Will Roadstar lead the way for OOH measurement?

The out-of-home (OOH) advertising industry’s ambitious Unified Audience Measurement Tool, Roadstar, is on the brink of its official launch. 

Developed by Mumbai-based software firm Relu AI in collaboration with the Indian Outdoor Advertisers Association (IOAA), Roadstar aims to standardize OOH media measurement, potentially boosting the sector’s share of advertising spend. The IOAA is striving to establish this tool as the industry's common currency expeditiously which would mark a significant achievement for Chairman Pawan Bansal and CEO Praveen Vadhera. 

Despite being one of the oldest forms of advertising, (and receiving annual ad spend worth ₹4,100 Crore) with an annual ad spend of ₹4,100 crore, the OOH sector still lacks a universally accepted measurement system. The industry is largely unorganized, with a significant portion of operators being unregistered and operating across urban and rural areas. While larger agencies have been using various measurement tools such as Move, Moving Walls, X-OOH, and IMPOT, developed by themselves or procured from abroad, these tools differ in methodology and metrics, lacking a common standard.

The absence of a universally accepted currency is believed to have hindered the sector’s growth compared to Television and Digital. Roadstar, a homegrown tool, is expected to address these issues and set a new benchmark for OOH measurement in India.

How Does Roadstar Work

 An IOAA official explains that Roadstar was developed with stakeholder consultation and covers over 800 markets across India, down to the taluka level. It tracks impressions and profiles of consumers exposed to more than 63,000 outdoor media properties including billboards, gantries, bus shelters, LED panels, and other OOH formats. The tool gathers data from over 35 million mobile users, mapping their movements across three million places of interest, and provides metrics such as unique reach, gross reach, frequency, and hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly audience reports.

Using GPS and location-based technologies, Roadstar enables advertisers to track consumer movement patterns, measure the impact on foot traffic and sales, and adjust campaigns for higher engagement and ROI. The tool also facilitates precise audience targeting, location-based site selection, and site cluster searches by distance, as well as client and competitor location mapping.

Dipankar Sanyal, CEO, Platinum Communications, said, “Roadstar provides a single source of data syndicated for the industry which brings more credibility to the data that is being shared with the clients.”

We try to find out how Roadstar differs from other existing tools in the market. Both Relu AI and IOAA officials expressed their inability to share this information. “Agencies don’t share their tools with us,” said Pawan Bansal, Chairman, IOAA. 

Future Challenges

Despite the IOAA's efforts and optimism, the goal of making Roadstar the standard currency for the outdoor industry remains elusive. The tool still requires approval from the Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI). In April, the IOAA presented Roadstar to AAAI’s technical committee, where it faced scrutiny over data privacy and other concerns raised by major agencies like GroupM and Rapport. IOAA claims that most of these issues have now been addressed.

The updated version of Roadstar is currently undergoing pilot tests at leading ad agencies such as GroupM, Madison, and Dentsu. While the agencies have expressed general satisfaction with the results, a few issues still need to be resolved, suggests Pawan Bansal, Chairman, IOAA (can be removed).

Even if the pilots are successful and AAAI gives the green light, Roadstar is bound to face further challenges. Not all agencies and media owners are aligned with the initiative. The IOAA represents only 60% of media owners and agencies, leaving many independent and smaller players unrepresented. Some of the stakeholders have raised concerns about Roadstar, citing a lack of endorsement from any industry body or research agency and claimed that they were not consulted during the tool’s development.

Vikas Nowal, Co-Founder & Country Head of Interspace Communications, commented, "I would love to understand the methodology, metrics, deliverables, periodicity of updates, and broader vision behind Roadstar to evaluate how it compares to the proprietary tools that established agencies like ours have already invested in. A deeper understanding would help us assess the potential for alignment with our existing metrics and ensure data privacy, which is paramount."

Saibal Gupta, Managing Partner and CEO of Xperia Group added, "We have developed our own high-tech measurement tool, X-OOH, and have been using it for more than a year. Other tools are also in use in the industry. Unless IOAA proposes something with a competitive edge over existing tools and is user-friendly, it will not gain wider acceptance in an industry with low entry barriers."

These voices suggest that a section of industry is not ready to adopt Roadstar anytime soon. Moreover, IOAA wants media agencies to work exclusively with association members. While the IOAA claims that this move is intended to prevent agencies from engaging with illicit media owners and to encourage broader adoption of the measurability software, it risks alienating smaller players who may see it as an attempt to strong-arm them into adopting the common currency.

Many agencies, which are already using some or other measurement tool, may not use Roadstar at all, says Atul Shrivastava, Executive Director and CEO Laqshya Media Group. “We are using our own tool-SHARP/ which got active in 2017 and got patented in 2022. There is no reason for us to invest in another tool,” he explains.

Shrivastava also points out, "It would have been better if MRUC and a research firm were involved in developing this tool. Their endorsement would have given the methodology the credibility needed to call it an industry-wide unified research.”

To complicate matters further, many agencies and media owners are reluctant to bear the cost of the software. Media owners argue that agencies, who will use the software more extensively, should cover the expenses. On the other hand, agencies contend that since the initiative was initiated by media owners, the responsibility for funding it should fall on them.

Finally, Roadstar also needs an endorsement from the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA), which is crucial for its broader adoption. However, the onboarding of advertisers is yet to begin.