Commercial advertisements at times tend to use social messages to promote common products. Such advertising campaigns gain reasonable popularity and work positively towards corporate image building. This article focuses on a few such advertisements which have used social issues for promoting known brands. These campaigns remain in recall for longer duration and are very effective too.

The advertising world is a very big experimentation floorboard. Advertisers are always on the lookout for new triggers for commercials so that the ads can enjoy better recall levels. Some advertisements involve celebrities; some exhibit a common man appeal; a few try to use innovative ideas with respect to the usage of the product to get the attention of the viewers. Addressing social issues in commercial advertisements is one such appeal which is not very common in the advertising world. Advertisements addressing social issues can be effectively used to improve recall levels. Some product categories normally bring into play all the possible unique selling propositions and then turn towards social issues to make the copy attractive. This strategy is used successfully by many advertisers the world over. India is on the helm of an immense developmental phase. As the country progresses ahead on the proliferation path, many social, political and economic issues surface for discussion. All these issues are close to the heart of the masses. Apt use of these issues in commercial advertisements can hook the audience on to the copy. Here are some advertisements which have become very popular due to their unique idea and appropriate use of social, country-specific issues.

A very effective advertisement was released by Rajasthan Patrika which precisely focused on the gender bias in Indian education. A very well-constructed advertisement in print, narrates a lesson in Hindi which gives the exact situation in many rural Indian homes where boys study, eat and play and the girls of the same age do the household work, cook and serve food. This is a very good eye opener for the Indian society where the gender bias is not excluded even from text books.

Social Perspective in Disguise, Self Management, Social Schism, SWOT Analysis, Commercial Advertisements, Economic Issues, Social Animation, Developmental Phase, Immense Developmental Phase, Innovative Ideas.