign. This is a unique and amusing case where the the campaign got attention but the brand did not! The campaign got attention because of the mystery created by KILB but unfortunately the message behind the mystery was not connected to the brand at all. The campaign ended up selling the generic product (insurance) and not the brand. When the idea is new, you sell the idea and not the brand. If you go to a town where nobody wears shoes, you don't sell the brand. You sell the idea of wearing a shoe. In this case, Insurance is not a new idea/product but the brand is new. So what do you highlight? The brand, ofcourse. AEGON RELIGARE did the opposite. Result - the idea of getting insurance is boosted but brand recall is weak. All because the basic hook - mystery/message - was never tied to the brand.
Dear Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteCompletely agree with the point on RELIGARE. As I mentioned, the hype was so much on the KILB that the brand itself got sidelined. A classic case where the client and agency fall in love with the creative and not the idea itself.
HDFC has had different renditions i the SAR UTHA KE JIYO campaign. I guess, what the brand was trying to say that it's self esteem that's dear to the elders than anything else!
Though i agree with you that the rendition could have avoided the contrast that you have highlighted.
Thanks for your comments. do keep them coming!
Growing older is like a normal distribution curve one starts to behave like a child after a particular age. so any advert that links it that way generally strikes a strong chord. The one that is doing this strongly is SBI, Old men playing cricket, Sister going to visit her brother and sharing ladoo and so on..
ReplyDeleteAs an audience, the various themes potrayed in these ads definitely capture my imagination to pursue my retirement planning diligently . . . instructive post.
ReplyDelete