How Disney+ Hotstar cleverly promoted Brahmastra's OTT premiere without really promoting it

As Brahmastra releases on OTT platform Disney+ Hotstar, the platform releases a campaign with Ranbir Kapoor. It uses memes to promote the premiere. However, this isn't the first time that the OTT giant has used talk of the memes to plug in its content pipeline.

After the release of the Bollywood movie Brahmastra, which broke the industry’s dry spell, a memefest sparked up on Instagram. These memes poked fun at Alia Bhatt’s character Isha and how she had a one-word dialogue throughout the movie where she calls her partner ‘Shiva’ in a distinct tone. Netizens took a shot every time she said 'Shiva'. Another meme format took a dig at the film's dialogue, 'Light aa rahi hai'.

In a clever social media spot, Brahmastra's OTT partner Disney+Hotstar uses these memes to promote its movie premiere. 

In the video, Ranbir Kapoor goes on to rant about Brahmastra’s aggressive movie promotions. He exclaims that he is done with its promotions and director, Ayan Mukherjee! He then subtly plugs in the OTT release and says, “Now that Brahmastra is releasing on Disney+Hotstar, what does that mean? More promotions, promotions and promotions! Even Alia didn’t say ‘Shiva Shiva’ as frequently as these promotions.”

He then goes on to touch upon various subjects that the movie was mocked for. He says Alia’s voice has become hoarse after singing Kesariya at every event and he has a life besides doing Brahmastra’s movie promotions, he is going to be a father soon and it is a big moment in his life. 

Just then, he gets a call from director Mukherjee and you notice a change in his tone. In a chirpy voice, Ranbir agrees to promote Brahmastra yet again like an agency agreeing to deliver a revised pitch after receiving a call from their client on a late Friday night. Ranbir, like the agency folks would in this situation, bangs his head against a pillow, cries and prepares to promote Brahmastra yet again. 

This isn't the first time that OTT giant Disney+ Hotstar has poked fun at itself. It listens to the talk on the internet and uses those themes to plug its own content pipeline subtly.

Also Read: Inside Brahmastra Marketing Strategy – An ‘astraverse’ of tactics

In the past, Disney+ Hotstar heard the conversations on social media about the audience missing Shahrukh Khan, who has been away from the big screen and brandverse for a while now. The platform used this theme to announce its content pipeline while SRK expressed his ‘FOMO’ (Fear of Missing Out) on not being on any of the OTT platforms.

The OTT giant then released the second leg of the campaign, which hinted at SRK launching his own OTT app ‘SRK+’. After much speculation, it was revealed that the teaser was a build-up for Disney+ Hotstar’s campaign that was in continuation of the OTT platform’s ‘Siway SRK’ campaign. It also featured director and producer Anurag Kashyap. 

This campaign was conceptualised by All Things Small, directed by Ayappa, and produced by Early Man Films.