MediaLink brings Tata Green Batteries and EasyCabs together for 'cabvertising' deal

OOH firm MediaLink has brought together the two companies for a mutually beneficial arrangement

Mumbai based OOH firm MediaLink, which was founded in November 2009, has been on a roll, winning clients and launching outdoor campaigns for them.

Some of its ongoing campaigns include Tata Green Batteries branding on EasyCabs in the National Capital Region (NCR), ICICI Direct's topical campaign for the Walkathon in Pune and Sugar Free Natura's branding on Jet Airways' boarding passes.

MediaLink brings Tata Green Batteries and EasyCabs together for 'cabvertising' deal

Interestingly, Arijit Dutta, head, marketing, Tata AutoComp GY Batteries, initiated discussions and approached MediaLink with the proposition of supplying batteries to cabs running in the EasyCabs system, in lieu of which EasyCabs was to offer the battery brand visibility on cabs. Thus came about the initiative and henceforth, EasyCabs has adopted Tata Green Batteries.

Ravi Gupta, chief executive officer, Tata AutoComp GY Batteries, says that the strategic reason for going in for such an arrangement is that in times of recession, it is always a challenge for advertisers to maintain spend levels, which do not show immediate returns and is thus a long term brand building process.

Tata Green Batteries broke this deadlock in an innovative way by entering into a unique deal with private cab operator, EasyCabs. "While we advertised on radio, we realised that it is important for us to be seen across multiple touch points. The taxi media was identified as a key driver of visibility, purely because it travels across the length and breadth of the city and delivers high visibility at important touch points such as airports, residential complexes and business districts.

"Tata Green Batteries is committed to using innovative marketing strategies and business practices to build a unique image for our brand."

Discussing the forte of the organisation, Virender Raina, vice-president, MediaLink, says, "While we shall cater to the needs of our clients in the OOH space, we have identified all formats of moving media across the country and strategically tied up with them to offer a single point solution to various brands."

Earlier, Raina was national head, media, Serve & Volley. He shares that though the financial year has been pretty slow, it was anticipated that it would look up during the last quarter and thus November, they felt, was the right time to launch the concept.

MediaLink is also handling outdoor advertising for Telebrands, which is traditionally a TV-centric advertiser.

Revealing some plans that are in the pipeline, Raina says that MediaLink has ambitious ideas in mind but will keep a tab on the market scenario and make adjustments accordingly. "Gradually, we want to provide creative solutions to our clients - other than just OOH solutions. We shall increase our team size according to the requirement as and when it arises, depending on our client size. First of all, we need to garner the confidence of not only our clients but also our business partners and the industry as a whole."

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