Quikr says ‘get buyers and sellers quickrrr’ with a missed call, through ‘Bob Biswas’

Online classifieds site Quikr.com has released a TVC to communicate an innovation, wherein customers can transact through a missed call. It uses the character ‘Bob Biswas’ essayed by Saswata Chatterjee in the film ‘Kahaani’ to get the message across, with a dash of humour. The film created by Scarecrow Communications went on air on 4 November and will run for four months.

The film begins with ‘Biswas’ seated in a packed cafe. He observes people around him, before stripping down to his vest and brief and standing on the table to get their attention. He thanks everyone for their attention and announces that he has an apartment at Amboli and goes on to list its features. He asks if anyone would be interested in renting it. He finds no takers, but a man replies, ‘Quikr.com ko missed call maar na’. The voice over says, “Ghar ho ya gaadi, buying selling aur renting ke liye, quikr ko missed call di jiye 1800 3000 1000 par. Aur paaiye buyers aur sellers quikrrr.” Biswas then makes the missed call and is immediately surrounded by hordes of people interested in renting his apartment.

Pranay Chulet, founder and chief executive officer, Quikr, said, “The objective of the campaign was to reach out to a large section of consumers who may not be online today but will access the internet in the near future. So, we wanted to expand the market ten-fold with this campaign. Secondly, this campaign also differentiates us from the other websites present in the market. It manages to break through all the clutter in the market. With this campaign, we aim to change the rules of the game fundamentally. Our innovation makes it more difficult for others to emulate us.”

On the TVC, Raghu Bhatt, founder director, Scarecrow Communications, said, “The earlier communication was to achieve brand recall for Quikr. This time the objective was to highlight Quikr’s innovation on missed calls where a person instead of logging on the web site can make a missed call to the toll free number. The call centre then responds providing the relevant information in minimal time. Thus, the brief was to highlight this innovation and mention the various categories at Quikr. The missed call is a game changer for the category. The communication too had to be equally fresh and disruptive.”

On using the character of ‘Bob Biswas’, he said, “We were looking for someone who has pan India appeal and has great timing in delivering deadpan comedy. After considering Boman Irani and Paresh Rawal, we zeroed in on the character of ‘Bob Biswas’ enacted by Saswata Chatterjee in the film Kahaani. The film was a big hit and there was a lot of curiosity around him; we felt that people want to see more of him, and that if Quikr brought Bob Biswas back, the brand would benefit greatly.”

“The response to the campaign has been beyond expectations. Quikr’s call centre has been able guage the response and says it is excellent,” he added.

Arunava Sengupta, founder director, Scarecrow Communications, added, "Saswata is very choosy about what he works on. He opted for Quikr because he liked the bizarreness of the plot. Quikr is a street-smart brand and its ad spends are less than its competitors, but it enjoys disproportionate share of mind. That's because it has never played safe in its communication."

The campaign will explore the mediums of digital and radio and use regional and national media.

Credits:
Client: Quikr.com
Founder and chief executive officer: Pranay Chulet
Brand head: Aparna Mahesh
Creative agency: Scarecrow Communications
Creative team: Raghu Bhat, Manish Bhatt, Sarvesh Raikar
Account management team: Arunava Sengupta, Sukhvinder Wikhoo
Production house: Equinox Films
Director: Naren Multani
Producer: Manoj Shroff, Sia Bhuyan
Music: Rohan Vinay