Surrogate Advertising

Surrogate advertising is a strategy of advertising a product that can not be advertised openly. In Surrogate Advertising, advertisers create advertisement(s) that help in building a brand and often involve popular celebrities without naming the actual product that is being indirectly advertised.

Surrogate advertising is used to promote regulated products, like cigarettes, Gutkha, alcohol and Betting apps, websites in the disguise of another product. This type of advertising uses a product of a fairly close category, such as club soda or mineral water in case of alcohol, products of a completely different category (for example, music CDs or playing cards) to promote the brand name of a product.

This advertising tactic banks on brand recall, generate curiosity and lead people to their main product by advertising. They use similar name to their main product for their surrogate advertising campaigns, example - 1xBet use 1XNews and 1XBat. Some online betting platforms such as 1xBet, Dafabet and Betway have been advertising themselves as professional sports blogs and sports news websites. Dafabet and Betway do surrogate advertising by Dafa News mobile app and Betway (sport analysis, news) app resp.

Studies have shown that viewers of these advertisements understand the real product being advertised on television, online or offline.

History

The origin of surrogate advertising can be traced to Britain, where housewives started protesting against liquor advertisements which provoked their husbands. The protest rose to a level where liquor advertising had to be banned and brand owners seeing no way out decided to promote fruit juices and soda under the brand name; the concept later emerged as surrogate advertisements.

Surrogate advertising in India

India has held a strong stance on the ban of advertising tobacco and liquor products since 1995. The ban was enforced after extensive research from the Indian Ministry of Health found that cigarettes and liquor have adverse effects on a person's health. In addition to this, the Indian government holds the notion that these products are especially harmful to a person's mental health, making them lazy and unmotivated. The combination of these factors lead to an eventual ban on advertising of these products throughout its media channels.

However, the negative outlook on advertising these products can be traced back to 1975, when the Indian government introduced the Cigarette advertising act, forcing tobacco companies to display health warnings on the packaging and advertisements for cigarettes. The Indian government and health ministry continued to push for stronger restriction of the advertising of tobacco and liquor until its eventual complete ban in 1995. However, the increase in population saw the sales of tobacco and liquor increase at an exponential rate. Therefore, companies were forced to seek alternative means of advertising, which lead the eventual creation of surrogate advertising in India.

Some of the first evidence of surrogate advertising was seen by the Indian tobacco Company ‘''Azad Bidi'', who sponsored an international cricket match in India. In India, extensive surveys resulted in similar findings which showed that liquor ads had direct influence on consumers' purchasing behavior. Soon afterwards, the Cable TV Regulation Act banned liquor and cigarette advertisements; thus, India gradually adopted surrogate advertisements.

Such companies usually either go for brand extension and promote the extended products, or promote certain products which might not be available in the market. The excessive pressure of the ban forced companies to focus more on brand building and thus liquor companies started sponsoring and hosting glamorous events, yet many others started distributing t-shirts, caps, key chains, drinking glasses with the brand name displayed on these products.

Surrogate advertising mandates a requirement for the product being marketed to have a revenue model associated with it.
On 7 October 2022, consumer affairs ministry of India issued notices to 6 alcohol and tobacco brands due to their surrogate advertisings. Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has sent notices to ''Premium Black, Sterling Reserve, Seagram's Imperial Blue, Vimal Pan Masala, Rajnigandha Pan Masala'' and ''Kamala Pasand Pan Masala'' and told them to give answers on violating advertising guidelines. CCPA also asked them to discontinue these ads with immediate effect.

Many Betting websites, mobile apps do surrogate advertising in India. For example, they open similar name websites as apps to advertise their main betting company. Some examples include 1xBet running 1XNews, 1XBat, extensively advertised as sporting blog and sportswear brand respectively. 1xBet singed Indian former cricketer Yuvraj Singh as their brand ambassador. Fair Play, Betway also use similar type of tactic, to attract people to their main betting app, website. They are using national TV channels such as Star Sports etc. and YouTube channels, online media for advertising. But due to weak Indian laws these illegal betting apps are running and advertising in India.

Effectiveness of surrogate advertisements

According to the inferences drawn from several surveys and interviews, 42 out of 50 people can understand the actual liquor or tobacco product being advertised.

Surrogate advertisements do impact a consumer's buying decision as well. They also inform consumers about the leading liquor brands and thus promote sales.

Betting platforms

Betting is illegal in India, but India doesn't have proper laws against online gambling, betting. Many gambling platforms and mobile apps advertise themselves during the IPL, international, and domestic cricket matches on television through surrogate advertisements in India, Some of these apps are 1xBet, Fairplay, PariMatch, Betway and Wolf 777, with most of these websites and apps operating from outside of India. Betting on horse racing is legal in India, but matka gambling is ill-legal in this nation.

1X Bet and Fair Play are among the blacklisted betting platforms in India, but both of these websites or apps using surrogate advertising in India. 1X Bet opened a sporting apparel and 'Sporting blog' website, named it as '1X Bat', '1X News' respectively, they singed Indian former cricketer Yuvraj Singh as brand ambassador, started advertising on national television Star Sports, they also sponsored teams in Legends League Cricket etc. Fair Play using similar idea, singed Indian film actor Ranbir Kapoor, former amateur boxer Mary Kom. Betway doing advertising without mentioning themselves as a betting app, website or platform, thorough YouTube channels, Google ads, news websites operated by Indians, one of example - Akash Chopra do advertising of Betway on his channel, ''Akash Chopra.''

Current scenario

With government now enforcing ban on surrogate advertisements, companies are turning to event sponsorship, event organising, corporate films and more and more innovative integrated marketing communications strategies, though surrogate advertising is still a common practice.

Brand extensions, which is the expansion of a company towards products it did not sell previously, are allowed and somewhat common. The main difference between this practice and surrogate advertising is that surrogate advertising does not want to sell the supposed new product and it actually wants to promote a product whose advertising is prohibited.

Surrogate advertising brands

Some notable brands who do surrogate advertising through disguise of other product :

See also

* Fraud in India - List of articles related to fraud in India
* Fraud
* Internet fraud
* Misleading advertisement
* False advertising
* List of Commercial crimes articles
* Deception

References

External links

*''{{webarchive , url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121013004542/http://www.isrj.net/June/2011/Commerce_Surrogate_Advertising.html , date=October 13, 2012 , title=Surrogate Advertising : A Successful Marketing Strategy for Liquor, Whisky products ''
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Banning Liquor Surrogate Advertising
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Advertising techniques