The Vodafone Campaign and the Controversy: Was it called for?

Whats common between the pug(the dog made famous by hutch) and the cheer girls these days..well both are definitely cute and adorable, but at the moment both are surrounded by controversies. The only difference is that one controversy has been raked up to protect the cute doggie whereas the other one is against the cheer girls. Well for now lets not talk about the sexy cheergirls made famous by IPL (POB for me for not talking about them) and lets talk about the latest controversy surrounding vodafone over the campaign involving the cute lil' doggie-the
pug.

Firstly let me congratulate O&M for coming up with such a brilliant campaign. For those who havent seen the ad, the campaign has primarily marketed its customer care with the tag line being "Happy to Help". At the moment, 4 ads are being telecasted as part of the campaign. The ads show the pug and a little gal and how the pug being a good friend helps the little girl out with the smallest of the things.

Within a week after the campaign was launched, the animal rights activists have raised protests against the ad blaming the company for showing ill treatment towards dogs by humans. Some activists have gone to the extent to say that the little things that the pug helps out the little girl with are actually a strain and that pugs due to their tiny physical structure are incapable of doing heavy work.

Now the point: Is all this really called for?

The reason why I congratulated O&M is that I felt that it was an outstanding campaign. Being an MBA mind, I tried to analyse the ad and believe it was a pretty simple analysis. I do have a few objections though.Lets talk about the pros first.

Two ads that have been aired as part of the campaign, convey the intended message to the consumer brilliantly. The little girl is getting ready for school, wearing shoes, and is trying to find a single missing sock from the pair (Obviously, the cinematography is excellent and adds to the cuteness of the ad), the little pug friend comes in with the missing sock in its mouth and gives it to the gal. Simple and yet its shows how when we go to the customer care centre of a network provider, we search for the best connection for our phone and the executive there helps us
out. The second is where the little girl is fishing with her hands in a pond and the lil doggie come running from behind with a fishing net. Brilliant campaign. Trying to show that if an executive of the customer care feels that you as a consumer are using the wrong scheme for your phone usage, he tells you to shift to the right one.

The other ads i felt were a little away from the message conveyed. The little girl is sticking stamps and the dog kneels down and sticks out its tongue to provide lubrication (ooopss...donn u go wild...m just talkin about an ad) as gum basically for the stamp. It somehow did portray a demeaning angle, as though the dog or the customer care is at the hands of the customer. The other campaign shows the dog running behind the little girls school bus with a tie in its mouth that the girls forgotten to wear. Is the customer care that desperate ???

Well, to be honest, the campaign itself was so strong that a few small factors like the one I mentioned shouldn't even count. I feel that Vodafone did the best thing by repeating what hutch did with the pug. In fact Hutch was successful in achieving the highest percentage of customer retention amongst mobile service providers after its campaign.

I do believe that the protests by animal right activists was uncalled for as somewhere the protested because they had to without a reason. Why would you protest if the campaign has been shot as per what the campaign has to convey. The animal rights activists saw an animal on the screen in ad and found an opportunity to be heard. I also do feel that the activists are hypocritical when they did nothing over the ORBIT ad which demeaned the buffalo. I found nothing wrong but what about the masses, the rural India, whoa are 70% of the whole population. For them, the buffalo and the cow are holy animals as they earn a living through them. Why did not they protest then? Well, obviously because Vodafone is a bigger company and the leverage effect is higher protesting here.

Anyways, I loved the campaign and so did many people.