Nihar Shanti Amla’s Shanti Se Poocho: AI as a Companion

The ad in one paragraph

Nihar Shanti Amla’s new campaign, “Shanti Se Poocho,” introduces Shanti, an AI companion women can message on WhatsApp. The campaign is less about a new product and more about a new role for the brand: Shanti offers guidance, reassurance and perspective on topics ranging from education and entrepreneurship to hair care. The brand says the AI is trained on consumer psychographics and behavioural insights, which makes the advice feel more personal than a generic assistant. The promise is simple: ask Shanti.

The levers it pulls

The campaign works because it leans on three psychological shortcuts.

• Familiarity heuristic. The campaign places Shanti inside WhatsApp, a daily habit for many users. The less new learning a user has to do, the more likely they are to start. WhatsApp also carries the norm of casual chat, so asking Shanti feels like texting a friend, not filling a contact form.
• Anthropomorphism. The film gives the AI a name and a role—someone to ask, not something to operate. People attribute more trust and patience to named, human-like helpers; the interaction feels warmer and less technical.
• Trust transfer. Nihar Shanti Amla has decades of credibility in haircare. The campaign stretches that earned trust into everyday guidance. This is the riskiest lever: if the advice feels generic, it could weaken the core brand. When it works, the brand earns permission to join more life moments.

There is also a subtle framing move. The name “Shanti” carries a calm, reassuring ring, so the interaction begins with warmth rather than machine formality. That matters when women are being asked to share everyday dilemmas with a brand-owned interface. These levers work together: familiarity gets the first message sent, anthropomorphism keeps the tone open, and trust transfer gives the brand permission to advise.

What it does for the brand

The initiative moves Nihar Shanti Amla beyond the haircare shelf and into daily decision-making. Instead of appearing only at the point of purchase, the brand becomes a companion in the moments between purchases. That deepens affinity, builds habitual engagement, and gives Marico a high-frequency touchpoint in conversations a hair oil would never normally join.

Vikram Karwal, chief marketing officer—India, Marico, frames the move as reimagining the brand from a hair care solution into a trusted companion. The goal is not just problem-solving; it is to strengthen trust and bring the brand’s purpose to life. For a legacy hair-oil brand, this is less a product launch and more a repositioning exercise.

What to borrow for your next campaign

You don’t need an AI chatbot to use the same ideas.

• Meet people on a surface they already trust, even if it isn’t yours.
• Give the helper a name and a point of view, not just features.
• Stretch one proven brand equity into an adjacent daily moment.
• Design for repeated small questions; habit beats the big launch.

The larger lesson is to stop asking what your product does and start asking which daily friction your brand can remove.

Watch the original: Nihar Shanti Amla on YouTube

Source: Afaqs!