General Elections- The great Indian Saga

It is deemed to be the largest political exercise on this planet involving close to a billion people. It might also be among the most expensive democratic exercise (cost us Rs 846.67 Crore in 2009) and practically a logistical nightmare. The great political tamasha called General Elections in India.

We live today in an age where communication and technology have transformed the coordination process; but I cannot even image the kind of pains Sukumar Sen, the first person to be the Election Commissioner in India, might have gone through. Holding elections in India in 1951-52 and 1957 might have been the most herculean task. A time when 85% of the 176 Mn age eligible voters were illiterate, a time when accessibility of some areas was almost impossible and designing a code of conduct, ballot papers, boxes and the procedures had no references. The worst of it all- registering 176 Mn voters onto a list.

A fitting tribute to his capabilities- Sen was also the Election Commissioner in Nepal and Sudan. Not to mention, there were a few votes cast with his name written on it by some in 1951- I feel people just felt that if one person can orchestrate a process so daunting; he can run a country as well.

Indian’s have always been starry eyed when it came to people they vote for. From the Thakur of a village to a religious head, a union leader to sportsmen, everyone has come under the democratic process at some point or the other. Film actors have a special mention here, as they have always portrayed larger than life characters. So if an MGR was campaigning, his words became the words of the god he played in his last super hit. This trend will only grow as I see it.

Electoral reforms have been coming in throughout the years beyond with change in the rules for political campaigning, propaganda and use of resources- but the Election Commissioner as a person rarely rose to a recognizable figure until almost 40 years after Sen. T N Seshan will possibly be always remembered as a man most responsible for cleaning up the election process- not to mention; feared by politicians and political parties alike. Seshan along with MS Gill and GVG Krishnamurthy was the trio who in my opinion could have also taken up against the Chicago mobs.

I did read that Gill and GVG were brought in by the government in power then to negate Seshan’s one man army by bringing in parallels- but together (along with all their internal disagreements) made the Election Commission a force to reckon with. Any irregularities in the election procedure, suspected malpractices or violations usually resulted in disqualification of the person or the result. The iron fist method was a remarkable success. Gill went on to succeed Seshan as the big boss and successfully brought in the Electronic Voting Machines- which now limit the possibilities of a booth capture or bogus voting to a fair extent. Not to mention, the counting process is now far more efficient and quicker.

One large and significant change that has come to the fore front of every election campaign has been spending of large sums of money on media campaigning. Penetration of radio and televisions across the country was very low till the 80's and the state run network only accessible to the ruling party. The traditional means of mass campaigning remained dominant with the megaphones on jeeps and last minute campaigning with car drop services for voters.

But advent of private television networks post 1991 firstly provided options to a wider array of options to the people. Add to it the rise of music videos and private albums- all contributed to use of new media in elections. It brought with it national debates on channels, opinion polls along with expert opinion panels.

By the time the 1996 elections came around, private media was well entrenched in India and I was also enriched with some understanding of the political parties and their policies. If media had anything to play, I got to see some of the political campaigning of the Rao government trying to push forth their development agenda and liberalization via a songs. What was funny in that song though, was seeing how the destitute couple was uplifted to their smiling glory by a government led by a leader whose frowns became a cartoonist delight.

The by-elections in 1999 were amazing for one reason- every political party had entire Video CD with songs in their praise and criticize the other. I still can’t get over “dauda dauda bhaaga bhaaga sa… Deve Gowda bhaaga bhaaga sa”, and attracting Bollywood singers and directors as the talent. Advertising agencies were running the political campaigns and public relation agencies wrote speeches, designed press releases and managing the public image of leaders to a level where even the dress they wore for a public appearance was orchestrated. Today I can listen to Modi adding in verses to Sukhvinder Singh's 'Saugandh mujhe iss mitti ki' almost 3 times an hour on radio and the 'Shiv Senaaaa' tune playing across Mumbai.  

Mobile phones as a medium of political campaigning came in dominance in 2004 with BJP having a pre-recorded message of Atal Behari Vajpayee playing out to every voter on a reliance network. In 2009, the UPA bought the rights for “Jai ho” and the NDA fought back in mocking them with “Bhay ho”… the latter failed miserably though.

Internet and social media has taken political campaigning to a whole new level. BJP and AAP are amongst the most prolific users of this media with dedicated teams working overnight. Youtube videos are helping voters excited. Websites are updated on daily basis and even a “Mann se hai Mulayam…” can become the talk of the town in minutes. Anything said in any form cannot miss the public eye and the person involved cannot get away saying he was misquoted.

