They might be a $ 4 billion enterprise, but somehow the line doesn’t sell; let alone capture the idea of ‘Technology that touches lives’. Indian companies (barring a handful) have been marked out for their lack of branding; or in simpler words for failing to communicate as to who/what they are or are into. The recent advertisement of HCL shows a ‘computer guy’ dressed in smart casuals (though he does look gay in a tight pink shirt) and loaded with a notebook hiking a ride from an investment banker who happens to be driving in the middle of a desert. To start off, once inside the car, the computer guy appears too cool to move. He takes off his cap, flips open the notebook, and informs the banker in a pseudo-concerned tone - “The stock market just crashed.” The banker is distraught on hearing this. Smugly the HCL guy goes on to brief the IB about how the ATM at the fueling station runs on ‘our technology’. Some distance later, the HCL guy gets off the car and heads towards a helicopter waiting to take him “abroad for a life sciences project”.
By the end of the ad, one is left bewildered and angry with the computer guy and with a sense of pity for the investment banker (who has just hosted a robbery of his self_image).
The HCL guy’s I_am_somehow_superior_to_you attitude makes you want to throw slush at him*; and keep the IB for a pet. And then the line ‘touching lives’ makes you want to throw up.
And as for the $ 4 billion catch-line, there is trouble. A lot many minds seem to think of a billion as being just a little more than a million. With all due respect, a million is not much of a test these days. The enormity that these guys are trying to get us to recognize is not coming through with those very words.
Better luck next time.
*see the bigger picture here.
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