They’ve said it time and again; if you think a minute crawls by real quickly, you’ve probably never held yourself in the plank position. The symbolism of this exercise that robustly strengthens the core was singled out by sports attire brand, Puma, to sway women in discovering their inner strength with #DoYou.
Traveling from the globe after being headed by Cara Delevingne, #DoYou here in India featured actress Jacqueline Fernandez, Kalki Koechlin, Olympic winner Sakshi Malik, model-actress Lisa Haydon amongst other achievers.
Campaign sketch
To be or not to be will no longer be the question because the answer will always be ‘to be’. Streaming the campaign along this line, Puma propels a visionary idea by signifying the planking position into a broader aspect of empowering women through the pressure of societal expectations that have augmented and infiltrating our dreams and aspirations.
Specifically sticking to a format of monochromic short films and surfacing individual story-telling of celebrated women in different walks of life, Puma set itself apart.
Early last month, Cara Delevingne the ambassador of the brand in an oversized hoodie shared her version of inspiration, “It's not about finding yourself. It's good to be inspired and look up to people, but to really find out what makes you happy, no matter what that is, don't follow the crowd. Don’t do what other people do because everyone else is doing it. If you want to go against the grain, don't be scared to, because if that's what makes you happy, it doesn't matter.”
Posing to be a woman of substance, Delevingne expressed dominance and power through the visuals, thus, pouring the same emotion out of the screens.
The campaign basically stirred inspirational tales by woman who have excelled in their fields; through the films Puma subtly promoted their products and moreover built on a philosophy.
Indian version of #DoYou
Soon, the contagious campaign reached home-country where a women centric initiative on the International Day for Girl Child on October 11 was celebrated. Overall the gist of the campaign voiced about brainwave, grit, individuality, encouragement and positivity to reach sky-high, despite the hurdles.
Ujjwala Raut, single mom and supermodel introduced herself as a ‘trail-blazer’ where she shared her story how she admits that she always wanted to achieve more and that’s exactly the message she puts out asking everyone to believe in themselves and believe that they can achieve their dreams.
Next is the story of Tashi and Nungshi Malik the avid mountaineering twins where they shared, “We didn't pay heed to those who said we couldn’t, who said we're just girls. True to our cores, we blazed ahead to discover ourselves." Through this campaign the global brand introduces these mountaineers to the world, thus benefiting both ways.
Sharing success stories Sucheta Pal talks about how finding her passion was nothing less than a movement. The international Zumba Education Specialist and Engineer, followed an unconventional path to pursue her career
Puma, through #DoYou shared an inspirational tale which has already been illustrious to plenty; it’s the life of Olympic medalist Sakshi Malik who hailed from a small town and went on to make the nation proud and the journey in between is worth knowing. Wrestling her way up, she scripted her name in history and grew into a young woman turning her dreams into reality.
"When life gets overwhelming, I move to the beat of my heart, I listen to the sound of my footsteps, that's where I find a world full of possibilities," shared Kalki Koechlin who strongly believes learning is growing, learning leads to change and learning will get you to do you.
A short video of Bollywood actress Jacqueline Fernandez was posted where she expressed how it felt deep down that she was meant to be doing something bigger. The actress who grew up around the world, worked hard and that’s when she realized it was never around her but within her.
Nidhi Mohan the fitness and nutrition expert too shared her story where she stood strong against societal norms and flourished from there. Along with her model-actress Lisa Haydon too had a message from everyone, "You don’t have to choose who you want to be, because choosing puts you in a box. And boxes are for things, not people."
Outcome
A sports brand churning out a motivational, women-driven campaign by foretelling success stories of women in their fields. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Familiar or repetitive, choose your word but the idea with which Puma fruited their campaign lacked innovation and did not hold any thought that the social-verse had not witnessed before.
#DoYou though is a lengthy global campaign extended in India, has a similar outline of what the grand successful campaign #DaDaDing of Nike did with Deepika Padukone and various other women sports personalities or Reebok’s #FitToFight with Kangana Ranaut.
Overpowering their campaign with influencers rather than a brilliant content strategy, Puma could not produce individualism as a sports brand and ended up following the trail of their competitors.
Despite the monotony of the campaign, Puma built around the plank position, thus driving a campaign on a particular path and also encouraging people to take up the undemanding exercise which is extremely beneficial. Apart from the preaching from influencers, Puma attempts to inculcate a habit in their audience which in the long run will only benefit them towards a healthy lifestyle.
The brand even conducted an offline activity on such a large scale that entered the Guinness World Record where women came together to plank and this activity was shared through Facebook Live and got celebrities like Virat Kohli despite being the brand ambassador for competitor Adidas talking about it on social media along with Sonakshi Sinha, Neha Dhupia, Manoj Tiwari, and others.
The video received thunderous views and managed to get plenty of digital attention. With recurring content Puma did not rise above Nike’s #DaDaDing, but still left a footprint on social media and encouraged the exercise of planking thus exiting with some positive leftover from their end.
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