N. Raghuraman's column: Is your company better at advertising with Moment Marketing?

About three weeks ago, a British F-35B fighter aircraft was diverted due to bad weather while flying from HMS Prince of Wales in the Indian Ocean. When it could not return to the aircraft carrier, it had to make an emergency landing at Thiruvananthapuram airport in Kerala. The plane, worth at least $110 million, had been on standby since then. Despite several efforts by engineers, it could not be fixed. As the team of engineers was working tirelessly to restart the aircraft by this Saturday to save the UK Royal Navy from any embarrassing situation, Kerala's marketing teams, meme makers, became increasingly active. The Kerala Tourism Department started. In the promotion of its slogan 'God's Own Country', the department turned the UK disaster into an opportunity for itself. The tourism department launched a poster made with AI. It wrote a funny 'review' about the precious aircraft. It's as if the plane itself is saying, 'Kerala is a fantastic place, I don't want to leave'. I would definitely give this place a five-star rating. A caption at the bottom of the poster read, "Kerala - A place you would never want to go from." The post immediately went viral and grabbed people's attention. People active on the internet made a lot of funny comments about it. Soon many others started doing the same. A small gadget shop also used the same image to boost July sales, which were always down during the rainy season. 'What happened that it broke, isn't it our job to fix it?' In an advertisement, Jet even gave a five-star rating to a food brand, saying "Pavan Food made my trip a delightful journey". Every morsel tastes like home. Another one added the picture: "Very expensive tea brakes, even the world's most state-of-the-art jet could not stop itself from staying in Kerala." A good breakfast will do the same with you. The company that sells face tissue joked about keeping the sweaty pilot fresh. "Not everything goes according to plan, just ask Jet. But the good thing is that staying fresh is in your hands. The vegetable market used AI images, in which the pilot is taking vegetables with cabbage in one hand, basket in the other. Educational institutions claimed that the pilot landed because he wanted to study a course in their institutes. However, the original pilot of the plane had gone back. Matrimonial service providers started looking for the perfect pair for the pilot and the PVC pipe manufacturer offered to build a rainproof shelter for the jet. When everyone was making a hue and cry with the picture of the jet, where was the dairy department of Kerala going to remain silent? She coined the slogan 'Come on, after all, who wouldn't want to take a cool break?' Through this, we use immediate events in a constructive way. If your creative team has a little situational intelligence, i.e. it has the ability to create creative, witty one-liners on trending or happening situations, then your brand can capitalize on opportunities on the internet and make a place in the minds of digital users. And that's the most important job of an advertisement. Think about how good your team is at Moment Marketing. Amul is doing this every week as a national brand. It retouches something trending in the news, it helps in connecting with consumers and reminds him of a trending topic. The funda is that marketing is all about putting things in the customer's mind and what could be better than moment marketing for this.