Social listening, a process through which companies and brands track social media conversations around specific phrases, brand names or hashtags to keep a tab on consumer trends or gauge consumer feedback, has been employed for a film promotional campaign by makers of "Phillauri".

Given that the storyline of the film revolves around a friendly spirit Shashi, played by Anushka Sharma, the marketing strategy was built on playing up the characteristic traits of the spirit -- she was invisible and she was omnipresent -- and drive social engagement around the film.

Shikha Kapur, Chief Marketing Officer, Fox Star Studios India, explained how while social listening tools have always been used by brands to monitor online chatter, the company has gone ahead and integrated it in the digital campaign.

"For 'Phillauri', we have created ideas that are experiential in nature and invoke participation from the target audience. We expect this digital campaign to garner organic traction and engagement with social media users. The campaign lends itself seamlessly to these social media conversations around weddings. We believe there is a potential to reach over 30 million social media users through this unique campaign," Kapur said.

Three months ago, the banner engaged the process to track weddings through popular hashtags such as #weddings and #shaadi, in line with the movie's plot. The plot of the film unfolds during the revelry around a Punjabi wedding and the movie's central character is called Shashi.

This helped the company gather data of over 10,000 social media users who have shared their wedding experiences by posting images or videos. After gathering this data, they have started the #ShashiWasThere campaign. As part of this, Anushka has started responding to these social media users by reposting an altered version of their pictures, in which the character Shashi has been photoshopped in their wedding pictures.

"Phillauri" is a co-production between Fox Star Studios and Anushka Sharma's Clean Slate Films and is slated to be released on March 24.