Go, Go, Pokemon Go! This is a rare example of a declining brand reinventing itself as a pioneer. They’ve managed to launch a super-hit mobile game AND showcase the potential of Augmented Reality (AR). It wasn’t Pokemon on it’s own – there’s a hefty involvement of Google in it too. Google Maps is the backbone of this game, just as it is for another super hit service, Uber. The game will follow the path of all online games with an eventual decline in interest, but as I argue in my piece, this is a trend-setter in AR adoption. I personally don’t have the gaming bug, but I think the serendipity of finding treasured creatures can easily be translated into ‘discovering’ other things of commercial value.Closer home the viral phenomenon is Kabali, the latest Rajinikanth movie. The first splash came with the association with Air Asia (which offered round-trips from Bangalore to watch the movie, tickets included). They now have more product tie-ups, including Emami’s Fair & Handsome. Rajini is the Boss/Thalaivar of course, but even his most enamoured fans are unlikely to associate him with the word fair. But Kabali seems to have sparked a marketing gold-rush with fit not being a prime consideration. For those not familiar with the movie star, Google him. The joke doing the rounds is that while stars like Salman Khan pick holidays to launch their movies, Rajinikanth launches a movie and it is declared a holiday. No, really.
I was viewing an old Dan Ariely video yesterday on how irrational our decision-making is. What came as a surprise is also how intuitive it is to game that. My 7 year old and her friend opened a pop-up ‘shell shop”at our housing complex selling shells and corals they had found on the beach. The opening price was a uniform Rs 1. But as soon as their first customer (me) bought two, they realized that some shapes were preferred to others and initiated differential pricing, now with a range of Rs 1 to Rs 5. The captive audience (funded by me) now suddenly became far more engrossed in selection as there was competition for the ‘better’ ones. With dynamic pricing becoming easier to implement, I think all of us – consumers and marketers – need to do a course in Behavioral Economics!
Have a great week!
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