Well, so the stage has been set for the next big saga to unfold… all that remains is how all the media and popularity transforms the political landscape of this country. 

Roti, Kapda aur Mobile

If I wanted to sum up the changing fabric of India over the last 20-25 years, this is what I would say.  While roti and kapda have been popular political slogans right from the 60’s as basic and essential needs for a population, mobiles have become a key requirement for people. And why not; calling rates in India are cheaper than in comparison to any place in the world, handsets and even smartphones are available within budget and tower penetration has been improving. One big reason for this is the advantage of a large population base; the numbers compensate for operating revenues.

Mobile phones have changed the way India has functioned over the last 20 years of its existence in India. It started off as a luxury which only the super-rich could afford. No ordinary Indian could afford a handset resembling a brick costing above Rs 5000 and paying Rs 16 the moment they said hello. But this was an era when number of networks were few and competition had not set in yet. Orange

The first winds of change came in from Reliance which came in with its captive low cost handsets and lowest calling rates for the day. They targeted corporates and roped in the biggest names with their massive employee strengths to come through with corporate offers that gave them scale as well as steady clientele.

The next boom came around early 2000s when Airtel was launched and came in with a sweeping offer of free SMS every month. This was revolutionary in terms that mobile phones unlike fixed lines were no longer for voice alone and SMS was the choice of communication which was most analogous to an internet messenger. And as always, even at times when a call would cost Rs 1, an SMS was free.

This coinciding with cheaper handsets entering the market which set the trend for mobile phone rising higher in the must have list. Finally, when TRAI scrapped the free SMS schemes and limited discounting, some felt was there scope to innovate beyond calls and SMS at 50p. Enter Tata Docomo and its game changer per second billing. In reality, this is not discounting at all… in fact this is expensive that what other players offered; but the perception of value won the game.

Running parallel to this was the handset market with Indian market flooded with low cost options through joint ventures with East Asian companies. Between 2008 and 2010; there were a total of 26 handset companies which entered India. Everyone had a phone; the maid, the watchman. The neighbourhood vegetable vendor now took orders on the mobile phone and delivered on the door step. You could now call a taxi cab as the driver had a phone. STD calls were now dropping as migrants could call their relatives in rural India at places where power and water may be a problem, but telephone networks were always present.

During this time, I used to avidly follow the blog of an ex-Nokia guy; Tomi Ahonen. In my view, he was among the first guys who had predicted how the mobile phone screen would be the next big thing. At first, the idea seemed a distant dream considering India was still in the WAP days with abysmal subscriptions. But how right he was. In the next few years, the personal space of the telephone screen was doubling faster than the traditional computers and with the advent of smart phones is almost looking to replace takeover the market completely. Mobile based internet access has been increasing ever since. Today there is more revenue being generated through mobile based internet services as compared SMS. Just a few numbers- 185Mn mobile internet users in India alone. It kind of justifies the reason why an internet platform like facebook has bought a small mobile social App like Whatsapp. 

Blackberry was considered a serious business phone until BBM became a college hangout. It was now a scenario where a business person carried a top of the line Blackberry and a collegian had a low end model with almost every functionality as the top end. Dedicated widgets for applications were a rage when launched. But all this was just a phase as we see it today.

The rules of the game have changed and the biggest game changer has been Android. The open software platform and Apps for android rendered Symbian as an ancient relic and Android, Windows and iOS became the mobile softwares by choice. Today, it is not surprising for me to find people from modest backgrounds flaunt a high end phone as a combined effort of low tariffs, cheaper handsets and a host of free Apps to cater to everyone. It is astonishing to find that globally, 24% of all internet access is through Android (phones and tablets), 18% is iOS (all devices including PC) and Windows is only 9% (all devices including PC).

Where will we go next is anyone’s guess. But one thing is for sure, what is the ordered of the day, will be a page in history soon. What Motorola and Nokia were once; Samsung and iPhone are today. Mobile technology is changing so rapidly that the jump from iPhone 4 to iPhone 5 has been about 6 months. Mobile phones are now a need and it won’t be long when nomophobia (phobia of having no mobile connectivity) will be as prevalent as common cold.

