No, not Vidyut Jamwal of Force and Commando fame. Abhishek Jamwal. You ask – who is Abhishek Jamwal? This.
Dettol took TV ads with this direct attack on Vim, with no attempt to hide the other brand’s name. (Read my earlier take on the launch of this new product from Dettol). The oddest part is that it has been uploaded by someone named Abhishek Jamwal.
Do a LinkedIn on the name and you get this!
Question time! Is it wise to take on a professional role this seriously that you use personal names and handles to the organization’s messages? Of course, we all share, RT and pass on corporate messages from our personal social media handles, but most often than not, I have seen organizations being careful enough to tag the source message to a handle that is the organization’s name (sometimes an agency’s name, particularly when it comes to advertising, where agencies proudly proclaim their work – because they can, unlike PR agencies, which can’t). Once the source message is in the organization’s name, it becomes easy for employees to merely share it.
This Dettol ad seems different. It is possible that Reckitt Benckiser does not have a YouTube handle, but that’s not the case. They do have a global handle that also includes a lot of Indian TVCs. What seems like a possibility here is that this Dettol vs. Vim was conceived so suddenly that there was no time to align someone from the global team managing the YouTube property to upload the new video that an employee from Reckitt Benckiser India went ahead and did the honors.
He has only one video to his name on YouTube, incidentally – this one, uploaded on February 20th (Wednesday).
I can’t say whether it is right or wrong – there are no sides to take here, since things are evolving. But, I’d assume that at least in cases where it comes to dicey situations like taking on another brand directly, it may be prudent to not have your name tagged with the effort and let it be from the brand handle. Who knows – today’s Reckitt Benckiser employee could be tomorrow’s Lever employee!
Your take?
Incidentally, Vim responded to Dettol’s attack today, at least on print. This is the first page ad from The Times of India, today.
