'India among the most heterogeneous markets in terms of delivering brand message'

At the exchange4media Independent Digital Agency Connect Conference (iDAC) 2023, leaders across the industry deliberated on the issues concerning digital marketing, brands, and agencies. Following the standalone sessions and panel discussions, the panellists also discussed how brands are strengthening technology and digital marketing in proliferating their presence in regional markets. During the conversation, speakers also spoke about how decentralisation of communication helps brands in building a regional connection with the audience.  

The panellists were: Jaison Thomas, Co-Founder & CMO, Blusteak Media, Kuntal Chatterjee, CEO, Digital Googly; Pramod Maloo, Founder & CEO of Kreative Machinez; Sayak Mukherjee, Founder & Director, Brandwizz, and Nimesh Shah, Founder, Windchimes Communications. The session was chaired by Kanchan Srivastava, Senior Assistant Editor, exchange4media Group.  

Before opening the discussion, Srivastava pointed out how the digital landscape of the country has undergone a significant change in terms of audience, content, and consumption pattern, which is prominently influencing the micro and macro brands across the boundaries in catering to the niche-based audience in tier cities.  

Emphasising how national and regional brands chart their marketing rule book in significantly advancing their market presence across India, Mukherjee, said, “The national brands use the 360-degree approach as compared to regional brands in taking their marketing campaigns to the different media platforms. Moreover, the regional brands due to their limited market presence subscribe to specific media platforms to convey the brand message only to the targeted audience. The linguistic and cultural diversification within India helps regional brands in building a strong presence and connects in the regional markets.” 

Drawing attention to how brands prioritise their ad spend keeping all micro and macro markets at the central stage, Maloo, said, “The ad spends are generally planned based on the understanding of the brand, segmentation and simplification of the audience catered to be and comprehending the category which is supposed to be marketed.  

Adding on, Shah said, “Before tapping into tier cities, the brand must be aware of the markets available for the consumers and accept & afford the market demands. Moreover, with an increased influence of targeted advertising and marketing, there has been a significant rise in nano influencers within tier cities. The village Sarpanch has now become an influencer who conveys the brand message to the local audience.”  

Further elaborating on the optimisation of ad cost considering diversity, cultural variations, demography and linguistic differences at the focal point, Chatterjee, said, “The adoption of the Internet in the tier cities help brands in bringing and executing marketing and advertising tactics in micro towns to optimise the overall ad cost and maximise the ROI.” 

Sayak added, “The ad budgets are comprehensively and strategically planned to target only regional audiences in a country where dialect gets changed at every kilometer.”  

Differentiating micro and macro brands considering their ad budgets, Thomas said, “The big brands invest higher ad budgets signing long-term contracts of twelve months with us as compared to small brands. However, both big and small brands have different expectations and priorities when they draft their ad budgets.” 

As for Maloo, Working with smaller brands is more satisfying as the ROI of the ad spends is visible not only on Excel sheets but also on clients' faces. “The small brands expect more ROI in a given period which compels us to work more effectively and efficiently with small brands.” Adding on, Mukherjee, said, “It takes time for smaller brands to put the trust in agencies to invest more on ad budgets initially but eventually they realise the importance of ROI and are willingly investing more on ads.”  

Taking the discussion forward and further categorising regional and national markets in terms of communication, Mukherjee said, “With the significant rise in the deep market penetration the communication has become more decentralised.” Adding on, Maloo, said, “Brands like CRED are planning to enhance their regional presence in the upcoming festival seasons using regional communication as a core marketing strategy.” 

Focusing on how the definition of creativity gets changed with every passing corner in India, Shah said, “India is one of the most heterogeneous markets in terms of delivering brand message to the diversified audience.”  

Highlighting how regional brands plan their digital ad spends, Chatterjee, said, “The brands and agencies both make sure that the expected ROI from digital ad spends is coming in terms of conversion.” Mukherjee said, “We need the right Chief Marketing Officer representing the brand in rural areas."  

In the concluding remarks, Thomas highlighted the fact that the rise in Internet usage across the country helps brands in strengthening their identity in regional markets. However, technological advancement is yet to be witnessed at a broader scale in developing economies like India. 

“The digital market penetration in India is still in the improving phase compared to developed economies like the USA.” Said Thomas.