India- The State of Ignorance and its Youth

I was not born the time India became a sovereign nation. Nor did I witness the China war, the East Pakistan conflict or the Emergency. I was a toddler when insurgencies brew in Punjab and not even in my teens when Babri Masjid was knocked down. I will agree that it has been my self- driven need to know about my socio-political surroundings and an insatiable thirst for history as a subject. But what is disturbing is that how many people of my age chose to update themselves with India post 1947.

One of the arguments made by Ramchandra Guha in his scholarly book- India after Gandhi, is why the history textbooks of India stops abruptly after 15^th August 1947 with only small references made to the Goa liberation. I second this sentiment. The constitution, local self government and the legislature are a small part of a small annexure called the Civics text book; treated so insignificant that it was reserved for last day look before exams (or so it was in my times). The transition from the Nehruvian economy to the post ‘91 liberalization came in an even smaller textbook of Economics. Sadly this book also failed to capture the License Raj era; so one day in the 50’s we were a socialist economy building the dams and steel plants (the temples of modern India), next in ’77 we threw out Coca-Cola and IBM and the day after that in the 90’s we got in Coca-Cola and IBM to make us the 2^nd fastest growing economy in the world.

While these thoughts resonate my mind in a lot of ways- what got me to write them down was a recent interaction and some research I did to verify why this was happening.    

It has been just over a week after the Rahul Gandhi and Arnab Goswami saga unfolded on TV and the reactions on how and what was said and what should have been said are still high. Amidst the discussions on at work, I stumbled upon a line asking what should Rahul Gandhi apologise for; there have been so many riots in India. What was so special about 84 riots?

Though it was not my argument; I simply could not refrain myself from the discussion even as I could sense there was a bagful of ignorance to plough through. My question was pretty simple- no doubt any of you were even born when the riots happened, but what as per you all were they all about? The answers I got were both hilarious on one part and raising a concern as well. Indira Gandhi made derogatory remarks against a Sikh religious leader... some sardar ending in‘walla’- Indira Gandhi had called some Sikh saint a terrorist and the Sikhs retaliated by killing her- Indira Gandhi sent some police into Golden temple to catch terrorists and so there was rioting, Operation Blue Star- AC ka ad hai kya???

As much as I was taken aback, I could not help clarify that it was a chain of events leading to the assassination followed by riots which involved some Congress leaders in the fore guiding mobs. Okay, but why should Rahul apologise? He said na that I was not even born then. Needless to say that a man of 40 was most definitely born then; but what was ignored here was that it was moral responsibility for party actions was being demanded much on lines that Modi is being asked for in the 2002 case. Finishing touch came in a statement- I’m not into politics so I don’t know much.

This incident involved people who are 20 something and voters in this land of the largest democracy. The Congress campaign is stating that 50% of the country is under 30. If this is the awareness about our own country and its state- what are the young turks planning to vote on?

I am not sure who should be blamed or is there anything to blame at all? This part of our country’s history is not written in text books, politics is a dirty and dynasty driven business, TV has Sitcoms and social media always has dancing kitten videos to entertain GenY. Until someone wants to take it seriously by interest- there is no reason or mens to know it.

But I don’t know, somehow we know more about United States than India. Though when I probed these set of people (until I got ‘kya subah subah bore kar rahe ho...) I got some winners as well- the tallest waterfall was Niagara, Kempe Gowda Airport was my mythical creation and Chhattisgarh (like Raigad, Rajgad) is a fort.   

Bottom line, I know it is much cool to know all about the latest gadgets, hottest house DJ and even every word of what Pitbull yaps in his song and say India is in its state due to corrupt Politicians; somehow it is our own ignorance and neglect that we have such people deciding our fate. 

Click- Shopping ka naya formula

Diwali- one of the biggest festivals in India was underway last week and possibly serves as the time when massive spending on shopping takes place. Amidst talks of a weak economy, slow down in terms of manufacturing and spends likely to go down, I saw a report on the fact that this festive Indian were high on shopping for high end consumer durable and smart phones and that most of this was  through online purchases. Online shopping was up by 30% this year for Diwali against last year while foot falls at malls were up by 10%.  

While I was writing about the slow death most malls in and around Mumbai were seeing, I had mentioned that the next big threat to malls was going to be a completely different form of shopping with the ‘Click to cart’ replacing the ‘Pick to cart’. While I was reading today that traditional retailers of electronic goods have filed in a petition to counter the online attack claiming online retailers selling at a loss, retail chains with spaces in malls definitely seem to be bearing the brunt of the internet savvy crowd moving away from the showroom outlets.

