Local vs. Global dubbed ads

One of the everlasting debates in multinational companies is to decide between local ads vs. dubbed versions of global ads. Although both school of thoughts enjoy a loyal fan base, the answer to this lies with specific situation based on which, the client can determine the way forward. Following are few of the issues to ponder while selecting any of the solutions.

• Creativity ideologically is beyond the language barriers. Which in turn allows it to convey its messages to anyone and everyone irrespective of their knowledge base and language preferences. Visual communication should carry the ease of understanding across any region without verbal aids. Foreign ads are favorable in this respect. Case in reference, Coke/ DHL has long enjoyed running foreign ads successfully due to their strong visual communications.

• Literacy plays a major role in the communication development phase citing reasons as “level of understanding”, “language preferences” or even “choice of wording”. In a country like Bangladesh, where literacy rate stands at 46-50% on an average, any English copy is sure to bomb in the effectiveness market. Many brands have switched to dubbed pay-off lines to convey their message (e.g. Tang) while other keeping the original (e.g. Warid Telecom and “be heard”) have drastically failed to make a connect with the consumers. Notable in this regard, a mix of Bengali and English words (commonly referred as Banglish) has worked wodners lately, i.e. Frutika “ektu beshii pure”. 

• When a global communication is usually developed it keeps in mind a broader set of issues that helps in wide acceptability and usage across various languages. However, a fundamental issue is found to be lacking in most global commercials. While we all strive for providing a more personal, a more customized solution to all out customers, enticing them to buy our products looking at a global ad is a risky business. Communications that involve human interfaces and emotions are less likely to be taken positively since every nation/region has their very own style of expression.

• Many a country lacks the creative powerhouse or local know-how to develop a local ad for a global company that will be true to the original brand message. This lack of credibility also drives the clients to depend on foreign aids for their communication purposes, too. However, a country like Bangladesh, which has grown leaps and bounds in terms of creative ideas and executions, is unlikely to be such a destination. Over the past few years, the unprecedented growth and success the local advertising fraternity has enjoyed makes the choice of going ahead with a global communication in a bigger limbo.

I have tried to put in place, a few of the reasons, I find obligatory to go ahead with a locally developed communication. But all said and done, it’s a value-driven decision supported by numbers, which I’m not so good at :P

naming it RIGHT

as the clock struck 2 in the night, i started missing our old singing cuckoo wall clock. of course there was no apparent reason to miss the long-gone, ultra-noisy timekeeper then and there, but at least it would have saved me from the events following and the discovery.

passing another boring thursday night while playing "who fools whom first" on msn was going rather routinely until the point of conversation came in where i was (out of my stupid random queries) was making complete translations of names. to begin with it was fun and easy; we all are pre-programmed with the meaning of our names and the wonderful story of how my grandpa had 20%, uncle 10%, aunts 15% and parents the rest (55%) to contribute to the wonderful sounding names. even if your name spells "osama" and you know that the CIA was on your tail ever since you got a passport; the loving parents would always be content with the gist of it. after all who wouldn't like putting their son in the league of lions (i.e. osama in actual means lion-like). but sigh! we seem to overlook the post-teen effects of such cute turned murderous names, when in spite of having all the right scores and finances, mr. osama fails miserably at getting a visa to pursue education in any of the western world universities.

my concern however doesn't lie with what you name your kid. since at the end, its your own asset of procreation and you have full natural/human rights to practise your creativity in real life. we all love to "think different" (like a mac) believing "impossible is nothing" (like adidas) and thus end up screwing the future of our kids with one moment of ingenuity. otherwise when i see names like osama and jonah or czarina and kareena; i can't make any goddamn sense of it!!!

but all said and done, even if any of the readers of this post is stuck with a name you have regretted ever since you gained sense... there isn't much to gain from taking up another myopia of affidavit, since you would be left with a bigger state of confusion and no second chance. which brings me to the tip of the iceberg, what am i doing countering age-old practises and hip names at the most unlikeliest hour of all???

