Amazon ties up with Viacom18 to promote festive season sale

With total media spends pegged at Rs 250 crore, the e-commerce giant has tied up with the network and will be partnering the first eve made for TV concert to be telecast

As the festival season approaches, e-commerce players are gearing up to grab customers’ attention. Amazon is likely to spend Rs 225-250 crore on marketing of its annual sale.

This would be a marked increase in ad spend of the global e-commerce giant in India, compared with last year when it had spent Rs 150-175 crore (industry estimates).  As part of its various marketing activities, the firm has tied up with Viacom18, to promote the festival season sale, not only across the network but also on-ground.  

The e-commerce companies have become big spenders on media around the festive season (October to December).

In 2015, the big three — Flipkart, Snapdeal and Amazon — had spent about Rs 350 crore on festive season promotions. This year, the figure is expected to reach Rs 450-500 crore, said sources close to developments.

This year, Amazon has tried to reinvent in a disruptive manner. Using the insight that people want to do good deeds around festivals, the campaign uses the small and big gestures as a reflection of Bade Dilwala (Big-Heartedness). The campaign idea is to build and celebrate this spirit of big heartedness during this festive season. Amazon Great Indian Sale’s tagline this year is “Tyohaar Bade Diwala”.

“Tyohar Bade Dilwala celebrates the feeling of happiness and generosity that unites us all and is at the heart of this period of festivities. Festivals encourage magnanimity that manifests into acts of benevolence not just towards immediate family members but also towards extended friends and family as well as society at large,” says Manish Tiwary, vice-president, category management, Amazon India.

Amazon has partnered with Viacom18 to create a televised music festival for the first time. This music festival has been envisioned as grand platform to unveil Amazon Great Indian Festival Sale. The premise is that it would be bring together the biggest names in the Indian music industry for a Bade Dilwala evening, culminating in the big bang launch of Amazon Great Indian Festival Sale.

The music festival will feature likes of Badshah, Vishal and Shekhar, Sunidhi Chauhan, Papon and Shaan, and will be aired across MTV, MTV Beats, Colors, Rishtey, Colors Marathi and Colors Gujarati on September 30, leading viewers to the online sale. Viacom18 is increasingly offering its network services to brands for various promotional activities. A couple of years ago, the network helped provide media solutions to Chinese handset maker Vivo when it entered India. More recently, the network has tied up with the state of Arunachal Pradesh to promote tourism.