LURING THE LEFT-BRAINED TO PLAY A GAME OF CHANCE

Media Buyers are practical and left-brained – as is anyone who deals with numbers. But they have a weak spot – games of chance. Because they are so good mathematically, there is an inherent belief that they can beat the odds in any game of chance.

And through a happy coincidence, this is also the time of the year when games of chance are high on everyone’s consciousness. It is rooted in the cultural belief that during Diwali, it is almost auspicious to gamble as it signifies that you are leaving the doors open for Lakshmi (the goddess of wealth) to come in. Gambling then has a widespread social sanction.

GAMIFICATION OF A TRANSACTION: We created a game “Casino Grande” to sell advertising packages.

Instead of negotiating deals, Media Buyers played a game to get the best deal. The game had 3 levels of deals – Casino Entry, Casino Central and Casino Exit, each level with multiple ad sales packages. Through the game, they could upgrade their ads, buy more space and “win” better deals.

CREATING MYSTERY AROUND THE GAME: To generate curiosity, all communication invited buyers to Casino Grande, without divulging details of the deal. To know the deal, the Media Buyer had to sit with Dainik Jagran sales representatives and play the game. This gave us uninterrupted time with the buyer during the peak festive period.

The game was promoted through activation in agencies. Buyers were primed to gamble. Instant prizes were given away to winners. Buyers wanted to unravel the mystery.

- 129 deals signed up through the game generating a revenue of INR 366 million – this was a 47% growth over the previous year’s scheme

- Amongst all advertisers who participated in Casino Grande 2017

o Dainik Jagran had a majority Market Share of 50%

o We had a volume growth of 24% over comparable period last year

- We added 15 new advertisers. Our Market Share amongst these advertisers is a whopping 68%.

- In a crowded market, the Dainik Jagran sales representatives steered Media Buying discussions from “haggling” for discounts to “earning” discounts by playing a game.

- It was a clutter breaking scheme – that achieved tangible results :

o Our advertising revenues for the Casino scheme grew by 47%

o Our Market Share Increased

o Loyal advertisers to Casino Grande grew their volume by 24%

o It positioned Dainik Jagran as an innovative brand

For the newspaper industry in India, advertising revenues are a critical part of the business model. About 65% of our revenues are drawn from advertising revenues, and the rest come from circulation revenues. This places a huge priority on generating advertising revenue. Through this campaign, we attempted to drive advertising revenues innovatively – and for the 1st time ever, we gamified a transaction. The way we constructed the game, and way we took it to the market were a key part of its success. This case is testimony to how innovation in ad-sales marketing can yield great business results.

BIG IDEA = GAMIFICATION OF DEALS!

We did something that no one had ever heard or seen before. Instead of a regular festival discount plan we created a unique game. A game of chance that challenged the left-brained media buyer.

A game… that would tickle their right brains.

A game… that would challenge their expertise with numbers.

A game… that had tremendous amount of thrill involved.

This was Casino Grande

Nobody waits for festivals like the newspaper industry.

Advertising spends are at their peak during the Diwali festive time in India. The period accounts for 30% of the Annual Ad Spends for Newspapers in Dainik Jagran’s competitive set. Naturally, it’s the time of the year when newspapers get into an aggressive ad sales mode.

IT’S RAINING DISCOUNTS

The category during this period is commoditized by many newspapers offering huge discounts.

HOW DOES A LEADER GET INTO THIS ?

Dainik Jagran, India’s leading newspaper also needed to grab the opportunity to scale-up its ad space bookings, but without hampering its imagery of a leader. Which means we couldn’t blindly get into the discount war.

The objectives were

1. To increase our revenues during the festive period, compared to last year

2. To increase our market share during the festive period