Why iconic characters like Shaktimaan and Bhide learnt to endorse products

For instance, Raju Rastogi’s family from3 Idiots was recently seen alerting us about low prices on Flipkart Minutes or Ratna Pathak, as Maya Sarabhai from Sarabhai vs. Sarabhai encouraged us to buy Korean beauty products from Myntra.

Saurabh Sharma, head of marketing at Ather Energy, ran one such campaign with actor Mandar Chandwadkar in November 2024 and March this year during the festival season. Sharma highlighted that Chandwadkar, known for his role as Atmaram Tukaram Bhide in Taarak Mehta ka Ooltah Chashmah, was a perfect fit to endorse their two-wheeler electric vehicles (EVs) as the character loved his scooter in the show.

“Unlike many social media influencers who continually adapt their content to suit their audience, actors known for iconic roles have developed their characters and the surrounding content in a more singular way over the years. Additionally, their relatability helps to strengthen the connection with their core audience,” Sharma said.

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“If your product and brand message align with their character arc, you can leverage this connection to create a successful collaborative campaign. The ads we produced with Chandwadkar were among his best-performing branded posts and also ranked as some of our best-performing digital ads,” Sharma said.

Marketers are willing to navigate hurdles to acquire intellectual property rights because they believe this can yield better returns on investment.

Roping in characters

“We approached the makers of Shaktimaan about 1.5 years ago, and it took a bit of convincing for them to grant us the rights to the character and the iconic song of the show to be used in our advertisement. The deal got formalised after almost three months of back and forth. This process was much longer and difficult than any of our other marketing pursuits,” said Shish Kharesiya, founder and chief executive officer of Baby and Mom Retail Pvt. Ltd, the holding company of Gadda Co., a mattress company.

“However, it was all worth it as this campaign performed better than all our other campaigns. Our click-through rates (CTR) are usually around 5.5%, but this ad saw a CTR of up to 7.5%. This is because the character, known as the first superhero of India and the protector of humanity, has more equity in endorsing our mattress protectors than the actor himself,” Kharesiya added. Click-through rate is a marketing metric that measures the percentage of people who click on a specific link after viewing it, relative to the total number of views of that link.

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Moreover, the executive said the show’s popularity among the ’90s and early 2000s kids aligned perfectly with the brand’s target age group between 25 and 40 years.

Iconic role rerun

When actors are approached to play their iconic roles in advertisements, they are very cognisant of the brand and image they have built over the years. “Over the past three decades, I have established two very strong characters of Bhishma Pitama in Mahabharat and Shaktimaan, and I am very vigilant about how I use and maintain them today. I don’t endorse any products as Bhishma Pitama to maintain the pristine image of that character and am very picky about brands I work with as Shaktimaan,” said Mukesh Khanna, the actor who played Shaktimaan in the 1997 Hindi television series.

“When I command a higher fee to endorse a product as Shaktimaan, marketers often try to negotiate with the argument that all I am doing is saying a few lines. However, they don’t realise that years of my work have gone into building that character, and I am not charging for those lines, but for the brand I have built and its power to influence the audience,” Khanna added.

From the show’s producers’ perspective, the same values of upholding the image of the character are the priority, even if the deal is monetarily lucrative. “We have an immensely popular IP, and brands see value in working with us as a part of their media campaigns. They appreciate the scale and size of the show’s community. It’s a win-win for both,” said Asit Modi, managing director of Neela Film Productions, and creator ofTaarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah.

“As the holders of the trademarks and copyrights for our show, all collaborations involving our characters must be approved by us. Even the actors who portray these characters cannot engage in collaborations without our consent,” Modi highlighted. “We are very selective about the collaborations we approve, as we have been on air for nearly two decades, and our viewers trust us. We only endorse family-friendly products and avoid partnerships with anything that doesn’t align with our brand values, such as substances or betting apps.”

Popular still

Despite the films and shows’ age, these characters remain relevant and popular to date.

“For Flipkart Minutes’ recent marketing campaign of farm fresh veggies @ ₹9, the iconic scene from 3 Idiots showcasing Mrs. Rastogi’s angst against rising prices provided a perfect platform for us to land the message,” said Pratik Shetty, senior director, Marketing and Media, Flipkart.

“The campaign has been received well and the engagement on social media has been beyond our expectations. I believe the key reason behind the success of this campaign was our ability to meaningfully leverage the underlying nostalgia and fandom for the film and situation,” Shetty added.

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Thanks to memes and pop culture references, these icons woo the GenZs too. This becomes all the more reason for marketers to loop them into digital ads to attract the social media generation.

“Memes have extended the half-life of characters like Shaktimaan and Jethalal.

Because memes aren’t just jokes, they are cultural capital. Gen Z, who may not have watched the original shows, have formed a bond with these characters thanks to the memes. In that sense, memes are the new TV show reruns.

When brands use these characters with strong meme momentum, they are speaking a lingo with high cultural fluency, they are activating a cultural icon, not just an influencer,” said Sumanto Chattopadhyay, an independent creative consultant.

“Ultimately, Jethalal sells better than Dilip Joshi; Shaktimaan commands more nostalgia than Mukesh Khanna. That’s the new equation of influence,” Chattopadhyay added.

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While this trend is gaining traction among brands, marketers suspect its shelf life may be limited. As traditional media’s influence wanes, it may become increasingly rare for new fictional characters to achieve the same iconic status as their predecessors.

“In the TV era, there were only a few shows and the popular characters of that time became iconic. Today, the viewers are spoilt for choice and it is hard for characters to stand out and establish a brand identity so this trend might die down in the future due to lack of strong character identities,” said Aditya Gurwara, co founder of influencer marketing agency Qoruz.