Ad Club's organizes seminar on 'marketing through entertainment'

Titled ‘Value Creation’, the daylong seminar aims to explore the anatomy of entertainment, and understand marketing tactics through entertainment

With entertainment fast becoming a high-stakes business, and more and more clients looking at entertainment as a means of reaching out to consumers, The Advertising Club Bombay is organizing a seminar on the marketing-entertainment mix, aimed at unraveling the method in the madness. Titled ‘Value Creation', the daylong seminar is being held at Oberoi Hotel, Mumbai, on Saturday, January 11.

As per a prepared statement, the seminar will serve as a platform to explore the anatomy of entertainment, and understand marketing tactics through entertainment. "Various facets of entertainment and marketing will be discussed… such as in-film product placement, creating and cultivating relationships between celebrities and companies to establish and promote brand loyalty, building brand image within the entertainment community etc," reads the release.

Speakers at the seminar include noted journalist Pritish Nandy (of Pritish Nandy Communications), director Ashutosh Gowariker, Hemant Sachdev (of Bharti Enterprises), Anish Trivedi (of GO 92.5 FM), creative consultant Rekha Nigam, ad man Sanjay Bhutiani (of Leo Entertainment), UTV's Zarine Mehta, STAR TV's Sameer Nair and Amit Khanna (of Reliance Entertainment).

Nandy, for instance, would be dwelling upon his personal experiences in the successful marketing of entertainment, and would also throw light on the road ahead for the entertainment business. Bharti Enterprises' Sachdev would be speaking on how entertainment can help in selling brands, while Bhutiani is scheduled to address the hotly-debated issue of in-film placement. With the success of CHannel Popstars under his belt, STAR TV's Nair is expected to talk about what it takes to build entertainment brands, while UTV's Mehta would focus on the marketing of television serials. Reliance's Khanna would be summing it all up by arguing how marketing and entertainment should leverage one another to succeed.

Disclosing reasons for picking the topic for the seminar, Rajesh Pant, member, Bombay Ad Club, and CEO, Percept Advertising, said, "Entertainment, as an industry, is booming, be it through television, through FM radio or through movies - although last year was supposed to have been particularly bleak for Bollywood. At the same time, competition is severe, which forces the entertainment business to apply marketing thought. If you look at the successes of movies like Spiderman and Die Another Day, you will see that in the Hollywood pattern, marketing is critical. Films like Kaante and Saathiya have worked because they have been marketed well. The same applies to other forms of entertainment. The Ad Club felt it should create a platform where a cross-section of professionals from the entertainment and advertising communities share their thoughts on how formats can be adopted and applied."

Pant agrees that the takeout from the seminar could be marginally more for the entertainment community - but only just. "I think the marketing community will benefit as much," he says. "After all, corporate clients are looking at tactical means of increasing brand salience. We believe that the entertainment business can provide some answers on how brands can leverage entertainment." Expanding on this, Pant says, "The entertainment business is all about grabbing attention, which is also a basic requirement in marketing. If you get the consumer's attention, you cross a big hurdle. Also, brands such as Coke, Pepsi and Lux have been built on associations with entertainment personalities. Brands can leverage these facets of entertainment."

Pant is hopeful that the initiative will add value to the concerned communities. "With a set of speakers representing the spectrum of the communication business, I have reason to believe that the event will be well attended and beneficial," he says. For the record, registrations for the seminar can be made at adclub@vsnl.com. © 2003 agencyfaqs!