A peep into the world of TV commercials

Any program on TV, minus its commercials, is something that just cannot happen in India – these appear in between the news, in between TV soaps, in between the movies and even in between bhajans and devotional songs on TV channels meant for the religious minded. Movie channels have come up with a new concept – the concept of the ‘one-break’ movie.
Of course, these breaks have their importance, you can use the opportunity to finish off some unfinished work – like getting the rice off the hot plate or the gas stove or switch off the micro oven and take out the items from within. Most of the ads usually fall into a number of categories – like washing powder, detergent, tooth paste, cosmetics, hair dye, fast food (noodles, chips, biscuits), cold drinks, cooking oil, quick relief medicines, sanitary napkins, pregnancy kits, deodorants, condoms, mobile phones, jewelry.
Ads of drinks like whiskey are not allowed, hence there are surrogate ads that link the name of the brand with an innocent product like bottled water!!
Other ads belong to the insurance sectors and banks.
Then there are the public service ads like those of tourism and various policies and projects of the government of the day related to the betterment of the people and their lives.
During the cricket season, ads of the IPL teams occupy large chunk of the time. And, more recently, football teams have joined the fray. Tennis is trying to make an entry.
A new trend is of promoting movies through ads – in such cases, the title of the movie is important – it must be short and should have the power to blend into any product.
Then there are the funny ads are those that evoke instant laughter and remain etched memory long after the ad has disappeared – it takes plenty of creativity to come up with such ads and the visualizers deserve full credit.
And it is of interest to note that most of the ads run on all channels and in all languages – that is the beauty of technology – translation is no problem, readymade packages ae available that even imitate the voice pattern of the artistes.
There are a few ads specific to a region – like ads of mustard oil. Such ads are meant to woo the Bengali population and encourage them to switch brands.