Vivel Face Wash rides Hungama's digital talent hunt ‘Mobisur’

ITC’s personal care brand Vivel Face Wash has partnered Mobisur, a digital talent hunt property conceptualised by Hungama Digital Media Entertainment and singer Shankar Mahadevan.

Participants can send in their voice recordings through mobile phones or upload video recordings on a website. Vivel, which is riding on the contest to increase consumer engagement in the digital space, has opened up the contest for its fans on Facebook - 5,000 female participants chosen from the page will be part of the second round of Mobisur.
Commenting about the association at Mobisur's launch, Nilanjan Mukherjee, head of marketing, personal care products business, ITC, said, “Vivel has always looked at opportunities where we can engage today's women and fulfil her dreams. And Mobisur is the ideal platform for engaging them and fulfil many Indian women’s dreams of becoming a singer. The initiative also embodies the Vivel brand philosophy of 'Choo lo aasmaan'.”

Campaign India caught up with Neeraj Roy, managing director and chief executive officer, Hungama Digital Media Entertainment, on the sidelines of the launch. Edited excerpts:

Campaign India (CI): What was the idea behind launching Mobisur on a purely digital format, and not involve an on-ground or television connects in the launch phase?

Neeraj Roy (NR): We are a digital company and our interest will be to try and leverage more on the digital platforms. It is a thought we had for a couple of years, and in Shankar we found a person who is extremely energised. We come from a technology mindset, and it was important to get the real process in play for the initiative. We hope that in the following years, there might be a television angle that can be brought on. It is not about ‘Why not?’. It is about what we are doing. Even tying up with existing properties for similar initiatives can be done.  It is something that we can examine in the coming years. 'Physical-related' activities have their challenges of scale, and through the digital initiative we hope to break that barrier.

CI: What do you think prompted Vivel to associate with such a property, as compared to existing television and on-ground properties?

NR: My sense is that as a consumer brand, they are reaching out to consumers in every aspect. They would like to experiment with digital medium, and that is really what they have done. Each of these things, in their initial phases, is about partnerships. We are investing in technologies and building it in certain ways. So, it kind of facilitates. Sometimes, newer concepts require a little more tenacity till it unlocks something big, and I am hopeful with time when we complete the first season and reach 10 million people and they have had the chance to express, then it has the potential of reaching much more.