Why Aamir Khan is a Marketing Genius
Of Doodles and Bum Chairs
By October, two months before the release of 3 Idiots, no one knew much about the movie. There were no hoardings. No signs at theaters. And to build the suspense, multiplexes were sent bum chairs (like the ones the 3 Idiots sit on in the film); stickers that read “You are the 4th idiot”. No one knew what it all meant.
But on October 30, the 3 Idiots team made their first break of communication. They launched the film’s trailer to a gathering of trade people, multiplexes, and media. Ghajini was in the media for a year and a half before it released. 3 Idiots would only be in the media for two months.
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Image: SAMEER JOSHI FOTOCORP
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3 IDIOTS producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra opened his purses to make Alternate Reality Gaming happen | |
In December, Khan was also busy designing T-shirts. “I said I can’t design, I’m not a designer, but I can give you my doodles,” says Khan. Pantaloon created a T-shirt line with the doodles, and 3 Idiots Converse sneakers.
Featuring Khan’s doodles instead of just replica merchandise worked. Pantaloon sold more than 1000 pieces per day in its opening week, and then sold out of the merchandise twice. The doodle T-shirt was also created as a gift friends could send to one another on “Aamir the Pucca Idiot” Facebook page, whose profile now had almost 2 lakh fans.
BusinessofCinema (BoC), who did the digital marketing, launched the Pantaloon gifts on Facebook, plus ticketing applications, and 3 Idiots videos and songs. Most of all, BoC readied themselves for the launch of the ARG game. And then, on December 12, Aamir Khan disappeared.
Director Hirani and Producer Chopra claimed not to know where he was. All that was left behind was a video on the film’s website, idiotsacademy.com. “I shot a video, and I said, ‘If you want to be a part of this of game, well... For two weeks, I will be traveling around the country. I will appear seven places, will give you seven clues to find me. For the first clue you need to get it from Sachin Tendulkar.’ And then I kiss my wife goodbye and walk out the door,” says Khan.
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A GANDHIAN SCHOOL in Palanpur gets an unexpected visit
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I Am Not Here
Khan first reappeared in Varanasi, disguised as an old man. “I couldn’t tell anyone who I was,” he says. The 3I team shot footage of what he was doing, but no TV stations could find him. Choudhary worried, “How will media take it? Will they think it’s a gimmick to ignore?” And at every stage, someone on the team said this would not work.
It didn’t help that a lot of the 3I recce team’s planning didn’t work out. Choudhary broke his collarbone in a rickshaw accident. Instead of spending the night at Varanasi station as planned, Khan decided to find his mother’s home in Varanasi.
“I really went to Varanasi to make friends over there. It had to be a genuine process. I didn’t know who I would meet or how they would react to me. It was happening organically,” explains Khan. He talks for more than an hour about Varanasi, recounting the story of a rickshaw driver he calls “damn funny”, and the four men who help him find his mother’s house.
After Khan left Varanasi, he let it be known he was there. 20,000 people trampled the tea shop where Khan had just been. The local media went crazy. “They found the story fascinating because they saw how unplanned the whole thing was. The English media picked it up only four times in those two weeks, but Hindi news channels and local print and TV media went ballistic. I was on the front page. They would report every new clue we announced, and interview the people I had met,” says Khan.
Khan not only evaded the media, but also goaded them. “I had been given the names of 15 editors in each city. So when I left their city, I wrote each of them handwritten letters on my letterhead that said ‘I was passing through your city and felt like having sweets. So I bought some mithai and got you some as well. Love, Aamir’. It was a like a tease,” Khan says and smiles.
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Too simplistic a piece.
