Karthik S | beastoftraal.com

What would you tell your younger self?

May 24, 2022May 24, 2022 by Karthik S

Back in March 2021, I wrote about an advertising trend that has a lead character meet his/her future self, in service of making a point about a specific product or service being sold. I had listed 5 ads that use the very…

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Apple’s new privacy ad and its Indian predecessor from 2020

May 23, 2022May 23, 2022 by Karthik S

Let me describe an ad film to you. A young girl. Her digital data is being auctioned. Her medical history, search data, location data, her contacts, everything is being auctioned. A group of buyers bids for the data excitedly even as the…

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The evolution of Apple’s privacy-centric advertising

May 20, 2022May 20, 2022 by Karthik S

That Apple sells privacy as a significant product is already well-known. The company started positioning privacy as a distinct advantage in 2019 and has made a series of ads through their agency, TBWA\Media Arts Lab. I have written about 2 such ads…

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The ‘dealer panel’ goes digital thanks to AI and cloning. But is it useful?

May 19, 2022May 19, 2022 by Karthik S

An important fixture in newspaper advertisements that only advertising industry professionals know about and appreciate is the dealer panel. This is usually a horizontal section at the bottom of the ad that lists the dealers of the product being advertised above, with…

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The social media content race for ‘topical days’

May 18, 2022May 18, 2022 by Karthik S

No matter what kind of brand it is these days—B2C or B2C—one critical element in their content strategy is ‘topical days’! ‘Seize the day’ (Carpe diem) has a very different meaning for social media content teams and agencies 🙂 It means they…

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The top view of a crocodile

May 17, 2022September 14, 2023 by Karthik S

A very senior marketing industry professional messaged me in the month of March after seeing my commentary on a new ad film. (I took their permission to talk about our conversation but, obviously, without any identifiable references, either of the person or…

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Evolution of quick-grocery communication narratives

May 16, 2022September 10, 2024 by Karthik S

I guess Zepto has caught on to a nice advertising template, concocted by the agency L&K Saatchi and Saatchi. After Kailash Kher and Shankar Mahadevan, here’s the 3rd in the singers-stretching-time series, featuring Usha Uthup. Unlike the earlier two ads, this one…

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