well, just as always here i am with another (rather) weird and sensational story and this time its definitely personal. i think i was born with an insatiable hunger... of course the hunger was not for the "wrong" things in life but neither were they too much for the apparent "rights" either. the quest to know it all resulted in me asking questions i didn't need to know the meaning of pretty early. for the record, when i was admitted into nursery, the first question i faced standing with a million other "devil's own" was "what does you name mean?". may be the teacher just wanted to amaze the whole class how great my name actually meant or she was three months into pregnancy looking eagerly for anything new... there i was standing in front of the crowd explaining "sabih" the "morning daylight" origins and chronology of events making it my first name. sabih, as a name had always stirred a look or two; not to mention the million deviations it came with (sabah, chabi, sabiii to name a few), i always tried my level best to establish a proper pronunciation to ensure an exact replication of the actual word. i failed, but i didn't give up hope... and by the time i was makin more enemies than friends in college... people actually started getting a hang of spelling it right.. sabih with a "h". but just as the saying goes, "all's well that ends well" and it indeed didn't. tonight at 2, all my efforts and feel good memories came crashing down because of a mere "I". yes, my dear reader a mere "I" has changed what i stood for all my life, upside down... down and down.

because my grandpa had lovingly named me, sabih uddin ahmed... which stood for "the morning daylight of the religion of the most blessed"... i always took a sense of pride in being just and honest and all that for the longest time in my life. i believed my name had a purpose to itself, and reminded me of what i was expected to do every time, all the time. but the sweetness was short-lived. as the mind and its unquenchable thirst for knowledge spread its wings further, the brain started looking for verifications to check the actual meaning of the name and oblige thereby. on one such random endeavours, i came across this book called "1000 baby names" in Wn'P and while carefully flipping through pages...there it was...my name in bold and italic...but wait! it wasn't spelt sabih as i have come to know all my life or have used ever since. it was in fact "sabiih" which meant the "morning daylight". surprised and bewildered, i return home to ask my encyclopedic dad to answer my query... to which he simply said... well son, an "i" wouldn't make any difference. you and i both know what we meant when we named you "sabih".content and quenched, i moved on.

but tonight is the night, that history will remember itself as the night even thick brained sabih made a discovery, and perhaps the most important discovery in my short-lived life. my name isn't at all what it seemed to be. by virtue of the missing "i" and some crap arabic pronounciation funda, "sabih uddin ahmed" stood for "handsome of the religion of the most praised" (where sabih meant handsome) while it actually had to be "sabiih uddin ahmed" to be the daylight dude. perhaps its unfair to blame it on my parents who didn't have access to such books and www or my grandpa who simply wanted his eldest grandson to be special - not through his looks but his character and class. strangely all i remember now is what the great mahatma, mr. mohondas had said "an i for an i would make the whole world blind". yet he could have never come to realize that without an "i", daylight simply switched places with good looks.

such is the story of my name,
and here i am putting others up for blame!!!

why vote?

looking back in time, at least a decade or so... i remember seeing the purple/violet mark on my dad's hand identifying him as a voter (casted already). being in my early teens, i always wondered how fun it would be to actually go stand in lines and decide for the nation's future one day. may be at 13 i was just a little dumb or may be i was just overly optimistic, that i thought voting could actually change the course of a nation, my nation... Bangladesh. i grew up watching an ever increasing sense of self-interest and  grass-root corruption becoming the "in" fashion. a society where politics was spitted upon always managed to leave out the politicians of any blame game. everyone had issues, none with the solutions. everyone seemed to know what was the right thing to do, but none ever came forward. the knowledge to speak and be heard was so common is so many bright souls, yet they opted for a life is peace and harmony endangering the lives of a million others. life moved on, i grew up... learning lessons on morale, ethics and all such "rated banned content in today's world at the best possible school i cud ever ask for (my home). however, my the time i struck 18 and was ready to vote... the train (parliamentary election) had left with the company and i was left all alone in the dark for the next one.