I have been a slow mover to the online shopping spree. My first online purchase might have been back in 2004 from bazee.com (now ebay India) where I got a 256MB Sony pen drive for about 900 bucks. At that point, I had no idea of online retail and was actually wondering how the ‘Buy Now’ option worked on a site which was known for bidding. I did not even have a credit card then and the transaction was done for me by a colleague.

 As a contrast, I picked two pen drives of 4GB and 8GB with a combined cost of 600 bucks.  I reserved online book purchases only for exclusive titles which I could not get pirated on the street or ones which I did not find in Crossword. I was astonished when a recent purchase of two books online was at 50% of the bookstore cost. I have now started exploring other avenues as well. Though my experience of a pair of dark glasses or an mp3 player some years back was not too encouraging, the same with shoes and earphones has been good so far.

So will I try foods or clothing next? Traditionally, these areas have been my choice for pick off the shelf as quality for things I eat or wear is of utmost importance to me. I have still not too much faith in the online system for performance oriented items which cost more than a thousand or things where touch, feel, demonstration and replacement still matter. But I don’t see that trend to last too long by the way things are going.  

As for as I am concerned, paying for shipping is not a huge cost for items where reaching out, parking my vehicle and time spent in the activity are monetized. For all low value items; Click- is my shopping ka naya formula. 

Who is killing Odisha??

Though my title might suggest, this is not about any natural disaster- this is a disaster which has disturbed the socio-economic fabric of this state. I recently had an opportunity to travel through the interiors of Odisha to a place called Barbil in Keonjhar district taking my count of visiting the state from never to three in a space of ten months. Though on the last two occasions, I was restricted only to Bhubaneswar and outskirts, I did get a hint that the state was still more of an under-developed area with a high concentration of tribal population. This trip was an eye opener to the real world of sorts.

The first few hours for me till Jajpur were more of a drive through the countryside, much like Maharashtra’s Thane district in the monsoons. Scenic aspects of the countryside with lush green fields and wide highways running through the fields on both sides were refreshing. But as we approached the mineral rich areas where mining was the key activity, the picture changed drastically. Mining in India should be a profitable activity with low royalties and high rates offered in the Global markets.

But as I had read in ‘Patriots & Partisans’ by Ramchandra Guha, mining in India has always resulted in ecological and economic plunder. What came in next was like time travelling back into India 20 years earlier. The roads got bad and un-motor able, signs of iron ore on the sides and accidents involving dump trucks signifying reckless driving. The road was single lane in either direction with heavy traffic and pot holes that were representative of the lunar landscape. Traffic jams which ran for kilometers and involved at least 200 vehicles on both sides with 10 wheel trucks with 16 tonnes of ore to Paradip at the hands of drivers who were visibly under age. Highway 215 went across a landscape where there were just forests with little or no civilization. Shops by the road only catered to the truckers with dhabba food, tyres and lubes for the trucks and recharge vouchers for cell phones.  

The infrastructure was abysmal. The one vehicle width bridges across small rivers were relics from the British era- made of bricks which were never designed to carry loads of 16 tonnes on 10 wheels. The daily traffic of heavy trucks had eroded the bridges to an extent where the bricks had formed ridges under the tracks.  Like the roads, the vehicles are also badly maintained. The towns we passed through looked like the India story had never reached these places with the locals bearing the brunt of daily traffic jams. Even ambulances and local buses were stuck in the jams every day.

From what I understood from the driver and other people in the area was a picture created out of both: degenerative politics and opportunistic attitude of the locals. To paraphrase my driver- the situation you are witnessing is much better than 5 years ago. We had above 300 illegal mines in this area; now we down to just 15-17. Today a jam might be for a few kilometers and last us an hour or two to get across; back then we just used to camp in the car- no one wanted to take up a drive these roads. Today we have just a fraction of the truck which used to ply here and they too are permitted to run only between 8pm to 8 am. By night- they simply rule; by day the block the roads as there are no parking bays to support the numbers. End result is the two lane road is reduced to just one working lane by day.

But why are these people ready to face hardships and why does a local not protest against the plight? Why does no one seem bothered that a truck covers 300 kms over 7 days? Why do we have multi-axle trucks plying on narrow roads not designed for such traffic even when there is a railway line running from the mines to the port? The answers I got were mind boggling to how people are deep rooted to corruption, selfish interests and missing the bigger picture towards development.

