HT Media webinar on 'What makes a story great': The Power of data-driven narratives

Just as food nourishes the body, content feeds the mind, offering a unique lens through which we perceive the world and its culture. Content is also like food for the brain. It's the window to culture and a great way to understand the world around us. 

From ancient oral traditions to modern novels, films, and digital media, storytelling serves as a powerful means of conveying ideas, emotions, and experiences from one person to another. 

At the HT Media Webinar, Prachi Narayan of Havas Play, Dheeraj Kummar of Motivator, Groupm, Hari Krishnan of Publicis Groupe, and Averill Sequeira from Essence Mediacom India got into an engaging conversation with Saurabh Sharma of HT Brand Studio to unveil the secrets behind exceptional storytelling and to also demonstrate how integrating data into storytelling can elevate that whole art of storytelling.  

Sharma, who curates compelling stories for all brands that come to HT Media for solutions, set the foundation of the discussion by sharing that the internet has changed what it means to tell a great story. “In a world where every click, every swipe, every interaction leaves behind a trail of data, it has created a new breed of storytellers. They are the ones behind the scenes, creating and connecting brands to captivate audiences like never before.”

Krishnan stressed the fact that data-driven narratives have evolved over time and how this evolution has impacted consumer engagement strategies that brands have deployed to connect with consumers.

He said, “30-40 years ago, any piece of content was based on data, as in the brief that was given was data. But since we've added so many layers to the word data, everybody seems to think that what used to happen in the past was just magic without any input.”

This word ‘data’ is getting more traction because the complexion of data or the quality of data or the dimensions and granularity of data has become so much more refined. We are now using this word in a sense that it is supposed to trigger a lot more performance, a lot more efficiency, and a lot more precision, Krishnan believes.

Sequeira opines that blending creativity and tech has revolutionised how the audience interprets the story, how they make it their own. Technology has really helped democratise creativity and bring in more participation. And that, according to the executive, has been the power of some of the campaigns that they have done.

“There are two ways of doing technology. One is to grab eyeballs. Another is to be the first at doing something,” she added. 

One of her first brushes with creativity and technology was when they had Coke enter the first Metaverse wedding; it was all serendipity for Sequeira. This was back in 2021 and being able to be the welcome drink in the Metaverse was a big initiative for them.

Kummar as a creative director, gets access to a lot of data and insights but how does he use them to enhance his further storytelling process?

He lives by the ideology of ‘Thoda data, thoda dil’ because emotion and the voice of the consumer is at the heart of any brand communication.  It has to be the right mix of things because one has to take intuition, which is Thoda Dil and take data, which is Thoda Data to do a mix of it and deliver the communication.

Narayan noted, “Dove Real Beauty campaign is one that stays very high on my list always. Dove has really stayed true to its core brand values of body positivity and boosting self-confidence. They've also pushed the creative boundaries with thought-provoking creatives by using real authentic people in their campaigns. Hence, being true to the brand essence, embracing the same and yet challenging the existing category codes would be actually one of the ways of striking this balance.”

Speaking of trends that brands should be more aware of, she shared, “Interactive storytelling is one of the biggest trends right now and brands must explore it. The second thing being AR and VR that can provide a very immersive storytelling experience.”

Companies like OnePlus are using Blip AR for launching phones. Apple Vision Pro all of us are huge fans of and it's going to be a game changer in mixed reality, according to her.

User generated content is going to be massive again. While it helps in fostering a sense of community and authenticity, it also builds in trust and credibility. 

Finally, short format video content is evolving massively. Attention span is reducing and that's been proven by the success of platforms like TikTok and Instagram. While these short videos are easily shareable, they also have increased engagement.

Now the challenge is when it comes to real spending money behind a campaign, that's when brands and marketers shy from loosening purse strings. They will all ask, where's the ROI. 

Kummar highlighted.”The whole idea of bringing ROI to a campaign, is not seen only from the lens of what creative we are building, it is also seen from the lens of where we are deploying it, to whom we are engaging it, what kind of manifesting that we are giving to the idea. So it's a great idea, which is hard, but it has to be converted into some sort of business objective also.”

This made Sharma bring up a point where targeting and sharp targeting to relevant folks is extremely important nowadays. HT Media, as a solution, deployed something which is called a CDP, a content data platform.

Sharma further explained, “Leveraging the power of first-party data that resides on HT Media of all the users that come to us, we move from more probabilistic to more deterministic signals of identifying who the individual is. We sharpshoot first-party data, then further boost it with second-party data.”

Next challenge is, India is a land of culture but this culture is also evolving on a daily basis. So how do storytellers recommend to brand owners, marketers especially, that their stories remain relevant?

Sequeira suggests that she doesn't claim to say there is a formula here but, there are themes of the greater good. There are themes of the underdog story. There is the hero's  journey. “You know, there are all of these themes which are universal and which continue to be so. So even as culture evolves, it can remain relevant. Maybe the way I look at it today, it can be a woman hero or somebody from another underprivileged class of society.”

As an advice to brands to stay relevant, she suggested they find a way to still hold on to those themes and not let them go. 

Addressing the challenge of creating and implementing interactive content, Krishnan shared how they ensure that the UX is seamless and engaging across different platforms.

He said, “Interaction itself needs to be first looked at as to whether you want the consumer to interact or whether you just want him or her to experience the magical stuff that has been offered or served.When we are producing interactive AI art at scale, we also only skim the surface of it and think we have served it to millions of people. But the experience that I've served is actually at a very base level.”

We really are still in the woods when it comes to utilising it and juicing AI and the personalisation to the fullest, according to him. 

Stressing on the challenges that Krishnan foresees brands will face, specifically when it comes to data-driven storytelling, he said, “Format repetition is the major one. One thing happens and everyone wants to do it, then it follows and the freshness, the surprise element of that format itself, loses the sheen.”

Secondly, there are a whole lot of conversations around ethics and credibility of people which get impacted. Hence,  there are a lot of authenticity, transparency issues, which one needs to take care of. 

The whole aspect of cultural sensitivity and localisation is third since there are lots of nuances. So when, when high tech, data driven signals are used to create stuff, there is also a lot that gets generalised. Bandwidth is still an issue in many other places. So the experiences that have to be delivered will not be possible everywhere, it will only be delivered to the top 2-3% of consumers.

“Last but not the least, publicity is a challenge, where the adoption of technologies, even when we make it free, available to people leaves a lot to be desired. People have to get the time to embrace it, adopt it, and learn up-skill. There's a skill gap,” he concluded.

By the end of the discussion, Sharma summarised the insights shared by the panelists. Most crucial one being, the intricacies of crafting compelling stories, data or without data, is very important. The need to balance creativity and tech to create campaigns that really cut ground is needed now more than ever. 

There is also a need to balance and blend tech in those traditional ways of engaging people in tier two and three cities. Consumer trust needs to be balanced too with authentic storytelling. That's where people, brands and platforms come into play.