obviously, the next one came... and came with a big-fat BANG! the then ruling government appointed this cool "steve austin" look-alike mr. aziz for running the greatest show on earth. well if not the greatest entertainment show, it was definitely a worthy "fool the nation" gimmick anyway. our beloved prince of the nation (mr. so-called int'l airport), had all his pawns hand-crafted and ready to roll... 70 crores of tax money down the drain, a voter list that i didn't even get a chance to get enlisted on (like a million others reading it, may be) and even more heat on the streets of raging Dhaka. although the "texas rattle snake" (the pet name for steve austin) left the post unharmed, unscathed and without any convictions (the new buzz word)... the time, money and effort... was all spent... well of course money was the only delicious dish amongst the three... but who cares anyway!

so, under total chaos and drum-rolls, the 1/11 happened... gladly none died... no aircraft went missing in radar (although a few months later the whole national airlines went off air :P)... no 5 star hotel was held hostage at gunpoint and to everyone's surprise and against the very fundamentals of the "/11" jargon, people were rather relieved. yes, the next 22 months flew past with pretty ease; aside from the sky-rocketing prices of essentials due to cartels or brain-dead military administration drastically failing at making worthy cases against the corrupts... the general public seemed to be content (even being content is a tough bargain here).

and then of-course, the true colors slowly started showing and shining up again... from the military administrations bribe-is-all-we-seek to the politicians election-we-want status, it was again back to the 'drawing board' for the newly found reformists (or lets say, old wine in new bottles). the worse of the worsts got out in bail and a noble-old lawyer... turned to be the talk of the nation in a matter of few days. in fact, i enjoyed his words... all the flaws in emergency rules and how he managed to get all who mattered out on bail at the right moment... made me think he saw a picture none of us did.

but sigh! the English... be how stupid they were in the later half of 18th century... used the phrase "all's well that ends well". and here i am, staring at my state-of-the-art, wide screen-ready pictured, shiny, new voted ID and thinking of what i just saw in all the talk-show today. after all the hassle and haggle for all this months, so much blames and inhuman beatings; its all down to the basics of dirty politics.... hearing the noble-old mr. rafiqul haq sharing how "frustrated" he was at the nominations given out by the two major political parties (two parties whose leaders were freed on bail by the same man), i murmur... what was it that you were fighting for, to get them out in the free world... for what??? 

i know, as we all probably know by now, he got his calculations wrong... but let us at least waste our part of the decision making in haste as well. Please VOTE! cause even if you didn't have the right answer to the MCQ of voting, there is... for a change an answer that says "NONE OF THE ABOVE" :-)

the resume of an advertising man

being in the profession of advertising for over 2 years now, there is one lesson (if any) i mastered with my whole heart - the art of selling (esp. thyself). questions apart on how i learnt it, the fundamental tool every working advertiser needs to make a worthy move in his career is his/her resume. although in bangladesh, there was always a great hue and cry regarding 'how to write a cv" and blah! blah!... the use of specialized is rather uncommon and hardly practiced in general.

me, being considerably tech-savvy and up-to-date with market happenings, never took upon the effort to make necessary amendments to my already working good-enough resume. but lately, as i have engaged myself into deep thoughts regarding the future of my career and choices i have made regarding my long term goals, i thought to myself... it's time to spare that extra effort in making a specialized advertiser's resume.

so, there i was flipping through page after page in google, vault.com and god knows what other employment website looking for advertising resume samples. yes, i found a few good samples in those vaults, but as always even the world wide web seems to think advertising has only 1 wing, that to creative & copywriting. being a staunch worker of account planning and management, my luck wasn't smiling upon that favorably as i reached the peak of my patience (yes, i have a shortage of it according to patient few :p )...i came across this wonderful lady, a fellow strategic planner from american mid-west @ her blog advergirl. here she had wonderfully made-up a few advertising resumes as if jawed habib had run his scissors across fulbanu from jhalkathi; i mean to say truly creative and marvelous outcomes. almost instantly, i remembered the words of keya apu, "steal with pride"; and there i was, not-bogged down by the fury of flu or the strains my weak back suffered from, busy re-doing my resume as if the last date of submission for the million dollar job was midnight sharp.

