Case study: how CRED used IPL and hoardings to become a household name

CRED, the credit card payments and rewards app, launched into a crowded fintech market in 2018. Two years later, the brand made an aggressive IPL play with television films and matching outdoor takeovers in Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi. The Rahul Dravid "Indiranagar ka gunda hoon main" spot became a cultural moment, and the hoardings that echoed it turned it into a shared joke on every commute.

The goal

Take a niche premium fintech product to a mass consumer audience quickly, and get high intent users to install the app during a specific window.

The approach on the road

Time the outdoor to IPL windows. Book unipoles and large formats in tech and startup hubs like Indiranagar in Bengaluru, plus premium arterial routes in Mumbai and Delhi. Keep the creative single frame and self referential, always leaning on the television joke people had just watched.

Evidence boundary

The public record includes the creative work and broad campaign coverage, but not an audited breakdown of outdoor spend, site delivery and app outcome. It would be misleading to credit a download or membership number to the hoardings alone. Use this as an example of synchronising outdoor with a live cultural moment, not as a performance case study.

What we can learn

Outdoor works hardest when it rides an event people are already watching. CRED did not use hoardings to introduce an idea. It used them to remind commuters of a joke they had seen the night before. That earned attention on the road with almost no extra creative effort.

Credits

Brand: CRED, Dreamplug Technologies. Creative partners: Tanmay Bhat and Early Man Film. Campaign performance figures are not attributed here because they are not independently audited for outdoor.