Behind Bournvita’s AI-led campaign that offers personalised batting classes from Rahul Dravid

Cadbury Bournvita’s latest campaign is all about getting children out of their homes and onto the cricketing turfs. And to do that, they are teasing a chance for kids to get personally trained by veteran cricketer and former head coach of the Indian national cricket team, Rahul Dravid. 

The chocolate malt drink mixes brand is using AI and QR codes to make this happen. In the campaign titled D for Dreams, Bournvita is pushing for a world where the up-and-coming generation of youngsters have the motivation to step up their cricket and polish their skills.

Conceptualised and created by Ogilvy, the campaign sheds light on the lack of outdoor activities in children. In an ad film, the brand discusses the necessity of vitamin D in children, and how playing outdoors in the sun can be the best way to source it. The film also sees Rahul Dravid don his mentoring avatar while he spells out the key components of batsmanship. 

This campaign is also very atypical of ads Bournvita is known for. On one hand, it carries the empowering, and motivational overtones that the brand is conventionally known for. But on the other hand, it integrates tech into the initiative while roping in one of the greatest players of the game.

Akshay Seth, who is the executive creative director at Ogilvy, says that the campaign was based on the widely observed pain point of parents with regards to their children spending disproportionate amount of time on their gadgets. “Increasing levels of Vitamin D deficiency in Indian kids due to disproportionate screen time is a pain point for most parents today. The brand wanted to join hands with them in giving kids a strong enough reason to keep their devices down and step out in the sun,” he says. 

The campaign, which ties together cricket, AI, and an icon in Rahul Dravid, was unveiled right around the time when the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup was commencing. The idea was to ride the cricketing wave in a way that made the association between the brand and the sport appear natural. 

“Since almost every Indian kid dreams of playing cricket for the country, we decided to create a cricketing experience that would excite kids to step out in the sun. With the fervour of the T20 World Cup, getting the very legend who would be training India’s 11, to be every kid’s personal trainer seemed like a very promising opportunity to encourage kids and made the association a natural fit.”

Rahul Dravid was the head coach of Indian National Cricket Team for T20, and recently stepped down to make way for the new head coach Gautam Gambhir. 

With the campaign trying to pull kids away from the screens and onto the fields, there is one thing to be noted here. The personalised training from Dravid can only be obtained by scanning the QR codes on the Bournvita packs, or by visiting the website directly. Which, to some minds, appears a little paradoxical.

Seth clarifies, “There isn’t any tech intervention for kids as the campaign is directed towards parents who on buying Bournvita, can scan the QR code or visit the website. They simply have to record their kid playing shots under the sun and with our AI training module, Rahul Dravid will provide them technical training, on how to perfect their technique down to minute degrees.”

One of the peculiar functions of the AI-module is that it can visualise a batter’s movement and suggest improvements in terms of form, angle, and body weight. But how did the agency devise the entire AI-set up to pull this off? And more importantly, what was the lead time to get this thing done?

Seth answers, “Since the experience did not exist, we had to create the Ai training module by using advanced computer vision technology to record the exact technique of Rahul Dravid. The key to never-before experience was in ensuring highly detailed, personalised and technical feedback. Ogilvy’s tech team, along with us, spent a lot of time on this. The entire experience took about 1.5 months to create and optimise.”

The campaign is omni-channel, with digital and social leading the way along with on ground, TV, points of sale, and ecomm.

As per Seth, the whole initiative has yielded positive results for the brand, perhaps also due to the widely celebrated World Cup victory of team India. He says, “The campaign has created a lot of impressions and engagement. The opportunity of getting personalised training from Rahul Dravid has resulted in heavy traffic on the microsite and we hope that an increasing number of kids continue to step out in the sun.”