- Client
- Emperor Akbar
- Services
- Branding Strategy
- Packaging Design
- Social Media Marketing
- Electronic – TV & Radio
- Outdoor
A brand of international repute and clientele, Emperor Akbar Cardamom sought out an ad agency for its long-term creative strategy and brand communications. Water Communications was the creative agency that proved to be the perfect fit. Long-term is exactly how we cut it. Breaking it down into a 24-month plan, we gradually moved the brand from product/functional benefits to emotional benefits.
The thinking behind that was that the brand was already well established in its core markets, primarily the Middle East and it didn’t need any more hard-sell. Rather, the time had come to endear it to the end user. We started by fine-tuning the logo, to leverage the GI authorisation and redesigned the packaging, with a focus on category ownership. The core brand communication began focusing on the unparalleled aroma of Emperor Akbar Cardamom’s products highlighted by innovations such as aroma-lock packs and UV coated cartons that help seal in plantation freshness and aroma for years.
Water Communications leveraged its rich experience as a retail branding agency (in both, the conventional and digital space) to build a powerful brand strategy for Emperor Akbar Cardamom. This strategy comprised a comprehensive suite of film, print, social media, digital communications and experiential marketing support. Given the emphasis on social and digital, Water Communications leveraged a potent SEO approach to ensure the brand benefitted from strong visibility in its key markets.
In this day and age, when attention spans are getting increasingly shorter, how does one tell a brand story in 20 seconds or less – as the reels and shorts formats demand! Simply by leveraging the power of simplicity. We took the brand’s single biggest attribute and let it manifest through expressive human emotion.
In the case of cardamom, that single attribute is aroma – if cardamom loses its aroma, it loses its very reason of being. There was also the insight that the sense of smell hugely impacts the sense of taste. So, in the film, we visually linked different aroma to the various past events and memories they evoke. Such as the smell of the first rains, a new book or a certain perfume. Indeed, the sense of smell conveyed through a visual medium!
Print communications for Emperor Akbar Cardamom provided a different challenge for Water Communications. While much of the brand communication is digital or via film, conventional print creatives had to be part of the strategic thrust because the brand is a regular at expos and hence needs to also be seen in their print editions as well as trade journals.
To ensure consistency in communications, we aligned the print strategy to film, social and digital, albeit with a mix of tactical and conceptual creatives. Our print ads for Emperor Akbar Cardamom were featured at international expos such as Gulfood and World Spice Congress. Being a 360o creative agency with long and rich advertising experience, Water Communications is blessed with conventional and new age strengths that help give our clients the edge they need in an increasingly crowded marketplace.
As a brand, Emperor Akbar Cardamom appeals to the senses. Hence, we curated the website to reflect this sensory perception. We achieved this via rich, evocative imagery and appealing aesthetics, while keeping text and content to the minimum on the home page. And yet, Emperor Akbar is a brand name that has an entire story to tell – not just a single linear story, but one that splinters into many directions and paths.
We struck the perfect balance by replacing boring and ‘templative’ Read More prompts with interesting link titles that lure the reader to explore more. From where, all the beautiful stories that the brand and product encapsulate come to live through single clicks, that transport the reader to inside landing pages, thus maintaining the pristine aesthetics and sanctity of the home page. All in all, we achieved the fine balance of a visually rich and evocative website, that piques the interest of the reader through interesting facts and tidbits on cardamom, its health benefits and its culinary applications, gradually priming the reader to shop at the online store.
Social media by, its very nature, demands of creative agencies a large degree of nimbleness and flexibility. It is a medium where an ad agency has to literally think on its feet and churn out ideas at the drop of a hat. Water Communications is one of those unique advertising agencies that has rich experience in both conventional and new age media. A dedicated Social Media team is forever in ‘ready mode’ to deliver at a moment’s notice.
This has come out strongly in our Social Media communications for Emperor Akbar Cardamom. The creatives and posts range from tactical and newsy, to festive and celebratory, to educative and enlightening (such as how to identify good cardamom). We also created a health series, given cardamom’s therapeutic properties. On a PSA plane, we linked the ‘goodness of cardamom’ to the goodness of being charitable and kind towards others, as well.
For a product defined by its aroma, the most powerful brand interactions happen in the physical world. Water Communications conceptualised and designed event stalls that translated Emperor Akbar Cardamom’s premium quality into a tangible, immersive experience. The objective was not just visibility, but engagement allowing consumers to see, feel and most importantly, experience the product firsthand.
By bringing the product closer to the consumer, these on-ground activations helped bridge the gap between awareness and trust, reinforcing that the true value of Emperor Akbar Cardamom lies not just in what it is, but in how it is experienced.