In the hay days of illegal mining, just about everyone made money through every possible avenue. Anyone with money bought a truck to move the ore. Anyone of 16 became a driver and villages made money by facilitating their movement by collecting illegal tolls. No one needed to work in the fields to make a living, they survived on the revenue share from what village made through the trucks going through. If someone had the influence, one could even fill a truckload of ore by borrowing small quantities from others. Villagers even made money from the traffic jams by offering passage through private land for anyone who paid to get their vehicles ahead by a few kilometers.

Even truckers made big bucks. Labour contractors at Paradip port were given Rs 200 for every vehicle unloaded- they take Rs 50 against a receipt of Rs 200 and the truckers do it themselves and pocket the money. As the trucks moved slowly on the roads, an account of 1 km/ltr was the mileage given; the rest of the fuel sold.

When the government cracked its whip on illegal mining and made transportation via railway wagons a must, the locals, truck operators and the opposition partnered. Cornered, the government still rules with an iron fist on the mining; but gave in to the trucks coming back. But the damage has been done. A road widening project funded through PPP was on the basis of the 300 mines and the thousands of trucks on it each day. With activity limited to a fraction now, the private partners have pulled out. With no infrastructure to support, global giants like POSCO have moved out from the state.

So finally... who is really killing Odisha? The government, the politics or the people themselves? I feel it is the greed, corruption and selfish ends of all three of the above. 

Power, Trust & Responsibility

I admire the trapeze act in a circus. The idea of a trapeze that lets go of the swing takes a giant leap of faith while loosening his grip hoping the other person will be grabbing their hand on the other side defines teamwork and coordination in a lot of ways. In between the two swings is the space where the trapeze has the power to do all kinds of turns, twists and somersaults to enthrall the audience. This arrangement is completely flawless in itself as long as the two people in the act have faith in themselves, each other and are committed to their job at hand. In the rare case where there can be a failure of coordination, is the safety net which saves either from paying the ultimate price.

This arrangement is a very close analogy to the way organizations are structured and function. Like the circus manager, organization heads lay down the objectives, teams handling functions are given a target, the team leader assumes the role of playing the anchor to all activities and his team performs various tasks within the given framework to deliver results. The safety net is the organization and its top management which takes the onus of all activities done under its umbrella. Everything can function as smooth as a circus act till every unit maintains its decorum of duties and takes the responsibility for their actions.

The above arrangement basically eliminates the hierarchy structure in an organisation, empowers people within their spheres and decentralizes responsibilities to all involved. The output in true sense is built on teams and their collaboration and the credit for good work if shared can actually make work environments as fun as the circus. I can vouch for it considering I have worked at places where office strength has ranged from 30 to 300 to 500 to 1500.

The team of 30 was very well knit and this I must agree was the most enlightening phase of my professional life. Fact remains, it was more of each man for himself and if this were to go wrong, it was never more than two people who shared the blame for failure to deliver. When in a crunch scenario, it was an unwritten rule that the man at the helm of things is the man of the hour and is the one who takes the call. Results may vary as per the decision taken, but it made every person think twice and take an informed and thought out action.

Things did not change much even when I shifted to a placed that had over 300 employees, mainly because even then we functioned as an almost independent entity with our own targets, resources and at most times, decisions were always taken in a manner where every individual had to own up to the task at hand.  

As I have seen organisations of a bigger size, the chain of coordination has grown and strangely enough the equation of responsibility against decision making power has got greatly reduced. It was surprising that while a department comprised of about ten people, only about two or three had authority- the rest were merely a chain of execution. What came as a big surprise was that when I worked at a placed with 3000 people, authority is so very centralized that it was a cause of bottlenecks.

Image a scenario where a quick decision is required: the first person in the chain gets to understand the problem, escalate it to the next person and then gets through to the last person who takes the call. The urgency has to be firstly understood by two levels of gate keepers prior to it reaching the decision-makers. Not to forget, there is filtration of information at every level which in the end can be inaccurate. So not only I see delayed calls but also calls based on half burnt information. Also, the concentration of power at the apex has ruled the lower rungs happy to slip out of responsibility. All you have now are robots that follow orders.

I see this as a breakdown of the team structure. Responsibility and authority resides at the apex and the people below have no powers to take decisions neither the inclination for taking it either. The charm of power for the people at the top, at times don’t feel the need to delegate authority along with responsibility. With no power or freedom to take a decision, the people below are just means of execution and a channel to the top.

