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‘tis the season of…

reflections,

musings,

planning,

but above all, to pat ourselves on the back for having made through another year, for having come so far, and finally, for kicking back to take a break from all the running around.

I started this newsletter in the first half of the year, and it’s one of the biggest highlights of my year, one that I’m proud of.

I started it from the scratch and I’m happy to have got so many regular readers in the last few months. Writing this newsletter taught me the value of consistency like nothing else. It gave me a reliable routine, worked as an anchor during my tough times, and above all, gave me a platform to share my learnings, experiences and thoughts with you.

It’s been a fulfilling and enriching experience, and I can’t be grateful enough to you for tagging along with me on this journey.

Thank you 🙏❣️

As I take a stock of the new year, one thing I clearly realize is that it’s no mean feat to keep putting out well-researched, well-articulated, thought-provoking, quality content week after week.

While it’s deeply satisfying, it also takes a toll, not just on me as the one-person force behind it, but also on the growth of the newsletter.

As I get consumed in putting together the content every week while also managing my work and personal life, there is little time and energy left to focus on other aspects of growing the newsletter, like promotions, increasing readership, research, collaboration, audience engagement, experimentation and monetization opportunities.

Hence, as I plan for the next year, I’m also considering the ways for tackling that. One of the ways I can do it is by changing the frequency of the newsletter, perhaps from weekly to once in two weeks. And I’m seriously considering that at the moment.

I would love to get your thoughts on this, and any other ideas or suggestions you might wanna share with me about this.

Write back to me, I’ll read and respond to every single email, I promise.

With that, let’s get to the final edition of this year with a compilation of five biggest Marketing moments of 2023 as per my observations, in no particular order.

But first, let’s quickly look at the themes that clearly emerged in 2023 across the spectrum:

• Impact of women on economy and popular culture

• Paradoxically, toxic masculinity has new takers and doesn’t seem to be going anywhere

• Post-pandemic return of live experiences and events

• Power of stoking nostalgia and how Gen Z is lapping it up

• Breaking of language and cultural barriers across mediums

We’ll see these themes underlining the moments covered in this edition too:

Table of Contents

• Barbenheimer

• Swiftonomics & Return of Live Events

• ICC Cricket World Cup

• Macho Mania in Indian Cinema

• Moye Moye

What other moments could have made to this list according to you?

Write back and let me know.

For now, let’s dive in👇

Barbenheimer

Let’s start with the most obvious stroke of pop-culture genius in the year 2023 - Barbie - the movie.

It won’t be an exaggeration to say that Barbie essentially ruled the first half of the year, first with a brilliant and all-out marketing campaign, then with a masterfully artistic and hard-hitting cinema content, and finally by delivering this year’s biggest Hollywood blockbuster.

In the year 2023, the world turned pink, and we loved it.

Pink Money or Female Dollars came to the forefront in its full glory this year and arguably saved the economy. Women across the world related with Barbie and drove in hordes to spend their money to watch her fictional beautiful world.

Opening on the same weekend was another summer blockbuster - Oppenheimer.

Christopher Nolan’s movies always create a buzz before their release. But this time, the intrigue was at its peak. The viewers were polarized in how they liked the movie.

Everyone initially thought that Barbie makers were being either audacious or plain foolish by pitching this female-led and female-directed “girly” movie against the might of a Christopher Nolan biopic drama.

The clash of Barbie and Oppenheimer stoked the imagination of people and gave birth to the double feature trend of Barbenheimer, giving both the movies a massive organic hype-boost led by fans.

And both movies benefitted from this immensely, with Barbie emerging as a clear winner.

Now that’s how you resonate with your audience and make it a win for everyone.

Swiftonomics & Return of Live Events

Talking about the power of “female dollar” on full display in 2023, leads me to perhaps the biggest pop-culture global phenomenon and Time’s person of the year - Taylor Swift.

I’ve already written in detail about Swiftonomics in the previous edition which, by the way, has been the most successful edition so far. Looks like whatever Taylor Swift touches this year turns into pure gold, indeed.

This year, we also saw the return of live events across all spheres. So the success of Swift’s Eras Tour was not a standalone one and led us towards more of a year-long trend of sorts.

