Aamir Decides to take the No Promotion route for Talaash!
Reliable sources reveal that Aamir Khan has done the
unthinkable once again. His most awaited Talaash will be one of the first-ever ‘Blind’ mainstream release in the Indian
cinema.
And by Blind, it
means completely blind. Barring the first few posters of the film, the film
will simply release on a given date without any fanfare. No promos, no teasers,
trailers – be it on TV channels or theatrical trailers. No music release prior
to the movie, no songs on radio, no media bytes about the subject, no on-road
promotions, no tie-ups with any events, no hard-selling on reality shows. No Nothing!
The maverick that Aamir has always been, strongly believes
that a film of this stature and sensitivity doesn’t need to ‘sell’ itself to
get the target audience in theatres. He opines that off-late movie promotions
have taken bizarre proportions akin to an event of national importance. Of course,
he confesses, that he himself needs to be blamed for starting this mad trend of
innovative marketing gimmicks during movie promotions. And the crusader that he
is, he has himself decided to clean the muck by simply releasing Talaash on the release date with zero
promotions. Read that again, it will be Zero
Promotions!
And now, just stop here and think about it once again. By going
the Zero Promotion route, has Aamir,
yet again, played a wonderful counter move in promoting his movie? For those
with an understanding of consumer behaviour, it’s a typical case of ‘Curiosity campaign’. The best that one
could get with ‘Reverse Psychology’. Aamir, who has often been accused of
manipulating the media before all his releases, has decided to make a strong
statement to rebuke this accusation. “I am not telling you anything about Talaash. I am not providing you with any sound
byte. I challenge you to go and find for yourself. I challenge you to go on
this ‘Talaash’ and dig up anything that you can. For anyone who is interested,
you’ll have to come to the theatres to find out what Talaash is all about. Beyond
that we’ve decided to go completely off your radar.”
Now, if we’re thinking that this could be another of those
new-age viral marketing strategies
that’ll keep plugging content on Youtube, we’ve got it wrong once again. Zero
promotions out here actually mean ZILCH
Promotions! The Talaash sets (in fact we don’t even know where they are)
will be guarded like forts. The entire cast and crew has been made to sign
contractual NDAs (Non-Disclosure Agreements). No one is telling anyone,
anything about Talaash. It’s as Blind as
it could be!
Moving ahead, can we even think of the repercussions? This one
particular stand has sent shock waves across the industry. It has caused
ripples across the media circles. It’ll be interesting to see the collective stand
taken by the Media. In fact, is there any possibility of a collective stand? Will
the Media Moghuls give it back to the superstar and start snubbing his Talaash.
Or will they go on the counter attack, and go completely aggressive in their
spy/sting missions to unravel Talaash? Hidden cams, Scoops, chasing Aamir and
other stars for bytes, the works?
Can we even imagine a landmark
mainstream film like Talaash having
the guts to attempt a ‘Curiosity’ campaign! Is this gonna be huge? Is this yet
another stroke of genius from Aamir? Is this the most daring media strategy
EVER? And with an Aamir at the center
of it, does it ensure an unbelievable,
impossible, roof-shattering opening?
Imagine, the black market would
come alive. There would be serpentine queues all-night long (just like Harry
Potter books) for the first-first show advance. The fans and media would go
berserk! I can already imagine a riot-like situation across the country.
Imagine hearing an ‘All is well’ kind of chartbuster for the first-time in the
theatre. And so privileged and dazed the first show watchers would actually be,
that I am sure they will completely miss the content! (amidst soaking in the
atmosphere). They’ll actually come back to watch and understand the movie the
2nd time. The social media would go mad, with posts like ‘I was there!’ doing the routine!
If one is confident about the
product, the content, the ability to keep the hawks away (like Aamir is), then
in fact this could be the most kick-ass marketing strategy ever. Remember, the
Rajshris more or less attempting this during Hum Aapke Hain Kaun in 1994. And the results, we all know, were
historic! Wasn’t it the first time we heard figures like 100 crores?
Before we take this further, allow
me to reveal, that this is nothing but a fiction of my imagination. Inspired by a
very similar post from the thought leader, Shailesh Kapoor, the CEO of Ormax
Media –
I couldn’t stop salivating at this
sizzling possibility. The possibility of a mainstream Bollywood movie releasing
completing blind and sending the media, the fans and the industry in a state of
tizzy! I just stopped short of saying how this would impact the entire nation
as a whole (perhaps too much of an exaggeration). But, think again, doesn’t
this have the possibility of being a national event?
For now, it was my imagination
(fuelled by Shailesh Kapoor) playing havoc and thinking of this mad marketing
strategy for Talaash. But I sincerely
hope that somehow this blog post goes viral and Aamir actually picks this up! Imagine!
No comments:
Post a Comment