The endorsement situation is dominated by cricketers, per se. The World Cup will, obviously, have a tremendous impact on their brand value. Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni will easily benefit a lot more than the others because they performed when it mattered most. The others don’t think advertising is their job. They feel advertising is the cherry on the pie. Their job is only to play cricket. They don’t realise that their public image is taking a beating (or not taking a beating). They aren’t at a loss, but they feel left out.
They make more money from advertisements than player contracts. It’s all about getting the right PR and good coverage in the press.
When Yuvraj Singh went down on his knees and screamed after
hitting the winning runs against Australia in the quarterfinal, the whole thing was real. When he cried, he didn’t cry like a baby. He cried like a man. This will go miles in Yuvi’s favour.
When grownup men cry, it makes them vulnerable. Vulnerability is the most important asset of a man. You may possess a macho image and an I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude. But if you cry in public on a rare occasion, it ends up being a moment of greatness, not a moment of weakness. It shows that you care, even though you may pretend not to care. That gesture proved it that Yuvi carries his heart on his shoulders and is not arrogant as he is being made out to be. That’s the quality brands look for. Unfortunately, most brands don’t think scientifically.
But the fact is that you have to be patient and humble. Not many in the Indian cricket team possess those virtues. I think that’s the difference between Manish Pandey and Sachin Tendulkar. Pandey wants to become Tendulkar in half the time. And on the other hand, Tendulkar is someone who will play his game and never think about the money. The game is more important than the money. Money will come if you play well. The youngsters don’t want to last as long. The new generation of players wants everything instantly. Instant fame, instant money, instant partying and, of course, instant women!
That is where these guys have to learn from MS Dhoni and Tendulkar. Both hail from humble backgrounds. Dhoni is a touch different. I mean he’s a modern cricketer, while Tendulkar is traditional. But Dhoni has a long-term agenda on his plate. He isn’t a flash in the pan. In fact, he’s a flash of brilliance.
Tendulkar offers continuity of tradition and a huge degree of stability to youngsters. Not only is he a superb role model, but he’s also an ‘agony uncle’. The youngsters in Team India are as old (or young) as Dhoni and they might not be comfortable talking to the captain and spilling the beans. They would not have any compunction in going up to Tendulkar and opening up.
Both Tendulkar and Dhoni perform two very vital functions within the team. They encourage youngsters and give them the right kind of guidance. If Pandey was under Tendulkar or Dhoni, there would have been a huge difference. Whatever sympathy he used to get due to his talent has now gone because of the IPL contract negotiation issue. He shouldn’t have thought too much about the money. The reason is simple. If you run after money in India, then you’d become money-minded.
Dhoni is very low-key, private, not so flamboyant and doesn’t do anything stupid. He doesn’t make irresponsible statements. He is straight and doesn’t slant away from things. He is real and not politically correct. If he was politically correct, he would not have the following he has. He always seems to be anti-establishment.
He has a strong opinion about things. If he is wrong, he admits it.
Dhoni’s leadership qualities are invaluable. Everybody is trivialising his leadership skills by saying he is lucky. It is not a compliment. When you say Dhoni is lucky, it means that he hasn’t done anything. You are undermining his ability to plan and strategise. To say that he’s riding his luck is grossly unfair. I don’t think he was lucky. Halfway through the tournament, we thought India would not win the Cup. People called him stubborn and complained that he didn’t listen to anybody.
These perceptions create doubts in the minds of advertisers and brand managers. When you make someone a brand ambassador, you want him to be perfect. You want him to be humble, talented, courageous, anti-establishment, young, gladiator-like and nationalistic. You want him to be attractive to women but not attracted to them. There is a huge difference having women chase you and you chasing them. The moment you do that, you are a bad guy. Perhaps, that’s why Yuvi was never made captain.
Another fact is that the industry doesn’t believe in taming people. When you tame someone, that person will cease to be himself. A tamed version of Yuvi is not Yuvi. But S Sreesanth has overdone it. People don’t take him seriously anymore. On top of that, he got slapped and he cried. He was being called a cry baby. All that aggression went for a toss. He should tone down himself and perform. That might get him some sympathy. He is now a laughing stock.
The new mantra in marketing and advertising is to take the brand ambassador to the brand. What you are paying the brand ambassador to do is, artificially, in your control. But it’s even more important to control what you don’t control. If he fits the brand, then whatever he does adds to the brand value. So you don’t have to write in his contract that you can’t be seen drunk at a bar.
There is something that cricketers need to learn from Tendulkar — they cannot let other people write their scripts. The copy writer who sits in the office doesn’t know who Tendulkar is. He prepares a script that demands a fair bit of acting skills. If you expect cricketers to act, they will look like monkeys. Look what happened to Sourav Ganguly and Hrithik Roshan during the Hero Honda campaign.
Ganguly’s is a classic example. In that ad, the brand sacrificed Ganguly for Hrithik. Dada was lost in the ad. He was trying to dance like Hrithik! From being a god on the cricketing field, he looked like a monkey in the ad. Today, we remember three things about Ganguly — his off-side play, that Lord’s balcony moment and the stupid ad. Nobody is debating his greatness, mind you.
Tendulkar, on the other hand, was so conscious that in one of the Pepsi ads, he was asked to hit the cricket ball with a mosquito swat. He did it once but then realised that he isn’t bigger than the game. He immediately asked me to re-shoot the sequence using a bat.
To my understanding, Dhoni is under-utilised. They haven’t made him exciting; they haven’t shown Dhoni can be wild — a biker. To just ‘change the game’ isn’t enough. Dhoni should not be used in urban sectors, he is a small-town boy and he should remain there. That is where the market is. The urban market is saturated.
The shelf-life of a player remains as long as you are playing and performing. Sports managers aren’t professional. They don’t look at life beyond cricket. They don’t look at the player as an icon. The human qualities are ignored. Look at Rahul Dravid, for instance.
He has been a gentleman all his life. But the point is that Dravid was never a great actor. However, the courage, simplicity and purity of the man stands out. Do you want your son to grow up like a Rahul Dravid who is simple, brave, courageous, compassionate, straight and honest? Or would you prefer your kid to be a Suresh Kalmadi — rich and successful, but a liar.
The best ad campaign involving cricketers was the Birla Sun Life Insurance campaign that had Yuvraj, Virender Sehwag, Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina in it. Specially, what Yuvi said, “Jab tak balla chalta hai, thaat chalte hain. Warna… (As long as your bat does the talking, you are on top of the world. Otherwise…).”It was an example of perfect placement. Consumers will believe when their icons talk from the heart.
To conclude, cricketers are and will remain on top of the pie. They bleed and sweat it out. Brands look for other qualities too. It’s not just enough to get runs, how you get them also counts. Win or lose, those are fickle predictions of faith. However, conduct and courage is the key.
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