Jobless in Kochi? Start a boutique in Panampillay Nagar & promote through Facebook!

Jobless in Kochi? Start a boutique in Panampillay Nagar & its Facebook page!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Go to Kochi and bump into 3 random individuals- chances are two of them are running their fashion boutiques in Panampillay Nagar. Every ladies tailor I know has done their best to catch up with this (now one year old) fad. They have changed their shop names and started displaying cloths on mannequins while creating a page on Facebook. Thus “Vanaja Tailors” has been renamed into “Le Lorel Boutique” and “Niram Ladies Dresses” into “Hues Boutique”. Panampilly Nagar is the new fashion capital of Cochin!

So be it!

As far as I know, this is what you have to know to start a boutique:

1. You have to know to stitch churidars-this is very important. You got to do it like a pro.
2. Then you have to learn to manipulate the stitching of churidar in such a way that it resembles something similar to churidar (but not exactly a churidar!) and name it creatively like Pehalwan Choli, Shawkeen Kamiz, Mumtaz Pallu, etc.
3. Where will you find your raw material cloths? That’s your own well-kept secret. Every month you travel to some remote places in Delhi, Gujarat &….
4. Worried that you have no designing sense? It’s not a problem. The trick is to take two unrelated coloured cloths and cut them left, right and centre. Then to stitch them all together without fear or remorse. This way you master the most required enigmatic skill called MIX & MATCH!
5. And now promoting these stuff on Facebook. That’s easy. Actually very easy! You stitch a dress, shoot a pic, post a post and someone working in Kakkanad Infopark will open their deep wallet for sure. And also eye for NRIs coming home!  (See, this way you don’t even need the help of a Social Media Agency!) 😉

I know, things are not as simple as I wrote here. Well! But social media, especially Facebook is helping these new entrepreneurs-small & big to find their market and sell without incurring huge advertising or marketing costs. That’s promising. Digital is closing the gaps once existed between the seller and the buyer.

Ah! I forgot to mention one last point. Being the wife of a celebrity helps if you are planning to start your boutique. Its gives a boost to your shop, especially if your husband is a movie star!

Let’s Boutique!

Social Media Manager, it’s time to increase our fan base 729%

Social Media Manager Dubai

See, the problem is, everybody wants to have a huge fan base on Facebook. Social Media is the buzz word. Even a paperweight manufacturer based in Timor or an all herbal Agarbathi shop in Agra wants to have a fan base of 20, 000, 00 in 3 months.

Forget fan engagement, just numbers will do. Form the Director Social Media to the Community Manager, the pressure is on. No allocated online budgets, just two banner ads on three non related websites. The brand manager or more often, the brand custodian (means that very rich internet illiterate guy who owns the company that owns this brand) wants wall posts like “Dear fans, LIKE this comment if your gold fish can swallow frozen beer froth” everyday to exponentially improve brand loyalty. Everybody is running. Everybody is trying to make everything viral.

I think the age of Social Media waste creation has begun.

Mr. Creative Director, will you marry me? [Asks a Copywriter!]

Mr. Creative Director, will you marry me? Asks a Dubai Copywriter!

“Tell me Denis, why female copywriters often marry creative directors”?  Well, that is a question. And coming from a T shirt wearing fresh graphic artist, this question has some value. Freshers time and again point out things (read truths!) we normally miss. This CW marrying CDs is not a hidden/new thing though. The phenomenon is old as the industry itself.

May be it is something like doctors marrying doctors and lawyers marrying lawyers. (Or is it true for every profession? Do rig welders marry rig welders? I am not sure…lol). These women content/copywriters with square glasses, pony tails, lose fitting white shirts and denim jeans see something special in our CDs. Is it the dedication our CDs show to their work makes them attractive?  May be it is their creativity that is acting as a big magnet. (But magnets attract and get stuck with many nails, but that is another BIG story!).

When you accidentally bump into your ex-creative director after a very long time, you will be happy to know that he is now running his own advertising agency. He will ask about you and your career and even invite you for a beer. But only when you drop him at his house, you will come to realize that he is married to that copywriter intern you worked and fought with. While driving you start to wonder about a creative soul’s ability to keep secrets.

Coming back home you just ring the bell and wait patiently for your sweetheart to open the door. As a square glass wearing woman in white kurtas and pony tail welcomes you in, you will wink and smile at the world.

It’s a strange world my masters!

Another advertisement dedicated to a freelance content writer…

Keep on running!

Freelance copywriter ? This shoe advertisement is for you…

Freelance copywriter..it's for you!

About matchboxes, copywriting and bromides…

Things change. It’s the law of nature.  These days Bromides and spray cans have no place in advertising agencies. Copywriting is impossible without computers and internet. Jpegs killed the Styrofoam presentation sheet “Hero”.

Not only at work. Everything has changed in life too.

My table salt is iodized now. Washing powder is granulated and tooth paste has Sinclova 5. FM radio has RDS, earphones are powered with cobalt coils and the hand sanitizer disinfects without drying my skin with its 70% ethyl alcohol and 30% moisturizer mixture.

But there is one exception…
Still my matchbox retains its pretty old self, a small stick with some ignitable powder on its side. Dependable and good to the last…well 🙂

Advertising is about observing people…

It helps to be in Advertising as it teaches you to observe people. You watch them and learn about their mannerisms, especially when they face your camera in a group. As they see you trying to focus them, women invariably adjust their hair falling over their foreheads with one finger and tuck it behind their ear; men try to look serious by holding their potbellies inside. Good looking women suddenly become more self aware, on the pressure to remain as good looking as possible on photos while kids smile embarrassingly looking at their mothers!

Next time when you are in a photo session watch them. Let me know if I am true. 🙂

There is a fun in being ourselves…

There is a fun in being ourselves. Like time and again you wear socks to work that does not match, that you secretly throw away toilet soap before it finishes to try a new one, procrastinate paying bills and then end up paying heavy fines, forget to switch off the iron, your heart still skips a beat near a voluptuous woman/sweet talking gentle man. Only thing is that we don’t appreciate this fun that often! .

My aquarium fish has studied from us

 

I think my aquarium fish has studied from us, the humans. When I photograph it, suddenly he calls out to his wife; they come together as a happy couple, strike a pose for a second and after the flash goes off, they go their separate ways. Even a quarrelling couple act happy before a camera and for a moment they forget everything. 🙂

School teachers just don’t grow old.

 

School teachers just don’t grow old!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

School teachers just don’t grow old. They are frozen in time with all their dignity. When you meet them accidentally after a long long time, you realize how old you’ve become but how young they remain. Once ferocious they seemed, now look so mellow and loving. When you part ways after a brief “hello sir,” a vestige of good times linger. Only teachers can claim this!