Ad Campaigns
upGrad’s new campaign brings back the donkey in a new ‘kick-ass’ avatar
MUMBAI: After the success of its #DontLickAssKickAss campaign last year featuring a donkey, edtech platform upGrad has come out with another campaign which sees the animal in a fresh avatar. The second leg of the 'Sirf Naam ki Nahi, Kaam Ki Degree' campaign sees the donkey as an animated, feisty fortune-teller.
Conceptualised by The Womb, the film reminds working professionals how the right specialisation can lead to one getting salary increments, as high as 50 per cent.
Previously in 2020 the ed-tech firm, via its campaign, had offered an alternative to licking ass in order to progress in one’s career- It told one to get a specialised degree from its many offerings that would make one’s boss take notice of your skillset. In its new ad film, it takes the 'Sirf Naam Ki Nahin, Kaam Ki Degree’ messaging further, using the fortune-teller donkey. The animal predicts the person’s success and bright future after he has acquired a specialisation certificate from upGrad saying, “Specialisation hain right, toh future hoga bright (If the specialisation’s right, the future is bright).”
The Womb founding partner Navin Talreja said, “With the success of #KaamKiDegree we had to find a message that would showcase the value of upGrad specialisations to the fence sitters. Given the success of the donkey as a device we just felt what could be better than getting our donkey deliver this wisdom, albeit in its own feisty manner. Embarking on this journey with Varmdea was reassuring as he is awesome with performances. A charmingly intricate set up, brilliant animation, and the perfect soundtrack have all come together to bring this spectacularly to life."
upGrad chief executive officer Arjun Mohan said, “The campaign is a wake-up call for the youth and working professionals to invest in real value-adding, outcome-oriented education that can result in employability and career progression. We received an overwhelming response in our first leg, as the Donkey, quite literally became a talk of the town."
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
