iContract wins Gold at Lions Direct for ICICI Bonds<b><font face="Verdana" size="1" color="#FF0033">Cannes Awards!</font></b>

iContract, Contract Advertising's one-to-one specialist division, has picked up a Gold Lion at Lions Direct 2002, the inaugural direct marketing festival organized under the aegis of the Cannes International Advertising Festival. iContract bested 17 other shortlisted entries in the Financial Services category, to claim gold for its direct marketing exercise for ICICI Bonds.

It may be recalled that with this year's Festival, Cannes has started honouring and showcasing the most creative and innovative direct marketing solutions from around the globe by awarding the Lions Direct. And in the very first year of its constitution, the Lions Direct received in excess of 1,000 entries, which rivals the number of entries that the DM-specific, US-based Echo Awards attracts.

"I can't believe it, it is such a mind-blowing piece of news for us," Bimal Nair, associate vice-president, iContract, is beside himself with joy. "This is a huge win for direct marketing in India, and signals the arrival of Indian direct marketing ideas to the world." Nair admits that he and his team had no inkling of this. "We didn't even bother going to Cannes. We never thought we stood a chance of winning, so we thought we'd just look up the results later."

Disclosing details about the winning entry, Nair says, "See, this was an exercise for ICICI's deep discount bonds. So we had to target parents of children in the seven-to-10 age group, and tell them to invest in their child's future. And the device we used for this was very novel." As it turns out, iContract first devised a school-level promotion involving a painting competition for children. The theme of the competition was ‘What I want to be when I grow up…' The competition was conducted in over 35 schools in Mumbai and Bangalore.

Once the competitions were over, a database was generated, and targets identified. Now comes the creative idea of the whole exercise. The targets were then sent mailers - and the mailers were the paintings drawn by their respective wards. "The idea was very clear," says Nair. "What we were telling parents is, this is what your child's dream is, so what are you doing to fulfill that dream. This was not a commissioned piece of creative - it was their own child's creativity they were seeing, and it immediately struck a chord. The response for ICICI was just great."

While the idea itself is undoubtedly good, credit must go to iContract for pulling off a three-month logistical nightmare (the entire exercise was conducted between August and October 2001). "First we had the school-level promotions," Nair counts. "Once that was over, the creation of the database took over. And once that was done sending out some 47,000 mailers - each mailer with an eight-point personalization." What this means is that each mailer had eight instances where the name of either the concerned guardian or the concerned ward appeared. "Can you imagine the kind of goof-ups that can happen?" Nair asks. "But that was the level of personalization we pushed for. As an idea it was simple, but executing it was an awesome exercise. I am so happy."

Nair gives full credit to his team, which includes Samir Shanbhag, Leroy Alvares (both account management), Steven Menezes, Jeetu Sangurdekar (both creative), Jiju George, Allwyn D Pio (both database generation and personalization), Hitesh Udani and Nitin Gandhi (school promotions). "I must share the credit with them; they are the guys who pulled this thing off," Nair says. "And we had a most supportive client in ICICI. The gold is as much due to them." © 2002 agencyfaqs!