Pritha Mitra
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All one needs is Rs 500 to invest in a mutual fund

Through its latest television campaign, SBI Mutual Fund has tried to break the several myths that a general consumer has conceived about mutual funds

The great Indian middle class thinks that investing in mutual funds is beyond their reach as it needs a huge investment. Now SBI Mutual Fund is trying to break this myth with its latest campaign.

In fact, SBI Mutual Fund has come to this conclusion after it did a research on investment behaviour among 30 + males.

As Srinivas Jain, chief marketing officer, SBI Mutual Funds, says, “The research revealed that people are still conservative, when it comes to investing in mutual funds. However, with this campaign, we do not hope to change their mindset completely, but the idea is to create an interest towards this category.”

“The campaign attempts to change investment behaviour among general consumers rather than promoting the product”, he adds.

Out of the four TVCs, which SBI Mutual Funds has recently launched, the first commercial conveys the message that investments in mutual fund can begin with a meager amount of Rs 500 a month.

The TVC begins with a man traveling in a bike, who stops in front of ‘Barat’ procession, which is completely engrossed with the music and dance. The man joins the crowd, picks up a kid and starts dancing. He comes in front of the bridegroom, sprays some rose water in his eyes and then flicks some money from the garland of the bridegroom. He counts the money and finds six hundred rupees. He goes back to the bridegroom and returns a hundred rupee note in such a manner that it seems that he was blessing the newly wed.

At the end, the voice over concludes “ ‘Ek-Do-Teen-Char-Panch. Bas Panchso Rupiye Hi To Chahiye Har Mahine Kuch Khas Mutual Fund Mein Nivesh Ke Liye’. (One-Two-Three-Four-Five. Rs 500 is needed to invest in certain Mutual Fund schemes every month.)

The campaign includes three other 30-second television commercials. And each one has used a different metaphor to describe the various other characteristics of mutual fund investment.

While the second commercial communicates the fact that experts guide investments in mutual funds as opposed to any other investment options, the third commercial educates the consumer about the tax benefits, one gets from investing in mutual funds. Similarly, the last commercial talks about the transparency in mutual fund investments.

Bhaskar Mani, creative director, JWT (the agency which has conceptualised the entire campaign), says, “The brief for us was to convey the message in a simple but effective way. This is also why we decided to have a separate commercial for each of trigger revealed by the research.”

He adds, “Each one of us takes our hard earned money very seriously. And also, the entire mutual fund category is perceived to be complicated and boring at times by the masses. Our effort was simplifying the concept of mutual funds through a humorous approach, ultimately leaving it to the consumers to decide.”

Talking about the execution of the four commercials, Ram Madhvani, film maker, Equinox Films, says, “Mani was very clear that the films should look young and contemporary. So to give the films a modern and quirky look, we decided to colour the film by using lights of different shades on the characters. So when you see the film, the characters are little magenta or green or blue (sometimes all together in one frame). It is the effort of the cameraman Rafey Mehmood and Niraj Banerjee and their team that when the audiences watch the film, they don’t remark about the quirkiness. Yet, I believe they feel it.”

Jain’s says that the campaign has already started delivering, since it was launched in the third week of November. “After the launch of these commercial our call centre has been receiving end number of queries, especially from people who have never invested in mutual funds,” he says.

© 2005 agencyfaqs!

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