The Evergreen advertising journeys of Hutch and Vodafone
Has any advertisement inspired you?
Or
Made you fall in love?
Well, I guess, the one advertisement which grabbed everyone’s attention was Vodafone’s. It can be either of Pug, Zoozoos, or even Zumi’s. The ads of Vodafone have got a huge fan following till day.
Let’s dive into those evergreen advertising journeys of Hutch and Vodafone
You and I Campaign:
Whenever you think of Hutch, the only thing that comes to everyone’s mind is “The Pug”.
Chika became a viral sensation in 2005. Without her, the advertising campaigns of Hutch would never have made a massive hit.
Hutch roped Ogilvy and Mather for their advertising campaigns and the first challenging campaign was “ You and I, in this beautiful world”. This 60-second ad was simple and it was the story of a boy and his dog. Throughout the ad, the dog follows the boy wherever he goes and thus the Ad symbolizes that “Wherever you go our network (Hutch) follows you”.
Hutch extensively promoted its network’s value proposition with its tagline of “ Wherever you go our network follows you” and even the soundtrack of the commercial was magical, it mesmerized every viewer and at that time everyone kept the jingle as their phone’s ringtone.
Hutch is now Vodafone — “Change is Good” Campaign:
Uk based Vodafone acquired Hong Kong-based Hutchison Telecommunication Ltd, India in 2007. The company renamed it as Vodafone Essar, and the Hutch’s vibrant pink was now dominated by Vodafone’s red. The only thing that didn’t change was Chika, who is the brand mascot of Hutch-Vodafone.
To inform its consumers and their fans about its rebranding, Vodafone came out with the marketing message called “Change is Good”.
In the ad, Chika who lived in her pink house goes out, roams everywhere from plains to grasses, and when she comes back from her stroll, she notices that her house has been changed into red color one. She looks at the house for a while and eventually she accepts the change and goes into the house. The ad was shot in such a way to notify the customers about the change.
Thus “Hutch is now Vodafone” emphasized that “Change is Good”.
Vodafone’s “Happy To Help” Campaign:
The ideology of this campaign, “Happy To Help” was to tell the customers that Vodafone will take care of all its customer doubts and queries anywhere anytime.
Chika and a young girl were featured in this campaign with a beautiful soundtrack “Every day I want to fly, stay by my side”.
The first ad begins with a little girl waking up from her bed and getting ready for her school. While wearing her socks she finds one is missing. Chika brings her the missing sock, the girl wears them, and then she leaves for school. In continuation with the ad, the girl was seen fishing in a pond and Chika brings her a fish net to help her to catch the fish. The campaign consists of little moments where Chika was seen helping the little girl with utmost care.
On the whole, the “Happy To Help” commercial communicated the brand’s message that “Vodafone is happy to help every customer, and the customers can clarify their doubts at any time anywhere.
Entry of ZooZoos:
The most attractive and charming content, which was introduced during the IPL season was the Vodafone ZooZoos. ZooZoos are loved by everyone and were introduced as a symbol of the Vodafone 3G launch in India. People thought the ZooZoos were animated characters but it wasn’t true. Zoozoos are humans wearing white suits with balloon bodies and eggheads.
ZooZoos were mainly spotted during the IPL season 2 and the Vodafone predominantly advertisers ZooZoos ads during the breaks of IPL matches. Like Minions, ZooZoos too have their own language and the people fell in love with the ZooZoos giggles and the way ZooZoos has communicated its brand messages with its great humor and funny face reactions.
It also served as an extension of the “Happy To Help” campaign and Vodafone rolled out 30 commercials involving ZooZoos. Each ad promotes different value added services offered by Vodafone. ZooZoos commercials were all about Vodafone’s value proposition and emphasized on the fact that they are “happy to help the customers with all types of queries”.
ZooZoos was a hit among the Indian audience and they have a huge fan following on the social networking sites even today.
Vodafone’s Zumi Anthem:
In every season of IPL , Vodafone comes up with new and fresh advertisements. Along with popular characters like Chika and ZooZoos, a new character was launched called “Zumi”. Zumis looked identical to ZooZoos, but they were smaller in size.
The 30-sec ads open with the entire army of Zumis dancing and celebrating highlighting the latest data plan offered by Vodafone.
The ideology behind this IPL special Zumi campaign was to encourage mobile users to use Vodafone’s exciting and amazing data packs.
Zumis too has there their own anthem and the music track goes with,
“Zumi Zumi,
We’re Zumi Zumi
It’s so much fun,
We’re Zumi Zumi
Share your picture, play your songs
We show videos, We play along
Ya Ya we bring fun to your phone!”
And Zumi says, Vodafone internet is fun with its latest data plans!
With the extension of the Zumi army’s, Vodafone launched user friendly version of MyVodafone App
ZooZoos and Zumis were incorporated in this campaign, to establish the fact that MyVodafone App is a “one-stop-shop” for all Vodafone related services.
MyVodafone App gives personalized experience for both prepaid and postpaid customers. Through this app, customers can check their usage plans, bill details, pay their bills, and do mobile recharges for themselves, friends, and family.
Come Back of Chika:
It was the time where every telecom operator upgraded their data services to 4G networks. Though every telecom operator was talking about their latest upgrade to the 4G network, Vodafone gave a beautiful shot of Vodafone’s SuperNet 4G. Vodafone was clear about how they wanted to promote it and curated a campaign that portrayed Vodafone offering the best 4G network with the tagline “World’s Largest 4G network is here”. In this SuperNet 4G campaign, they featured Chika and a little boy in a 15sec ad (Master Vodafone Pug Truck and Master Vodafone Pug Drummer ad).
ZooZoos Are Back With The New Ninja Avatar:
ZooZoos came back with the brand new Ninja avatar. To boost the digital experience in India, Vodafone launched the “Happy To Help In A Click” campaign as a new digital transformation initiative of helping its customers digitally. These Ninja ZooZoos are quick, agile, and efficient.
In this “Happy To Help In A Click” campaign, ZooZoo gifts a phone to its partner. The partner sees the sim-less phone, gets upset and yells at its partner. Immediately the ZooZoo reaches for the ‘help’ button on its old phone. After seeing the help signal, ZooZoo who was busy exercising halts its exercise and puts on the Ninja avatar flies out to help and rescue the couple with a new sim.
And the Vodafone clearly emphasized, Vodafone is “Happy To Help In A Click”
Last but not the least, the entire ad campaign and commercials of Vodafone were curated by Ogilvy and Mather advertising company.
These are some of the most interesting and exciting campaigns of Vodafone to date. If you know some other interesting campaigns, leave your thoughts on the comment section.