I find this absurd. How will people grow in an organisation? What happens to the high risk high dividend act which people should be encouraged to shoulder to fast pace the company? How will achievement be seen? It hardly surprising I see many people who have the romance with the companies of such sort and end up with 25 years in the same place with little or no aspirations. Not to mention, change is never going to come in a place like here as there is never a need felt for it. 

In an age when we feel that customers are low on patience and response time is the key, such attitude is actually building doom. I have heard that giant companies are like giants- they take time to get of their inertia but gather pace in giant steps. I really am not sure how valid this will be now as by the time the giant catches pace, the smaller bunnies make the dough- and when the giant comes at par, technology changes! Giant have to function as independent units with greater responsibility, authority delegated down the line if they wish to survive competition. Else the blades of grass will survive the storm and the giant oak will be uprooted.

The KISS that works...

Advertising and Marketing Communication often is expected to do wonders like we see in fairy tales. It is like the true loves kiss that breaks the evil spell and changes the life for the prince or princess or ogre in a way only imagined. It works much the same way with brands and their consumers. Brands are constantly in the search for those loyal customers who swear by their name and will never defect to competition no matter what. For consumers, from the wide variety of options at hand, is the basic need for the brand to serve its purpose as well as satisfy the need for association at a social level.

Like people, brands have personalities and much alike is also the fact that the less layered and complicated the brand personality; people tend to adapt to it faster are more closely associated. This is the reason why when we plan for the branding or communication for any brand, the governing fact has to be KISS (Keep It Short n Simple). The simplicity is a key here since layers not only distort the message but increase the number of time something has to be conveyed before the right meaning comes through. Shortness- well it is possible at times and most brands do manage to talk about their personality through a phrase and in around 3 words or less.

The basic purpose of branding was to differentiate one from another and somehow each time we talk about branding opportunities or brand manuals; it somehow seems dominated by visual aids.  I will not deny that the moment I think branding, my mind starts working on use of shapes, fonts, colours and trying to figure out a unique arrangement for talking about the brands persona. One possible reason I see is that an organisation needs to have an identity to start with business and the logo becomes the first point of establishing this. Another that shapes and colours are usually easy to identify. But once the brand has reached a level where it looks to hold a unique place in the minds of its consumers, other aspects like catch word phrases or audio mnemonics make more impact.

One problem I see with visual identities is the overcrowding of the space leaving very little scope for anything innovative. Indian or multinational large corporate groups seem to have sided with blue as a colour of choice. GE, Philips, Samsung, AT&T, Infosys, Tata, Ashok Leyland are just a few examples. Close on the heels is red. Coca Cola, 3M, Honeywell, Cannon, Virgin, ESPN, LG, Mahindra are just some who make this space. Not to mention how many use a combination of Red and Blue. So unless you have a yellow like DHL or the brown of UPS; the colour palette is running out fast. For symbols, the ‘H’ can be for Honda or Hyundai; the ‘T’ can be Toyota or Tata. The call is to make a breakthrough at some level.

If we look globally, most companies have picked up on catch phrases. The simplicity being that use of small words can have multiple meanings and endless possibilities to apply across the domain.  For instance Nike- They use the swoosh and ‘N’ as the identity on the shoes, but what the brand will today stand for is - ‘Just do it’. So what would be ‘Impossible is nothing’- the biggest competitor with the 3 stripes or 3 petal flower, Adidas. So why do brands so successful in their visual look for words as a part of its identity? I feel these simple words add in value. As much it works for brands abroad, it works in India as well. Things like ‘Utterly, butterly, delicious’, ‘Fill it, shut it, forget it’, ‘Taste the thunder’, all have a unique association in our minds.

Another sense which has been successful in terms of brand association is sound. Each time we switch on or turn off a Windows based PC, we hear a sound which we are so familiar with. We know what PC has an Intel inside it even on a radio ad. Nokia sound in a unique way; so does Samsung. It works so well that major phone networks in India like Airtel, !dea, DoCoMo all have a unique mnemonic sound to identify itself. Even Britannia and the corporate house like Reliance ADAG have an audio identity.

I guess these are a few brands where I felt it was just small and simple ways where brands have done things to just stand apart and make their presence felt. I’m sure there are many more- but then again; what works in my opinion is the simplicity in messaging to represent the brand in the most unique of ways and cut down the clutter. And more often than not the KISS works.