Shahid Kapoor - The winner doesn't come with an expiry date!

So this is what the roadside hoarding saying :-)
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Some questions that came to my mind:

• How has Shahid Kapoor been perceived as a winner of life?
  

Shahid kapoor though has the image of macho man, he has never projected as biker/driver, etc. Alternatively John Abraham who has been endorsing Castrol Products, is not just a macho man, but his passion for bikes is widely (and occasionally badly ;-)) known.

"And as Castrol contracted Rahul Dravid (in past), Sachin Tendulkar (contemporary), David Beckham (in past) or Bharat Petroleum's MAK was endorsed by MS Dhoni (in past)"; so such endorsement by sports personalities to me, are somewhat logical because, the consumers can related their performance in 'sports' with such products.

• While advertising any product, deciding 'who is the hero of the advertisement' is crucial. For non-technical products or products in daily use like biscuits, detergent powder, cold drink; the product are not the projected as hero but the celebrity endorsing these products are. Simply because, the idea that "THE CELEBRITY is using so-and-so product why not me" .... expected to be imbibed in consumers mind & products in their category are difficult to differentiate.

Whereas in case of highly technological products such as Digital Camera, Utility Vehicles, etc, the product needs to be projected as a Hero rather than other entities involved in the advertisement. Simply because, the product has utmost importance and it can be differentiated from other products in a given category

But you will see the advertisement swaying between the continuum of the two ends mentioned above. That's why you would see, Karin Kapoor endorsing Laptop, Deepika Padukone clicking Sony cameras, Shahrukh Khan driving Hyundai Cars, etc.

• If you observe the advt closely - you can notice that the background somewhat indicates not a mechanic (work)shop but some tyre (repair?) shop

• I feel, for ELF MOTO 4 GOLD 20W40, Total Oil India is making overreaching claim. The product description claims to give longer life for engine, clutch, gear, etc parts of a bike but the positioning as 'The winner doesn't come with an expiry date' is far more to claim than reality. Probably, the positioning was meant to highlight the performance relativity among competing products, but again I doubt such positioning, how long be retained !

• What I liked about the positioning of ELF MOTO 4 GOLD 20W40:: is that it has been projected as a Bike oil & not just an Engine oil. Since nowadays, automotive engine oil products are not serving as a oil for engine alone rather it is running in broader structure of bike (except where break oil, fork oil, grease, etc are applied).

• The marketers emphasize on the importance of Integrated Marketing but may be because of resource constraints or lack of drive to make it happen; Lubricant marketing companies mentioned above are not displaying celebrities in their websites, though companies are officially contracting them. Only Castrol & MAK oil would fare better among their competitors because they have a section to download pictures of John Abraham, Rahul Dravid (in Indian website of Castrol) and MS Dhoni in case of MAK.
  

• Probably, it has been a high time for Indian Oil to launch separate website for its Servo Lubricant products. Since Indian Oil has so many products (Base Oil, black oil-Furnace Oil, MS, HSD, LPG, Marine, Kerosene, Industrial products, Special products to name few) & Lubricant oil needs a separate presence to break itself from the clutter.
  

Reference: Official Websites of Elf India, Castrol India, IOCL, MAK
Note: Views expressed are personal & do not represent my current or previous employers.