as the saying goes, alls well that ends well... and so was the case for me, too (as per my judgement at least). 3 hours since i began the modification work, after extensive cheats and mod with english words and ms word, there it was... my new retro resume. it was just not another resume, it had the flavor of retro hip-hop along with the sweet enchanting melody of traditions... it was my favorite resume for a change (amongst all other i made for myself).

writing no more, i present to you... the before & after effect the make-ups had in my resume. right or wrong, i am none to judge... aesthetically the "after effect" was far superior and so was in terms of space utilization and efficient wording. rest of the criticism, i leave to the well-read ones ;-)

BEFORE

AFTER

what's your trademark move?

yes, i know... just as usual, it reminds you all of the traditional male machismo and pick-up moves every guy aspires to master all throughout his life. but as facts speak... its not always the girls that are picked up in this neo-conservative society of ours, in fact ironic may it seem... girls are always better at the "pull strategy" (historically) yet pick-up is associated with guys. this leads to the question of what came first, "the chicken or the egg"??? well obviously, if there weren't any sorta pulling, there wouldn't be any inclination towards pick-up either. of course the ultra-active, ever-interested and insatiable nature of male hormones never ceases to provide ample supply of "a rush of blood in their heads" in the right moments but it remains a great mystery what's the case with the ever-alluring opposite sex?

what we call our pick-up moves, could easily be dubbed as losing it all together... since we never get to know what it was? we getting the girl, or the girl letting us get to her. may be as always, it will give birth to a never ending debate where the smart-kinky females try and establish how they are the ones who let their guards fall to let the guys get close; it doesn't always hold true. we, the males can't possibly concede defeat after defeat knowing the urge of mating overpowers every possible logical sense at the right moment at the right time. even we, as susceptible we may seem, do have our achievements to speak of as well. not in all instances, is the guy favored upon, rather in many instances its the guy who gets the game going. i can surely say, all of you reading this in whatever insignificant ways have put your trademark moves in place at some point or the other. and if lady luck was on your side, may be you tricked the other party into the net more often than you couldn't. 

just like all other, i can look back and remember many a move i made during my "high" years and getting away with a taste of success in more cases than i didn't. i call upon all you out there, to look back in time and unearth that special move that makes you stand out in the crowd, the move that defines the person you are, the move that leaves that everlasting mark in her heart...

share! share and enlighten others... be it in anonymous mode, be it the brave fool like me who dares to write this piece... whatever you may be... you definitely have a story of your own, and i present to you a platform to share your "moments of glory" :)

An unlikely discovery!

It was just another usual day at office - regular work, daily errands and of course picking on people. But something was unusual about the day, which kept me guessing all day long. What could it be? What have I missed out on? Well of course, there were many unique things to start the day with... no picking on munir or no morning smoke with saif bhai... et al. but deep inside, I knew something was cooking and I just couldn't figure out what it was... until right before I was leaving office this evening. 

 Just as any other days after 6 discussions, (after 6 discussions are usually PG rated) we got into a healthy discussion about how great it would have been if we all were girls... for example, just like the common bias... raise a family, no work, feed on husband's earnings and merry with the in-laws, so on and so forth. Seemingly a harmless discussion soon swapped its skin like a snake does in winter when it started going in all the wrong directions one could think of. Well obviously as a post-teen adult male (I still feel a teen though) I am not by any means referring to anything elusive but rather harsh realities of life! Wonder what could that be?@?  I was once advised by my dad on how not-to eat food with the wrong hand, and much later in life I was reminded by my bosses on how not to make things too complicated... I remembered both instances yet paid no heed to them, as I once again started lurking in the wrong forest. The issue is, at least from a bird's eye view... very simple... how lucky women are in Bangladesh!

