Adgully FORUMS | How smart CMOs are tackling the smart user...!

Digital is now the king of all. It has seen a meteoric rise to become one of the most powerful ways of modern day communication. With Digital being disruptive and going beyond the realms of just Social Media, there is a dynamic insistence for brands to engage users across platforms. Brands extend their reach into new networks and consumers to earn recognition and reward for their online status. These new paradigms also present a number of unforeseen challenges as businesses and digital consumers alike come to grips with what influence is and isn’t.

Over the years, the user has evolved along with the various platforms. It is essential to create an influential enough digital experience of the brand for the smart users across the medium.

Keeping in mind this notion, we at Adgully for the very first time conducted Adgully Forums, a Panel discussion with one of the best veterans in the industry. While the evening was fully sunk into the discussion with the panelists, there was an interesting topic that the media house came up with “New Media and the Rise of the Smart user.”

There were eminent names on the panel viz a viz, Sanjay Tripathy, Deepali Naair, Ratish Nair, Sandip Tarkas, Jayraj Jadhav, Pradeep Dwivedi, Adarsh Pete, Tanmay Mohanty and Ramesh Chembath. The session was moderated by the Managing Director of Performics, Mr. Tanmay Mohanty.

Yesterday was an evening which saw the smart CMO's. It was indeed a great brainstorming session and there was a great healthly discussion with the audience.

Here’s a look at what each of one them had to say about the event.

Sanjay Tripathy, Senior Executive Vice President, Marketing, Product, Digital and E-Commerce, and member of the Executive management Committee at HDFC Life said, “New media is doing what television did to radio; killing the competition. Customers now want to not only be informed about your product or service, but they also want to swap ideas, post updates and participate in activities and events with fellow customers which is transforming online user behaviour.”

Deepali Naair, Chief Marketing Officer, Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India Limited said, “Brands have always succeeded when they are present where their consumer is. With Indian consumers getting internet savvy, it becomes imperative for brands to either engage with them across different digital platforms or be present as an information provider on themselves or transact with them across digital platforms depending on the maturity of the category that the brand is in.”

Sandip Tarkas, President (Customer Strategy), Future Group & CEO - Bengal Warriors said, “What we have learned over the last two decades is that change is NOT constant, it is in fact accelerating. And communications and media is where the page change is scorching. Evolution off the new media consumer is perhaps the most fascinating story of our times.”

Jayraj Jadhav, Head e Business & Digital Marketing, Tata AIG said, “In this era of technology led media, Consumers have emerge as superheroes and if Marketers want to be part of their world they have not option than being smarter users” 

Pradeep Dwivedi, Chief Corporate Sales and marketing officer, Dainik Bhaskar Group said, “The ubiquitous proliferation of smartphones is really turning the tide for media industry with readers/ viewers i.e. consumers being in ultimate control of the content salience. It takes more than a smart 'social media strategy' to connect with this audience and hence only the innovators shall survive and flourish in this age of the 'smart users'.”

Ratish Nair, co-founder AdMagnet, a full-service advertising network said, “The one thing that has given rise to the smart user is the "quick" availability of new information and the ability to act on it.”

Adarsh Pete, Marketing Manager, Digital Marketing, Adobe,India said, “Unless Marketers look at Digital in the overall scheme of things, smart customers are farfetched.”

Tanmay Mohanty, MD, Performics said, “Data shows us that rather than digital merely cannibalizing traditional media, it has helped overall market, for example traditional linear broadcast television, whose audience in many markets is actually still growing in parallel with the explosion of usage of Premium VOD like Hulu and Netflix.”

Lastly, Ramesh Chembath, Associate V.P. & Head - Strategic Marketing, Retail Operations & Microwave Oven Godrej Appliances said, “Today consumer sits at the center of the business. He controls the fortune of the organizations through his thoughts and deeds. While most of us are still figuring out how to use digital data or big data, our customers are already making best of it to create value for him and the world seamlessly.”

Indeed there was an exchange of lot of ideas and information in this panel discussion. The views put forth were quite informative and enlightening. Adgully looks forward to doing many more events in the coming year. Look out for this space for exciting events from our end.

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