Filipino: Pitch Perfect

Not the type of pitch however, that catapulted LEA SALONGA to international stardom.

But the type which causes a stir or a HYPE in product endorsement.

( or maybe something related to a prize-fight that might have been promoted by Bob Arum, as my brother would say)

The Filipino is the right culture to pitch any product to, ( may it be food, clothing or service ) as long as a bustle or a hoopla would involve it.

A hype will always be more appealing to the people in my country,
than paid advertising which is heard over the radio
or seen on print and television .

( in fact when a nearby street is on fire, people would rush towards it and watch firefighters put off the fire )

While police enforcers in this country know, that a yellow cord is good as nothing here.)

We are a hyped culture, so we are attracted to the hyped type of advertising.

It indeed appeals to the greater nature of the Filipino.

Filipinos like me, seemed to have a built-in sensors -installed, encoded and encrypted in our DNA. Sensors which recognize this kind of promotion. Our minds process and qualify ‘hypes”, as something to be acted upon immediately.

Thus, bringing myself down to memory lane,
years ago, one day, I told my supervisor that I was not going to serve overtime.
I had an important matter to attend to, something in the breadth of life and death, I even added.

Only later on, she found me, in a queue,
in front of an american doughnut cafe;
it was on its first day of opening here in Manila.

I was intensely watching from a store window, the life and death of freshly baked doughnuts as they were being gobbled up by customers.

There could be three types of product campaign which have hype effect, made and cut to precision for the Filipino mentality or culture.

1. WORD-OF-MOUTH

If advertising has WORD-OF-MOUTH to fuel a hype, the Filipino lingo,
has something called, ” CHIZMIS. “

It may not necessarily be hard-core gossip,
but small talks and chit chats that transform later on, into full-blown gossip.

An average Filipino day starts by engaging small talks with any one, an officemate, a househelp, or a customer. It may be personally or over the phone.

There should be nothing wrong with that, for it just showcases the easy-going trait of Filipinos.

But when the small talk with anyone, takes another predicate as in,
” small talk about someone. ”
then “ Chizmis “, is taking place, and fast.

In my old office our average morning are moments spent,
when a few of us, would all be huddled up in one person’s cubicle.

With me of course, having spearheaded the narratives.

( something from before that I most definitely am not proud of )

Then our Boss would pass us by and he of course had to disperse us like pigeons.

( nice fellow that man. He would just say, ” C’mon everyone, end with the chit-chat. I didn’t pay you for that. “)

Then the Chizmis on whoever and whatever the topic of the day was, got to be passed around like flu virus.

CHIZMIS adheres to a type of Hype generating ad campaign which is
” The Word Of Mouth ” .

Thus perhaps, when the office talked about this yummy empanada or delicious pastry that tasted so heavenly,
the information quickly gets passed on from one person to another,
till this person arrives in front of the doughnut shop and finds out for himself if Al Capone really rocks?

THEREFORE, as you see the VERY long queue on JCo Donuts,
let us agree to disagree in calling those people, including myself,

” Mga Nakapilang Chizmosa o Usisera
sa labas ng J Co Donuts sa Sm MOA.” 🙂

2. EXTREME EXAGGERATION TECHNIQUE

overkill in ad campaigns are taken literally by many in this country, like myself, who are great fanatics of the overrated and the improbable.

We are fanatics of teleseryes. ( myself included )

Of the totally aping-api or someone overwhelmingly maltreated then suddenly rose from her situation, through an incredibly exaggerated
course.

Not only are the portrayal of characters sometimes unduly magnified,
but even dialogues are delivered in an unrealistically husky voice,

” alikabok sa himpapawid, maliit man, nakakapuwing din.”

While after which, the action hero pulled his gun and defeated all his
forty or so adversaries, while he remained unscathed.

Some movies would have villains that refuse to die, even if a front-loader would run over them, twice.

Even the Filipino language itself is not spared of exaggeration.

A notably ample number of words in the roster of Filipino morphemes,
repeat itself, in an excessive form such as :

tuwang-tuwa,
maligayang-maligaya,
malaking-malaki ,

as if one word alone, does not suffice to describe the state of being.

I don’t think english grammar permits happy-happy to very happy.

( and in fact the nickname of my country’s president happens to be a double assertion. )

Was it not here in the Philippines,
that an exaggerated and misleading broadcast,
made television audience leave their homes
and flock to a certain venue
to watch a television show, live?
While later on, some of them were trampled over, after a disastrous stampede that erupted then after?

” Pagpapakalabis ” or exaggeration,
most likely was the magnetic attraction which lured my husband and I’s genetic
make up,
to try an american pancake diner, that recently opened here in Manila.

And as the hypnosis came to an end ,
my husband and I found ourselves staring at our plates full of diner pancakes that were
smiling back at us,
as if saying in agreement,
” Yep, were selling like hot cakes,
man.” ,
while the viscid marmalade said , “ hands on the air, this is a stick up! ”

We’ve been had.

Au revoir, for ” a fool and his money are easily parted.”

3. THE CELEBRITY FACTOR

On ” how our local celebrities ( or artistas ) fared “,
in the recent senatorial election, more or less,
gives one an idea, of the level and the intensity of celebrity idolatry in this country.

In the Philippines,
” you just do not mess with an actor, for he could be senator or president someday.”

So when a group of celebrity cliques composed of youthful, stylish and trendy,
” artistas “,
with one of them having three million followers on twir’r,
posted this particular ice cream,
#magnum hashtags came to be.

And the Filipino consumer was ” it “ in the game of advertising tag.

( Tom Selleck is already a thing of the past, all the more was it elevated to fossil status, when an ice cream took the Magnum from Magnum P.I. )

No celebrity campaign has effective success rate, as that in Philippine setting.

And my greatest fear, is in fact having to face the day when
the three stars in the Philippine Flag
would be super imposed with the faces of the three big stars in my country :
Kris Aquino, Erap Estrada
and Fernando Poe Jr. ( deceased)

THE PERFECT PITCH, PITCH PERFECT

But that is just the psyche of most Filipinos:

And it is of course because of those traits and vulnerabilities that we become target markets by many companies, with their ad campaigns and their perfect pitch for a product:

We will queue for it.
We will spread the word around.
We sometimes even feel compelled to exaggerate about its quality.

And those traits are which makes us, an indiscriminate market, -another best thing about pitching products to our race.
( except when it comes to talent shows and concerts, the Filipino crowd knows good entertainment from mediocre.)

But this just how I see many of us Filipinos.

We love artistas.
We love exagg.
We love chizmis.

All because we are fun-loving people who just love entertainment and gossip.

HOWEVER though,
even if we are easy to pitch products to
we have a certain trait called.
” masawain. ”

We get fed up easily.

Therefore as the novelty of the product/service would wear off, we search for something new.

We are easy to pitch products to,
but I could not say the same for sustainable market.

So bring on the PANCAKES, DOUGHNUTS AND ICE CREAM.