TVC: United Healthcare: Our song
BY Malay Desai From: Leo Burnett, Chicago One of the American health insurer’s new campaign films features an obese couple breaking into spontaneous dance in their dining room when the song ‘Time of my life’ comes on the radio. The dance goes well until a few steps but at one point the woman runs in and throws herself on her partner, leading to a fall for both and a dining table crash. ‘There are thousands of ways into the complex healthcare system, and United Healthcare has ways to make this system simpler,’ the voiceover says, before the film cuts to the couple having an online appointment with their doctor. Why we Like? Keeping in with the musical mood that one very clever Amazon commercial has been setting this IPL season (‘Aur dikhao’, it was even called the best commercial in 20 years by an over-excited Mint columnist), here’s a film that’s an equally good earworm. The song’s a classic though, Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes’s 1987 chart-topper Time of My Life and the brand is of an insurer. Absurd? Not! The American healthcare market is complicated, cluttered and for us here, confusing to say the least. With new ailments always outnumbering the medicinal cures available, the cycle keeps moving and UnitedHealth, currently No. 14 on Fortune’s 500 (US) list, I believe is a hefty beneficiary. The motive of this campaign is to sell the insurer’s services to average (read obese) Americans, break clutter and vouch for simplicity, and it does just that. It might be a popular culture thing in the States, for couples to dance to the Dirty Dancing number and emulate Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey in public, but our couple here choses their kitchen-dining room for their impromptu jig. With an entertaining start, the film keeps you interested and makes you wince when the 100-something kilogram wife attempts to do that Grey did in the romantic drama… and crashes. With the fun factor and repeat viewing ensured, the message won’t take too long to drill itself in – the couple later on, thanks to a few clicks, is shown talking to a doctor on a video-conference. That’s a service we only avail of if our chacha is a doc, and this show-off works well. Virtual clinics, like many other value-added services in the pharma market, are picking up in the US (also ironically promoting laziness and hence, obesity) and United does well in just a minute to tap on to this trend. Moreover, the campaign’s other films too feature common American men and women falling/getting smashed by stuff (it’s a huge audience for ‘funny home videos’ remember?) and winding up with a plug to the service. (To watch this film,type‘bit.ly/ViewTubeApril27’in your browser) Social Newsfeed Your regular dose on the shifts in the social media universe Who’s a better saviourof Nepal? Far from the times when we would wait for the local post office to put up a donation notice or wait for the ‘PM’s fund’ announcement in the Times of India, now, it’s heartening to witness social media come all out in support of natural calamity victims. Facebook, apart from being the carrier of appeals and emotional messages, has itself tied up with International Medical Corps, whose teams are carrying out relief work in the hardest hit regions. While a large number has already been sought from us users, it will match up 2 million USD, we read in a blog. Twitter, however, has been more proactive, with the India team swirling into action, compiling emergency numbers, co-ordinating with the ministries and disaster relief teams. Again, stellar work is underway, thanks to the Kashmir and Kedarnath experience. And while AirBnB has waived off its service fee, mobile app Freecharge (recently snapped up by Snapdeal) made a day-long gimmicky donation drive using missed calls. Not as classy! Kathmandu likes this Cashtags are the new hashtags No, nobody is going to pay you for adding inane hashtags next to your morning coffee picture, but talking of money transfers, there’s a pretty cool service developed by the geniuses of Silicon Valley (who else) that you must explore if you are in the service industry. SF-based start-up ‘Square’ is enabling small businesses to get rid of cheque payments by offering them unique digital addresses. To pay someone you owe money to (restaurants, artists, even that guy playing the guitar in the alley), you go to their web link, enter your card details and voila, deed is done. The business plan of Square is to offer business houses this service, and set a transaction limit. The process, I explored, is so simple, it might not grow big in our cluttered industry! Your waiter likes this And finally, the IPL 8 numbers for Twitter Did you know,Sarfaraz Khan, the star of last week’s RCB game versus Delhi was only nine when IPL began back in 2008? I found this and many other facts intriguing in Twitter’s specially designed interface for the Indian Premier League, akin to that of the World Cup. The blue bird’s India team is taking cricket very seriously, obviously, as it nets them millions of impressions even though the tournament’spopularity is on the wane otherwise. According to a report, the impressions only during April 16 to 22 were 62.7 million, with the high points being super over games, high-profile clashes and in general, team CSK’s exploits. ‘Whistle Podu’ fans have been relentless this IPL too, and Dhoni and his boys are only willing to fuel this fire. Lastly, Twitter must also thank Shah Rukh Khan, who takes to tweeting every KKR game and stirs up much buzz. Lalit Modi likes this
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