summing up last few years of my life
We have come a long way when it comes to consumption of any form of information, be it an important byte in a newspaper or a random meme on Facebook. We are surrounded by information throughout the day to the point that it has become almost difficult to segregate what is organically perceived and what is not. Given the spirit of our times, I think the future lies with visuals and aesthetics. Now coming to talk about my personal interest in visual communication, I realized the potential and importance of the visual medium when I was working with Leh Berry (Seabuckthorn Beverages LLP) after I was finished with my Graduation from the University of Cincinnati, Ohio. Leh Berry is a brand essentially dealing with beverages made of Seabuckthorn extracts, which is a very rare superfood found in the far reaches of the Himalayas. My core responsibilities included facilitating all the marketing and branding strategies for the brand. I mostly focused my expertise on business development, sales, promotions, ATL and BTL activities, merchandising, digital marketing and branding for all kinds of brand communication for B2B and B2C respectively. Since Leh Berry was a start-up, I got the opportunity to work very closely with the core team and further polish my understanding of how marketing works with a brand like this. While working for the brand, I realized the importance of visual marketing in the FMCG industry. At the end of the day, a consumer first and foremost perceives a product with their eyes before using any of their other senses. If she/he finds the product appealing visually, it is only then that the process of engagement with a brand begins. The marketplaces that exist today, both virtually and physically are being suffocated with brands and their respective visual stories, the objective of a sensible design in this case is to de-clutter itself in a product parity market-space. However, the buck does not stop with a pretty packaging only; it is the recall that a brand manages to garner in a specific period of time that makes it a successful brand, and to create that recall a brand language needs to be created in order to maintain a similarity and distinction in its communication. In this regard, Graphic Designing holds immense power to manipulate consumer behaviours and the ways with which one perceives and interacts with a brand.
For example, the brand war between Pepsi and Coca Cola has existed for a long while now and it is understandable why one would like to fight for the position of the best soft beverage of the world. It is also understandable why such brands would spend millions on their marketing campaigns and in creating a visual language for their respective brands while doing so. The core messaging aligned with the correct creatives/visual narrative is a sure-shot formula to create a buzz within the target audience. In the end, what we see is nothing but a visual representation of the larger idea that is in our heads. The more attractive and relevant it appears, the more chances the work has of gaining success.The visual medium, is one of the purest and most simple forms of communication to have existed since the Stone Age. It is fueled by creativity and depends on iterations, as long as we don’t run out of ideas to present a single thought in various forms, I think the potential of a visual artist remains untapped.
I was born and brought up in a family which has always been involved with business and that has played an important role in shaping my interest in Business Administration. That is why I decided to get a degree in the same field since I was initially planning to join the family business. But the actual decision-making process began for me in the last year of my Graduation when I was still unsure when it came to placing myself in one profile. I could not make up my mind as to which job profile would be the perfect match for me. It was then that I started working with the Centre for Entrepreneurship and Commercialization under the University of Cincinnati as an assistant to the Marketing Manager. The Centre was an incubation start-up working for the benefit of other start-ups by organizing various events between start-ups, VCs and students for networking purposes. During this tenure, I learned a lot about the start-up culture and about the various job profiles that an average company has to offer. Soon after that, I decided to return to India and look for opportunities here because I was much more adept to the culture and the workings of the country. That is how I ended up working for Leh Berry and furthermore learning about Marketing on an in-depth basis. I had the opportunity to develop all of their marketing and branding strategies, with the primary focus on sales and promotions, such as ideation and development of the packaging, corporate identity, brand book, it’s brand language, online and offline campaigns, creative photoshoots, in-store promotional activities, advertisement through traditional and digital media and almost everything else that is required for a brand to generate awareness in the market. Throughout this experience, I worked very closely with graphic designers which made me realize the fact that I was only missing the technical expertise when it came to creating an identity for a brand, and only if I was fluent with the various software, I would have been able to execute my ideas in a better way.
Apart from this, I have also worked on several creative sales strategies. For instance, I initiated a pilot project which involved creating juice carts which had to be supplied to different geographic locations in the country for Leh Berry’s 200ml packs which turned out to be a successful implementation of the pilot project and managed to garner a decent ROI in the last summer season.This helped me greatly to concretize my passion for Marketing, and especially Brand Management. After 3 successful years at Leh Berry, I moved on to the agency side starting at Creative Inc to gain a deeper knowledge of Branding, which according to me is where Marketing meets Graphic Designing. Adding to my experience, I am currently working at Animal Advertising where I am convinced that my experience in the field will put me a step ahead of everyone else. I will be able to think in a more practical and logical manner now that I have a sense of how the industry functions.
In today’s world where there is a distinct shift of content from the textual format to a more visual one. Interaction is key and nothing better than visual communication can instigate a sense of curiosity in a potential consumer/ audience. People do not wish to read, they want to be presented with the same information in an easier format. The combination of my existing degree in Business Administration with my work experience in the creative field will develop my creative as well as analytical skills in design and management - something that will help me in creating value with my set of skills for the company that I will be associated with. In order to excel in this career, I am prepared to fully indulge myself and commit to working hard to acquire the skillset and the knowledge base that is required to survive in this cut-throat industry. .