Summary

India’s festival shopping season is centerstage for Flipkart in generating demand for its marquee online shopping event, The Big Billion Days (equivalent to Single’s Day and Black Friday). It’s a period where media buying determines success for the competition. With new users looming, Flipkart decided to take on an age-old Indian virtue, to bring thrills to shopping for the country online once again.

Awards

Cannes Lions: 2 Bronze Lions (Ecommerce, Brand Experience)

Spikes Asia: 1 Grand Prix (Creative E-commerce), 1 Gold (Brand Experience and Activation), 4 Silver (Brand Experience and Activation and Direct Silver) and 1 Bronze (Media)

Insight

We identified the singular, unique trait every Indian believes in: bargaining! Indians love bargaining hard on every single purchase: right from a hairpin up to a house. This set the foundation for the retail experience we could simulate. Secondly, we noticed the evolution of voice technology as a paradigm shift in smartphone use in India, where it overcomes the barrier of typing for the next 100 million. To grow excitement and use, we decided to tap a latent desire from the category: to get a full market experience online.

Creative Idea & Execution

The world’s first-ever online bargaining experience. Where Indians brought their bargaining best to set prices on products for the rest of India. Only this time, not over the counter, but over their resident voice assistant of choice, Google Assistant. In the lead up to the country’s biggest online shopping days, when users instigated Google Assistant with ‘OK Google, talk to Flipkart,’ they could be crowned the country’s craftiest bargainer by Hagglebot.

We built a game for uniquely Indian virtues. We travelled across 30 bazaars in India to build a robust foundation for responses. 8 commonly used bargaining strategies were shortlisted. Google Zoo’s teams across four countries then translated each API for India and Hagglebot. Bargaining strategies like Blackmailing and Lowballing were handled with panache; GIFs and sounds helped recreate the feel of a shop.