 Ask how? Then there is the explanation of how men are always expected to provide bread and butter for the family, how women are expected to work but in areas like teaching or running a hobby boutique. How men are expected to be a workingman yet keep up the family man spirit. How men need an MBA to be qualified for marriage yet women are accepted even as a mere high school grad (HSC/A level). Where men have to support their own family as well as his parents are sometimes even expected to contribute to that of his in-laws and women get away making all the money for her maintenance expenses (only). How men are alleged of cheating when being nice to a female colleague simply becomes a helpful brother in case of women. Such ironies... exist handsomely in and around our daily lives but the biggest irony is... the women in fact... have ruled this nation for almost as long as men have.

In a country where female head of state was amongst the first in the world, why should women get off not doing many a thing like men do (everyday)? Being a liberal 21st century educated human being, I do support equal rights and encourage female participation in the work environment, but shouldn't the implementation of equal rights make men and women equal in balance. Will we ever get to see girls coming up to take the helm of a family while the men rest, or will it continue to be as it is - the social taboo of men heading the family. Its said that women are the more prone to discrimination, human rights violation and social injustice, and may be it is right and makes every sense to the "smart" world. But the way my twisted mind sees it, its utterly butterly (as Amul says it) simple... we, the men... are subject to reverse-discrimination, and that too... by women...

run, its 5.30... run!!!

9’o clock…and here I am humming across the empty streets of Tejgaon getting done with my upcoming TV commercial scripts. Well I am sure there are multiple elements of surprise in it, how come a part of Dhaka city be empty at 9 (well at least I never find it empty at 9 in the night on a weekend, when I have all the time in the world) and also the fact that how come Sabih from the best practiced time scheduled agency (aka O&M Bangladesh) manage to stay up so late in office. As for the answers, well… continue to read on J

I am at the semi-heaven of all possible work environments. Ask me why and I have a hundred if not a million reasons to cite – I am avidly into advertising, the career I enjoy and cherish; none works past 6 here (achha that’s a little too exaggerated, lets say for the sake of good image 6.30) and on top of that… none actually works upto even 60% of his/her potentials… of course just like everything else in the world (especially economic factors) there are several outliers who bring down the average to beyond 7pm at times (for example, me or the others who are still at office today)… but in most cases, its 6 to 6.30.

May be it sounds outrageous or even mythical knowing an advertising agency that shuts its doors (mostly) down by 6.30 in a demanding industry like Bangladesh…but its not only the work environment/management to be blamed.

We, the wonderful nationals of Bangladesh, seem to inherit a quality generation after generation, procrastination and lethargy…this coupled with the ever opportunist nature, makes the perfect recipe for a fleeing workforce. Fleeing cause its an unrivalled sight that I get to experience everyday in the aforesaid hours, a rush of blood, a desperate cry to get home… a sad picture of inefficiency and ‘faakibazi’.

For the record, I, myself ain’t a saint either… may be I try to put a more industrious face by staying up a few minutes (yes, minutes) more… but the end, a car cant run on its own… a set of wheels needs a litre of fuel as well.

The reason behind this sarcasm filled, skeptic and surprising writing from me is because I believe in the world where more people lose jobs everyday than the amount of taka we make in a month, nothing is for certain… and we don’t work under the Japanese style of management either. May be for the precious kinds I speak of, take life to be a walk in the park, but I wouldn’t want them to forget… the principle lesson every mother in Bangladesh teaches her son/daughter before going for the walk in the park for the first time… beware of muggers… a false step, an unnoticing mind, a single in a jungle can always prove to be fatal in many more ways. In these world of fierce competition, where every bread is fought over… I urge my mates, people I care for… to step up to the challenges… work, earn your living! For god’s sake… we aren’t an NGO (ring a bell?&*&@#?)