Adgully FORUMS| New media and the rise of a smart user

When the CMOs came under one roof the forum took another route. With an aim to take digital thoughts and ideas all the more closer to its target audience, Adgully conducted The Adgully Forums on 11th December. The event took place in Mumbai’s Four Seasons hotel last Thursday with veterans like Sanjay Tripathy, Senior Executive Vice President, Marketing, Product, Digital and E-Commerce, and member of the Executive management Committee at HDFC Life; Deepali Naair, Chief Marketing Officer, Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India Limited; Sandip Tarkas, President (Customer Strategy), Future Group & CEO - Bengal Warrior.

Some more eminent names include: Jayraj Jhadhav, Head e Business & Digital Marketing, Tata AIG; Pradeep Dwivedi, Chief Corporate Sales and Marketing Officer, Dainik Bhaskar Group; Ratish Nair, Co-Founder Admagnet, a full-service advertising network; Adarsh Pete, Marketing Manager - Digital Marketing, Adobe, India;   Ramesh Chembath, Associate V.P. & Head - Strategic Marketing, Retail Operations, Godrej Appliances and   Tanmay Mohanty, MD, Performics; who also moderated the session.

New media has been in the air since long and the consumer is now known as the ‘new user’. The CMOs discussed various points such as are the brands ready today to engage the smart users who have tons of options to engage with which poses a challenge on brands & marketers on how do they engage them. Is social just enough to say ‘we are digital savvy’ or to top the chart of questions are we thinking enough in creating a seamless experience of the brand for its prospect who engage at various level.

Digital is disruptive and no vertical is left out from its ripples, your case is top of the media but unless you engage or create a digital extension of your brand as on demand, you are volatility is high. Mohanty who was moderating the session divided the topic into two parts one was how the consumers have changed and how has technology leveraged the consumption pattern.

Ratish nair said, “The consumption pattern has changed quite literally over the years. With internet penetration across the world the technology cycle has moved from corporate to home.  We see a faster adoption of technology today among the new generation. Number of app downloads have also gone up.”

Supporting Nair’s point, Sandip Tarkas said, “Today people have an easy access to internet and the internet penetration is being witnessed across all sectors whether FMCG or travel or insurance or any other.”

Deepali too opined to the fact that travel industry has also seen a good amount of penetration as far as internet is concerned. She said, “Internet has played a vital role in the travel industry too. The center of gravity has changed. The shift can be seen happening in two phases. Firstly, the self-availability of internet has enabled a lot of women and teenagers to take part in planning a vacation which gives rise to more number of consumers consuming our content.”

Giving a media perspective Pradeep Dwivedi said, “As like other sectors, Media has also witnessed a big fundamental change in terms of technology and internet. Though there has been a thought that print is dying but when there is a deep demand of content Print still plays a vital role being a cheap and ready medium for the consumers. Technology in media has supported content reach its target audience. With the advent of technology, the choices of content consumption to consumers have increased so the whole media industry is evolving whether print, TV or Radio.”

Adarsh Pete said, “The way things are moving in the digital media marketing one aspect that has evolved more is the usage of analytics. Adobe products are being used and are being preferred by the marketers at a substantial level.”

As we all know with the increase of internet has given rise to e-commerce in a big way so when posed a question to Ramesh Chembath about online versus offline, he said, “The e-commerce is changing the game in every category including appliances and is rapidly driving growth.”

Undoubtedly social media is the key focus for a lot of marketers but the point that was raised in the discussion was that mostly consumers use social media to give vent to their feelings and mostly give negative comments more than positive ones. Supporting the conversation, Sandip Tarkas said, “That is a true fact that on social media 90 percent of the feedback is negative whereas in-store 70 percent feedback is positive. Also it’s the fact of nature that we all forget positive comments soon and negative over powers our minds.” Pete said, “Digital has today become a part of every marketer’s strategy and every marketer has started using it quite extensively.”

Increasing user engagement on mobile Tabs and I Pads has leveraged the internet penetration at every point. With the help of new mediums users are using smartphone services like messenger, WhatsApp, We Chat, Instagram and other apps along with FB & Twitter. Having said that it is fair to say that over the years, new media has evolved the consumer to a larger extent hence it is becoming essential for the brands to optimize the growing new media and help the consumers evolve at a much faster rate. It is also essential to create an influential enough digital experience of the brand for the smart users across the medium.

The event was attended by whose-who of the industry including names like Rubeena Singh, Chief Operating Officer, Network 18 online; Adnan Chara, Vice President, Mitashi Edutainment; Nitish Tipnis, Nissan and a lot more. Though this was just a part of the discussion but a lot of ideas were exchanged at the Adgully Forums. 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. By Aanchal Kohli | Twitter: @aanchalkohli