First, fast, furious...Bangladeshi business blog

We provide
--social media strategies for Bangladeshi businesses worldwide
--public speaking on Bangladeshi businesses and social media
--paid product/service/website reviews of Bangladeshi companies

Interested to place an advertisement for your business?

Friday, April 11, 2008

Unilevr's Khalu

Cloze Up 1: Tomakei Khujche Bangladesh (TKB) is perhaps the most successful event that has promoted Unilevr and its brand Cloze Up. For over three years Unilevr has been admired as one of the first multinational giants which has put much of its interest in bringing out the hibernated talents of Bangladesh. I, too, think highly of Unilevr for putting their valuable wealth in search for the ultimate music talents of Bangladesh. Certainly it’s worth praising. It doesn’t matter whether the idea has been copied or the set ups has been modified to suit the culture of the country; what matters most is the purpose of the job, and in this very case it can be stated without any doubt that the purpose was good enough.


Undoubtedly, Unilevr has a strong market research team, along with the very best business executives who work hard to keep the Unispirit up. Unilevr has shown strong business skills in their day to day operation, their managerial skills, and the dexterity in getting things done pursuing people with power. Like in the case of Cloze Up 1:TKB, the most awestricken reality show ever aired in Bangladesh. I look for answers to a couple of questions that I’d not have shown interest in if I were not engaged in writing business articles concerning Bangladesh in most of the times. The questions are:- 1) Despite having so many TV channels why did Unilevr choose NTV as their host? 2) Would Unilevr consider joining up with NTV if Mr. Khalu had not been associated with the company?

As accountants, often our purpose lies in finding out fields where we are putting our money in, and making no profit out of it. For management, we sort out it non-value added items, and try to find why these are happening. This process is called Activity Analysis in our terms. The process consists of two things, i.e. 1) Finding out root causes for an activity and 2) Sorting out activity triggers that are setting off the activities. Root causes are often difficult to identify, and require group discussions while sorting them out. For example, if you are producing cigarettes, you need to buy tobacco as your raw material. So when you procure tobacco, your root cause is to collect the main resource for the soundness of the production, and so on.

So, I went searching for the root causes that could answer my questions. I found the root cause to be very simple and straightforward. As I move on, please note that, all these thoughts of mine are based on assumptions. So, do not rely on this information. This article may change some of your view points in finding out the reasons behind Unilevr’s choosing of NTV as their host for the event of Cloze up1: TKB.

At the time Unilevr thought to stage the so called drama, the team of Mr. Khalu was in power. And it is widely known that Mr. Khalu had some unusual relationship with the Prime in a number of ways. If you are to get the blessings from the boss, you must satisfy his/her PA. Here, in this event, Unilevr may have persuaded Mr. Khalu to get oiled by the smooth hands of the Prime. One other thing, I have labelled Cloze Up 1: TKB as ‘Drama’ for, because I found it nothing but a drama! It’s a way to get rich by the contribution of public wealth. The mobile companies, along with Unilevr and NTV did a monstrous business through public sms; the revenue from each of the sms that I, he and you have sent has been evenly distributed among the three companies.

Did you know? The non resident Bangladeshis were given a chance to vote for the contestants through online voting. And no one was allowed to vote a candidate more than 5 times. And, most importantly no people living in the boundaries of Bangladesh were permitted to take part in the online voting as it would turn their sms business down! Huh! I smelled the rat, and voted Rumi more than 20 times a day changing my IP (Internet Protocol) address from my home at Dhanmondi. Guess, how fragile their voting system was for such a big event? Do you think they put much of their interest in planning for the program? No, they just thought of making business blackmailing public emotionally.
.
Moreover, the (three) judges were not satisfied with event management team, and at one stage they refused to run the judgement panel. Some newspapers covered news about these. However, I suppose NTV managed the whole matter with the power they have in them, obviously from the part of Mr. Khalu.

I don’t think Unilevr would have tied up with NTV if Mr. Khalu had not own this media. They may have gone either to Channel I or ATN. Everything would be same then, the channel would make money from advertising in between the gaps while the program ran, Unilevr would make profit from the sms, and getting promoted to more and more public. But . . . but Unilevr would never get a chance to handle political influences if they worked with Channel I and ATN.

Now for the third time Unilevr is going to arrange the event again. But the company’s Khalu is not in power anymore, and not even in the vicinity of their premises! But Unilevr certainly is long sighted, and they have not yet breached the unwritten contract between it and NTV.
.
Mr. Khalu will surely benefit this multinational giant sometime in future.

1 comment:

Rajib's Weblog said...

Hello,
I live in Tokyo.I would like to invite all of you to visit my blog
http://rajiblog-ms.blogspot.com/

Recently I have started a project on a web portal which is aimed to build a good relation between Bangladesh and Japan business and cutlure...
Your Idea will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance