BSNL 3G Launch

BSNL seems to have finally come of age in launching its 3G services. But is it too late and too hackneyed a strategy to be used and that too so blatantly that it actually takes off any sheen that could have rubbed off on the viewers. First it seemed to promise too much of its services when the market known acronym of BSNL is 'Bhool Se Na Lena'. BSNL might be promising all th

e promised services by Deepika Padukone but any user of BSNL knows that call drop is a nuicance with BSNL and so connection is reset every now and then.

The lastest advertising strategy revolves around using the age old Female power to draw eyeballs. One of the ad features a girl making a pass at a boy sitting beside her in a bus, but when she sees another guy with a BSNL 3G enabled handset she chucks out this person and invites the other one to take a seat close by.

Target audience: Clearly the youth / anyone (infact everyone) wanting to impress the people around

It is asssumed that the biggest target group for such a service would be the youth who would use it to see their friends while chatting over the phone. And the cricket crazy nation who would like to see matches on their phones. Infact this could be a great hit in various offices where all the sites are blocked but the phones are allowed. So now people would not have to call up a friend or depend on messages to know the score they can see it live on their mobiles.

But has BSNL been too myopic in its ad strategy. This is a strategy that has developed a lot and the same Female Power is now used in much more suttle fashion to evoke interest in the ad. The ad gives a feeling that BSNL is still running 10 years behind the competitors. While Airtel has also started ads for 3G with same live TV proposition the ad is much more pleasant.

BSNL needs to do a lot of ground work on improving its network service and if this time around its promises of high quality 3G service falls flat then it will have no way out but to ramp up its business. BSNL has paid the Govt. over Rs. 10,000 Crore for the licence. It has already filed a request for refund of 3G licence fee paid by it.

Hope that BSNL's strategy works wonders for the brand this time and brings it back to see the glory days.