How Cadbury Campaigns fuse the ingredient of technology into humane storytelling

Opening the pack of Cadbury Celebrations campaigns and tasting the flavor of generosity to know how the brand fuses technology and remains humane in nature, connecting with people across the nation with a strong emotional insight.

In an exclusive conversation with Social Samosa, Padma Shri Piyush Pandey shared a notion stating, "I hope you're able to add the human touch to the digital world". He shared his belief saying advertising mediums may change from Print to TV to Digital. What doesn’t change is the ability to keep the human connect. Which is exactly what Cadbury has been able to do through its campaigns over the years.

The only element that has remained constant through the marketing campaigns through the years, from TVCs to digital, is the human touch of creative storytelling that arouses emotions and crosses the barrier of simply being viewed by a consumer to being experienced by the consumer.

Here we decipher how technology has been an enabler for Cadbury's creative stories to transform into an experience and touch the lives of consumers, along with adding some sweetness to it.

Creative Storytelling X Technology

Connected Rakhi, the Raksha Bandhan 2022 campaign by Cadbury Celebrations created in association with Ogilvy India and Wavemaker, builds on the insight of how the vow of protection and love has been reduced to the minutes of getting a Rakhi tied and how sisters miss the times when the brother would stay by their side.

Spending quality time together has been a custom that ends with childhood, and the meaningful communication of 'staying connected' is based on this foundation. #ConnectedRakhi is a Bluetooth-enabled Rakhi that shares friendly reminders of staying by the sister's side.

The limited edition tech-enabled product can be bought from e-commerce platforms, and by scanning the QR code on the package, they can upload a voice clip as a reminder of the brother's promise. The tied Rakhi on the brother's arm then shares the reminder whenever they try to move away and plays it on loop until they're back to their sisters.

#ConnectedRakhi

Sharing the roots of the campaign and the insights from which the campaign fertilized, Anil Viswanathan, Vice President - Marketing, Mondelez India, states, "Our insight for the campaign was simple - with daily routines dictating our quality of life, the time spent with siblings decreases".

He adds, "With #ConnectedRakhi, we wanted to take the conventional sweet gifting a step ahead with the integration of technology. The vision was to encourage siblings to get more facetime at the back of personalization at scale.

Sukesh Nayak, Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy India, shared, "Building on Cadbury Celebrations’ proposition of 'Kuch Accha Ho Jaaye, Kuch Meetha Ho Jaaye', the campaign uses technology to help strengthen the emotional bond between the siblings".

Shekhar Banerjee, Chief Client Officer & Head-West, Wavemaker India, described the initiative as "an innovative use of proximity-based technology to bring the siblings together on a very special day".

This is the second year in a row Cadbury Celebrations has set out on an initiative to make a meaningful difference in the consumers' lives through emotional merit backed with technology. For Raksha Bandhan 2021, the brand launched the campaign #MyFirstRakhi for differently abled children who could not have the privilege to feel the sensation of getting a Rakhi tied from their lovely sisters.

Cadbury Celebrations developed a sensor-based prosthetic arm that enables the sensation of touch in association with Social Hardware, an organization dedicated to crafting assistive devices and rehabilitation services for unmerited communities, in alliance with non-profit organizations and socially conscious brands.

Through this technological advancement, the brand was able to enable human emotions that induce from the merry moments of life, like getting the Rakhi tied from your sister.

Anjali Krishnan, Head Of Media, Mondelez India, stated, "Cadbury Dairy Milk stands on the platform of generosity. The company has time and again tried to bring this thought alive by trying to shed light on acknowledging the unacknowledged".

Let's further explore how the brand fuses technology into one of the most humane qualities in existence.

Also Read: How Cadbury added ‘Celebrations’ to Raksha Bandhan Campaigns

The Taste Of Generosity

Generosity - The quality of being kind.

Oxford Dictionary

Anil Viswanathan states, "We don’t just want to stop at communication, we want to make it more purposeful. That’s where the platform of generosity came to play". Cadbury has enjoyed top-of-the-mind recall for over a few decades now, and generosity is an innate part of their storytelling that connects with humans across the country. Kindness goes a longer way than one can imagine, a moment of kindness could be remembered for a lifetime, and this universal notion is a fundamental element in the stories.

This notion also remained constant through the times when it was needed the most - through the pandemic. The mention of COVID-19 is enough to remind us of the disruption it caused to our lives. And while several brands took the call of staying media silent, Cadbury chose a different route.

Remarking on these times and the brand's stance, Anjali Krishnan mentioned, "While premiumization and premium offerings took a backseat on the product front, the company kept its communication strategy focussed on building timely bonds and 'generosity' among the consumers".

She mentioned this approach stemmed from the belief that brands that stay invested will benefit from that kind of mental availability. "We are staying invested, and our mantra is very simple, we are where the consumer is".

For Diwali 2020, Cadbury Celebrations, in association with agency partners – Ogilvy India and Wavemaker, the brand conceptualized and executed 'Not Just A Cadbury Ad', a hyper-personalized campaign that promoted local stores in the vicinity of the viewer through geo-mapping enabled through the location of the viewer.

Mondelez India rolled out the hyper-personalized ad film, promoting 1800+ local retailers across 260+ pin codes in India, providing the geo-targeted visibility amongst potential consumers around the area that the local stores needed in the trying times, and turned Diwali into a Happy Diwali.

The stores featured against the product category for specific pin codes in Mumbai, Delhi, Pune, Indore, Ahmedabad, and Lucknow. A family is seen rejoicing the gifting season, with products bought from local stores and highlighted in each frame, concluding with a celebratory note reading, "When all of us support our local stores, all of us can have a Happy Diwali".

In 2021, the brand elevated this concept by collaborating with the biggest brand ambassador in the country, who promoted local stores and retailers through his voice by making several versions of an ad through AI-Powered technology developed by Rephrase.ai.

The campaign recreated Shahrukh Khan's face and voice to promote local store names in the ads. Different versions of the ads were targeted using pin codes of the viewers. The brand also launched a microsite that enabled consumers to submit their store names and addresses and get their small businesses promoted by the biggest brand ambassador.

This campaign successfully utilized the brand's media spends to promote small businesses and present a campaign that is not just a Cadbury ad during the peak of the advertising season. The use of technology was seamlessly connected with emotional insight.

Remarking on the campaign that won at Cannes, Shekhar shared, "The most important thing for a great idea to work is resilience. You don’t let go of an idea that you have just because you are hitting hurdles. You have to keep crossing them and make sure that the technology does not look jarring on the face of the consumer".

The Festive Cadbury Celebrations

From the most-recognizable tagline to visuals joyful moments, Cadbury has successfully transformed festive celebrations into festive Cadbury celebrations.

In a conversation with Social Samosa about festive marketing Kiran Giradkar, Chief Marketing Officer, Nilon’s mentioned that he cannot miss seeing an ad from Cadbury because the campaigns are weaved around great insights of sharing love and celebrating moments.

Krishnarao Buddha, Senior Category Head, Parle Products, shared that Cadbury has been consistent for over two decades, and they have been able to bring a very strong linkage with festivals.

This linkage between Cadbury and festivals keeps evolving in the changing times, but the brand never fails to maintain the human connection in the digital world.