Karthik S | beastoftraal.com

Wordle’s viral marketing tactic makes brilliant use of people-as-media

January 4, 2022January 4, 2022 by Karthik S

Have you noticed people sharing random sets of colored squares on social media platforms like Twitter? I started noticing this some two weeks ago but assumed (wrongly) that it was something to do with a crossword puzzle (that I’m not very interested…

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The 10 best Indian ads of 2021

January 3, 2022January 3, 2022 by Karthik S

It struck me recently that since I write about new ad campaigns so very frequently I could also make a Top 10 ads list to summarize a calendar year! And since I meticulously make a note of every single ad I see…

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The ‘on background’ problem in corporate communications

December 15, 2021December 15, 2021 by Karthik S

Netflix India reduced their pricing yesterday and sent out a press release to this effect, as is the norm. Here are the news reports about the announcement, on Medianews4u and Yourstory, for instance. (screenshots below since the reports could most probably be…

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Peloton confidently blurs PR-advertising silos for its latest crisis

December 14, 2021December 14, 2021 by Karthik S

Peloton, the maker of high-end exercise bikes and treadmills, is already having a pretty rough year in 2021. Back in April, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) warned consumers to ‘Stop Using the Peloton Tread+’ (in so many words, directly) with…

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On-demand advertising

December 13, 2021December 13, 2021 by Karthik S

We gave up on Tata Sky quite some time ago. I still have the box at home, but it’s lost somewhere and I don’t intend to restart my subscription anytime soon. When we had Tata Sky (meaning: satellite TV/appointment viewing), my wife…

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Those e-commerce packages…

December 10, 2021December 10, 2021 by Karthik S

Amazon had earlier updated the way they send emails to customers. I wrote about this late last year. Before the change, customers used to get detailed mails that featured the actual product details including price. After the change, the emails were sparse…

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Video killed the resume star?

December 9, 2021December 9, 2021 by Karthik S

When you think of a resume, what comes to your mind? Usually, it is a 2-page document in PDF or MS Word format. This has been the case for the longest time, and only in recent times has LinkedIn mildly substituted this…

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