Brands becoming Products

Confused by looking at the title. Yes, you have read write 'Brands becoming Products'. This tells about how the brand names once established become synonymous with the products they are selling.

One perfect example of this in Indian house holds is Godrej, with it becoming synonymous with almirah. If not all but most of us refer to almirah as godrej. Why? Is it because it was the only prominent player in the market then. Godrej almirahs are well known throughout India. Another good example of an MNC following the footsteps of Godrej in India is Xerox. Xerox is used everywhere to refer to photocopy a document. Most of us would have forgotten that it is to photocopy a document and not xerox. You say naturally as '2 copies xerox' when you are in photocopy(xerox) shop. Surely the products of these brands stand for quality. So it is perfectly fine to have equivalent name for the product itself.

What are your thoughts on this? Provide them with your comments.

Regards
Raveesh

Advertising Standards Council Of India

Hi All,

This is for your information. We have an organization called Advertising Standards Council of India (http://www.ascionline.org/index1.htm) which has the authority to take necessary action if any advertisements offend/mislead/cheat you.

More details at the site above.

You can keep mail them at asci@vsnl.com if you wish to complain on any print/TV ads.

Cheers!

Conditions Apply

How many times this 'Conditions Apply' term left you baffling? Many of us are familiar now atleast with this term which appears at the end of almost every advertisement whether it is in news paper, TV or radio.

You will come to know of the conditions only when you are about to buy the commodity. There are hardly any ads in the news papers which does not come with the star mark somewhere in the ad. And we all know what that star means(Conditions Apply). And there is also one more way of representing it. They will say these conditions at the end of the ad as 'Terms and Conditions'. And these terms and conditions are there with a such a small font so that it is unable to read. Was it only done to fool the potential buyers?. Not clear yet. Ok when one has to market a product he boosts of its good features but other thing like these 'conditions apply' should not be hidden from customers.

Nowadays you can find a new advertisement strategy in ads published in news papers. You will find a mobile phone ad with much lesser price than you know. But be aware of the star mark on the end of the price. When you come to the end of the ad, you will see that the star means : it is the exchange price he is talking of.

Perhaps only in the radio ads they explicitely have to say 'Conditions Apply' (which is not the case in newspaper ads as you may miss while glancing the ad in the news paper) and you become more aware of that.

What do you say?