ISA media charter to heavily impact digital agency operations

It was a busy day at media and digital agencies, a day filled with leadership huddles, conferences, and screened calls, as they grappled with a “comprehensive initiative that aims to safeguard the interests of brands by promoting fair and transparent practices in the advertising industry”.

The newly formulated “ISA Media Charter” was released by the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA) on Wednesday and addresses six key areas wherein both traditional media and digital agencies are required to revise their business practices. Given the growing digitization across spheres, many of the newly announced measures particularly impact digital agencies.

Sunil Kataria, Chairman of ISA and CEO-Lifestyle Business, Raymond Ltd., in a statement, said, “As India's advertising media spending continues to surge, it becomes essential to have a clear and equitable framework that protects the interests of brands and fosters healthy relationships between advertisers and media agencies. The ISA Media Charter encompasses six crucial areas that are of paramount concern to advertisers - this emphasizes our commitment to a transparent and consumer-centric media ecosystem.”

As per the document, the ISA Media Charter’s key focus areas include:

1. ISA Model Media Agency Agreement: To establish detailed and precise agreements between advertisers and media agencies, particularly considering the substantial media flow and the complexities of the media ecosystem, The Model Media Agency Agreement template, was launched. The template for the Model Media Agreement serves as an initial framework to facilitate personalized agreements tailored to individual media agencies.
2. Zero Tolerance to Ad-Fraud: To create a vigilant environment in the industry where ad fraud is unequivocally condemned and stringent measures are adopted to eliminate fraudulent practices.
3. Brand Safety: To ensure brands are showcased in secure environments, free from content that may harm their reputation.
4. Viewability: To address the challenges posed by digital advancements and to ensure ads are genuinely viewable by the target audience.
5. Common Minimum Standard for First-Party Data: To establish guidelines for the responsible collection and usage of consumer data, prioritizing privacy and consumer protection.
6. Cross-Screen Measurement: To develop unified measurement standards for both TV and digital platforms, enhancing advertisers' ability to gauge their campaigns' success across various media channels.

While these are areas that definitely need attention, the seeming shifting of onus squarely onto agencies, with accompanying punitive penalties isn’t exactly appreciated, with the language of the charter being said to favour advertisers to the detriment of the agencies that cater to them.

While the conversation around data privacy and protection as well as data ownership has been only increasing, the actual digital architecture is struggling to keep up with fast-moving data collection practices. And while the global digital ecosystem has been promising a ‘cookieless future’ for some time now, it’s a future that is being continuously postponed, a fact that has blurred the lines of acceptable and capable data collection, storage and use.

A senior digital agency executive, speaking off the record, said that recalibrating for these practices could be a speed bump for the swift digital transformation that the advertising ecosystem is undergoing and could impede further growth, especially of new, smaller players. 

Conversely, the argument could be made that since large agencies have more skin in the game, they are liable to take on the burden of change that the charter proposes.

While some digital agencies refused to comment either on or off the record, others requested a little more time so as to be able to address the issues underlined by the charter in their totality and in proper context. Watch this space for more.