In the post pandemic world, people drove to live events hungrily. If 2022 was the year of revenge travel, probably 2023 was the year of revenge live-gigs.

Beyonce’s Renaissance tour, Bruce Springsteen’s long-running tour, sporting events, almost every live event saw packed houses and a lot of fervor.

This phenomenon also fueled the FOMO to another level.

When people couldn’t attend major live events like the Eras Tour and the Renaissance Tour, they went to cinemas and lapped up their Concert Movies.

Both concert movies have seen blockbuster success this year in cinemas, transcending mediums and bringing the event movies back in vogue.

ICC Cricket World Cup

ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 was hosted in India, with the home team being a clear favorite and ruling the tournament like champions, undefeated till the final match.

The shocking loss in the finals and the fact that we didn’t lift the trophy in the end, doesn’t take away anything from the mania the event created amongst fans.

The tournament was a grand success by all measures. The biggest of the stadiums in the world were jam packed for weeks (though mostly when the home team played).

The TV and online streaming viewership crashed all previous viewing records scaling new heights. Brand endorsement deals were through the roof.

All in all, for those six weeks and 47 matches, Cricket-mania ruled the limelight, and popular media touching the lives of millions of people, and creating the kind of advertising fervor that doesn’t come by often.

Macho Mania in Indian Cinema

While the power of female dollars was evident in most spheres, Indian Cinema saw an interestingly opposite trend - the spectacular rise of ultra Macho Man.

Indian film industry reportedly produces the highest number of movies in the world every year. It comprises of many regional language industries while Hindi Film Industry aka Bollywood leads the pack as the biggest one.

However, last 2-3 years saw the Hindi film industry going downhill, with controversies and an all-over box office failure. While the Hindi film industry struggled, some other regional films scored big national and even global successes on box office breaking the language and cultural barrier.

Thus came the times of making films with “national appeal”, a mixed cast and crew from different industries, simultaneous shoots and releasing in multiple languages. Hindi film industry tried to adopt the formula that was working for regional cinema and found immense success in 2023.

Unmistakably, all of these movies, with only some minor exceptions, are helmed by the ultra-macho, mostly toxic superhero-isque male characters, and are out and out high-octane action packed emotional dramas.

The trend was so strong that even the likes of Shahrukh Khan, popularly referred to as “the king of romance”, saw mind-blowing success after years of lull with movies made largely on similar formula, and transforming himself into a trailblazing action hero of the year with multiple record-shattering blockbusters.

Moye Moye

If there was one social media viral trend that we have to include in this list, this is the one. If you used social media in 2023 in any form, you couldn’t have escaped the grip of Moye Moye.

Everything became Moye Moye in the year 2023.

The misheard and mispronounced lyrics of a Serbian song by singer-songwriter Teya Dora caught of the fancy of social media, and like how.

The viral trend started its journey on TikTok, where users, perhaps unwittingly, incorporated snippets of a Serbian song “Dzanum.” The misheard lyrics of the song as “Moye Moye” quickly spread like wildfire across social media platforms, starting from TikTok to moving on to Instagram reels, Facebook videos, YouTube shorts and everything else in between.

The trend soon gave birth to many viral memes and the use of the term “Moye Moye” as a verb to describe unfortunate yet funny situations. It’s showing no signs of slowing down and can still be seen being used in a lot of social media content across platforms.

This trend also underlines the breaking of language barriers in popular culture which is a growing theme that can be seen across content formats. It would be interesting to see how it shapes trends in the coming year.

P.S.> The correct term is “Moye More”.

Goodbye 2023, Hello 2024

As we reflect on our personal journeys through the year gone by, I want to take this opportunity to once again express my deep gratitude for joining me here and reading my writings through the year.

For me, starting this newsletter is one of the biggest highlights of my year, one that I’m taking proudly into the new year, hoping to scale it to even bigger highs.

With that, it’s a wrap on this very fulfilling and eventful year. Hope you all have a great time ringing in the new year with your loved ones.

Wishing a very happy new year to you.

Stay tuned for more Aha! in the new year.

What topics would you want to see here?

Hit reply (if you’re reading it in email) or leave a comment (if you’re reading it on the web) and tell me what topics, brands, or case studies you would want me to analyze, and I'll add them to my list of ideas. You’ll also get a shout-out.