Will the ‘Real OLX’ please stand up?

I recently came across the latest OLX campaign, 'Keemat Bhi, Kuchh Keemti Bhi' on YouTube - the video is called The Cricket Bat. The execution of the video is brilliant with fantastic music to add to the drama, and it is entertaining. But a dissonance for me, and a large one at that, was the theme’s association with OLX. This was reinforced by the new OLX TVC of the same theme, with Shefali Chhaya as the protagonist.

OLX is not a brand that I follow, but since they are so omnipresent in the mediascape, it is very difficult for one to escape them. However, this video got me thinking, rather questioning what the brand stands for.

The concept of the shared economy was new to us, and therefore OLX did catch our attention when it was among the first brands that arrived with it in India. For a land that is so consumed with ‘sentimentality’, a concept that is exhibited so unabashedly in every walk of our lives, whether in our relationships, jobs, food (read ‘ma ke haath ka gaajar ka halva’), cinema, music, books, mythology… one would conclude that OLX in its communications initially (‘Sab kuchh bikta hai’ campaign) was trying to break the stereotype of the sentimental Indian who is a hoarder by nature. The communication was directed towards persuading us to let go of our possessions.

All marketers know that there are two aspects to a brand – the functional and the emotional. The former relates to utility, and the latter to satisfying an emotional association or the fulfillment of an emotional need. With respect to this, the Keemat Bhi, Kuchh Keemti Bhi campaign has a very strong messaging component, in that it marries the functional and the emotional aspect of the brand very well – let go of your possessions and clear your physical and emotional space (functional aspect), however your possessions will live on and take on meaning in someone else’s life (emotional aspect).

But, every communication from brand OLX when they first started out was about the functional aspects of the brand for the seller as well as the buyer. Its message was “Give up things that are of no use to you but could be, to someone else”. And all of this in a very light vein, be it the Kapil Sharma campaign, the O Womaniya TVC, the sleepless-at-night wife of a snoring husband, or the parents of the oh-so-naughty child who had made the home into a war zone. Amarjit Singh Batra, CEO of OLX India had this to say about the Kapil Sharma campaign, “As a brand we have always used humour to drive pertinent messages around aspirations, consumption, stocking, and selling. Kapil Sharma personifies humour in India, and that resonates strongly with OlX’s style of messaging.”

One could debate that humor is an emotion. But for the sake of this article, that is a moot point.

OLX carried this humorous brand story across mediums at different points in time. Their YouTube channel with its video series had the protagonist Mrs. Bech De, The Material Aunty spewing benefits of non-sentimentality when it comes to things we own, with statements like “There is no value for sentiments today” “Feelings ki value hai zero”, since she sees everything through a material lens. The series also took it one step ahead by showcasing the concept of Sentimentality as useless in the form of Mrs. Bech De’s assistant, a qualified buffoon who got all her orders wrong by many miles. And what was he called? You guessed it right ‘Sentiment’.

So, the complete volte-face of the brand with its new 'Keemat Bhi, Kuchh Keemti Bhi' campaign does leave one wondering what it stands for. The non-stereotypical and therefore non-sentimental, or the stereotypical and therefore sentimental? Anybody can see that these are polar opposite stands that the brand has chosen to take through its communications. And either of these stands WILL have an impact on the lasting impression that the brand wants to leave. It therefore seems to be one of those classic cases where a brand has not defined its personality. Or if it has, it has forgotten to view every brand message through that prism. And this, almost hundred percent of the time leads to inconsistent messaging.

Brands do not get created in isolation. Any audience that chooses to associate itself with a brand will do so because it sees a reflection of itself in the brand’s self-image. OLX today has two contradictory self-images and therefore comes across as a confused brand showing both its sides to the world. Resultantly, it ends up confusing audiences about what it really stands for - "Sentiment, that should live on in some form", or "Practicality, that considers Sentiment highly overrated". There is nothing right or wrong about the intrinsic nature of each stand. But what is wrong for the brand is it taking up BOTH these stands.

So, will the real OLX please stand up?