Pathaan marketing relies solely on Brand SRK

Here's how 'Brand SRK' worked its charm into Pathaan's marketing strategy that completely avoided the traditional marketing route.

It is not too often that you find a product so good that it sells itself. Luxury brands such as Lamborgini and Ferrero Rocher are a few brands that have seldom gone heavy on advertising. For the recent Shah Rukh Khan’s big-screen release Pathaan, the makers have steered away from traditional marketing and relied on SRK’s brand value and fandom to do the work. They are relying on organic PR to bring in fans to the theatres.

As mentioned by an Indian movie critic and trade analyst Taran Adarsh in his Tweet, just like Drishyam 2, Pathaan is turning to this unconventional method to promote their film, which Adarsh says was a wise strategy.

Brand SRK 

In 2021, according to the Duff & Phelps Celebrity's brand evaluation report, SRK’s brand value stood at $46.3 million. With Pathaan’s marketing strategy, the makers simply leveraged SRK’s brand value and stardom, which seems to have worked in their favour. 

Apart from creating chatter around the movie with its music videos and star cast which includes SRK, Deepika Padukone, and John Abraham, the movie saw organic marketing from King Khan’s fans. 

Fans from around the country engaged in various marketing activities to create a buzz. A few organised blood camps, while others took to the streets with life-size cutouts of the characters, and more.

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The Big Comeback

It isn't just SRK, Deepika and team Pathaan who are waiting to see the movie's performance at the box office. This time, the stakes are high. The entire Bollywood industry, which has been struggling to bring back audience to the theatres at the pre-pandemic level, has pinned its hopes on SRK's Pathaan.

According to GroupM iTV and Ormax Media’s report, compared to 2019, which remains the best-grossing year for the Indian box office, Hindi cinema has lost 11 percentage of its share (44% to 33%). With Pathaan coming to theaters, it has the potential to revive the sinking ship that is the Hindi film industry. 

Karan Taurani, Sr. VP, of Elara Capital said, "Pathaan is expected to have a strong opening day net Box Office collection of INR 0.4bn, based on compelling advances. Lifetime BO (Net) collection may be in a wide range of INR 2-2.5bn, likely breaching the upper end of our estimate, if positive reviews and ‘word of mouth’ publicity ensue."

Not just exhibitors, Bollywood stars have also shown support to increase the public's excitement. Various celebrities took to Twitter and shared congratulatory Tweets which further worked in favour of the movie makers. 

Moreover, to promote the movie's release and increase ticket sales, SRK and the makers of the movie sent out an appeal to all his fans around the globe to help the film industry fight against piracy.

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A post shared by Shah Rukh Khan (@iamsrk)

Engaging with fans

To amplify the chatter around the movie, Shah Rukh Khan used his Twitter as a way to communicate with the audience directly. He scheduled multiple #AskSRK sessions on the platform, cleverly integrating the audience's enthusiasm for the movie and turning it into a marketing opportunity for the flick.

The movie made its way to theatres on January 25 with many theatres going house-full. Additionally, the much-awaited movie has already broken multiple records, including becoming the first Bollywood movie to collect ₹100 crore worldwide on day one - all without any direct marketing.